David Rose Misunderstanding Axis And Realisation (Inter Alia)

David Rose replied to Brad Smith on Sysfling on 23 August 2023 at 15:47 and 16:26:

I used realisation below as the interstratal relation. Axis is the feature/structure relation in systems (which is also confusingly called realisation). Both are abstraction (token/value) relations. Axis is a one-to-one relation between a feature (value) and a structure (token). It also implies the generalisation of a system, because it is a contrast between structures that realises a contrast between features (not individual structures).

It is that coupling of generalisation with abstraction that lies at the heart of semiosis, and hence of SFS theory.

Interstratal relations are not one-to-one. Hence tone choices can be coupled with various mood choices to realise variations in appraisal, //4 don’t you know//. …

Oh sorry Brad, how rude of me.

I meant to say, //5 don't you/know//

Blogger Comments:

[1] Here again Rose misunderstands axis. Axis is a local dimension with two orders: paradigmatic and syntagmatic, whereas system is the dimension of the paradigmatic order of axis. Systems include realisation statements attached to features which specify structural realisations, but that is not 'axis'.

[2] To be clear, realisation is the relation between different levels of symbolic abstraction, and so it applies wherever that relation obtains: between system and structure, between strata, between function and form. It does not obtain between a feature and a structure, since a feature is not realised by a structure. Instead, a system (of a clause) is realised by a structure (of a clause). Importantly, a structure is not a functional element, but the relationships between such elements. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 451): 

Note that, although it is the functions that are labelled, the structure actually consists of the relationships among them.

[3] To be clear this argument rests on an invalid premiss:

Premiss: Axis is a contrast between structures that realises a contrast between features

Conclusion: Axis implies a generalisation of a system

The premiss is invalid because this is not what axis is (see [1]). Moreover, a contrast in features is not realised by a contrast in structure. For example, the contrast between the POLARITY features positive and negative is not realised by a contrast in structure, since both are realised by the element Finite in the same structural configuration, e.g. Subject^Finite^Predicator.

[4] To be clear, Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 618) write:

The developmental dynamic of "generalisation — abstractness — metaphor" provides the semiotic energy for the grammar, enabling it to serve as the powerhouse for construing experience in the form of scientific knowledge.

But this bears no relation to Rose's use of the terms generalisation and abstraction. For example (op. cit.: 615):

This principle of generalisation — that is, naming general classes rather than specific individuals — is what makes it possible to construct an ideation base. …

General terms are not necessarily abstract; a bird is no more abstract than a pigeon. But some words have referents that are purely abstract — words like cost and clue and habit and tend and strange; they are construing some aspect of our experience, but there is no concrete thing or process with which they can be identified.

[5] This is misleading. To be clear, in the absence of grammatical metaphor, semantics and lexicogrammar are in agreement (congruent):

• a statement (semantics) is realised by a declarative clause (lexicogrammar);
• a question (semantics) is realised by an interrogative clause (lexicogrammar);
• a command (semantics) is realised by an imperative clause (lexicogrammar);
• an elaborating sequence (semantics) is realised by an elaborating clause complex (lexicogrammar);
• a relational figure (semantics) is realised by a relational clause (lexicogrammar);
• an element (semantics) is realised by a group or phrase (lexicogrammar).

[6] This is potentially misleading. The phonological system of TONE realises the grammatical system of KEY.  Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 168):

The tones are not, however, simply additional markers attached to the realisation of mood. They realise distinct grammatical systems of their own, which are associated with the mood categories. The general name for systems that are realised by tone is KEY. The term KEY covers a number of systems …

(1) declarative clauses

unmarked statement: tone 1

reserved statement: tone 4

insistent statement: tone 5

tentative statement: tone 3

protesting statement: tone 2

(2) WH- interrogative clauses

unmarked WH- question: tone 1

tentative question: tone 2

echo question: tone 2 with tonic on WH- element

(3) yes/no interrogative clauses

unmarked yes/no question: tone 2

peremptory question: tone 1

(4) imperative clauses

command: tone 1 (unmarked in positive)

invitation: tone 3 (unmarked in negative)

request (marked polarity): tone 13, with tonic on do/don’t

plea: tone 4

[7] Note that tones 4 and 5 are not used with yes/no interrogative clauses. Since Rose's question is peremptory, it would be realised by tone 1 if spoken. 

David Rose On Edelman's Theory of Neuronal Group Selection

David replied to Kieran McGillicuddy on sys-func on 28/7/22 at 17:27:

Re circularity, generalising seems to be a basic capacity of any organism: ‘food/not-food’, and later ‘food/mate’

Edelman explains how it happens neurologically in animals, as perception, and in larger brained animals as perception of perception.

and at 21:22:

To mansplain what [Edelman] means by perception of perception I’d have to drag up his whole theory of neuronal group selection.

Aside from his books there’s a bunch of papers that summarise it. You could start here which is free to download...

