[lit-ideas] Re: Russian?
- From: John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: Lit-Ideas <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 6 Jan 2014 17:18:34 +0900
*There is obviously an innate ability to acquire language in humans (not
shared with hedgehogs, presumably) but to claim the existence of an innate
grammar is in effect to claim that we are born with language, or some
crucial aspects of it. This seems highly unlikely on logical grounds. We
aren't born knowing the words of a language, or sounds, so why should we be
born with a grammar ?*
Omar, you have stated that "There is obviously an innate ability to acquire
language...," but what is the nature of that ability? That is the question
that Chomsky was attempting to answer. He began with a critique of the
simple imitation and reinforcement model suggested by B.F. Skinner. If
language were learned by imitation alone, it would be impossible to do what
speakers of any human language can do, i.e., create new sentences,
intelligible to themselves and others, that have never been spoken before.
How is that possible?
Jakobson's phonology suggested the general form of an answer: Human beings
are born with a limited ability to produce and distinguish sounds. The set
of potential significant differences is finite, the set of differences
significant in any particular human language is a subset of those.
Empirically speaking, the sounds of every human language are a subset
called phonemes of the possibilities described by the International
Phonetic Alphabet, which are limited by the nature of the human vocal
tract. When it comes to phonology, every human infant starts with a
sensitivity to all of the possibilities described by the IPA, then learns
which are NOT significant in whatever language the child learns. Adult
speakers of the language mostly, if not entirely, cease to be aware of what
are insignificant differences in that language. Thus, for example, adult
native speakers of Japanese find it difficult to distinguish the sounds
heard as "L" and "R" in English, which makes it hard to distinguish "lice"
from "rice." A group of Japanese businessmen created quite a stir in the
postwar foreign community when, to encourage the U.S. presidential
aspirations of Douglas MacArthur, they hung a large banner from the Sony
Building on the Ginza bearing the test, "Best wishes for General
MacArthur's erection."
Chomsky's gambit was to assume that syntax was acquired in the same way as
phonology. That is, there would be a universal set of primitive forms and
rules governing their combinations that would account for the differences
found in all possible human languages. Thus, for example, let us assume
that all languages include words identifiable as subjects, verbs, and
objects. There are languages in which the usual order is
subject-verb-object, others in which the usual order is
subject-object-verb. But there is only a small number of ways in which a
set of three types of terms can be ordered. All languages will display one
or more of these possibilities. Languages may also differ in having what
linguists call either left-branching or right-branching clauses. Thus, for
example, English clauses are right-branching: We say "The cat who chased
the rat who ate the cheese." Japanese clauses are left branching: "The
cheese <object marker>ate rat<object marker>chased cat <stative verb "there
was" (chiizu wo tabeta nezumi wo oikaketa neko de aru). But again, the
underlying mechanism is the same as in the case of phonology. The human
infant is born equipped to process any of the possibilities realised in any
language and learns which are not permitted in the language it learns to
speak.
Why was this theory plausible? Mathematicians had already demonstrated the
possibility of generating infinite sets from small finite sets of
primitives, e.g., all of of the real numbers from the five Peano
postulates. Alan Turing had suggested the fundamental idea now embodied in
all digital technology, that an infinite number of differently meaningful
strings can be created from series of "1"s and "0"s. The idea that
every human infant is, in effect, a programmable Turing machine, with a
small set of primitives and a set of basic rules built into its operating
system, was not only plausible but appealing.
The difficulties with implementing Chomsky's original proposal arise from
two sources: (1) disagreement on what the primitives of a universal grammar
should be, there being no compelling constraint like that imposed by the
vocal tract on phonology, and (2) the very real possibility that human
"wetware" works very differently from digital software and hardware, more
like an analog than a digital computer, with fuzzy logic embodied in
chemical reactions instead of simple binary switches like those that
represent "1" or "0" in the case of computers. Whether quantum computing
will close the gap between these two models remains to be seen.
Cheers,
John
On Mon, Jan 6, 2014 at 4:03 AM, Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> There is obviously an innate ability to acquire language in humans (not
> shared with hedgehogs, presumably) but to claim the existence of an innate
> grammar is in effect to claim that we are born with language, or some
> crucial aspects of it. This seems highly unlikely on logical grounds. We
> aren't born knowing the words of a language, or sounds, so why should we be
> born with a grammar ? Those who make such an unlikely claim carry the
> burden of empirical proof, which as far as I know hasn't been provided.
> But I don't think that I would go as far as to say that this is a
> transcendental argument, i.e. it is logically possible or imaginable that
> this could be the case.
>
> O.K.
>
>
> On Sunday, January 5, 2014 7:35 PM, Walter C. Okshevsky <wokshevs@xxxxxx>
> wrote:
> I believe that McWhorter's "language hoax" is right on. But perhaps my
> reasons
> for that conclusion differ from his. Mine are transcendental. I'm not sure
> what
> his are. But if they're strictly empirical, he doesn't have a leg to stand
> on.
>
> Those amongst us who wish to claim that "It's really all cultural" or "It's
> really all political" may wish to consider whether that claim is an
> empirical
> claim or one making a transcendental (i.e. universal and necessary) claim
> about
> relations between concepts their possibilities and limits given our "form
> of
> life" or "being-in-the-world."
>
> Walter O
>
>
> Quoting Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx>:
>
> > Julie wrote
> >
> >
> > The article which triggered my original question was all about language
> > acquisition and fluency development. Any general reactions to this?
> >
>
> http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/12/30/258376009/how-language-seems-to-shape-ones-view-of-the-world?utm_content=socialflow&utm_campaign=nprfacebook&utm_source=npr&utm_medium=facebook
> >
> >
> > You might want to look at
>
> >
> >
> >
> <
> http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/12/30/258376009/how-language-seems-to-shape-ones-view-of-the-world?utm_content=socialflow&utm_campaign=nprfacebook&utm_source=npr&utm_medium=facebook
> >
> >
> >
>
> http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Sapir%E2%80%93Whorf_hypothesis.html
> >
> >
> > The so-called Sapir-Whorf (Whorf was Sapir's student; they did not
> > collaborate) has been around for a long time, under the name 'linguistic
> > relativity.' Most people think it's been thoroughly debunked, although a
> > 'weaker version of it' is still around.
> >
> >
> > This is the origin of the view your article sets out.
> >
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hopi_time_controversy
> >
> >
> > might be of interest
> >
> >
> > Robert Paul, who has a vast indifference to time
>
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
> To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
> digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
>
>
>
>
--
John McCreery
The Word Works, Ltd., Yokohama, JAPAN
Tel. +81-45-314-9324
jlm@xxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.wordworks.jp/
Other related posts:
