Of Minds and Language: A Dialogue with Noam Chomsky in the Basque Country PDF
Preview Of Minds and Language: A Dialogue with Noam Chomsky in the Basque Country
OF MINDS AND LANGUAGE This page intentionally left blank O F M I N D S A N D L A N G U A G E A Dialogue with Noam Chomsky in the Basque Country Edited by Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, Juan Uriagereka, and Pello Salaburu 1 3 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxfordox26dp OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. IffurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwidein OxfordNewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress intheUKandincertainothercountries PublishedintheUnitedStates byOxfordUniversityPressInc.,NewYork #2009editorialmatterandorganizationMassimoPiattelli-Palmarini, JuanUriagereka,andPelloSalaburu #2009thechapterstheirvariousauthors Themoralrightsoftheauthorshavebeenasserted DatabaserightOxfordUniversityPress(maker) Firstpublished2009 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, withoutthepriorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress, orasexpresslypermittedbylaw,orundertermsagreedwiththeappropriate reprographicsrightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproduction outsidethescopeoftheaboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment, OxfordUniversityPress,attheaddressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisbookinanyotherbindingorcover andyoumustimposethesameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData Dataavailable TypesetbySPIPublisherServices,Pondicherry,India PrintedinGreatBritain onacid-freepaperby CPIAntonyRowe,Chippenham,Wiltshire ISBN 978–0–19–954466–0 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Contents ForewordandAcknowledgments ix ListofAbbreviations xi 1 Introduction 1 MassimoPiattelli-Palmarini,PelloSalaburu,andJuanUriagereka PART 1: OVERTURES 2 OpeningRemarks 13 NoamChomsky Discussion 3 TheNatureofMerge:ConsequencesforLanguage,Mind, andBiology 44 CedricBoeckx Discussion 4 TheFoundationalAbstractions 58 C.R.Gallistel Discussion 5 Evolingo:TheNatureofTheLanguageFaculty 74 MarcD.Hauser Discussion 6 PointerstoaBiologyOfLanguage? 85 GabrielDover Discussion 7 LanguageinanEpigeneticFramework 97 DonataVercelli Discussion 8 BrainWiringOptimizationandNon-genomicNativism 108 ChristopherCherniak Discussion PART 2: ON LANGUAGE 9 Hierarchy,Merge,andTruth 123 WolframHinzen Discussion vi contents 10 TwoInterfaces 142 JamesHigginbotham Discussion 11 MovementandConceptsofLocality 155 LuigiRizzi Discussion 12 UninterpretableFeaturesinSyntacticEvolution 169 JuanUriagereka Discussion 13 TheBrainDifferentiatesHierarchicalandProbabilisticGrammars 184 AngelaD.Friederici Discussion 14 RoundTable:LanguageUniversals:Yesterday, Today,andTomorrow 195 CedricBoeckx JanetDeanFodor LilaGleitman LuigiRizzi GeneralDiscussion PART 3: ON ACQUISITION 15 InnateLearningandBeyond 223 RochelGelman Discussion 16 TheLearnedComponentofLanguageLearning 239 LilaGleitman Discussion 17 SyntaxAcquisition:AnEvaluationMeasureAfterAll? 256 JanetDeanFodor Discussion 18 RemarksontheIndividualBasisforLinguisticStructures 278 ThomasG.Bever PART 4: OPEN TALKS ON OPEN INQUIRIES 19 TheIllusionofBiologicalVariation:AMinimalistApproach totheMind 299 MarcD.Hauser Discussion contents vii 20 WhatIsThereinUniversalGrammar?OnInnateandSpecific AspectsofLanguage 329 ItziarLaka Discussion 21 IndividualDifferencesinForeignSoundPerception: PerceptualorLinguisticDifficulties? 344 Nu´riaSebastia´n-Galle´s Discussion 22 LanguageandtheBrain 352 AngelaD.Friederici Discussion 23 Conclusion 379 NoamChomsky Discussion References 411 Index 443 This page intentionally left blank Foreword and Acknowledgments In mid-2004, the organizers of the Summer Courses at the University of the Basque Country (UBC), San Sebastia´n Campus, contacted me because they wanted to organize a special event in 2006 to celebrate the twenty-fifth anni- versary of our summer program. Their idea was to arrange a conference in whichNoamChomskywouldfigureasthemainspeaker. What immediately came to mind was the Royaumont debate between Jean Piaget and Noam Chomsky, organized in October 1975 by Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini and published in a magnificent book (Piattelli-Palmarini 1980)thatgreatlyinfluencedscholarsattheUBCandhelpedtoputlinguistics onanewfootingattheUniversity,particularlyintheBasquePhilologydepart- ment.AsecondRoyaumontwasnaturallyoutofthequestion,sinceJeanPiaget wasnolongerwithusandalsobecauseChomsky’sowntheorieshaddeveloped spectacularly since 1975, stimulating experts in other disciplines (cognitive science, biology, psychology, etc.) to join in contributing new tools to the study of human language. It seemed therefore like a wonderful opportunity to bringtogetherscientistsfromvariousfieldsandgivethemthechancetodiscuss theirfindingsandproposalsatlengthwithNoamChomsky,inanopendebate lasting several days. But in order for this to be possible, we would first have toconvinceChomskytocomeandtakepart. Accordingly,IcontactedJuanUriagerekaattheUniversityofMarylandand told him my plan. Juan was instantly enthused by the idea and wanted to get started right away, so we talked to Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini about it and immediately set in motion all the machinery that an event of this nature requires. Noam agreed to the project, and all the persons whom we asked to participate gave us an immediate positive response. The result was a vibrant, fascinatingweekofwork,thought,anddiscussioninSanSebastia´n,fromJune 19th–22nd, 2006. The sessions drew large audiences of scholars and students, aswellasveryamplecoveragebythelocalandnationalnewsmedia.Chomsky himselfwasparticularlyengagedintheproceedings,nevermissedasingletalk, andcontributedatlengthtomanyofthediscussions,asreadersofthisvolume will see in the following pages, which contain the main contributions to that
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