Roni Katzir
Biographic Data
| ID | 459376 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Roni Katzir |
| GIVEN NAMES | Roni |
| FAMILY NAME | Katzir |
| SIGNATURE | KATZIR R |
| AFFILIATIONS | Tel Aviv University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0241-1896 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 15 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 119 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 15 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2007 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Large language models as proxies for theories of human linguistic cognition
We consider the possible role of current large language models (LLMs) in the study of human linguistic cognition. We focus on the use of such models as proxies for theories of cognition that are relatively linguistically-neutral in their representations and learning but differ from current LLMs in key ways. We illustrate this potential use of LLMs as proxies for theories of cognition in the context of two kinds of questions: (a) whether the targe…
Communicative Stability and the Typology of Logical Operators
The typology of the logical vocabulary in natural language is highly skewed. In the domain of logical connectives, AND and OR are often lexicalized, lexicalizations of NOR are less common and tend to be structurally complex, and no other logical connective is ever lexicalized. Existing accounts fail to fully derive this major crosslinguistic pattern, and moreover resort to otherwise unwarranted assumptions. The goal of this article is to provide …
Strengthening, exhaustification, and rational inference
The literature in semantics and pragmatics provides extensive evidence for the strengthening of linguistic expressions, both in matrix positions and when embedded under various operators. We study the properties of such strengthening using a very simple setting. Specifically, we look at when the expression “crate with a banana” can be understood as a unique crate even though two different crates have a banana in them. By varying the scenarios in …
Large Language Models and theoretical linguistics
Some recent publications have made the suggestion that Large Language Models are not just successful engineering tools but also good theories of human linguistic cognition. This note reviews methodological and empirical reasons to reject this suggestion out of hand
Large Language Models and the Argument from the Poverty of the Stimulus
According to much of theoretical linguistics, a fair amount of our linguistic knowledge is innate. One of the best-known (and most contested) kinds of evidence for a large innate endowment is the argument from the poverty of the stimulus (APS). An APS obtains when human learners systematically make inductive leaps that are not warranted by the linguistic evidence. A weakness of the APS has been that it is very hard to assess what is warranted by …
On the roles of anaphoricity and questions in free focus
Notes on Iterated Rationality Models of Scalar Implicatures
In the linguistics literature, the derivation of scalar implicatures has often been handled in a relatively modular way, using computations that are sensitive to logical relations among alternatives such as entailment but are blind to other notions such as the probabilities that participants in a conversation might associate with these alternatives (or with related propositions). In recent years, a family of models that we refer to as iterated ra…
A conditional learnability argument for constraints on underlying representations
We explore the implications of a particular approach to learning for an architectural question in phonology. The learning approach follows the principle of Minimum Description Length (MDL), which has recently been used for learning in both constraint-based and rule-based phonology. The architectural question on which we focus is whether the grammar allows language-specific statements to be made at the level of the lexicon, as was assumed in early…
Linearizing Structures
The linearization of unboundedly many syntactic structures given a finite number of ordering instructions poses a compositionality problem similar to the semantic problem of determining the meanings of unboundedly many structures. We discuss this challenge and use various constructions such as Right-Node Raising that have been argued to involve multidominance-and that combine a remarkable productivity across and inside languages with a sensitivit…
On Evaluation Metrics in Optimality Theory
We develop an evaluation metric for Optimality Theory that allows a learner to induce a lexicon and a phonological grammar from unanalyzed surface forms. We wish to model aspects of knowledge such as the English-speaking child's knowledge that the aspiration of the first segment of khæt is predictable and the French-speaking child's knowledge that the final l of table 'table' is optional and can be deleted while that of parle 'speak' cannot. We s…
A note on presupposition accommodation
The proviso problem arises for theories of presupposition whose projection component fails to derive certain presuppositions that are contributed by their constituent sentences. Mismatch-based satisfaction theories respond to the difficulty by tying the emergence of the proviso problem to presupposition accommodation. Consequently, when the context entails the projected presupposition and no accommodation is required, mismatch-based satisfaction …
A note on contrast
On the characterization of alternatives
Morphosemantic Mismatches, Structural Economy, and Licensing
Agreement and concord involve mismatches between the position where a syntactic or semantic contribution is made and where it is expressed morphologically. Such mismatches are often taken to involve either movement or the spreading and realization of features. I examine a number of superficially different instances of this kind of mismatch that seem to resist an account based on realization and movement alone. I argue that the patterns involved s…
Structurally-defined alternatives
Structurally-defined alternatives
On the characterization of alternatives
On Evaluation Metrics in Optimality Theory
We develop an evaluation metric for Optimality Theory that allows a learner to induce a lexicon and a phonological grammar from unanalyzed surface forms. We wish to model aspects of knowledge such as the English-speaking child's knowledge that the aspiration of the first segment of khæt is predictable and the French-speaking child's knowledge that the final l of table 'table' is optional and can be deleted while that of parle 'speak' cannot. We s…
A note on contrast
Morphosemantic Mismatches, Structural Economy, and Licensing
Agreement and concord involve mismatches between the position where a syntactic or semantic contribution is made and where it is expressed morphologically. Such mismatches are often taken to involve either movement or the spreading and realization of features. I examine a number of superficially different instances of this kind of mismatch that seem to resist an account based on realization and movement alone. I argue that the patterns involved s…
