Law - Revision history

Admin at 13:55, 15 April 2009

2009-04-15T13:55:44Z

Haspelmath: /* Link */

2008-07-08T11:53:01Z

Link

Haspelmath: /* Link */ explanation

2008-07-08T11:52:25Z

Link: explanation

Kbest: link

2008-07-08T08:54:33Z

link

WikiLingua at 10:28, 16 August 2007

2007-08-16T10:28:33Z

WikiLingua at 19:39, 2 August 2007

2007-08-02T19:39:40Z

Rk: /* References */

2007-07-13T14:49:28Z

References

Rk: /* References */

2007-07-10T18:39:25Z

References

Sven Siegmund: /* References */ -typo

2007-07-10T15:45:52Z

References: -typo

Sven Siegmund: bullets

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 In quantitative linguistics, the exact science of language and text, three kinds of uni-versal laws are known. The first kind takes the form of probability distributions, i.e. it makes predictions about the number of units of a given property. A well-known example of this kind is the Zipf-Mandelbrot Law (the status of the corresponding phenomenon has been discussed since the days of George K. Zipf, who was the first to systematically study quantitative properties of language from a scientific point of view). The law relates (a) the frequency of a word in a given text (in any language) to the number of words with the given frequency (called fre-quency spectrum), and (b) the frequency of a word in relation to its rank (called rank-frequency distribution). The first formulation by Zipf stated that about one half of the word tokens of a text have the frequency one (the so-called hapax legomena), a third of the rest – a frequency two (dis legomena), a quarter of the rest occurs three times in the text, etc. Zipf called it the harmonic law. It was later modified and corrected by Benoit Mandelbrot (outside linguistics known from his fractal geometry). He derived the law from the assumption that languages organize their lexicons in the way that the most frequent words become the shortest ones, using an optimization method (Lagrange multipliers) under the condition that the information of each code element must be greater than zero. This resulted in the famous formula (1), which has the form of a rank-frequency distribution: If the words are arranged according to their frequency, the most frequent word is assigned rank one etc. The formula gives the frequency a word should have at a given rank:
-<math>f(r) = \frac{K}{(b+r)^γ},</math>
+<math>f(r) = \frac{K}{(b+r)^\gamma}</math>
 where f(r) is the frequency, r - the rank, b and γ - parameters, and K a normalizing constant.

@@ Line 102: / Line 102: @@
 ==Link==
-*[www-alt.uni-trier.de/uni/fb2/ldv/lql_wiki/index.php/Main_Page U Trier page on laws in Quantitative Linguistics]
+[http://www-alt.uni-trier.de/uni/fb2/ldv/lql_wiki/index.php/Main_Page U Trier page on laws in Quantitative Linguistics]
 [[Category:En]]
 [[Category:Quantitative Linguistics]]

@@ Line 102: / Line 102: @@
 ==Link==
-*www-alt.uni-trier.de/uni/fb2/ldv/lql_wiki/index.php/Main_Page
+*[www-alt.uni-trier.de/uni/fb2/ldv/lql_wiki/index.php/Main_Page U Trier page on laws in Quantitative Linguistics]
 [[Category:En]]
 [[Category:Quantitative Linguistics]]

@@ Line 100: / Line 100: @@
 *Zipf, George Kingsley. 1949. ''Human Behaviour and the Principle of Least Effort''. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley.
 [[Category:En]]
 [[Category:Quantitative Linguistics]]

