---
abstract: |
  The speech code is a vehicle of language: it defines
  a set of forms used by a community to carry information.
  Such a code is necessary to support the linguistic
  interactions that allow humans to communicate. 
  How then may a speech code be formed prior to the 
  existence of linguistic interactions?
  Moreover, the human speech code is discrete and compositional,
  shared by all the individuals of a community but different
  across communities, and phoneme inventories are characterized by
  statistical regularities. How can a speech code with these properties form?
   
  We try to approach these questions in the paper,
  using the ``methodology of the artificial''. We 
  build a society of artificial agents, and detail a mechanism that
  shows the formation of a discrete speech code without pre-supposing
  the existence of linguistic capacities or of coordinated interactions.
  The mechanism is based on a low-level model of
  sensory-motor interactions. We show that the integration of certain very 
  simple and non language-specific neural devices 
  leads to the formation of a speech code that
  has properties similar to the human speech code.
  This result relies on the self-organizing properties of a generic
  coupling between perception and production
  within agents, and on the interactions between agents.
  The artificial system helps us to develop better intuitions on how speech
  might have appeared, by showing how self-organization
  might have helped natural selection to find speech.
altloc:
  - http://www.csl.sony.fr/~py/oudeyerJTB05.pdf
chapter: ~
commentary: ~
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creators_id: []
creators_name:
  - family: Oudeyer
    given: Pierre-Yves
    honourific: ''
    lineage: ''
date: 2005
date_type: published
datestamp: 2005-02-22
department: ~
dir: disk0/00/00/41/07
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eprintid: 4107
fileinfo: /style/images/fileicons/application_pdf.png;/4107/1/oudeyerJTB05.pdf
full_text_status: public
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item_issues_comment: []
item_issues_count: 0
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keywords: 'origins of speech,sounds,self-organization,self-organisation,evolution,forms,artificial systems,agents,phonetics,phonology,language,origins,vowels,consonants,phonemic coding,discrete,de Boer,Studdert-Kennedy,Goldstein,articulatory phonology,Lindblom,Hurford,neural network,neurons,learning,speech'
lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:55:51
latitude: ~
longitude: ~
metadata_visibility: show
note: ~
number: 3
pagerange: 435-449
pubdom: FALSE
publication: Journal of Theoretical Biology
publisher: Elsevier
refereed: TRUE
referencetext: ~
relation_type: []
relation_uri: []
reportno: ~
rev_number: 12
series: ~
source: ~
status_changed: 2007-09-12 16:55:47
subjects:
  - comp-sci-complex-theory
  - comp-sci-speech
  - bio-theory
  - ling-phono
succeeds: ~
suggestions: ~
sword_depositor: ~
sword_slug: ~
thesistype: ~
title: The Self-Organization of Speech Sounds
type: journalp
userid: 3681
volume: 233
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