Language to Code to Science

In Carnie’s textbook, he teaches readers about syntax and ponders the use of language. I personally found the first chapter the most interesting. The reading made me think of the stunning resemblance between humans and machines. Machines take once incoherent human language and turn it into a language it understands. The is similar to the way Carnie explains that words on a page are just squiggles and a reader is able to perceive the squiggles as something comprehensible. Like in programming, there are syntactical rules one must follow. There are also certain “Universals of Language” used in programming: functions and often objects. Another similarity is the use of tree diagrams to break down what is happening in some programming languages. In language, tree diagrams are used to assess the parts of the sentence and analyze how different languages order parts of speech. The first three chapters made me wonder how hard it would be to write rules of language in a program. There are many suffixes meant for all the different parts of speech. On top of this, the parts of speech could change if a certain ending is added. The recursive quality of language makes it slightly harder to encode but is definitely possible with programming. However, gathering enough data is impossible with the infinite amount of possibilities within language. All of these problems with trying to make language into a computer program act as evidence to show it is impossible to “learn” Language. Perhaps one day a computer will be powerful enough.

Another thing I found interesting was Carnie’s comments on how linguistics is categorized. He says that linguistics is part of the sciences rather than part of the humanities. I realized how strange it is that we even have such a distinction. Because science is so loosely defined, it is difficult to polarize it with something else. There are methods to many humanities – there are reasons and certain techniques to learning about these different topics. If science is simply defined as having a ‘scientific method’ involved, then many things we may not think would be considered science would be considered science. Our everyday activities have methods: we observe the clock before we get up, we use our knowledge about what times we have gotten up in the past to make generalizations about what may happen if we get up now or later, we make a choice to either stay in or get up based on a hypothesis of what the consequences will be, then we test this hypothesis essentially every day. Eventually we have enough data to decide what time is best to get up in the morning based on what is planned for the day. Is getting out of bed in the morning a science? Some people use the phrase, “it’s a science” when talking about things that are not conventionally biological, chemical, natural, etc. Perhaps it is often sarcastic but what if we do not treat it as such?