@@ Line 73: / Line 73: @@
 == References ==
-'''Altmann, Gabriel''' (1980): ''Wiederholungen in Texten''. Bochum: Brockmeyer.
+*Altmann, Gabriel. 1980. ''Wiederholungen in Texten''. Bochum: Brockmeyer.
-'''Bertalanffy, Ludwig van''' (1968): ''General System Theory.  Foundations, development, applications''. New York: George Braziller.
+*Bertalanffy, Ludwig van. 1968. ''General System Theory.  Foundations, development, applications''. New York: George Braziller.
-'''Bunge, Mario''' (1967): '''Scientific Research I, II'''. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
+*Bunge, Mario. 1967. ''Scientific Research I, II''. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
-'''Bunge, Mario''' (1998) “Semiotic systems.” In: ''Systems. A new paradigm for the human sciences'', ed. Altmann and Koch, 337-349. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
+*Bunge, Mario. 1998. Semiotic systems. In: Altmann & Koch (eds.). ''Systems. A new paradigm for the human sciences''. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter, 337-349.
-'''Haken, Hermann''' (1978) ''Synergetics''. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
+*Haken, Hermann. 1978. ''Synergetics''. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
-'''Haken, Hermann; Graham, R.''' (1971) ''Synergetik. Die Lehre vom Zusammenwirken''. Umschau 6: 191.
+*Haken, Hermann & Graham, R.. 1971. ''Synergetik. Die Lehre vom Zusammenwirken''. Umschau 6: 191.
-'''Hřebíček, Ludek''' (1997): ''Lectures on Text Theory''. Prague: Oriental Institute.
+*Hřebíček, Ludek. 1997. ''Lectures on Text Theory''. Prague: Oriental Institute.
-'''Herdan, Gustav''' (1966): ''The advanced theory of language as choice and chance''. Berlin: Springer.
+*Herdan, Gustav. 1966. ''The advanced theory of language as choice and chance''. Berlin: Springer.
-'''Köhler, Reinhard''' (1995): ''Bibliography of quantitative linguistics = Bibliographie zur quantitativen Linguistik = Bibliografija po kvantitativnoj lingvistike''. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
+*Köhler, Reinhard. 1995. ''Bibliography of quantitative linguistics = Bibliographie zur quantitativen Linguistik = Bibliografija po kvantitativnoj lingvistike''. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
-'''Köhler, Reinhard''' “Laws of language”. In: The ''Cambridge Encyclopedia of the Language Sciences'', ed. Patrick Colm Hogan, (to appear).
+*Köhler, Reinhard. Laws of language. In: Colm Hogan, Patrick (ed.). ''The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the Language Sciences''. (to appear).
-'''Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz; Altmann, Gabriel''' (2006): “Some aspects of word frequencies.” ''Glottometrics 13'': 23-46.
+*Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz & Altmann, Gabriel. 2006. Some aspects of word frequencies. ''Glottometrics 13''. 23-46.
-'''Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz; Altmann, Gabriel''' (2007): “Some geometric properties of word frequency distributions.” ''Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft'', (in press).
+*Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz & Altmann, Gabriel. 2007. Some geometric properties of word frequency distributions. ''Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft''. (in press).
-'''Zipf, George Kingsley''' (1935) (<sup>2</sup>1968): ''The Psycho-Biology of Language. An Introduction to Dynamic Philology''. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press.
+*Zipf, George Kingsley. 1935. (<sup>2</sup>1968). ''The Psycho-Biology of Language. An Introduction to Dynamic Philology''. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press.
-'''Zipf, George Kingsley''' (1949): Human ''Behaviour and the Principle of Least Effort''. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley.
+*Zipf, George Kingsley. 1949. ''Human Behaviour and the Principle of Least Effort''. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley.
 [[Category:En]]
 [[Category:Quantitative Linguistics]]

@@ Line 97: / Line 97: @@
 *Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2007. “Some geometric properties of word frequency distributions.” Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft, (in press).
-*Zipf, George Kingsley. 1935 (2nd ed. 1968). The Psycho-Biology of Language. An Introduction to Dynamic Philology. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press.
+*Zipf, George Kingsley. 1935 (<sup>2</sup>1968). The Psycho-Biology of Language. An Introduction to Dynamic Philology. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press.
 *Zipf, George Kingsley. 1949. Human Behaviour and the Principle of Least Effort. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley.

