Noam Chomsky’s research while affiliated with Massachusetts Institute of Technology and other places

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Publications (3)


On the Nature of Language
  • Article

October 1976

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38 Reads

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229 Citations

Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences

Noam Chomsky

Problems and Mysteries in the Study of Human Language

January 1976

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39 Reads

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30 Citations

I would like to distinguish roughly between two kinds of issues that arise in the study of language and mind: those that appear to be within the reach of approaches and concepts that are moderately well understood — what I will call “problems”; and others that remain as obscure to us today as when they were originally formulated — what I will call “mysteries.” The distinction reflects in part a subjective evaluation of what has been achieved or might be achieved in terms of ideas now available. Others see mysteries, incoherence and confusion where to me the issues seem rather clear and straightforward, and conversely.


On the Biological Basis of Language Capacities

January 1976

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150 Reads

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53 Citations

My title, of course, is taken from Eric Lenneberg’s major study of language and biology, now recognized as a classic in the field (Lenneberg, 1967, pp. 393-394). He set himself the task of studying language as “an aspect of [man’s] biological nature, to be studied in the same manner as, for instance, his anatomy.” The purpose of this study was “to reinstate the concept of the biological basis of language capacities and to make the specific assumptions so explicit that they may be subjected to empirical tests.” Adopting this point of view, we may regard the language capacity virtually as we would a physical organ of the body and can investigate the principles of its organization, functioning, and development in the individual and the species. Personally, I feel that this is just the right way to approach the study of human language. I would like to make a few remarks on the program that Lenneberg outlined and developed, concentrating on two theses that seem to me of particular significance.

Citations (3)


... Grondahl & Asokan, 2022;Miller, Naderi, Mullinax, & Phillips, 2022), and if so, exactly what symbols and rules do they implement? Chomsky (1976;2013) distinguished problems and mysteries in cognitive science. Problems were difficult issues whose progress may be slow, but were steadily improving; mysteries were questions whose answers are not graspable given our contingent human conceptual machinery. ...

Reference:

Problems and Mysteries of the Many Languages of Thought
Problems and Mysteries in the Study of Human Language
  • Citing Article
  • January 1976

... It involves minimal taxing of our working memory, as it has an innate component to it. Some examples include learning our first language, face recognition, basic human movements, and the ability to interact socially [19][20][21]. Therefore, arguably, animations displaying human movements may be easier to learn from than those representing mechanical non-human movements. ...

On the Biological Basis of Language Capacities
  • Citing Chapter
  • January 1976