Quote:
|
Originally Posted by ilduclo
not at all an expert in any of this, but there's a pretty entertaining article in the latest Harpers Mag all about this, penned by Tom Wolfe, personally I enjoy the musings of WS Burroughs on language, but don't find his analysis any more believable than any other dogmatic claims
"In this month’s cover story, Tom Wolfe attacks the charismatic cult of Noam Chomsky and the long reign of his theory that human beings are born with an innate ability to acquire languages. “It no longer mattered whether one agreed with Noam Chomsky’s scholarly or political opinions or not,” writes Wolfe, “for fame enveloped him like a golden armature.” For thirty years Chomsky had insisted that some empiricist would come along and prove him right. But in 2005, Daniel L. Everett published a paper that didn’t so much refute Chomsky’s conception of a language organ as dismiss it entirely. Wolfe tells the story of the man who proved Chomsky wrong, precipitating the great linguist’s fall from his “plateau on Olympus.” "
|
There's been a big to-do about Everett and Chomsky for some time now. Well... I don't know... maybe a decade? I don't remember the name of the book Everett published that refuted Chomsky's innate language thesis, but it has had plenty of critics too, as had Everett in general.
Tom Wolfe is such a garish writer. Someone needs to slap him with a glove and tell him he is neither Mark Twain nor Kurt Vonnegut (nor John Irving, for that matter). It really grinds my gears when matters of or relating to empirical science are hacked away at by flowery dandies. Not that I don't enjoy some To. Wolfe now and again, but I prefer my science writing — even editorializing — to come from individuals with some background in objective empiricism. Feels like a hackey attempt to steer pop culture toward one side of the argument or t'other when the literati gets involved. (This kind of applies to Chomsky as well. But at least the guy knows he doesn't have the skills to make an empirical statement about any of this. He's waiting out the research, and hoping a scientist will do this for him.)
Anyway, I think Everett's principal assertion is that language is a result of learning. A brief Wikipedia shows me that he likens language to a tool (which it undoubtedly is) and that the capacity for use is a result of problem solving and cultural learning. Communication being the end to which language is the means.
I'd have to get past a Wikipedia page to be able to speak to how he supposedly dismantles Chomsky's ideas, and I don't lab on doing that any time soon because — again — I'm not smart enough for this shit. But I will say that science is a process of trial and error itself... by definition. I think it's quite unreasonable to assert that everything one theorist claims is incorrect just because, hey, here's another theorist who says it's incorrect! Likely, the truth lies somewhere in between, and won't be known for God knows how long.
Also (more Wiki... take a look at the page... I'm not citing direct sources here) Everett asserts that Chomsky's claims are falsified by studies of the Pirah language and culture. Well, that's totally rad, and everything but it's also kind of a
good thing for Chomsky. If his theories are falsifiable, then they fall within the parameters of hard scientific inquiry. If a claim is NOT falsifiable, that means it's essentially scientific rubbish (see Kuhn). Claims like "God exists, he's just too great and unimaginably awesome for us to comprehend" inherently lack falsifiability because nobody can ever hope to gather evidence that this is not the case. Same with "there is no God." No lack of evidence will ever make that a falsifiable claim.
Chomsky's language theories were certainly not 100% correct, and he probably understands that... how could he not? The important thing with scientific theory is to generate a falsifiable hypothesis (I.e. One that could be discarded with enough evidence to the contrary). He appears to have done that. He's certainly kicked off a research fad that has yet to diminish. What's important is coming up with genuinely testable ideas, which Chomsky has clearly done.
But now I'm starting down the barrel of reading up on this shit again because I can't stand how basic and infantile I sound right now, and how limited my ability to write about this subject is. Thanks, guys. God fucking dammit.