Download Thinking about language: Chomsky – Geoff Poole

Thinking about language: Chomsky – Geoff Poole
Noam Chomsky (1928-), Institute Professor of Linguistics, MIT, USA
1. The cognitive revolution: linguistics as a science of mind
In the early 1950s, the dominant research paradigm in the humanities and social sciences was
behaviourism. Behaviourists were strongly influenced by a philosophical conception of science
known as logical positivism, according to which scientific knowledge is solely concerned with
empirical observation: discussion of unobservable entities was dismissed as unscientific. For this
reason, behaviourists held that psychology should not attempt to describe the internal structure
and properties of the mind, which cannot be observed directly; rather, they argued that
psychologists should study observable behaviour.
In particular, behaviourists focused on the relationships between the (observable) stimuli presented
to an organism and the organism’s (observable) response. A classical model for the study of
stimulus-response relationships was Pavlov’s investigation of conditioning and learning by
association: in Pavlov’s experiments, a dog that was exposed to the ring of a bell whenever it was
fed learnt to associate the sound of the bell with the expectation of food and would salivate upon
hearing the bell. Behaviourists regarded human language as not essentially dissimilar, i.e. as a set
of stimulus-response links learnt by association.
Noam Chomsky played a key rôle in the downfall of behaviourism. In 1959 he published a
devastating review of Verbal behavior (1957), a treatise on language by the then leading
behaviourist psychologist B. F. Skinner. Chomsky’s review conclusively showed that the stimulusresponse paradigm was wholly inadequate for the study of human language. Moreover, Chomsky
established the principle that language is mentally constituted, i.e. that it exists in the minds of
speakers.
Chomsky’s pioneering work led to the birth of contemporary cognitive science (the so-called
‘cognitive revolution’). Under Chomsky’s influence, researchers in the humanities and social
sciences now acknowledge the need to study the internal structure and properties of the human
mind/brain. In contemporary cognitive science, the study of the mind/brain is guided by an analogy
with the computer: the mind/brain is regarded as an information-processing device; it contains
representations analogous to computer data structures and carries out computational procedures
similar to computer algorithms. This research paradigm is often referred to as the computational
theory of mind.
Some of the arguments for regarding human language as esssentially mentally constituted were
presented in the first lecture for this module and the first lecture for ELL101. Consider for example
the following pair of sentences:
(1)
a.
b.
Flying planes are dangerous.
Flying planes is dangerous.
In (1a), the subject of the sentence (the string Flying planes) is a Noun Phrase (NP) headed by the
plural noun planes —hence the plural verb are; in (1b), Flying planes is a clause headed by the
verb Flying with planes as its object —hence the singular verb is. But the string Flying planes is
physically identical in both cases. Accordingly, being a NP or a clause cannot be a property of
sound strings; it is a property of representations existing only in the mind of speakers.
Consider also the following sentence:
(2)
Bill asked how old Sam was.
(2) is ambiguous between a query about Sam’s age and a query about old Sam’s state of health:
(3)
a.
b.
Bill asked [how old] Sam was.
Bill asked how [old Sam] was.
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Ignoring intonation, the difference between (3a) and (3b) has no physically observable correlates:
these two syntactic structures exist only in the minds of speakers.
2. Linguistic creativity: compositionality, rules, and grammars
One of Chomsky’s key concerns is how to account for the creative character of human language.
At any point in his life, a human being has only been exposed to a finite set of utterances; yet, in
the absence of pathological conditions, an adult human being has the capacity to produce and
understand an infinite variety of sentences, most of which he will never have been exposed to
before. The problem is: how is this infinity compatible with the inevitably finite character of the
human mind/brain?
One key to the answer lies in the compositional nature of complex linguistic signs. Like Saussure,
Chomsky acknowledges that the relationship between sound (signifier) and meaning (signified) in
simple signs such as cat is arbitrary, as witnessed by the fact that the same signified is associated
with different signifiers in French (chien), German (Hund), Spanish (perro), etc. Any speaker can
only store a finite stock of such arbitrary simple signs in his mental lexicon. In the case of complex
linguistic signs, however, the relationship between sound and meaning is not arbitrary. Consider,
for example, the two sentences in (4):
(4)
a.
b.
A dog bit a man.
A man bit a dog.
