人物专栏 | Andrea Moro教授访谈（下）
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《理论语言学五道口站》（2020年第30期，总第94期）人物专栏继续与大家分享本站采编人员訾姝瑶对Andrea Moro教授进行采访的访谈录。Andrea Moro，意大利帕维亚高等研究院语言学教授，北京语言大学语言学系国际教授委员会成员，是NeTS的创始人和前任主任，其主要研究领域包括句法学和神经语言学。本期访谈中，Andrea Moro教授分享了其在认知领域内研究句法的缘由，简要介绍了对自己影响深刻的学者，同时，他认为研究认知领域需要多接触非传统学科，接触不同观点。（Andrea Moro教授简介可参考《理论语言学五道口站》“人物专栏”2020年第25期，总第89期）
访谈录（续）
04.
訾姝瑶: 什么原因促使您进行认知领域的研究？
Andrea Moro教授：
认知研究是针对不同现象的一系列研究，这些现象可能属于同一领域，也可能不属于同一领域。我个人对句法很感兴趣，句法似乎是人类思维的指纹。有限的单词经过组合可以生成无限的句子，这种能力不仅使人着迷，而且它还揭示了至少两个其他独立的认知领域，即数学和音乐。这三个领域的特点在于它们都存在句法（有序排列）：其实，人们可以探讨这样一个构想，即它们三个拥有相同的句法，唯一使它们不同的是词库。另一方面，也有人试图把这种语法同化到支配行为序列的条件上，他们假设语言只不过是进化过程中解放出来的一种动力能。然而，这一假设既没有经验支撑，也没有理论依据。特别是语言表达式中词语间的依赖类型是无法与行为序列相比较的：从术语的语言学意义上讲，行为序列不存在依存关系，而且没有递归操作，除了少数可以表现为重复之外，并不存在功能行为；但所有的语言都有功能词。语法和行为序列间现存的唯一相似之处是，单词和行为一样在时间上都被放入一个序列中，但这只是一个巧合，它不能解释句子和行为之间不可弥补的差异性。其实，如果语法可以支配行为序列的话，只有人类才有语法这一事实将成为一个令人尴尬的难题，因为动物，特别是灵长类动物，确实管理着一系列的行为序列。因此，在认知研究这一广泛的异质领域内研究句法，能为理解人类提供一个独特的机会。
05.
訾姝瑶：在您的研究生涯中，哪位学者对您的影响最深？他/她又是如何影响您的呢？
Andrea Moro教授：
我对许多人，包括我高中的老师，都怀有非常深厚的感激之情：意大利高中拥有悠久的传统，这种传统根源自十九世纪的一些有影响力的教育机构，特别是受Friederich von Humbold模式影响下的学校。Friederich von Humbold对古希腊语、拉丁语和数学的研究具有重大意义。我之所以这样说是因为，我认为人在年轻的时候，能够有这样的机会思考逻辑和语言结构，这对于发展个人能力、选择研究领域以及在其成长过程中选择良师都至关重要。那些年里我所遇到的老师都深深地影响了我。
除了那些良师，我还想对在语言研究领域对我影响最大的三个人表达我的感激之情：Noam Chomsky，1988年，我作为富布莱特项目的学生在麻省理工学院（MIT）第一次见到他；Richard Kayne，曾在威尼斯和帕多瓦开设课程，当时我还是一名研究生；Luigi Rizzi，他是我在日内瓦大学的导师，在那里我获得了“高等教育文凭（Diplôme d’études superieures）”。有趣的是，这三个人之间也因为知识而联系起来，Noam Chomsky一定影响过Richard Kayne，而Luigi Rizzi一直认为Richard Kayne是指引他（科研）走向成熟的重要人物。换句话说，在回答这一问题时，我认为自己也是这一个链条的一部分，这是来自于学术研究过程中的真正的优待：你从来都不是独自一人。因为你会感觉到自己是更大的项目里的一部分，和其他学者有着共同的目标、同一理论框架以及相同的实证研究风格。这种研究风格可以通过引用胡塞尔式的词语来命名，正如Chomsky经常重复的那样，这就是“伽利略式的研究”。
06.
訾姝瑶: 您能给研究认知领域的同学一些建议吗？
Andrea Moro教授:
我只能根据自己有限的经验给一些建议，但并不能泛化。作为一名科研工作者，我很幸运能够投入到两个特定的研究方向中去，这让我提出一些普遍的假设。其中一个是所谓的连系动词（copula），像英语中的“to be”，在很多语言中可以将名词短语转换成谓语。主语通常是由名词短语来表示的，我有机会观察到短语结构的内部核心，即主语和谓语的连接点，在一个理想的环境中，这一连接点可以排除形态变化的干扰，事实上，除了带有系动词的句子，在其他所有句子中，谓语都是区别于主语的，因为它们属于不同的语类，主语通常都是名词，谓语是动词。以形式的方法来处理这种对称性，这一想法来自于我以前的数学学习，在数学中，对称是一个中心概念。这促使我的研究形成了一个系动词语句的统一理论和“动态不对称”理论，“动态不对称”将句法移位视为对称破坏现象。我的另一个研究方向是句法和大脑之间的关系。从事这一研究带有偶然性，虽然我只对句法的形式特征感兴趣，但当时我决定申请一家医院的研究职位。在意大利米兰，我可以和很多医生交流观点，尤其是和Stefano Cappa，他向我介绍了有关神经影像和神经科学的基础知识和研究方法。在那里，我产生了测试大脑对非递归性语言是如何反应的想法，这推动了我有关“不可能语言”的实验发现。
总之，无论是研究形式句法学还是神经语言学，我的很多想法都来自于其他人在不同领域中独特的直觉，比如数学和神经心理学领域的学者。如果我的经验对学生有用，我建议他们多去接触那些非传统的学科，接触不同的观点，因为独特的视角是发现新的研究方向的好方法。
INTERVIEW
04.
