> NC is the biggest senile idiot that ever lived, and thank the Allah that he > doesn't get any more airtime. > RT
It is seldom that I can agree with you, but Noam Chomsky isn't a senile idiot - he was an idiot 40 years ago. His initial works on linguistics back then were rather foolish. He took a similarity in the familial words in various languages and assumed an ingrained genetic language (although genetic wouldn't be his word at the time). He neglected the physical development of the baby. Those of us who have brought up children know that the first articulated sounds they make (after the annoying yowls) involve the closing of the lips to make an "mm" sound, and most languages have that sound for mother. The second linguistic experiment is the "explosive" of the same sound, the "P". So Noam finds a coded and ingrained language while I merely find that babys first articulation has been formed into a word for their closest companion, the mother - and the next one is the second closest, the father. OK, you all can find languages where this doesn't apply but exceptions don't exclude a rule. Chomsky saw similarities and found a rule of "natural language". I see the similarities and see merely a natural and human thing. The mother sees and hears the child making the "mama" sound and attatches it to herself. Quite natural, but not an innate language. Best, Jon To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