(4a) is relatively trivial; in contrast, (4b) is newsworthy. The difference in meaning between (4a)
and (4b), however, is not arbitrary: it correlates in a predictable way with the differences in word
order between the two sentences. This correlation is clearly rule-governed; the same pattern can
be found in the following examples:
(5)
a.
b.
John loves Mary
Mary loves John.
(6)
a.
b.
The policeman spotted the burglar.
The burglar spotted the policeman.
Thus, the meaning of a complex sign is compositional: it is determined by rules on the basis of the
meaning of arbitrary simple signs plus the internal structure of the complex sign.
The rule-governed character of complex linguistic signs holds the key to human linguistic creativity.
Chomsky argues that, in the mind/brain of speakers, there is represented a (finite) set of linguistic
rules. Given a (finite) stock of arbitrary simple signs, these rules can generate an infinite number of
complex signs (sentences), whose meaning is compositional. From this viewpoint, the goal of
linguistic analysis is the discovery of the mentally represented set of rules that underlie a speaker’s
linguistic abilities. Chomsky uses the term ‘grammar’ to refer to this mentally represented set of
rules. In its ordinary use among linguists, the term ‘grammar’ refers both to the set of rules
represented in the mind of a speaker and to the linguist’s description of that set of rules.
An important property of grammatical rules is structure-dependency. Sentences do not just consist
of series of words like beads on a string. Rather, they consist of hierarchy of constituents such
noun phrases (NPs), verb phrases (VPs), etc., each of which can in turn be broken down into
parts. Grammatical rules do not refer to the linear position of individual words in a sequence, but
rather manipulate sentence constituents. Given (7), for example, you might be tempted to say that
the rule for forming yes/no-questions in English involves moving the first verb in the sentence to
the front. (8), however, shows that what moves is the verb following the subject, regardless of its
linear position:
(7)
(8)
a.
b.
The boy will arrive soon.
Will the boy ___ arrive soon?
a.
b.
[The person that you have seen] will come back soon.
*Have the person that you ___ seen will come back soon?
c.
Will [the person that you have seen] ___ come back soon?
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3. Narrowing the focus: competence vs performance
The foregoing discussion has shown that, for Chomsky, linguistics is an essentially mentalistic
enterprise: the focus of linguistic study is the speaker’s mentally represented knowledge of
language (in particularly, the rules comprised within the speaker’s mental grammar). To sharpen
this focus, Chomsky establishes a fundamental conceptual distinction between competence and
performance: ‘competence’ refers to the knowledge of language represented in the mind of an
individual speaker; ‘performance’ refers to the behaviour in which knowledge is put to use. For
Chomsky, linguists should focus upon the study of competence.
The competence/performance distinction enables Chomsky to abstract away from a multiplicity of
factors that, whilst affecting linguistic behaviour, do not reflect the speaker’s underlying knowledge
of language: e.g. memory limitations, distractions, processing errors, hesitations, etc. However, the
degree of idealization involved in Chomsky’s characterization of competence has been the source
of much controversy:
First, some linguists claim that, by pursuing excessively abstract theories of linguistic competence,
Chomsky has made it impossible to explain how linguistic knowledge is put to use. These
researchers argue that the study of linguistic competence cannot be altogether divorced from
performance: competence models —they argue— must be compatible with plausible accounts of
language processing in production, comprehension, etc.
Secondly, in a much debated statement of the competence/performance distinction (Aspects of the
theory of syntax, 1965, pp. 3-4) Chomsky suggests that the study of competence should abstract
away from variation. Many researchers, particularly within the sociolinguistic tradition, are
vigorously opposed to this view: they argue that the knowledge of the patterns of variation
accepted within a speech community is an essential component of a speaker’s linguistic
competence.
Interestingly, Chomsky’s concept of performance is similar to Saussure’s notion of parole: both are
behavioural. The Chomskyan concept of competence is, however, significantly different from the
Saussurean notion of langue:
Langue
 finite list of simple signs

public/social
Competence
 finite set of rules generating an
infinity of complex expressions
 individual psychology
For Chomsky, the proper object of study for linguistics is the individual’s competence. Chomsky
regards social/public entities such as ‘English’ or ‘Spanish’ as not well-defined. E.g. if you
attempted to write a ‘grammar of English’, where would you draw its geographical and
chronological boundaries? Does the same set of rules underlie the language one hears in, say,
Newcastle and Bombay?