Edelman, G. M. (2003). Naturalizing consciousness: a theoretical framework. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 100(9), 5520-5524.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, ‘food/not-food’ and ‘food/mate’ are (linguistic) discriminations, not generalisations. 

[2] On Edelman's model, a perceptual category is established through instances being determined as alike in terms of both value-weighted perceptual features and adaptive motor response. This is achieved neurally through repeated value-guided firings of neuronal groups in global mappings for each instance. Each firing strengthens the synaptic connections within the group, making the group more likely — selecting it — to fire again under similar conditions in the future.

[3] To be clear, Edelman (2003) makes no mention of "perception of perception", but in Edelman's model, the brain further categorises its own categorising performances. For example, in categorising perceptual categorising, the brain creates what Edelman terms 'concepts', but what SFL Theory would interpret as perceptual systems (perceptions organised into systems).

[4] For interpretations of Edelman's Theory of Neuronal Group Selection in terms of SFL Theory, see the 72 posts here.

David Rose Endorsing A Contradiction Of His Own Claim

David Rose wrote to sys-func on 28/7/22 at 15:20:

Note that generalisation increases down strata (not up), Martin & Matthiessen 1991...

The most powerful generalisation is, arguably, that there is a tendency towards generalisation as we move down either the stratal organisation or the rank scale. That is, to put it crudely, a given number of semantic systems is realised by a smaller number of corresponding lexicogrammatical ones; similarly, a given number of lexicogrammatical systems is realised by a smaller number of phonological ones. And the same holds for the rank scale; for example, a given number of clausal systems is realised by a smaller number of verbal group systems. The reason for this state of affairs is easy to see. A stratal descent or a rank descent always entails a generalisation across contexts and this generalisation is reflected in the relatively smaller number of realising systems.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, here Rose unwittingly provides further evidence against his own previous claim (here) that 

[Halliday's] grammatico-semantic model assumes a bijective or one-to-one relation between LG features and semantic features…

David Rose Misunderstanding Generalisation And Abstraction

David Rose replied to Erich Steiner on sysfling on 16 May 2018 at 09:08: 

Why don’t we start on common ground, with the empirical technique Michael Halliday bequeathed us, the system network? Since it encapsulates the roles of generalisation and abstraction in semiosis.

A system relates features by generalisation... two or more features are grouped in a system by similarity, and distinguished by difference. But these relations are recognised by similarities and differences in the structures that realise them. This axial relation between feature and structure is abstraction, feature/value: structure/token.

The structures in our realisation statements are also generalisations. They generalise recurrent instances in text corpora. So the axial feature/structure relation is abstraction, while the instantial structure/instance relation is generalisation, and so is the paradigmatic feature/feature relation. This complex of relations is illustrated in the attached diagram.

 

These generalisation/abstraction relations are iterated fractally as we expand our descriptions outwards from a single system. Paradigmatic feature/feature generalisations are iterated as we expand systems in delicacy. The token/value abstraction is iterated as we expand from stratum to stratum. ...

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, 'empirical' means based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic.  A system network is a construal of language (data) as theoretical categories organised by logical semantic relations:

• elaboration (delicacy),
• extension: addition (conjunction),
• extension: alternation (disjunction), and
• enhancement: condition (entry condition).

[2] To be clear, a system network orders features in terms of delicacy.  Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 14):

the paradigmatic network is ordered in delicacy (subsumption, classification, specialisation), from the least delicate (most general) to the most delicate (most specific types).

[3] To be clear,  the features of a system are co-hyponyms of a superordinate type, such as [mental] vs [material] PROCESS TYPE.

[4] To be clear, the "similarity and difference relations" in a system are paradigmatic (choice) relations, whereas the "similarity and difference relations" in a structure are syntagmatic (chain) relations — the two types being of a different order.  So, for example, in the clause:

David couldn't understand

the systemic difference in choosing [mental] instead of, say, [material] PROCESS TYPE is not "recognised" in the structural "difference" between Senser and Process.

[5] To be clear, the axial relation of realisation (symbolic abstraction) obtains between syntagmatic organisation (token) and paradigmatic organisation (value).  Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 13):

… on the one hand, syntagmatic organisation realises paradigmatic organisation; on the other hand, types in a network of paradigmatic organisation correspond to fragments of syntagmatic specification …

[6] This confuses the general–to–specific dimension: delicacy, with the token–to–type dimension: instantiation; see Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 144-5).

[7] Contrary to the claim, the diagram does not encompass the dimension of instantiation.

[8] In addition to the problems already highlighted, two of the inconsistencies that invalidate this diagram are:

• it misrepresents syntagmatic structure as a paradigmatic system; and
• it construes the logical relation of 'similarity', not as a relation between features, as it does with 'difference', but as features themselves.

That is, reading the diagram, for both system and structure, the entry condition 'similarity' affords a choice between 'similarity' and 'similarity', where each 'similarity' is different from the other 'similarity'.

[9] These are claims about multiple confusions and misunderstandings, as demonstrated above.