Wolfram Hinzen
Biographic Data
| ID | 623674 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Wolfram Hinzen |
| GIVEN NAMES | Wolfram |
| FAMILY NAME | Hinzen |
| SIGNATURE | HINZEN W |
| AFFILIATIONS | Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6159-4215 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 21 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 26 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 20 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2001 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
A new argument for linguistic determinants of human thought
We argue that the commonly accepted existence of grammatical concepts such as Person (in the grammatical sense) or Tense poses an unrecognized challenge to the idea that human thought is independent of language. The argument is that such concepts identify aspects of linguistic expressions that also systematically define the contents and identity of the thoughts expressed in language. Since grammatical concepts are not known to have non-grammatica…
Explaining early generics
Preschoolers naturally form mental representations that capture generic knowledge about object kinds. These have been considered to pose a special explanatory and learning challenge. We here argue for a new deductive model of them, where (i) the representations in question have a linguistic format from the start; (ii) they are inherently structurally simpler compared to reference to individuals or quantifications; and (iii) formed in communicativ…
Modelling non-specific linguistic variation in cognitive disorders
Clinical linguistic diversity extends far beyond ‘specific language’ disorders, such as acquired aphasia or specific language impairment (SLI), to a large range of mental disorders that are not language-specific. As cognitive impairments are involved in the latter, models with an integrated approach to language and cognition can be useful for understanding and classifying the variation in question. The aim of this paper is to specify such a model…
Correlations between Case and the D-system and the interpretability of Case
A correlation between articles and Case has long been noted based on diachronic evidence. Beyond articles, evidence supports that this correlation extends further to clitics and the determiner system (the D-system) at large. The D-system in turn supports referential functions in grammar and is closely correlated to Person. The aim of the present article is to link support for these facts to the broader foundational question and independent recent…
De se or not de se
What Language Is
I am honoured by the thoughtful considerations that have gone into all of the commentaries in this issue. Their respective origins in psychology, linguistics and philosophy indicate the ramifications and implications that the present research program ismeant to have and the challenges it faces fromall of these directions. It is only in this broader frame that the fruitfulness of the central hypothesis of the present framework can be demonstrated:…
Reference Across Pathologies
According to a linguistic tradition here termed ‘Cartesian’, language is relegated to an expressive system considered to provide the means to encode or communicate an independently constituted thought process. An alternative vision here termed ‘un-Cartesian’ regards language as an organizational principle of human-specific thought, with the implication that thought of the same type would not become available to a cognitive system without language…
Deictic and Propositional Meaning—New Perspectives on Language in Schizophrenia
Emerging linguistic evidence points at disordered language behavior as a defining characteristic of schizophrenia. In this article, we review this literature and demonstrate how a framework focusing on two core functions of language-reference and propositional meaning-can conceptualize schizophrenic symptoms, identify important variables for risk assessment, diagnosis, and treatment, and inform cognitive behavioral therapy and other remedial appr…
Is our mental grammar just a set of constructions? Commentary on Evans 2014
According to this book, ‘each of us carries around in our heads a “mental grammar” far more \nimpressive than any written grammar’ (6); this grammar is made up of ‘abstract rules’ that can generate \na ‘seemingly infinite number of novel sentences’ (12)
Linguistic Evidence against Predicativism
The view that proper names are uniformly predicates ('predicativism') has recently gained prominence. I review linguistic evidence against it. Overall, the (cross-) linguistic evidence suggests that proper names function as predicates when they appear in a grammatically predicative position and as referential expressions when they are grammatically in a referential position. Conceptual grounds on which the predicativist view might nonetheless be …
The grammar of the essential indexical
On the rationality of Case
Case marking has long resisted rationalization in terms of language-external systems of cognition, representing a classical illustration in the generative tradition for an apparently purely 'formal' or 'syntactic' aspect of grammatical organization. I argue that this impasse derives from the prevailing absence of a notion of grammatical meaning, i.e. meaning unavailable lexically or in non-linguistic cognition and uniquely dependent on grammatica…
The Oxford Handbook of Compositionality
Compositionality is a key concept in linguistics, the philosophy of mind and language, and throughout the cognitive sciences. Understanding how it works is a central element of syntactic and semantic analysis, and a challenge for models of cognition. In this book, scholars from every relevant field report on the state of the art in all aspects of the subject. They reveal the connections in different lines of research, and highlight its most chall…
