arXiv:2608.21088cs.CL2026-08

LLM通过算法重加权语言分布,影响人类选择的语言演化路径。

When the Feature Pool Goes Algorithmic: Extending Mufwene's Ecology of Language Evolution to LLM-Mediated Exposure

  • 将LLM视为语言分布的算法中介,重塑人类可接触的语言变体频率。
  • 模型输出具特定语言特征,但未必导致语言趋同,社会评价决定其传播命运。
  • 适用于研究语言演化、人机交互与社会认知的跨学科研究者。

Mufwene的语言生态模型将语言演化置于个体语码变异的竞争及说话人从互动中获取的语言材料间的筛选之间。大型语言模型(LLMs)虽未改变人类说话人作为选择主体的位置,却使该架构变得复杂。本文主张,应将LLM视为分布中介:它们聚合人类群体产生的语言,通过训练和后训练过程转换其分布,并大规模重新分发具有模型特性的输出。由此形成的生态过程称为‘算法重加权’——模型中介能改变竞争性语言变体被人类选择者接触到的相对频率。现有证据显示模型具备特定语言特征及词汇采纳模式,支持此路径的部分环节,但尚不能证明必然趋同。人类社会评价仍起决定作用:模型相关形式可能扩散并成为惯例,或因被视为‘像AI’而被回避,亦可能根本无法传播。该观点将Mufwene的特征池生态学向前推进一步至说话人选择之前,提出了关于采纳、模型版本效应、收敛与社会逆转的可检验预测。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Mufwene's ecological model locates language evolution in competition among variants contributed by individual idiolects and in speakers' selection from linguistic material made available through interaction. Large language models (LLMs) complicate this architecture without requiring the locus of selection to move away from human speakers. This article argues that LLMs are best treated as distributional mediators: they aggregate language produced across human populations, transform its distribution through training and post-training, and redistribute model-specific outputs at scale. I call the resulting ecological process algorithmic reweighting of the speaker-accessible distribution: model mediation can alter the relative frequencies with which competing variants reach human selectors. Emerging evidence on model-specific linguistic profiles and lexical uptake is consistent with parts of this pathway, but does not establish inevitable convergence. Human social evaluation remains decisive: model-associated forms may diffuse and become conventionalized, become socially recognizable as 'AI-like' and subsequently avoided, or fail to diffuse in the first place. The proposal extends Mufwene's feature-pool ecology one step upstream of speaker selection and yields testable predictions about uptake, model-version effects, convergence, and social reversal.

语言演化LLM影响社会认知

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