乔姆斯基关于先天性假说

1、 Philosophical ReviewOn Innateness: A Reply to CooperAuthor(s: Noam Chomsky and Jerrold J. KatzSource: The Philosophical Review, Vol. 84, No. 1 (Jan., 1975, pp. 70-87 Philosophical ReviewYour use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available atJSTOR i

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3、se contact .Duke University Press and Philosophical Review are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extendaccess to The Philosophical Review. N. CHOMSKY AND J. KATZ elements "are only empirically necessary." In contrast, rationalists normally were concerned wi

4、th "Knowledge of universal (that is, nonparticular truths, concepts,principles, and so forth," and understood by "necessary," "what is not contingent," not "that which is requiredfor." Where they did use the latter sense, they had in mind "innate principl

5、es . . . logically required for further knowledge." We do insist that it is a contingent hypothesis that the principles required for acquisition of knowledge (of language are as we suggest; a different organism might employ different principles and acquire different systems of knowledge and bel

6、ief on the basis of the evidence available to humans (or acquire no systems, or acquire cognitive systems under conditions that would not suffice for humans. As noted above, Descartes, for one, might disagree, in part because he believed that he had demonstrated the necessity of all phenomena of nat

7、ure. Clearly, we reject this demonstration, while recognizing that certain of his specific theories (for example, of perception can be reformulated quite intelligibly as empirical hypotheses. It is unclear what Cooper thinks he is accomplishing when he reiterates our clearly expressed intention to g

8、ive a modified version of leading ideas that appeared in the rationalist tradition, rejecting the proof that there is a God who does not deceive us, the belief that the contents of the mind are open to introspection, and certain other features of traditional doctrines, and at the same time developin

9、g further the very important and suggestive idea that there is a system of innate principles, an innate schematism, that determines the general form and character of the cognitive systems that can be acquired, given the data of sense, by this particular organism. We are thus attempting to show that

10、these ideas provide an appropriate framework for the investigation of the "operations of the mind," a framework which is, as we noted, sharply at variance with leading ideas in the empiricist tradition. Putting aside Cooper's repeated misrepresentations, several already discussed, this

11、 seems an entirely reasonable enterprise, whether or not our conclusions are correct. It relates to traditional debates in just the way we have discussed, so far as we can see.33 Quite apart from his misrepresentation of our views, Cooper's discussion is marred by simple errors of reasoning. Con

12、sider, for example, his argument that "Chomsky's universals are not universal in the old 33 We have argued as well that this enterprise and the conclusions reached relate as well to current philosophical discussion, but since Cooper does not raise the point, we will not pursue the matter he

13、re. 84 ON INNATENESS sense. " This follows, Cooper alleges, from the fact that Locke was accurate in ascribing to his opponents the view that "Whatsoever is innate must be universal in the strictest sense; one exception is a sufficient proof against it." Thus universals, "in the

14、old sense," must be exceptionless, whereas, "Chomsky . stresses that various grammatical universals need not be found in each and every language." Thus "It follows that Chomsky's universals are not universal in the old sense." Cooper's argument requires that we ident

15、ify "exception to a universal" with "failure of a universal to apply." But the two notions are entirely different. Thus, in jakobson's theory of phonetic universals, which Cooper cites in this connection, it is held that the phonological system of each language is drawn from

16、a fixed universal system of features with particular laws of combination. An exception (counterexample to his theory would be a language with a phonological structure that violated the laws or that used features not in the postulated universal set. But, Jakobson holds, such universals as a given pho

17、nological feature need not be found in each and every language; that is to say, one universal feature may simply be missing from the inventory in some language, and some law of combination may simply have no instances. Evidently, this state of affairs is not to be confused with an exceptoi- to the J

18、akobsonian theory. Thus Cooper's argument collapses. What is more, the possible inapplicability of universal principles, contrary to what Cooper states, is entirely consistent with the dispositional theories of innate ideas of Descartes and others. While it is perfectly true that such theories c

19、annot tolerate exceptions, it is an essential property of such theories that some innate ideas may be missing in a particular "inventory." To recall Descartes's image, ideas are innate in us in the sense that "in some families generosity is innate, in others certain diseases like

20、gout or gravel, not that on this account the babes of these families suffer from these diseases in their mother's womb, but because they are born with a certain disposition or propensity for contracting them" (cited in Aspects, p. 49; and if these babes do not contract the diseases, the dis

21、position or propensity is no less innate. But it is in the latter sense that universals of grammar "tolerate exceptions," as Cooper's very citations make clear. Cooper notes that, for most rationalists, "what is innate determines the possible shapes that experience can take. . . .

22、 Whereas, for Chomsky, one cannot determine a priori what shapes linguistic experience will take on." We have indeed suggested that the principles of universal grammar (linguistic theory "comprise a hypothesis concerning the inborn capacity for language acquisition and describe a 85 N. CHO

23、MSKY AND J. KATZ device that determines what can count as genuine linguistic experience."34 These principles, "we may speculate, are a priori for the species-they provide the framework for the interpretation of experience and the construction of specific forms of knowledge on the basis of

24、experience."35 As far as we can determine, our discussion of the similarities and differences of our views to those of earlier discussion are clear and accurate. We cannot find in Cooper's critique any indication to the contrary. Cooper "finds it impossible to relate" Descartes

25、9;s theory of perception of regular geometrical figures, mentioned earlier, to Chomsky's "thesis in any significant manner." The relation, however, is quite simple, and we have discussed it several times. Descartes held that "we already possesswithin us the idea of a true triangle

26、, and it can be more easily conceived by our mind than the more complex figure of the triangle drawn on paper so that we, therefore, when we see that composite figure, apprehend not it itself, but rather the authentic triangle."36Introducing a distinction between perception and learning which (

27、as explicitly noted seems foreign to Descartes, we suggest that humans "already possesswithin us" the schematism for grammar; and when presented with data of sense, the mind applies this schematism to determine linguistic experience, and produces ultimately a specific, fully articulated re

28、alization of this schema, a grammar, which expresses a person's knowledge of language. It is difficult to debate the issues of how significant this relation is; to us it seems interesting, and becomes still more so when we consider the great range of other classical proposals surveyed in the sam

29、e reviews, but ignored in Cooper's comments. When rationalist and empiricist approaches are interpreted as metatheories, in the manner we have suggested, it is possible and we think fruitful to regard each in its full potential generality as a metahypothesis about the acquisition of all knowledg

30、e and belief. That is, each metatheory can be understood as specifying a form of explanation that holds for each domain in which knowledge and belief are acquired. So interpreted, each metatheory spans such diverse areas as perception, language, culture, politics, and so on. A priori, it is possible

31、 that human 34Katz, op. cit., p. 281. In this discussion, Katz relates these considerations to the question of synthetic a priori knowledge. See above. 35 Problems of Knowledge and Freedom, p. 44. See also Language and Mind, ch. 3, where some relevant suggestions by Lorenz ariecited. 36 Reply to Obj

32、ections V. Cited, with some discussion, in Cartesian Linguistics, pp. 68-69; "Recent Contributions ." 86 ON INNATENESS cognitive systems in some of these domains are developed on the basis of experience along the lines postulated by empiricist theories, while in others they result from the differentiation, articulation, and reali- zation of innate schemata in the manner postulated in our reconstruction of