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As someone who raised children and grandchildren, I can't find any explanation to how fast they learn the language, based on very few samples (where your 4D arg

As someone who raised children and grandchildren, I can't find any explanation to how fast they learn the language, based on very few samples (where your 4D argument doesn't apply). Sure, children learn from conversations with adults, but those are mostly trivial, and involve trivial concepts. And children seem to be able to learn not only from the very limited number of samples, but also (in a sense) - learn more than these samples contain. BTW, did anyone try to analyze how many words/phrases the child heard, say, by the age of 7, when they develop perfect understanding of the language and ability to speak like adults? And after that age, one can spend 50 years learning foreign language and still not get it.

lukeschlather 9y ago
> (where your 4D argument doesn't apply) The 4D argument is even more applicable to human language, IMO. Object recognition pretty exclusively involves sight and touch. Human language involves all the senses, frequently at once. My Spanish is not great, but usually I can communicate pretty well despite that, partially because there are a lot of other contextual cues (body language, nonverbal vocalizations, known objects) I can use to figure things out. It's amazing how frequently the words don't matter at all, and the meaning is almost entirely contained in tone and pacing of speech.
javierluraschi 9y ago
Intially, kids don't learn language that fast, they spend a whole year getting samples from parents where we try-and-try-and-try over and over to get them to say something, so there is a high sample rate going on for sure. However, it is also true that humans learn faster at some point by using self other tools, like consciousness. Not sure how exactly that works on a toddlers brain, but on mine, if you ask me to remember a phone number, I will repeat it in my head several times and try to make associations, those higher-level learning processes seem to be the algorithms that we are missing to discover and implement successfully.
AndrewKemendo 9y ago
based on very few samples (where your 4D argument doesn't apply) Again, define "few." Language development starts in-utero [1] and basically is a constant stream thereafter. Children who have more consistent exposure to directed language and singing from their parents learn language faster, so there is absolutely correlation between exposure rate (sample rate) and acquisition time. Additionally the idea that language isn't 4D is just completely missing the concept. There is no linguistic association with a "ball" if there is no physical (visual/tactile) representation of said ball. Assuming a child doesn't have a disability there are no single sense concepts that I can think of. [1]https://www.washington.edu/news/2013/01/02/while-in-womb-babies-begin-learning-language-from-their-mothers/ https://www.washington.edu/news/2013/01/02/while-in-womb-bab...

lukeschlather 9y ago

> (where your 4D argument doesn't apply) The 4D argument is even more applicable to human language, IMO. Object recognition pretty exclusively involves sight and touch. Human language involves all the senses, frequently at once. My Spanish is not great, but usually I can communicate pretty well despite that, partially because there are a lot of other contextual cues (body language, nonverbal vocalizations, known objects) I can use to figure things out. It's amazing how frequently the words don't matter at all, and the meaning is almost entirely contained in tone and pacing of speech.

javierluraschi 9y ago

Intially, kids don't learn language that fast, they spend a whole year getting samples from parents where we try-and-try-and-try over and over to get them to say something, so there is a high sample rate going on for sure. However, it is also true that humans learn faster at some point by using self other tools, like consciousness. Not sure how exactly that works on a toddlers brain, but on mine, if you ask me to remember a phone number, I will repeat it in my head several times and try to make associations, those higher-level learning processes seem to be the algorithms that we are missing to discover and implement successfully.

AndrewKemendo 9y ago

based on very few samples (where your 4D argument doesn't apply) Again, define "few." Language development starts in-utero [1] and basically is a constant stream thereafter. Children who have more consistent exposure to directed language and singing from their parents learn language faster, so there is absolutely correlation between exposure rate (sample rate) and acquisition time. Additionally the idea that language isn't 4D is just completely missing the concept. There is no linguistic association with a "ball" if there is no physical (visual/tactile) representation of said ball. Assuming a child doesn't have a disability there are no single sense concepts that I can think of. [1]https://www.washington.edu/news/2013/01/02/while-in-womb-babies-begin-learning-language-from-their-mothers/ https://www.washington.edu/news/2013/01/02/while-in-womb-bab...