Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction
- Part I The science of language and mind
- 1 Language, function, communication: language and the use of language
- 2 On a formal theory of language and its accommodation to biology; the distinctive nature of human concepts
- 3 Representation and computation
- 4 More on human concepts
- 5 Reflections on the study of language
- 6 Parameters, canalization, innateness, Universal Grammar
- 7 Development, master/control genes, etc.
- 8 Perfection and design (interview 20 January 2009)
- 9 Universal Grammar and simplicity
- 10 On the intellectual ailments of some scientists
- 11 The place of language in the mind
- 12 Chomsky's intellectual contributions
- 13 Simplicity and its role in Chomsky's work
- 14 Chomsky and Nelson Goodman
- Part II Human nature and its study
- Appendices
- Commentaries
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
11 - The place of language in the mind
from Part I - The science of language and mind
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction
- Part I The science of language and mind
- 1 Language, function, communication: language and the use of language
- 2 On a formal theory of language and its accommodation to biology; the distinctive nature of human concepts
- 3 Representation and computation
- 4 More on human concepts
- 5 Reflections on the study of language
- 6 Parameters, canalization, innateness, Universal Grammar
- 7 Development, master/control genes, etc.
- 8 Perfection and design (interview 20 January 2009)
- 9 Universal Grammar and simplicity
- 10 On the intellectual ailments of some scientists
- 11 The place of language in the mind
- 12 Chomsky's intellectual contributions
- 13 Simplicity and its role in Chomsky's work
- 14 Chomsky and Nelson Goodman
- Part II Human nature and its study
- Appendices
- Commentaries
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
JM: To get back to business . . . can we talk about the place of language in the mind?
NC: OK.
JM: It's not a peripheral system; you've mentioned that it has some of the characteristics of a central system. What do you mean by that?
NC: Well, peripheral systems are systems that are input systems and output systems. So, the visual system receives data from the outside and transmits some information to the inside. And the articulatory system takes some information from the inside and does some things, and has an effect on the outside world. That's what input and output systems are. Language makes use of those systems, obviously; I'm hearing what you say and I'm producing something. But that's just something being done with language. There's some internal system that you and I pretty much share that enables the noises that I make to get into your auditory system and the internal system that you have is doing something with those noises and understanding them pretty much the way my own internal system is creating them. And those are systems of knowledge; those are fixed capacities. If that's not an internal system, I don't know what the word means.
JM: OK; there are other systems, such as facial recognition. That also is not a peripheral system. It gets information from the visual system.
NC: Well, the facial recognition system is an input system, but of course it makes use of internal knowledge that you have about how to interpret faces. People interpret faces very differently from other objects. Show a person a face upside down; he or she can't recognize it.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Science of LanguageInterviews with James McGilvray, pp. 69 - 75Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2012