Deficiencies in the Cambridge Grammar of the English Language

[rewboss]

Originally Posted by alienvoord

The fact is that we construe "who do you want to fight?" and "who do you wanna fight?" as having different meanings, without being able to articulate why this is so, and without being explicitly taught how to tell the difference.

Actually, I don't; I construe them as meaning the same thing. If I wanted to ask who you wanted to see fighting, I would ask "Who do you want to see fighting?" (or "Who do you wanna see fighting?"). Or something similar. Mainly because otherwise I would risk being misunderstood. "Wanna" merely represents a pronunciation of "want to" where the particle "to" is reduced somewhat; the sentence is pronounced this way because this is the normal reading of it (and means "Who do you want to be in a fight with?"). If you wish to impart a different meaning to the same sentence, you have to use intonation to avoid ambiguity. This means you have to pronounce the whole thing more clearly than you might otherwise pronounce it, and this would account for writing "want to". And to me it sounds unnatural and contrived in this sentence.

My objection to all of this is the implication that somehow, we don't have to learn any of this stuff. That is what is implied by the word "innate" -- the rules are already there when we are born.

I have seen theories of a deep (innate) grammar where all languages can be reduced to a dozen or so concepts. Now, there may or may not be something in that, but I don't see how we can possibly verify that. In any case, all it means is that we can reduce all languages to half a dozen concepts; it doesn't mean that those concepts are at all innate, or even that our brains really do use this "universal grammar" at all. Humans are very good at finding patterns, but that doesn't mean that that is how things really work.

If you want to use learning to walk as an analogy for learning a language, that's sort of OK. Most of us can walk, and the ability seems genuinely innate. However, being able to walk is no guarantee that you are able to run a four-minute mile, play football or ride a bicycle.

Finally, if I want to criticise a theory, I am under no obligation to advance an alternative theory. It is enough to show that a theory does not adequately explain observed phemonema. Einstein did not use his Theory of Relativity to debunk Newton's Laws of Nature; he proposed his Theory of Relativity because other scientists had already discovered that Newton's laws failed to predict the orbit of Mercury.

[alienvoord]

My objection to all of this is the implication that somehow, we don't have to learn any of this stuff. That is what is implied by the word "innate" -- the rules are already there when we are born.

In my opinion, an adult speaker's linguistic knowledge and how they acquire that linguistic knowledge are two separate issues. Transformational grammar explains a lot of data. This makes it useful. How much of our linguistic knowledge is innate is another issue.

The "want to - wanna" example is not mine, I think it was originally Chomsky's but you're denying its validity, and I have no more examples to hand.

Finally, if I want to criticise a theory, I am under no obligation to advance an alternative theory. It is enough to show that a theory does not adequately explain observed phemonema.

Not everyone agrees with that. In any case, I don't think you've demonstrated that transformational grammar does not adequately explain observed phemonema; it would take a lot of work to do that.

I don't know if there's much more I can say. I've explained Chomsky's position on "between you and I" as well as I can, which was my intention.

[Tdol]

I know this is a bit OT, but someone sent me this link to a Chomsky interview with Ali G, which I hadn't seen: YouTube - ali g interviews noam chomsky

[Casiopea]

Hi Alienvoord,

Sorry for this late reply. You asked about syntax, about how the framework would get around it. Well, it could probably involve something along the line of movement, like this - not that I am offering a solution here or defending the camp.

Base Form: Sam wants pizza, and me too.
Surface Form A: Sam and me want pizza. <'and me' moved>
Surface Form B: Me and Sam want pizza. <'Sam' and 'Me' switch>

All the best.

[MikeNewYork]

Originally Posted by alienvoord

I have some problems with Chomsky's theory too; my problem is that linguistic competence cannot be directly observed. On the other hand, transformational grammar has a lot of explanatory power. I'm not familiar with any other linguistic theory as powerful.

I think Gentner reached the wrong conclusion with his birds. The people and Language Log think Gentner's claim that starlings know recursive embedding is too strong: Liberman tries to show that the same experiment, when performed on humans, will fail. More info here and here.

The birds became habituated to a pattern like AAAABBBB. I haven't read the paper but I think this means they assumed that AAABBB had the structure
[A[A[AB]B]B]
But there's nothing to suggest that the starlings weren't simply recognizing the numbers of As and Bs and responding when the numbers were the same.

I don't think this is a challenge to Chomsky at all. Something that might be a challenge is the claim that Pirahã has no recursive embedding.

AV, we're talking about bird brains here. By comparison, the brain of a human, even a small child is far more complex. If these scientists have made a leap in their conclusions, it is no bigger a leap than Chomsky has made.

[MikeNewYork]

Originally Posted by Tdol

There have been so many claims about animals and language over the years, but they generally seem to fizzle out.

That animals communicate with language has never fizzled. That humans can't recreate it is the problem.

[alienvoord]

Originally Posted by MikeNewYork

AV, we're talking about bird brains here. By comparison, the brain of a human, even a small child is far more complex. If these scientists have made a leap in their conclusions, it is no bigger a leap than Chomsky has made.

I don't know what you mean. I don't see how Gentner's false conclusion has any bearing on whether Chomsky's conclusions are false or not.

But you might be interested to know that some linguists reject Gentner's conclusion because, in their opinion, "Recursion is not the unique core property of the human language faculty anyway."

[alienvoord]

Originally Posted by Casiopea

Hi Alienvoord,

Sorry for this late reply. You asked about syntax, about how the framework would get around it. Well, it could probably involve something along the line of movement, like this - not that I am offering a solution here or defending the camp.

Base Form: Sam wants pizza, and me too.
Surface Form A: Sam and me want pizza. <'and me' moved>
Surface Form B: Me and Sam want pizza. <'Sam' and 'Me' switch>

All the best.

Actually my questions were rhetorical. You said that the CGEL's explanation "fails foremost to take into consideration that language is tied to culture." My point was that the CGEL's explanation has nothing to do with pragmatics (which is what I thought you meant by culture).

Yes, the CGEL's argument is flawed, but their basic point makes sense: co-ordinated pronouns are represented differently than single pronouns in our linguistic knowledge. And by "linguistic knowledge" I mean what I have also called "syntactic rules" and what transformational linguists call "the language faculty" or "the grammar." Whatever we do with coordinating pronouns pragmatically has to be constrained by the grammar.

[Casiopea]

Originally Posted by alienvoord

...their basic point makes sense: co-ordinated pronouns are represented differently than single pronouns in our linguistic knowledge.

Right. But, it doesn't go any further than that. As you know, the framework they're working within does not accommodate said pronominal distributions and, yet, one of the first rules in argumentation is that if you're going to reject an idea, you'd better provide a better solution, or at least a step towards a better or clearer understanding of the problem. Otherwise the endeavor leads us nowhere, which is where the CGEL's argument leads. Solution aside - and there is one - what's the point of their observation?

Originally Posted by alienvoord

Whatever we do with coordinating pronouns pragmatically has to be constrained by the grammar.

Actually, no. A theory explains the data. It's not the other way around.

[alienvoord]

Originally Posted by Casiopea

Actually, no. A theory explains the data. It's not the other way around.

I don't know how much you know about transformational grammar. Do you understand the differences between competence and performance, and between syntax and pragmatics?

The CGEL's idea, and also Chomsky's idea, has everything to do with syntax and has nothing to say about performance factors or pragmatics.