The "Time Machine" of Language

          A lot of us are familiar with the Rosetta Stone, an invaluable tool used to read Egyptian hieroglyphs. But it seems like a new "Rosetta Stone" has emerged, a technologically advanced one, that is. Researchers and scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, have created such a device, that of which has the ability to recognize and reconstruct a multitude of languages tracing back to the time of our ancestors. Using a newly fabricated computer program, the scientists of UC Berkeley and that of the University of British Columbia are able to regenerate those foundational languages, "proto-languages," that served as the predecessors of modern language(s) today. Some of these ancient languages include Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Austronesian, which were both beneficial for the development of the Southeast Asian and Pacific languages, among others.
        The method behind the madness of this form of technology is probabilistic reasoning, in which the device is capable of using "logic" and the statistics/figures of its complex database to create over 600 Proto-Austronesian languages with an 85% accuracy rate. The information that such technology can provide is also quite significant: Reconstructing language in a matter of days, this new device will serve to gain further insight on what the civilizations of the past were like, to observe how much vocabulary and use of words have changed or are still prevalent, and it can even be beneficial in the sense that we will be able to predict what transformations may become of our language in the future. Rather than just being able to discover more about our ancestors, we can also come to track which languages may become extinct.
        Currently, UC Berkeley researchers are advancing on this project, by creating a computational model (basically a tree model) that can link the alterations of words over time, similar to a "family tree." Implementing what is known as the Markov Chain Monte Carlo Sampler, the computer program is able to group words that share a similar origin, sound the same, and have a common history (cognates), and every step of the way, an "artificial" word is constructed for each mother language. With new findings being added to the computer program's database, the system is constantly being updated and modified reconstructions of words are becoming available.
        What was once the arduous task of manual labor has become what the science and technological fields get ramped up about, Big Data, which essentially eliminates the need for an on-hand database. However, a greater implication from the advancement of language will be the advancement of knowledge. With an ever growing vocabulary, our thought processes will no longer be restricted by a set amount of words and our ideas less askew and altered when spoken. In reference to Francis Bacon's The Four Idols, civilization will face less of a negative impact by the Idol of the Marketplace.

Computational model of the Proto-Austronesian language.

-Radster


Sources:
Article/ Photo: Automated "Time Machine" Reconstructs Ancient Languages by Yasmin Anwar
Big Data: What is Big Data?