Large language models are interesting, but linguistics and cognitive science should be cautious about centering any new technology as a magic bullet. Doing so reinforces the historically “narrow focus” of linguistics identified in the target article, rather than expanding our understanding of human language. We argue that centering values instead of technology is the best way to future-proof scholarly work and to keep finding out new things about language.

This study examines how love is metaphorically represented by non‑native English speakers, focusing on German learners of English as a second language. Drawing on interviews conducted in 2024, the research investigates the metaphorical linguistic features and conceptualizations used by 96 bachelor’s degree students when expressing love in English. Participants were asked to describe situations in which they would express love and to provide examples of how they would formulate such expressions. As the interviews took place in English used as a lingua franca, the dataset reflects communicative practices characteristic of ELF interactions, including creative or non‑standard metaphor use. Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) serves as the analytical framework for identifying and interpreting the metaphorical patterns in the data. By relying on naturally occurring language rather than introspective intuition, the study addresses critiques of CMT, including its dependence on researcher interpretation and limited empirical grounding. The findings show how socio‑cultural background, L1 conceptual structures and L2 proficiency shape metaphorical expressions of love, contributing to a deeper understanding of emotional metaphor use in second language contexts.

In this response, we outline the central idea of a real pattern as applied in the philosophy of science as well as its relationship to the modal structure of models. We suggest that there may be additional concerns with linguistically real patterns in terms of convergence between natural language processing and formal linguistic theory.

This roundtable discussion convenes contributors to this special issue for reflections on the diversity of their research questions, approaches, and findings, as well as avenues for further inquiry. The discussion touches on several shared concerns, including the role of lexicalization in improvised forms becoming intelligible, enregistered, and reusable; how improvisational action might implicate action below the threshold of awareness; and more generally the relation between sign-processes and embodied action. In doing so, this roundtable discussion considers the importance of social semiotic analysis for understanding improvisation.

Futrell and Mahowald’s assumptions about parallels between language models and human language are primarily based on LMs’ performance in English. In our commentary, we discuss how this impacts some of their key takeaways and highlight LM shortcomings in languages other than English (specifically, Icelandic), which are only alluded to in the target article.

China’s persistently low fertility is associated with fertility inequality, reflected in a U-shaped relationship between household human capital and fertility. We develop an overlapping-generations model showing that this pattern depends on the substitutability of educational inputs. When educational inputs are complementary, fertility is U-shaped in household human capital, with middle-human-capital households having the fewest children; when inputs are substitutable, the relationship is inverted U-shaped. Using China Family Panel Studies data, we find a robust U-shaped relationship between household human capital and fertility, significant complementarity among educational time, monetary investment, and household human capital in children’s human-capital formation, and similar patterns across eastern, central, and western China. Complementarity requires households to increase time and monetary inputs jointly, intensifying the quantity–quality trade-off, particularly for middle-human-capital households. Policies that enhance substitutability among educational inputs may therefore mitigate fertility inequality and raise aggregate fertility.

Acknowledging that large language models have learned to use language can open doors to breakthrough language science. Achieving these breakthroughs may require abandoning some long-held ideas about how language knowledge is evaluated and reckoning with the difficult fact that we have entered a post-Turing test era.

Food habits vary across ethnic groups and geographical regions. However, validated dietary assessment tools accounting for such diversity remain limited. A semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) was developed and validated to assess the habitual food intake of adolescents and adults across Malaysia. The 147-item FFQ was constructed using commonly consumed foods from five main ethnicities (Malay, Chinese, Indian, and Sabah and Sarawak indigenous groups) identified from national surveys. A cross-sectional validation study was conducted among purposively sampled healthy individuals aged 10–59 years from 16 administrative regions. Trained community nutritionists administered the FFQ to assess monthly intake, alongside a three-day dietary record and recall (3DRR) covering two weekdays and one weekend. Spearman’s correlation, Bland–Altman plots, and quartile cross-classification evaluated the agreement between the FFQ and 3DRR for energy, macronutrients, and selected micronutrients (Vitamin C, thiamine, calcium, and iron). Respondents (n = 361; 50.3% adults, 49.7% adolescents) were 50.4% female and represented five main ethnicities (range: 15.8–25.2%), with 60.4% from Peninsular Malaysia. Energy intake estimated by the FFQ (median: 2285 kcal) was significantly higher than by the 3DRR (median: 1785 kcal; Wilcoxon p < 0.001). Spearman’s correlation coefficients observed for energy (crude r = 0.31), and selected nutrients (energy-adjusted r range: 0.19–0.38), along with <10% of extreme quartile misclassification indicated acceptable ranking ability and agreement for most nutrients. Bland–Altman plots indicated no proportional bias for energy and macronutrients. In conclusion, the FFQ is a valid tool for assessing dietary intake within the multi-ethnic Malaysian population nationwide.

Futrell & Mahowald argue that language models (LMs) discover linguistic structure as “real patterns.” I contend this framing underplays what mechanistic interpretability uncovers: LMs implement specific algorithms to solve linguistic tasks. Under the framework of causal abstraction, we can rigorously test whether LMs converge on algorithms posited by linguistic theory, which further supports the authors’ conciliatory proposal.