The physics of randomness and regularities for languages (lifetimes, family trees, and the second languages); in terms of random matrices

TL;DR

This paper explores the underlying physics of language evolution and structure using random matrix models, focusing on processes like noise and fragmentation to explain observed linguistic regularities and family trees.

Contribution

It introduces a novel matrix-based model combining randomness and fragmentation to analyze language lifetimes and family trees, providing a physical perspective on linguistic phenomena.

Findings

Model reproduces empirical language data

Highlights role of randomness and fragmentation in language evolution

Provides a new framework linking physics and linguistics

Abstract

The physics of randomness and regularities for languages (mother tongues) and their lifetimes and family trees and for the second languages are studied in terms of two opposite processes; random multiplicative noise [1], and fragmentation [2], where the original model is given in the matrix format. We start with a random initial world, and come out with the regularities, which mimic various empirical data [3] for the present languages.