Learning Language by Eavesdropping

Reblogged from NeuWriteSD.org:

via WikiMedia Commons.

Though kids seem to learn language without effort, scientists continue to puzzle over how children go from scream-y, pre-linguistic squooshballs to slightly-less-scream-y toddlers who can string a few words together (including “no!”) to older children who speak more or less like adults do. Researchers have learned a lot about how kids learn to talk—they know that children are in tune with their environment, with caregivers [1-2]. More recently, research suggests that when mom and dad direct their attention (and verbal labels) towards what a child is already engaged with, children might to learn more quickly [3]–that is, when mom says “doggy” and a child is petting the dog, the word is probably more likely to stick than if only mom was looking at the dog.

Read more at NeuWriteSD.org...

A Neu- way to Write, and Beyond

New post on the UCSD Cognitive Science Blog repping NeuWrite SD and other venues for science communication at UCSD:

Students in cognitive science, neuroscience, and other disciplines at UCSD look for new ways of communicating science, including NeuWriteSD.org. 

As recent Pew Research polls indicate, views on key issues (like climate change and genetically-modified foods) often differ drastically between the public, in general, and scientists, in particular. Like the kids whose opinions changed after actually visiting a lab and speaking with scientists, it stands to reason that many people’s opinions of science (and scientists) might change given more experience communicating with scientists.

Read more here...

A ukulele, an Oedipus complex, and a pomegranate

So play your favorite Beatles song

And make the subway fall in love

They're only $19.95, that isn't lots of money

Play until the sun comes up

And play until your fingers suffer

Play LCD Soundsystem songs on your ukulele

Quit the bitching on your blog

And stop pretending art is hard

Just limit yourself to three chords

And do not practice daily

Better words were rarely spoken.  And thus came into existence my desire to own a bright green ukulele (in bright green case!) shown above.  Apparently Amanda Palmer is not the only one to have written a song about the ukulele -- Stephin Merritt is also excited about ukuleles (me-kuleles?).

There are two primary reasons I decided it was time to own a ukulele.  And two corollaries.

Reason 1: It is simple to play.  Simpler than the guitar, which I would like to play soon.
Corollary 1.1: I found out it only takes 3 chords to play "Absolutely Cuckoo," one of my favorite Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songs, and that's amazing.
Corollary 1.2: One of the reasons that I want to learn to play guitar is that I once wrote a song (in a moment of doom and gloom... mostly gloom) and I want to be able to play.  Somehow the piano just doesn't cut it.

Reason 2: It cost less than $15.
Corollary 2: Amanda Palmer has sanctioned ukuleles BECAUSE they only cost about $15.  Ok, according to her, $19.95 (and in an interview, that's "plus tax"), and also because of Reason 1: seriously, just learn THREE DAMN CHORDS.

Ok, I think that's enough about ukuleles for now.  On to Oedipus complexes.

In our core cognitive science class (that I have referred to before), we discussed the idea of "conceptual blends" this past week.  Related to metaphor, but not quite the same, conceptual blends involve the simultaneous use of two concepts in a single description.  Fictive motion is once example -- for instance, "trees running down the side of the river" blends the concept of a physical line of trees with the concept of an objet moving down the line.

Well, The Gospel at Colonus was a spiritual (in the musical sense, not necessarily the religious sense) retelling of the second play by Sophocles of Oedipus, after his arrival at Colonus post-gouging-out-his-eyes-upon-realizing-he'd-killed-his-dad-and-screwed-his-mum.  Woops.  A preacher simultaneously took on the role of storyteller and enacter, quoting "verses" which ended up being lines from the drama about Oedipus.  It was a blend of a church service, complete with (amazing!) gospel choruses and bible readings, and of the drama of Oedipus, where Oedipus at times became a Jesus figure, nearly seeming to wander the desert, and his daughters become virgin-Mary-like figures.

It was a play I saw with a friend at the San Diego Continuing Education Educational Cultural Complex (which was a fantastic space!) put on by the Ira Aldridge Repertory Players -- a friend of his was acting in the show, and did a stand-up job.  What was so cool was that there were many San Diego groups involved -- a jazz band, a men's quartet, a gospel chorus, individual soloists and actors... very impressive.

Item #3, the pomegranate, probably sounds the lamest but I'd claim stands an equal ground with fantastic local shows and acquisition of new instruments.  Here is a top-ten-type list of Things Noticed Whilst Eating A Pomegranate.

