Challenging distributional models with a conceptual network of philosophical terms
Computational linguistic research on language change through distributional semantic (DS) models has inspired researchers from fields such as philosophy and literary studies, who use these methods for the exploration and comparison of comparatively small datasets traditionally analyzed by close reading. Research on methods for small data is still in early stages and it is not clear which methods achieve the best results. We investigate the possibilities and limitations of using distributional semantic models for analyzing philosophical data by means of a realistic use-case. We provide a ground truth for evaluation created by philosophy experts and a blueprint for using DS models in a sound methodological setup. We compare three methods for creating specialized models from small datasets. Though the models do not perform well enough to directly support philosophers yet, we find that models designed for small data yield promising directions for future work.
Code (1)
Tasks
PhilosophySimilar Papers 제목 키워드 기반
Distributional Semantics for Neo-Latin
We address the problem of creating and evaluating quality Neo-Latin word embeddings for the purpose of philosophical research, adapting the Nonce2Vec tool to learn embeddings from Neo-Latin sentences. This distributional…
Word EmbeddingsDistributional techniques for philosophical enquiry
The Counterexample Game: Iterated Conceptual Analysis and Repair in Language Models
Conceptual analysis -- proposing definitions and refining them through counterexamples -- is central to philosophical methodology. We study whether language models can perform this task through iterated analysis and repa…
The Xeno Sutra: Can Meaning and Value be Ascribed to an AI-Generated "Sacred" Text?
This paper presents a case study in the use of a large language model to generate a fictional Buddhist "sutra"', and offers a detailed analysis of the resulting text from a philosophical and literary point of view. The c…
Philosophy-informed Machine Learning
Philosophy-informed machine learning (PhIML) directly infuses core ideas from analytic philosophy into ML model architectures, objectives, and evaluation protocols. Therefore, PhIML promises new capabilities through mode…