Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!news.mathworks.com!uunet!psinntp!scylla!daryl
From: daryl@oracorp.com (Daryl McCullough)
Subject: Re: What's innate?
Message-ID: <1995Feb13.120850.12610@oracorp.com>
Organization: Odyssey Research Associates, Inc.
Date: Mon, 13 Feb 1995 12:08:50 GMT
Lines: 89

rickert@cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert) writes:

>Much of your commentary is related to complexity.  If language were
>the only complex human activity, the case for UG would be stronger.
>But the integral calculus is rather complex, so can we argue that
>there is an innate integral calculus module?  Juggling is rather
>complex, so can we argue that there is an innate juggling module?

Neil, I don't know where you are coming from with these analogies,
since they seem to me to work against your argument. *If* children
learned juggling or integral calculus the same way they learned
language, then I would agree that the same kind of learning was
involved. But children don't just "pick up" integral calculus from
being exposed to it, the way that they do language.

However, there is the case of "prodigies", kids who learn piano
or math or whatever without being taught, but simply by being exposed
to it. I don't know whether there is any good theories about what
makes prodigies, though.


>I could name many other complex activities.  Yes, you can postulate a
>unique special purpose mental organ for each complex activity.

Neil, you seem to be arguing against a position without bothering to
try to understand the position. The reason that Chomsky argued that there
was innate support in the brain for language is because the way language
is learned seems so *different* from the way other complex activities
are learned. Your strategy in arguing against Chomsky seems to be to
ignore what he says, and argue against a position that is easier to attack,
such as "All complex activities require innate support in the brain".


>But why not simply postulate a general purpose learning methodology which
>applies to all such activities.  It seems a simpler and more likely
>explanation.

Because the evidence doesn't support that.

>Sigh!  I did not claim to *prove* that there is no UG.
>
>The argument for UG is of the form:
>   (a)	cite a bunch of evidence.
>   (b)	postulate UG.
>   (c)	demonstrate that the UG hypothesis can explain the evidence.
>
>The argument I was suggesting was of the form:
>   (a)  cite the same bunch of evidence.
>   (b)	postulate that there is no UG.
>   (c)	demonstrate that the no-UG hypothesis can explain the
>	evidence.

Except that you didn't cite any evidence, and you didn't demonstrate
how your alternative hypothesis could explain anything.

>The point was not to prove that there is no UG, but to demonstrate
>that the argument for UG is exceedingly weak.

But you haven't been addressing any of the evidence for UG. You have
only been addressing the phrase "poverty of stimulus" without bothering
to understand what Chomsky meant by the phrase.

>I am quite ready to
>admit the possibility that a neurologist might discover a UG
>tomorrow, although I think it highly unlikely.  What I am arguing is
>that, given the weakness of the argument for UG, it is better
>scientific methodology to keep your options open, and not to jump
>into a UG assumption.

I don't have any idea whether there is any evidence for UG. I only
know that the arguments against it in this newsgroup are pretty weak.

>>          It seems to me that stochastic arguments actually support
>>Chomsky, because (1) sentences with the right word frequencies still
>>sound like nonsense, and (2) sentences that are clearly sensible can
>>use quite rare word combinations.
>
>It seems to me that this misses the point.  When the words are chosen
>on the basis of the meaning that is to be conveyed, the number of
>possible words drops to a very small number.  The "quite rare"
>word combinations may be highly probable given that semantic
>restriction.

If the words are chosen according to meaning, then why is a knowledge
of statistical likely necessary? I think that this statistical approach
is a pretty weak alternative to using grammar.

Daryl 

