Language Log

A matter that requires nuancing: Jinyi Kuang and Cristina Bicchieri, "Language matters: how normative expressions shape norm perception and affect norm compliance", Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 2024:

Abstract: Previous studies have used various normative expressions such as ‘should’, ‘appropriate’ and ‘approved’ interchangeably to communicate injunctions and social norms. However, little is known about whether people's interpretations of normative language differ and whether behavioural responses might vary across them. In two studies (total n = 2903), we find that compliance is sensitive to the types of normative expressions and how they are used. Specifically, people are more likely to comply when the message is framed as an injunction rather than as what most people consider good behaviour (social norm framing). Behaviour is influenced by the type of normative expression when the norm is weak (donation to charities), not so when the norm is strong (reciprocity). Content analysis of free responses reveals individual differences in the interpretation of social norm messages, and heterogeneous motives for compliance. Messages in the social norm framing condition are perceived to be vague and uninformative, undermining their effectiveness. These results suggest that careful choice of normative expressions is in order when using messages to elicit compliance, especially when the underlying norms are weak.

In two successive comments on different posts (here and here), Jarek Weckwerth asserts that this garden path post is "a timely follow-up" to the exuberant discussion on the parsing of a Classical Chinese / Literary Sinitic (CC/LS) book title that took place in this post and the plethora of readers' remarks that followed it.  This is an interesting proposition, and it makes me wonder if CC/LS is prone to this sort of ambiguity because of the inexplicitness of its grammar.

During the more than half a century that I have been studying and teaching CC/LS, it has always seemed to me that checking out different possible "garden paths" is a sine qua non for responsible reading of such texts.

…this one in a headline — Toby Helm, "Sadiq Khan: 'Free young people from Brexit work and travel ban", The Guardian 1/20/2024.

Kate Riga and Nicole Lafond, "Congress Boots The Government Funding Can Down The Road, Again", Talking Points Memo 1/18/2024:

Under pressure from an impending snowstorm (translation for non-D.C. weather babies: a predicted couple-inch sprinkling), both chambers of Congress Thursday passed a continuing resolution to keep the government funded until early March.

‘Stochastic Parrot’: A Name for AI That Sounds a Bit Less Intelligent

An ancient Greek word for guesswork fuels a term that suggests supersmart computer programs are just mimicking whatever they see

Ben Zimmer, WSJ, Word on the Street (January 18, 2024)

In his capacity as chair of the American Dialect Society's 2023 Word of the Year competition new words committee, our Language Log colleague Ben Zimmer oversaw the selection of candidates from the "special ad-hoc category related to one of the most buzzed-about stories of 2023: artificial intelligence."

Our new category included an array of AI heavy hitters. There was “ChatGPT,” the name for OpenAI’s chatbot, which is so successful it often gets used generically for any generative AI system. There was “LLM,” short for “large language model,” the machine-learning algorithm trained on mountains of text that powers AI programs. And there was “hallucination,” for AI-generated responses that are untethered from reality.

Masterful essay by the Music Director of Symphony Nova Scotia.

"Maestro, Maestra, or Holly?"

We asked our Music Director Holly Mathieson how she prefers to be referred to on the podium!

Her reply may surprise you — or not:

The earliest record we have of the Italian term Maestro in connection to music is from 1724 (maestro di cappella, which translates as Master of the Chapel, similar to the German Kapellmeister). By the end of that century, there is evidence of it being used more generally in Italy as a single word, referring to a master or great teacher of music, or a composer. Etymologically, it shares its roots with the Latin magister, the offshoots of which include the musical term Maestoso, which instructs us to play majestically or in a stately manner, as well as more common language descendants such as magisterial and magistrate, words which connect to ideas of qualified authority.

The current SMBC presents a new (and alarmingly persuasive) theory about the origins of consciousness, in order to explain why Large Language Models are not (yet) conscious:

A recent LinkedIn post by Liang Huang lists some of his recent achievements, experiences, and honors. This work is all connected with the project of creating better algorithms for predicting the secondary structure of macromolecules, initially by analogy to algorithms developed for efficient parsing. This all began more than 20 years ago, based on work by Aravind Joshi — one of the first papers was Yasuo Uemura et al., "Tree adjoining grammars for RNA structure prediction", Theoretical computer science, 1999.

