The evolution of grounded spatial language

This book presents groundbreaking robotic experiments on how and why spatial language evolves. It provides detailed explanations of the origins of spatial conceptualization strategies, spatial categories, landmark systems and spatial grammar by tracing the interplay of environmental conditions, communicative and cognitive pressures. The experiments discussed in this book go far beyond previous approaches in grounded language evolution. For the first time, agents can evolve not only particular lexical systems but also evolve complex conceptualization strategies underlying the emergence of category systems and compositional semantics. Moreover, many issues in cognitive science, ranging from perception and conceptualization to language processing, had to be dealt with to instantiate these experiments, so that this book contributes not only to the study of language evolution but to the investigation of the cognitive bases of spatial language as well

How language adapts to the environment: an evolutionary, experimental approach

The aim of this thesis is to investigate experimentally whether cross-linguistic variation in the structure of languages can be motivated by their external environment. It has been suggested that variation does not only result from cultural drift and language-internal mechanisms but also from social or even physical factors. However, from observational data and correlations between variables alone, it remains difficult to infer the exact underlying mechanisms. Here, I present a novel experimental approach for studying the relationship between language and environment under controlled laboratory conditions. I argue that to arrive at a causal understanding of linguistic adaptation, we can use a cultural evolutionary approach and simulate the emergence of linguistic structure with humans in the lab. This way, it can be tested which pressures shape linguistic features as they are used for communication and transmitted to new speakers. I focus primarily on cases where linguistic conventions emerge in referential communication games in direct face-to-face interaction. In these settings, I test whether specific conventions are more adaptive to solve the same problem under different conditions or affordances imposed by the environment. A series of silent-gesture experiments shows that systematicity (the design feature giving language its compositional power) is sensitive to the communicative environment: Dyads creating novel gestural communication systems to communicate pictorial referents are more likely to systematize traits and create categories that are functionally relevant in the given environment. Additionally, environmental features, such as the size of the meaning space and visibility of referents, affect the degree to which participants rely on systematic rather than simple holistic gestures. This ‘experimental semiotics’ approach thus models how environmental factors could motivate basic linguistic structure. However, for complex real-world phenomena, such as the hotly debated relationship between spatial language and environment, it is difficult to design simple experiments that isolate variables of interest but retain the necessary level of realism. It has been proposed that topography (e.g., landmarks like rivers, slopes) and sociocultural factors (e.g., bilingualism, subsistence style, population density) can affect whether speakers rely on an egocentric or geocentric Frame of Reference (FoR) to encode spatial relations, but it remains hard to disentangle the exact contribution of these variables to the cross-linguistic variation we observe. I tackle this issue with a novel paradigm: interactive Virtual Reality (VR) experiments that allow for an unprecedented combination of ecological validity and experimental control. In networked VR settings, participants are immersed in realistic settings such as a forest or a mountain slope. By having dyads solve spatial coordination games, I show that speakers of English, which is usually associated with an egocentric FoR, are less likely to use egocentric language (e.g., “the orb is to your left”) if there are strong environmental affordances that make geocentric language more viable (e.g., “the orb is uphill from you”). Further experiments address whether the cultural ‘success’ of egocentric left/right could be motivated by its applicability across environments. For this, I combine VR with the ‘experimental semiotics’ approach, where the game is solved via a novel visual communication channel. I show how the movement data in the 3D world can be correlated with invented signals to measure which FoR participants rely on. In contrast to the English data, I did not find an advantage for geocentric systems in the slope environment, and overwhelmingly egocentric systems emerged. I discuss how this could relate to task-specificity and native language background. More generally, I show how this new way of studying spatial language with interactive VR games can be used to test hypotheses about linguistic transmission and material culture that could help explain the origins of the egocentric FoR system, which is regarded a fairly recent cultural innovation. Taken together, the thesis comprises several studies testing the relationship between linguistic and environmental variables. Additionally, VR is presented as a novel tool to study spatial language in controlled large-scale settings complementing more traditional fieldwork. More generally, I suggest that VR can be used to study the evolution of language in complex, multimodal settings without sacrificing experimental control

Using MapReduce Streaming for Distributed Life Simulation on the Cloud

Distributed software simulations are indispensable in the study of large-scale life models but often require the use of technically complex lower-level distributed computing frameworks, such as MPI. We propose to overcome the complexity challenge by applying the emerging MapReduce (MR) model to distributed life simulations and by running such simulations on the cloud. Technically, we design optimized MR streaming algorithms for discrete and continuous versions of Conway’s life according to a general MR streaming pattern. We chose life because it is simple enough as a testbed for MR’s applicability to a-life simulations and general enough to make our results applicable to various lattice-based a-life models. We implement and empirically evaluate our algorithms’ performance on Amazon’s Elastic MR cloud. Our experiments demonstrate that a single MR optimization technique called strip partitioning can reduce the execution time of continuous life simulations by 64%. To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to propose and evaluate MR streaming algorithms for lattice-based simulations. Our algorithms can serve as prototypes in the development of novel MR simulation algorithms for large-scale lattice-based a-life models.https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/scs_books/1014/thumbnail.jp

A complex systems approach to education in Switzerland

The insights gained from the study of complex systems in biological, social, and engineered systems enables us not only to observe and understand, but also to actively design systems which will be capable of successfully coping with complex and dynamically changing situations. The methods and mindset required for this approach have been applied to educational systems with their diverse levels of scale and complexity. Based on the general case made by Yaneer Bar-Yam, this paper applies the complex systems approach to the educational system in Switzerland. It confirms that the complex systems approach is valid. Indeed, many recommendations made for the general case have already been implemented in the Swiss education system. To address existing problems and difficulties, further steps are recommended. This paper contributes to the further establishment complex systems approach by shedding light on an area which concerns us all, which is a frequent topic of discussion and dispute among politicians and the public, where billions of dollars have been spent without achieving the desired results, and where it is difficult to directly derive consequences from actions taken. The analysis of the education system's different levels, their complexity and scale will clarify how such a dynamic system should be approached, and how it can be guided towards the desired performance

Recruitment, Selection and Alignment of Spatial Language Strategies

All languages of the world have a way to talk about space and spatial relations of objects. Cross-culturally, immense variation in how people conceptualize space for language has been attested. Different spatial conceptualization strategies such as proximal, projective and absolute have been identified to underlie peoples conception of spatial reality. This paper argues that spatial conceptualization strategies are negotiated in a cultural process of linguistic selection. Conceptualization strategies originate in the cognitive capabilities of agents. The ecological conditions and the structure of the environment influence the conceptualization strategy agents invent and which corresponding system of lexicon and ontology of spatial relations is selected for. The validity of these claims is explored using populations of humanoid robots