Outer Reaches of the Palindrome Page: 31
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S= if S then S
"A sentence can consist of the word "if', followed by a sentence, followed by the word
"then", followed by another sentence."
These rules embed one instance of a symbol inside another instance of the same symbol
(here, a sentence inside a sentence), a neat trick- logicians call it "recursion" - for
generating an infinite number of structures. The pieces of the bigger sentence are held
together, in order, as a set of branches growing out of a common node.27
Furthermore, recursion is a powerful tool in morphology, particularly with respect to
derivational affixes. In the same manner that phrases within phrases and sentences within
sentences can form loops that help to illuminate specific meanings, affixes attached to a word
can recursively modify the meaning of the word. For a simple example, take the word
"Republican," which pertains to one's political stance. Attach the prefix "anti" to negate the
original word and suddenly the word becomes "anti-Republican", which denotes opposition
toward the idea of "Republican." Repeat the process by attaching "anti" to "anti-Republican" and
you get "anti-anti-Republican," which denotes opposition toward the idea of "anti-Republican,"
which pretty much brings us back full circle to a point where we are closer if not directly at the
original meaning. This process can continue indefinitely, as illustrated further by Pinker:
... the output of one morphological rule can be the input to another, or to itself: one can
talk about the "unmicrowaveability" of some French fries or a "toothbrush-holder
fastener box" in which to keep one's toothbrush-holder fasteners. This makes the number
of possible words in a language bigger than immense; like the number of sentences, it is
infinite. (for example, "floccinaucinihilipilification"- OED- "the categorizing of31
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McConnell, Michael Constantine. Outer Reaches of the Palindrome, thesis, December 2003; Denton, Texas. (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc4407/m1/34/: accessed May 22, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; .