A Connectionist Model of Motion and Government in Chomsky's Government-binding Theory
John E. Rager, George Berg · Connection Science · 1990
In this paper we present a connectionist model of movement in government-binding (GB) theory. The model is a collection of regularly connected groups of connectionist units using only two architectures: a two-dimensional map, used to model tree structures, and a one-dimensional row used to model constituent feature assignment. GB theory is a constraint-based theory of syntax. The constraints of GB are modeled by the maps, the rows and the connections between them. All the connections are regular—they depend only on the maps being linked, not on the individual units. The model performs the movements in the transition from d-structure to s-structure mandated by the constraints on sentence form.