2025/07/01 by John Archibald · 1 voice
Psychology · Arts and Humanities · #Phonetics and Phonology Research #Language Development and Disorders #Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation
paper · doi:10.1177/02676583251339901
openalex publication_date 2025/07/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
In this paper, I provide a general response to the points made in the commentaries. One of the major questions probed is whether gradient, variable output is diagnostic of gradient mental representations. I argue that this is not necessarily the case, and look to aspects of the learning theory (such as input processing, restructuring, and cue reweighting), as well as the architecture of the phonology/phonetics interface to account for such variation. I argue for a conservative, incremental restructuring process as the basis of the transition theory of L n developmental paths. I reiterate the nature of the projection problem at various levels of the prosodic hierarchy when it comes to the input underdetermining the cues to abstract, algebraic phonological constituent labels. The question of whether L n grammars are consistent with the structural properties of natural languages (i.e. constrained by UG) is discussed. I conclude with a presentation of the idea that linguistic representations can be considered wavelike superstates. This has the potential of capturing what has been described as the fuzziness of representations, as well as the benefit of unifying our treatment of mental and physical objects.