Formalizing the relationship between meaning and syntax
The philosophical significance of Universal Grammar
On the Absence of X-within-X Recursion in Human Grammar
We make these observations: (a) The direct embedding of a syntactic category X in itself (X-within-X) is surprisingly rare in human language, if it exists at all. (b) Indirect self-embedding (mediated by a sequence of other categories, and usually a phase boundary) systematically goes along with intensionality effects; the embedding and the embedded XP exhibit different behavior at the semantic interface. We argue that these constraints on recurs…
Explaining intersubjectivity. A comment on Arie Verhagen, Constructions of Intersubjectivity
1. Overview Constructions of Intersubjectivity (CoI) is an important addition to the growing body of work on ‘cognitive’ and construction-based grammars, which CoI links to evolutionary issues in interesting ways. CoI also touches upon a number of fundamental (indeed philosophical) issues in the study of linguistic communication, meaning, and human cognition; it should be applauded for the explicitness with which it does so, using language as a ‘…
An Essay on Names and Truth
This pioneering book lays new foundations for the study of reference and truth. It seeks to explain the origins and characteristics of human ways of relating to the world by means of an understanding of the inherent structures of the mind. Wolfram Hinzen explores truth in the light of Noam Chomsky’s Minimalist Program. Truth, he argues, is a function of the human mind and, in particular, likely presupposes the structure of the human clause. Profe…
Mind Design and Minimal Syntax
This book introduces generative grammar as an area of study, asking what it tells us about the human mind. It lays the foundation for the unification of modern generative linguistics with the philosophies of mind and language. It introduces Chomsky's program of a ‘minimalist’ syntax as a novel explanatory vision of the human mind. It explains how the Minimalist Program originated from work in cognitive science, biology, linguistics, and philosoph…
Internalism about truth
The Pragmatics Of Inferential Content
The grammar of the essential indexical
On the Absence of X-within-X Recursion in Human Grammar
We make these observations: (a) The direct embedding of a syntactic category X in itself (X-within-X) is surprisingly rare in human language, if it exists at all. (b) Indirect self-embedding (mediated by a sequence of other categories, and usually a phase boundary) systematically goes along with intensionality effects; the embedding and the embedded XP exhibit different behavior at the semantic interface. We argue that these constraints on recurs…
Linguistic Evidence against Predicativism
The view that proper names are uniformly predicates ('predicativism') has recently gained prominence. I review linguistic evidence against it. Overall, the (cross-) linguistic evidence suggests that proper names function as predicates when they appear in a grammatically predicative position and as referential expressions when they are grammatically in a referential position. Conceptual grounds on which the predicativist view might nonetheless be …
On the rationality of Case
Case marking has long resisted rationalization in terms of language-external systems of cognition, representing a classical illustration in the generative tradition for an apparently purely 'formal' or 'syntactic' aspect of grammatical organization. I argue that this impasse derives from the prevailing absence of a notion of grammatical meaning, i.e. meaning unavailable lexically or in non-linguistic cognition and uniquely dependent on grammatica…
The philosophical significance of Universal Grammar
Internalism about truth
The Pragmatics Of Inferential Content
Mind Design and Minimal Syntax
This book introduces generative grammar as an area of study, asking what it tells us about the human mind. It lays the foundation for the unification of modern generative linguistics with the philosophies of mind and language. It introduces Chomsky's program of a ‘minimalist’ syntax as a novel explanatory vision of the human mind. It explains how the Minimalist Program originated from work in cognitive science, biology, linguistics, and philosoph…
Internalism about truth
An Essay on Names and Truth
This pioneering book lays new foundations for the study of reference and truth. It seeks to explain the origins and characteristics of human ways of relating to the world by means of an understanding of the inherent structures of the mind. Wolfram Hinzen explores truth in the light of Noam Chomsky’s Minimalist Program. Truth, he argues, is a function of the human mind and, in particular, likely presupposes the structure of the human clause. Profe…
Explaining intersubjectivity. A comment on Arie Verhagen, Constructions of Intersubjectivity
1. Overview Constructions of Intersubjectivity (CoI) is an important addition to the growing body of work on ‘cognitive’ and construction-based grammars, which CoI links to evolutionary issues in interesting ways. CoI also touches upon a number of fundamental (indeed philosophical) issues in the study of linguistic communication, meaning, and human cognition; it should be applauded for the explicitness with which it does so, using language as a ‘…
The Oxford Handbook of Compositionality
Compositionality is a key concept in linguistics, the philosophy of mind and language, and throughout the cognitive sciences. Understanding how it works is a central element of syntactic and semantic analysis, and a challenge for models of cognition. In this book, scholars from every relevant field report on the state of the art in all aspects of the subject. They reveal the connections in different lines of research, and highlight its most chall…