@@ Line 95: / Line 95: @@
 *Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2006. “Some aspects of word frequencies.” Glottometrics 13: 23-46.
-*0Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2007. “Some geometric properties of word frequency distributions.” Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft, (in press).
+*Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2007. “Some geometric properties of word frequency distributions.” Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft, (in press).
 *Zipf, George Kingsley. 1935 (21968). The Psycho-Biology of Language. An Introduction to Dynamic Philology. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press.

@@ Line 73: / Line 73: @@
 == References ==
-Altmann, Gabriel. 1980. Wiederholungen in Texten. Bochum: Brockmeyer.
+*Altmann, Gabriel. 1980. Wiederholungen in Texten. Bochum: Brockmeyer.
-Bertalanffy, Ludwig van (1968), General System Theory.  Foundations, development, appli-cations. New York: George Braziller.
+*Bertalanffy, Ludwig van (1968), General System Theory.  Foundations, development, appli-cations. New York: George Braziller.
-Bunge, Mario. 1967. Scientific Research I, II. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
+*Bunge, Mario. 1967. Scientific Research I, II. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
-Bunge, Mario. 1998. “Semiotic systems.” In Systems. A new paradigm for the human sciences, ed. Altmann and Koch, 337-349. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
+*Bunge, Mario. 1998. “Semiotic systems.” In Systems. A new paradigm for the human sciences, ed. Altmann and Koch, 337-349. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
-Haken, Hermann. 1978. Synergetics. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
+*Haken, Hermann. 1978. Synergetics. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer.
-Haken, Hermann, and R. Graham. 1971. „Synergetik. Die Lehre vom Zusammenwirken.“ Umschau 6: 191.
+*Haken, Hermann, and R. Graham. 1971. „Synergetik. Die Lehre vom Zusammenwirken.“ Umschau 6: 191.
-Hřebíček, Ludek. 1997. Lectures on Text Theory. Prague: Oriental Institute.
+*Hřebíček, Ludek. 1997. Lectures on Text Theory. Prague: Oriental Institute.
-Herdan, Gustav. 1966. The advanced theory of language as choice and chance. Berlin: Springer.
+*Herdan, Gustav. 1966. The advanced theory of language as choice and chance. Berlin: Springer.
-Köhler, Reinhard. 1995. Bibliography of quantitative linguistics = Bibliographie zur quantitativen Linguistik = Bibliografija po kvantitativnoj lingvistike. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
+*Köhler, Reinhard. 1995. Bibliography of quantitative linguistics = Bibliographie zur quantitativen Linguistik = Bibliografija po kvantitativnoj lingvistike. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
-Köhler, Reinhard: “Laws of language”. In: The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the Language Sciences, ed. Patrick Colm Hogan, (to appear).
+*Köhler, Reinhard: “Laws of language”. In: The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the Language Sciences, ed. Patrick Colm Hogan, (to appear).
-Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2006. “Some aspects of word frequencies.” Glottometrics 13: 23-46.
+*Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2006. “Some aspects of word frequencies.” Glottometrics 13: 23-46.
-Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2007. “Some geometric properties of word frequency distributions.” Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft, (in press).
+*0Popescu, Ioan-Iovitz, and Altmann, Gabriel. 2007. “Some geometric properties of word frequency distributions.” Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft, (in press).
-Zipf, George Kingsley. 1935 (21968). The Psycho-Biology of Language. An Introduction to Dynamic Philology. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press.
+*Zipf, George Kingsley. 1935 (21968). The Psycho-Biology of Language. An Introduction to Dynamic Philology. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press.
-Zipf, George Kingsley. 1949. Human Behaviour and the Principle of Least Effort. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley.
+*Zipf, George Kingsley. 1949. Human Behaviour and the Principle of Least Effort. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley.
 [[Category:En]]
 [[Category:Quantitative Linguistics]]