Shuyao Zi: What drives you to do cognitive research?
Prof. Andrea Moro:
Cognitive research is directed toward a constellation of different phenomena which may or may not be part of the same domain. I am personally interested in syntax because it appears to be the fingerprint of human mind. The capacity to generate a potentially infinite set of sentences by combining a finite set of words is not only fascinating: it also sheds light on at least two other independent cognitive domains, namely mathematics and music. These three domains are all characterized by having a syntax: arguably, one could explore the conjecture that they are the same syntax and that what makes them different is solely the lexicon. On the other hand, there have been attempts to assimilate syntax proper to the conditions governing sequences of actions, assuming the hypothesis that language is nothing but a sort of motor ability emancipated during evolution. Unfortunately, this hypothesis is not empirically nor theoretically grounded. In particular, the types of dependencies instantiated among words in a linguistic expression can by no means be compared to those manifested by sequences of actions: there are no dependencies in the linguistic sense of the term, there are no interesting recursive operations, besides the trivial ones characterizing repetition, there are no such things as functional actions, whereas all languages have functional words. The only extant similarity is the fact that words are put into a sequence in time as actions are but this is just a coincidence which hides the irreducible differences between sentences and actions. In fact, were this not the case, the very fact that only humans have a syntax would become an embarrassing puzzle since animals, and in particular primates, do manage sequences of actions. Again, studying syntax within the broad heterogeneous domain of cognitive research offers a unique opportunity to understand humans.
05.
Shuyao Zi:In the course of your research, which scholar influences you most? And how did he or she influence you?
Prof. Andrea Moro:
I have a very deep debt to many people, including my teachers at the high school: Italian high school has a long tradition whose roots come from the influential educational institutions developed in the XIX century especially under the model designed by Friederich von Humbold who gave a major relevance to the study of Ancient Greek, Latin and mathematics. I am citing this because I believe that the opportunity to reflect on logical and linguistic structures even during young age is fundamental to develop the capacity to individuate and select the themes and the people who influence a person during her or his maturation. So my first influence comes from the teachers I met during those years.
Besides them, my immense debt is to be express to at least three persons who influenced me more than any others in my linguistic studies: Noam Chomsky, who I first met at MIT as a Fulbright student in 1988, Richard Kayne, who gave courses in Venice and Padua where I was a graduate student and Luigi Rizzi who was my supervisor at the Universitè de Genève where I earned a “Diplôme d’études superieures”. Interestingly, these three persons are also linked among themselves by intellectual tributes, for Chomsky was the certainly influenced Kayne and Rizzi has always recognized Kayne as a fundamental person for his scientific maturation. In other words, to answer your question, this amounts to admit that I feel to be a part of a chain, which is one of the real privileges coming from the academic studies: you are never really alone. You feel to be part of a bigger project sharing common goals, a theoretical framework and the same style of empirical research, which in our case can be named by referring to the Husserlian words as the “Galilean style of research”, as Chomsky often repeats.
06.
Shuyao Zi: Could you give some suggestions to the students majoring in the cognitive field?
Prof. Andrea Moro:
I can only report my own limited experience but I am not sure it can be generalized. In my life as a scientist I was lucky to run into two specific themes which allowed me to develop some general hypothesis. One was the case of the so-called “copula” namely those verbs, like the verb to be in English, which in many languages may turn noun phrases into predicates: since subjects are typically represented by noun phrases I had the opportunity to observe the core of a clause structure, that is the link connecting a subject and a predicate, in an ideal environment, factoring out morphological interference; in fact, in all but copular sentences the predicate is also distinguished by the subject because they belong toe distinct lexical classes: the subject is a noun, whereas the predicate is a verb. The way to treat such a symmetry in a formal way came to me from my previous studies in mathematics where symmetry is a central notion: this led me to the formulation of a unified theory of copular sentences and to “Dynamic Antisymmetry”, a theory that consider syntactic movement as a symmetry breaking phenomenon. The second theme was the relation between syntax and the brain and it was somewhat accidental since I decided to apply for a position in a research hospital, although I was only interested in the formal properties of syntax; there, in Milano (Italy), I could discuss these ideas with medical doctors, in particular with Stefano Cappa, who introduced me to the methods and the fundamentals of neuroimaging and cognitive neuroscience. It was there where I had the idea to test how brain reacts to non-recursive languages which led me to the experimental discovery of impossible languages.
All in all, in both cases, for formal syntax and for neurolinguistics, my own ideas came from the combination of distinct separate intuitions other people had in different fields, namely mathematics and neuropsychology. If my experience may be of some use for the students, I would recommend to get exposed to non-canonical subjects, to many different points of view, since an heterogeneous perspective is a good way to recognize the seeds of new discoveries.
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编辑：李蔷薇 刘婷婷 辛雨晴 张晴 訾姝瑶
排版：马晓彤 安镜儒
审校：陈旭 王丽媛 安镜儒