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From: pindor@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca (Andrzej Pindor)
Subject: Re: What's innate? (Was Re: Artificial Neural Networks and Cognition
Message-ID: <D2vEL5.9u8@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca>
Organization: UTCC Public Access
References: <D2D2DK.6CL@spss.com> <3fosrd$2if@mp.cs.niu.edu> <D2q93L.JHA@spss.com> <3fq5ih$hkb@mp.cs.niu.edu>
Date: Mon, 23 Jan 1995 18:12:41 GMT
Lines: 49

In article <3fq5ih$hkb@mp.cs.niu.edu>, Neil Rickert <rickert@cs.niu.edu> wrote:
>In <D2q93L.JHA@spss.com> markrose@spss.com (Mark Rosenfelder) writes:
>>In article <3fosrd$2if@mp.cs.niu.edu>, Neil Rickert <rickert@cs.niu.edu> wrote:
>>>If the UG hypothesis is true, and if apes also have a UG, then why do
>>>not apes have language, and how did an ape UG evolve without
>>>providing them with language?  If the UG hypothesis is true, and apes
>>>do not have an UG, then it seems highly implausible that the UG could
>>>have evolved in the relatively short time span available.  Thus it
>>>seems that if the UG hypothesis is true, then evolution is false,
>>>creationism of some form is true, and dualism is possibly true.
>
>>I don't agree that UG is "highly implausible".  There are several million
>>years to work with, during which significant changes in the genotype 
>>occurred, including a huge expansion in the size of the brain, and 
>>the changes in the vocal tract which allow us but not apes to produce
>>the sounds of language.  I see no reason to exclude the possibility that
>>these changes included some prewiring of the brain to favor language use.
>
>I completely agree that there could be, and probably is, some
>prewiring of the brain to favor language use.  The evidence for that
>is strong.  But that is a long way from the sort of precise wiring
>that would be needed to encode the supposed UG.
>
I was going to make virtually the same comment as Mark. What do you mean
by "the sort of precise wiring that would be needed to encode the supposed 
UG" ? Do we (or yourself in particular) know anything about prewiring of
the brain to favor language use, to exclude a possibility that this prewiring
favors certain general language structure? I do not have strong opinions 
about the notion of UG (I have not made my own evaluations of pro and con
empirical evidence), but it seems to me quite plausible that the "language
prewiring" imposes restrictions on the structure of languages it can accomodate
and maybe UG is a general framework all human languages have to conform to
due to this prewiring. Why do you find is implausible? You will hopefully
agree that there seems to be evidence that certain geometrical forms (say
golden ratio) or some sound combinations are more pleasing to humans 
(irrespective of cultural conditioning) than other ones? If so, would it
not indicate that they are innate, i.e. come from brain wiring (and/or brain
chemistry)?
Certainly your statement "if the UG hypothesis is true, then evolution is 
false, creationism of some form is true, and dualism is possibly true" is 
far too extreme.

Andrzej

-- 
Andrzej Pindor                        The foolish reject what they see and 
University of Toronto                 not what they think; the wise reject
Instructional and Research Computing  what they think and not what they see.
pindor@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca                           Huang Po
