The question is whether the variety in human languages is constrained by our biology or by general structural issues which any intelligence which developed a communication system would come up against. This should have implications for cognitive science and maybe AI design.
Note that the anti-Chomskyans are not biology-denying blank-slaters. Geoffrey Sampson, who has written a good book about this, is a racist reactionary.
Ah! Yes, OK, that makes sense. Thanks for clarifying.
I don’t have a horse in this race, but I studied linguistics as an undergrad in the 80s so am probably an unexamined Chomskyist by default. That said, I certainly agree that if such general structural constraints exist (which is certainly plausible) then we ought to identify and study them, not just assume them away.
Is there a language that doesn’t have any kind of discrete words and concepts? ’cause I’m pretty sure there are possible intelligences that could construct a communication system that uses only approximate quantitative representations (configuration spaces or replaying full sensory) instead of symbols.
The question is whether the variety in human languages is constrained by our biology or by general structural issues which any intelligence which developed a communication system would come up against. This should have implications for cognitive science and maybe AI design.
Note that the anti-Chomskyans are not biology-denying blank-slaters. Geoffrey Sampson, who has written a good book about this, is a racist reactionary.
Ah! Yes, OK, that makes sense. Thanks for clarifying.
I don’t have a horse in this race, but I studied linguistics as an undergrad in the 80s so am probably an unexamined Chomskyist by default. That said, I certainly agree that if such general structural constraints exist (which is certainly plausible) then we ought to identify and study them, not just assume them away.
Is there a language that doesn’t have any kind of discrete words and concepts? ’cause I’m pretty sure there are possible intelligences that could construct a communication system that uses only approximate quantitative representations (configuration spaces or replaying full sensory) instead of symbols.