4. Plato’s Problem, the innateness hypothesis, and Universal Grammar
We saw above that Chomsky’s ideas about language are crucially geared towards accounting for
the fact of linguistic creativity. Another of Chomsky’s key concerns is Plato's problem. In linguistics,
this term is used to refer to the tough questions raised by language acquisition. The essential
problem is: how is it possible for children to acquire language (i.e. to construct a mental grammar)
as easily and as swiftly as they do, given the impoverished and limited character of the evidence to
which they have access?
Chomsky formulates several arguments to show that language acquisition cannot depend solely
upon the primary linguistic data (i.e. the utterances to which the child is exposed):
First, the primary linguistic data to which the child has access fail to reflect the properties of mental
representations of language in crucial ways. For example, the multiplicity of factors affecting
performance (memory limitations, distractions, errors, etc) often result in the child being exposed to
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deviant utterances. More seriously, many aspects of linguistic structure are exclusively mental and
have no physical manifestation; they are therefore not reflected in the primary linguistic data. For
these reasons, the child’s primary linguistic data are to be regarded as impoverished in relation to
the mental representations that need to be acquired; this is the poverty-of-the-stimulus argument.
Secondly, children only have access to positive evidence: namely, to a set of utterances in the
ambient language. They are not supplied with explicit information as to what structures are not
permitted in the target language. Observe, in this connection, that children acquire language
without formal tuition. Notably, they altogether ignore adults’ attempts at correcting their ‘mistakes’.
Thus, children succeed in constructing a grammar without access to negative evidence.
The arguments from the poverty of the stimulus and from the absence of negative evidence
indicate that Plato’s Problem is a tough one. Chomsky's solution is to assume that a good deal of
linguistic knowledge is in fact innate. Notably, he asserts that, by virtue of her genetic endowment,
the child is born with a cognitive device that facilitates the acquisition of language: this is known as
the Language Acquisition Device (LAD). Thus, the child does not come to language acquisition as
a blank slate (tabula rasa); rather, she has a basic blueprint of linguistic structure.
Chomsky assumes that the innate, genetically transmitted LAD supplies the child with knowledge
of universally valid principles of linguistic structure. For this reason, the LAD is also known as
Universal Grammar (UG). As well as universal principles of language, UG offers the child a limited
number of options (parameters) among which she must choose when acquiring her language.
Among the principles which, according to Chomsky, are supplied innately to the child by UG is
structure-dependency (see above): thus, innate access to the principle of structure dependency
prevents children from attempting to cast the rule for yes/no-question formation in English in purely
linear terms.
Many linguists agree in principle with Chomsky’s innateness hypothesis, but, as was the case with
the competence/performance distinction, the details remain surrounded by furious controversy.
There is thus extensive disagreement as to the precise contents of UG. Nonetheless, there are
several arguments that support the idea that humans possess an innate language faculty:
1. Species-specificity. Only human beings possess language. This suggests that there is some
genetically encoded property of the species that is essential to the acquisition of language.
2. The speed and ease of first language acquisition.
3. Uniformity across populations in the rate and stages and acquisition. This suggests that the
pace of acquisition is not essentially dictated by external stimuli, but rather follows an internal
genetic programme.
4. The critical period. The ability to acquire language declines dramatically after puberty. This
suggests that acquisition must take place while the internal genetic programme is unfolding.
5. Patterns of mistakes and nonmistakes. During language acquisition, children do not make
certain mistakes that one would expect to observe if they were freely formulating hypotheses about
the primary linguistic data: e.g. they do not formulate structure-independent rules for forming
questions. The absence of such mistakes suggests that they are prevented by innate knowledge of
universal principles of language.
References
Dahaene, S. (1997). The number sense: how the mind creates mathematics. London: Penguin Books.
Green, D.W. and others (1996). Cognitive science: an introduction. London: Blackwell.
Lyons, J. (1991). Chomsky. London: Fontana.
Maher, J., J. Groves (1996). Chomsky for beginners. London: Penguin Books.
Newmeyer, J. F. (1996). Generative linguistics: a historical perspective. London: Routledge.
Smith, N. (1989). The twitter machine. London: Blackwell.
Smith, N. (1999). Chomsky: ideas and ideals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
http://www.staff.ncl.ac.uk/hermann.moisl/ell130/lecture3full.htm
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