I discussed the history starting with an IRCS workshop in 2000, and the situation as of a few years ago, in "The computational linguistics of COVID-19 vaccine design", 7/27/2020.

Today's xkcd:

One Man’s Mission to Revive an Indigenous Language in Argentina

This Language Was Long Believed Extinct. Then One Man Spoke Up. 

Blas Jaime has spent nearly two decades resurrecting Chaná, an Indigenous language in Argentina that he learned from his mother. Blas Omar Jaime has, in many ways, placed the Chaná Indigenous group back on the map.

NYT (1/13/24), by Natalie Alcoba; Photographs and Video by Sebastián López Brach

To revive a half-dead language is not an easy task.

As a boy, Blas Omar Jaime spent many afternoons learning about his ancestors. Over yerba mate and torta fritas, his mother, Ederlinda Miguelina Yelón, passed along the knowledge she had stored in Chaná, a throaty language spoken by barely moving the lips or tongue.

For those who are unfamiliar with Classical Chinese (CC) / Literary Sinitic (LS), what I am about to demonstrate in this post may be completely revelatory.  Many outsiders to CC / LS operate under the misapprehension that — because they are both written with hanzi  漢字 / 汉字 ("Chinese characters / sinoglyphs") — anyone who can read Modern Standard Mandarin (MSM) ought to be able to read CC / LS texts without too much difficulty.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

How did this subject come up?

On the last day of 2023, I made this post:  "The Miracle of Western Writing" (12/31/23).  In it, I referred to Xī rú ěrmù zī 西儒耳目資, a book written by the Jesuit missionary, Nicolas Trigault (1577-1628), and translated the title as Aid to the Eyes and Ears of Western Literati.  The first commenter, Philip Taylor, asked, "…is it really possible that Xī rú ěrmù zī (西儒耳目資) can mean 'Aid to the Eyes and Ears of Western Literati'? So much meaning packed into just five Hanzi/?"  To which I replied, "The 5 hanzi mean what the 5 capitalized English words indicate: Western Literati Ears Eyes Aid. That's basically how we read Classical Chinese / Literary Sinitic that is easy and straightforward."  Philip then noted that he had asked GT and ChatGPT, and both of them were stumped.  That's understandable, for CC / LS is a dead, classical language, completely different from the living, vernacular MSM that GT and ChatGPT are designed to render (cf. Sanskrit / Hindi and Latin / Italian [much less English]).

No sooner have we addressed "The politics of frozen garlic in Taiwan" (1/11/24) than we now must look at the implications of dried mango for the current election in that island nation.  Here we will not be studying the obscene usage (gàn) that "dry" (gān) often gets mixed up with.  For those who are interested in that topic, which Language Log has been following since 2006), check out the last two items in "Selected readings") below.

Today's mango excitement derives from a pun based on the expression "dried mango" (mángguǒ gān 芒果乾); it has nothing to do with "$%#@!" mango.  The near pun is for "wángguó gǎn 亡國感" ("sense of national subjugation"), where wáng 亡 means "perish; death; die", though in this phrase, "subjugation" has become the usual translation.  Of course, guó 國, means "nation; state", and note that the "K" of KMT (Kuomintang [Wade-Giles romanization of 國民黨] "Nationalist Party") or the "G" of GMD (Guómíndǎng [Pinyin romanization of the same name]) is that same word, guó 國 ("nation; state").

According to Toyin Falola, "No Gree for Anybody!", HeartOfArts 1/12/2024:

I am writing this piece from Lagos. “No Gree” is what you now hear at every moment, every corner. […]

No Gree for Anybody seems to be a personal avowal to not compromise or concede and to maintain unwavering determination against factors and people that could impede one’s aspirations or thwart the pursuit of one’s desires.