Book review: Computation of Language: An Essay on Syntax, Semantics and Pragmatics in Natural Man-Machine Communication By Roland Hausser (Springer-Verlag, New York, 1989)

Abstract

Computation of Language is a self-styled essay that addresses issues in natural-language syntax, semantics, and pragmatics from the perspectives of natural-language processing (NLP), formal-language theory (FLT), and philosophy of language. Subtitling a 425-page book an "essay" is somewhat unusual, since an essay usually has the length of a journal article. Yet the word does seem to fit in the sense that an essay can be an "attempt," for the book attempts to provide a philosophical foundation, in terms of a comprehensive theory of natural-language communication, for the practical task of designing and constructing a natural-language-communicating robot (NLC-robot). Hausser fails, however, to connect satisfactorily his philosophical and practical discussions. The book is not a single essay at all: it's really three essays, 1 loosely related by their general concern with language and computation, yet without the sort of sustained unity one would expect for a project of the scope of Hausser's. Though the book as a whole lacks unity, it's not without other virtues. Hausser proposes an interesting delineation of the proper spheres of syntax, semantics, and pragmatics, and the book's parts are insightful and often novel in presentation, thus making them individually worthwhile.