Formalizing the relationship between meaning and syntax
The philosophical significance of Universal Grammar
On the Absence of X-within-X Recursion in Human Grammar
We make these observations: (a) The direct embedding of a syntactic category X in itself (X-within-X) is surprisingly rare in human language, if it exists at all. (b) Indirect self-embedding (mediated by a sequence of other categories, and usually a phase boundary) systematically goes along with intensionality effects; the embedding and the embedded XP exhibit different behavior at the semantic interface. We argue that these constraints on recurs…
The grammar of the essential indexical
On the rationality of Case
Case marking has long resisted rationalization in terms of language-external systems of cognition, representing a classical illustration in the generative tradition for an apparently purely 'formal' or 'syntactic' aspect of grammatical organization. I argue that this impasse derives from the prevailing absence of a notion of grammatical meaning, i.e. meaning unavailable lexically or in non-linguistic cognition and uniquely dependent on grammatica…
Is our mental grammar just a set of constructions? Commentary on Evans 2014
According to this book, ‘each of us carries around in our heads a “mental grammar” far more \nimpressive than any written grammar’ (6); this grammar is made up of ‘abstract rules’ that can generate \na ‘seemingly infinite number of novel sentences’ (12)
Linguistic Evidence against Predicativism
The view that proper names are uniformly predicates ('predicativism') has recently gained prominence. I review linguistic evidence against it. Overall, the (cross-) linguistic evidence suggests that proper names function as predicates when they appear in a grammatically predicative position and as referential expressions when they are grammatically in a referential position. Conceptual grounds on which the predicativist view might nonetheless be …
What Language Is
I am honoured by the thoughtful considerations that have gone into all of the commentaries in this issue. Their respective origins in psychology, linguistics and philosophy indicate the ramifications and implications that the present research program ismeant to have and the challenges it faces fromall of these directions. It is only in this broader frame that the fruitfulness of the central hypothesis of the present framework can be demonstrated:…
Reference Across Pathologies
According to a linguistic tradition here termed ‘Cartesian’, language is relegated to an expressive system considered to provide the means to encode or communicate an independently constituted thought process. An alternative vision here termed ‘un-Cartesian’ regards language as an organizational principle of human-specific thought, with the implication that thought of the same type would not become available to a cognitive system without language…
Deictic and Propositional Meaning—New Perspectives on Language in Schizophrenia
Emerging linguistic evidence points at disordered language behavior as a defining characteristic of schizophrenia. In this article, we review this literature and demonstrate how a framework focusing on two core functions of language-reference and propositional meaning-can conceptualize schizophrenic symptoms, identify important variables for risk assessment, diagnosis, and treatment, and inform cognitive behavioral therapy and other remedial appr…
Correlations between Case and the D-system and the interpretability of Case
A correlation between articles and Case has long been noted based on diachronic evidence. Beyond articles, evidence supports that this correlation extends further to clitics and the determiner system (the D-system) at large. The D-system in turn supports referential functions in grammar and is closely correlated to Person. The aim of the present article is to link support for these facts to the broader foundational question and independent recent…
De se or not de se
Modelling non-specific linguistic variation in cognitive disorders
Clinical linguistic diversity extends far beyond ‘specific language’ disorders, such as acquired aphasia or specific language impairment (SLI), to a large range of mental disorders that are not language-specific. As cognitive impairments are involved in the latter, models with an integrated approach to language and cognition can be useful for understanding and classifying the variation in question. The aim of this paper is to specify such a model…
Explaining early generics
Preschoolers naturally form mental representations that capture generic knowledge about object kinds. These have been considered to pose a special explanatory and learning challenge. We here argue for a new deductive model of them, where (i) the representations in question have a linguistic format from the start; (ii) they are inherently structurally simpler compared to reference to individuals or quantifications; and (iii) formed in communicativ…
A new argument for linguistic determinants of human thought
We argue that the commonly accepted existence of grammatical concepts such as Person (in the grammatical sense) or Tense poses an unrecognized challenge to the idea that human thought is independent of language. The argument is that such concepts identify aspects of linguistic expressions that also systematically define the contents and identity of the thoughts expressed in language. Since grammatical concepts are not known to have non-grammatica…
Linguistics (19 works) · Philosophy (18 works) · Computer Science (13 works) · Epistemology (11 works) · Grammar (11 works) · Psychology (10 works) · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation (10 works) · Cognition (7 works) · Cognitive science (6 works) · Generative grammar (6 works)