On the linguistic import of catastrophe theory

Here we would like to specify philosophically the nature of the contribution of catastrophe theory to linguistics. (For mathematical details see Petitot 1982a, 1985a, 1985b.) In order to do so, we shall focus our attention not so much on technical questions arising from the construction of models as on the epistemological questions arising from the use of topological concepts in linguistics. We shall therefore take our stand at the level of fundamentals, and shall attempt to outline a critique of the formalist dogma that dominates contemporary linguistics. We shall discuss in particular some aspects of the deep version of Culioli and Descles' (1981) thesis.