1. Pomegranates are Active Fruits. (You have to work to eat them!)
2. Plants and animals share some really strange apparently homologous features. (The thin layers of "skin" between seeds in a pomegranate truly _must_ echo the epithelial layers of animals, RIGHT?)
3. Corn kernels and pomegranate seeds are SO SIMILAR.  (Seriously... they are pretty much exactly the same size and very nearly the same consistency.)
4. Pomegranates are neighborly fruits. (I say this because I was invited to share a pomegranate, presumably because eating one is so much damn work that you want a companion in the process.)
5. Pomegranates are SO DIFFERENT FROM OTHER CITRUS FRUITS. (As I typed this I started thinking, hmm... I really hope pomegranates are _actually_ citrus fruits!)
6. Meat rocks maybe aren't that weird after all. (See this article published this past summer.)

Ok, think that's all I got for now.

i see a red jeep and i want to paint it black

Since we last spoke, there has been some excitement. Live-band karaoke San Diego-style was finally achieved, a visiting friend procured some pine nuts for me, and a camping trip to the Cleveland National Forest (near beautiful Lake Elsinore) was enjoyed by several cognitive science students.  Here's a picture of just one of the small impacts our camping had on the site:

I would place the primary fault of the lack of more recent blog updates on the sheer number of words I've been writing for the "core" / philosophical foundations of cognitive science course this term.  We read something like 100-300 pp a week (in theory, of course) and I believe have had something like four papers due over the last two weeks (including two within the last two days).  I continue to be pleasantly surprised at how engaged in the material everyone remains -- so unlike previous courses like it that I've taken.  I think this makes my 9th (sheesh) year enrolled in some sort of cognitive science program... you'd think I'd have figured out a little more than I do now.

Other efforts have been driven toward obtaining a digital piano, to no avail.  In theory, another couple of grad students and I are supposed to be forming a small music group.  There has been a trip to the library to investigate the music book situation (yielding thus far a nice "real" "fake" book and a James Taylor anthology (though not THE James Taylor Anthology which I played some stuff out of this past summer)); one effort to actually play music together, which included renditions of songs from Clapton to "Rainbow Connection"; and multiple karaoke ventures, including the live-band version referred to above.  Currently I am becoming obsessed with the Dresden Dolls -- funny that I should do so in southern California and not in Boston.  Some of the piano from their self-titled album reminds me of ... Natalie Merchant I think.  In particular, the driving piano beat from "Gravity" reminds me strongly of that of "Thick of Thieves" -- except it might actually be better accomplished by Amanda Palmer.  Just as I wrote that the thought crossed my mind that women seem to kill on piano in rock music, moreso than men -- and then I remembered Matt and Kim, who I _just_ saw live at House of Blues, where Kim kills on drums (she literally does seem to be trying to kill the drums sometimes, jumping all over them with a can of either Coke or the King of Beers in her back pocket), and Matt is one with the synth / keyboard.

Starting a second hat

I guess the story behind this blog is this:  I wrote one this spring and summer, pseudo-themed, and it was fun.  So in some sense, this blog could be a second hat.  This also coincides with my start in the cognitive science department at UCSD, which could certainly be seen as starting a second hat.

The thought of beginning a more traditional web log, with some sort of theme I'll have to come up with at some point, seems intimidating for a couple of reasons, one being that the timing element becomes more important when you don't cheat and post the whole blog at once after you've written the entire thing; and another being that I had to come up with at least a name for it to start.  With the idea of second chances, it first seemed to me that I might want a "second-this-or-that" sort of name.

First I turned to the snark of Dorothy Parker, and she had a catchy title to offer: "Two-Volume Novel."  Beginning a second PhD program seemed to fit with that... but not so much with the actual content of the poem, which, like the majority of Dorothy Parker's poetry, has to do with ironically unrequited love.

This seemed fairly inappropriate for a blog supposedly devoted to Finishing the Hat -- the title of a book of collected lyrics, along with anecdotes about writing them, written by Stephen Sondheim (the book and they lyrics).  A fellow classmate at MIT gave it to me for Christmas two years ago, and inside scrawled, "Dearest Liss, Go make a hat!" With a bit of inference, the metaphor (apologies; I've been reading Lakoff!) is clear... However, finishing the hat may be the goal, but Sondheim also refers to the process of making the hat within this blog's namesake song from Sunday in the Park with George (which I've actually never seen):

Finishing the hat,
How you have to finish the hat.
How you watch the rest of the world
From a window
While you finish the hat.

...

Dizzy from the height,
Coming from the hat,
Studying the hat,
Entering the world of the hat,
Reaching through the world of the hat
Like a window,
Back to this one from that.

...

Finishing a hat...
Starting on a hat..
Finishing a hat...
Look, I made a hat...
Where there never was a hat

So we'll call this studying the hat, for now.  And we'll let hat be interpreted as it may... from studies to things falling into some category called [other].  And for that I'll leave you with one further Dorothy Parker tidbit:

Faute de Mieux

Travel, trouble, music, art,
A kiss, a frock, a rhyme –
I never said they feed my heart,
But still they pass my time.