Linearizing Structures
The linearization of unboundedly many syntactic structures given a finite number of ordering instructions poses a compositionality problem similar to the semantic problem of determining the meanings of unboundedly many structures. We discuss this challenge and use various constructions such as Right-Node Raising that have been argued to involve multidominance-and that combine a remarkable productivity across and inside languages with a sensitivit…
Communicative Stability and the Typology of Logical Operators
The typology of the logical vocabulary in natural language is highly skewed. In the domain of logical connectives, AND and OR are often lexicalized, lexicalizations of NOR are less common and tend to be structurally complex, and no other logical connective is ever lexicalized. Existing accounts fail to fully derive this major crosslinguistic pattern, and moreover resort to otherwise unwarranted assumptions. The goal of this article is to provide …
Structurally-defined alternatives
On the characterization of alternatives
Morphosemantic Mismatches, Structural Economy, and Licensing
Agreement and concord involve mismatches between the position where a syntactic or semantic contribution is made and where it is expressed morphologically. Such mismatches are often taken to involve either movement or the spreading and realization of features. I examine a number of superficially different instances of this kind of mismatch that seem to resist an account based on realization and movement alone. I argue that the patterns involved s…
A note on presupposition accommodation
The proviso problem arises for theories of presupposition whose projection component fails to derive certain presuppositions that are contributed by their constituent sentences. Mismatch-based satisfaction theories respond to the difficulty by tying the emergence of the proviso problem to presupposition accommodation. Consequently, when the context entails the projected presupposition and no accommodation is required, mismatch-based satisfaction …
A note on contrast
On Evaluation Metrics in Optimality Theory
We develop an evaluation metric for Optimality Theory that allows a learner to induce a lexicon and a phonological grammar from unanalyzed surface forms. We wish to model aspects of knowledge such as the English-speaking child's knowledge that the aspiration of the first segment of khæt is predictable and the French-speaking child's knowledge that the final l of table 'table' is optional and can be deleted while that of parle 'speak' cannot. We s…
Linearizing Structures
The linearization of unboundedly many syntactic structures given a finite number of ordering instructions poses a compositionality problem similar to the semantic problem of determining the meanings of unboundedly many structures. We discuss this challenge and use various constructions such as Right-Node Raising that have been argued to involve multidominance-and that combine a remarkable productivity across and inside languages with a sensitivit…
A conditional learnability argument for constraints on underlying representations
We explore the implications of a particular approach to learning for an architectural question in phonology. The learning approach follows the principle of Minimum Description Length (MDL), which has recently been used for learning in both constraint-based and rule-based phonology. The architectural question on which we focus is whether the grammar allows language-specific statements to be made at the level of the lexicon, as was assumed in early…
Notes on Iterated Rationality Models of Scalar Implicatures
In the linguistics literature, the derivation of scalar implicatures has often been handled in a relatively modular way, using computations that are sensitive to logical relations among alternatives such as entailment but are blind to other notions such as the probabilities that participants in a conversation might associate with these alternatives (or with related propositions). In recent years, a family of models that we refer to as iterated ra…
Strengthening, exhaustification, and rational inference
The literature in semantics and pragmatics provides extensive evidence for the strengthening of linguistic expressions, both in matrix positions and when embedded under various operators. We study the properties of such strengthening using a very simple setting. Specifically, we look at when the expression “crate with a banana” can be understood as a unique crate even though two different crates have a banana in them. By varying the scenarios in …
Large Language Models and theoretical linguistics
Some recent publications have made the suggestion that Large Language Models are not just successful engineering tools but also good theories of human linguistic cognition. This note reviews methodological and empirical reasons to reject this suggestion out of hand
Large Language Models and the Argument from the Poverty of the Stimulus
According to much of theoretical linguistics, a fair amount of our linguistic knowledge is innate. One of the best-known (and most contested) kinds of evidence for a large innate endowment is the argument from the poverty of the stimulus (APS). An APS obtains when human learners systematically make inductive leaps that are not warranted by the linguistic evidence. A weakness of the APS has been that it is very hard to assess what is warranted by …
On the roles of anaphoricity and questions in free focus
Communicative Stability and the Typology of Logical Operators
The typology of the logical vocabulary in natural language is highly skewed. In the domain of logical connectives, AND and OR are often lexicalized, lexicalizations of NOR are less common and tend to be structurally complex, and no other logical connective is ever lexicalized. Existing accounts fail to fully derive this major crosslinguistic pattern, and moreover resort to otherwise unwarranted assumptions. The goal of this article is to provide …
Large language models as proxies for theories of human linguistic cognition
We consider the possible role of current large language models (LLMs) in the study of human linguistic cognition. We focus on the use of such models as proxies for theories of cognition that are relatively linguistically-neutral in their representations and learning but differ from current LLMs in key ways. We illustrate this potential use of LLMs as proxies for theories of cognition in the context of two kinds of questions: (a) whether the targe…
Computer Science (13 works) · Linguistics (13 works) · Philosophy (13 works) · Artificial Intelligence (8 works) · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation (8 works) · Mathematics (7 works) · Natural Language Processing Techniques (7 works) · Epistemology (6 works) · Artificial Intelligence (5 works) · History (4 works)