Abstract It has been conjectured that all properties of language beyond recursion can be motivated by interface requirements. One component in this setup is the parser, which is thought to give rise to a preference for computational parsimony. I discuss a mathematical result on reference-set computation, an (allegedly) non-parsimonious piece of machinery, that challenges this assumption and suggests that syntax can sometimes “trick” the parser in order to escape its demands. If reference-set constraints are construed as so-called tree transducers, they do not increase the power of the syntactic machinery. This in turn entails that they can be expressed purely in terms of the Minimalist feature calculus regulating Merge and Move, so it cannot be ruled out that syntax employs reference-set constraints, whereas the parser operates on their less demanding equivalents. In order to demonstrate the viability of this approach for the kind of reference-set constraints found in the literature, I give an implementation of Merge-over-Move.

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Optimality Is Not a Race: Against a Performance-Based View of Reference-Set Computation

Fri 29 April 2011 | in Presentations |
| transderivationality | reference-set computation | constraints | syntax | semantics | transducers |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract Reference-set constraints (RCs; also known as transderivational constraints) differ from standard well-formedness conditions in that for every tree, they compute a set of output candidates called its reference set and pick from said set the optimal candidate(s) according to some economy …
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Lost in Translation: A Formal Model of Merge-over-Move and Its Implications for the Language Faculty

Thu 06 January 2011 | in Presentations |
| syntax | transderivationality | reference-set computation | constraints | tree transducers | Merge-over-Move |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract I demonstrate that Merge-over-Move (MOM), a transderivational constraint (TC) put forward in Chomsky (1995, 2000), can be modeled by linear tree transducers, i.e.\ machines that take a tree as input and traverse it from the leaves towards the root while at …
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Syntax, Semantics, Pragmatics: Where Do We Find Optimality?

Graf, Thomas

Files [pdf] [code]

@Misc{Graf10Goettingentalk,
  author    = {Graf, Thomas},
  title     = {Syntax, Semantics, Pragmatics: {W}here do we Find
          Optimality?},
  year      = {2010},
  note      = {Invited talk, December 15, Institut für Anglistik,
          Universität Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany}
}

Optimality Conditions Could Care Less About Optimality

Graf, Thomas

Files [pdf] [code]

@Misc{Graf10ZAStalk,
  author    = {Graf, Thomas},
  title     = {Optimality Conditions Could Care Less About Optimality},
  year      = {2010},
  note      = {Invited talk, December 10, Zentrum für Allgemeine
          Sprachwissenschaft (ZAS), Berlin, Germany}
}

Reference-Set Constraints as Linear Tree Transductions via Controlled Optimality Systems

Sat 07 August 2010 | in Papers |
| constraints | transderivationality | reference-set computation | optimality theory | transducers |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract Reference-set constraints are a special class of constraints used in Minimalist syntax. They extend the notion of well-formedness beyond the level of single trees: When presented with some phrase structure tree, they compute its set of competing output candidates and determine the …
read more
Reference-Set Constraints as Linear Tree Transductions via Controlled Optimality Systems

Sat 07 August 2010 | in Presentations |
| constraints | transderivationality | reference-set computation | optimality theory | transducers |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract Reference-set constraints are a special class of constraints used in Minimalist syntax. They extend the notion of well-formedness beyond the level of single trees: When presented with some phrase structure tree, they compute its set of competing output candidates and determine the …
read more
Concealed Reference-Set Computation or How Syntax Escapes the Parser’s Clutches

Sat 29 May 2010 | in Presentations |
| transderivationality | reference-set computation | constraints | syntax | optimality theory |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract A core assumption of the biolinguistic program is that all properties of language beyond recursion can be motivated by requirements imposed by other cognitive modules. One component in this setup is the parser, which is thought to give rise to a preference …
read more
Some Interdefinability Results for Syntactic Constraint Classes

Fri 01 January 2010 | in Papers |
| constraints | transderivationality | reference-set computation | model-theoretic syntax | multi-dimensional trees | optimality theory |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract Choosing as my vantage point the linguistically motivated Müller-Sternefeld hierarchy (Müller and Sternefeld 2000), which classifies constraints according to their locality properties, I investigate the interplay of various syntactic constraint classes on a formal level. For non-comparative constraints, I use Rogers’ (2003 …
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A Tree Transducer Model of Reference-Set Computation

Fri 01 January 2010 | in Papers |
| syntax | constraints | transderivationality | reference-set computation | optimality theory | Focus Economy | Merge-over-Move | Shortest Derivation Principle | tree transducers | MSO |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract Reference-set constraints are a special class of constraints used in Minimalist syntax. They extend the notion of well-formedness beyond the level of single trees: When presented with some phrase structure tree, they compute its set of competing output candidates and determine the …
read more
Locality in Flux —- Reducibility Results for Syntactic Constraints

Thu 27 August 2009 | in Presentations |
| constraints | locality | transderivationality | reference-set computation | multi-dimensional trees | model-theoretic syntax | optimality theory |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract Müller and Sternefeld (2000) propose a locality hierarchy of syntactic constraints such that {representational, derivational} < global < translocal < transderivational. We use formal methods to demonstrate that their hierarchy correctly assumes that higher constraint classes are more powerful, but we also show that for …
read more
Some Interdefinability Results for Syntactic Constraint Classes

Thu 20 August 2009 | in Presentations |
| constraints | transderivationality | reference-set computation | model-theoretic syntax | multi-dimensional trees | optimality theory |

Graf, Thomas

Abstract Choosing as my vantage point the linguistically motivated Müller-Sternefeld hierarchy (Müller and Sternefeld 2000), which classifies constraints according to their locality properties, I investigate the interplay of various syntactic constraint classes on a formal level. For non-comparative constraints, I use Rogers’ (2003 …
read more

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