喬姆斯基 Noam Chomsky(1928-): Knowledge of Language: Its Nature, Origin, and Use, 1986

Preface, pp.25-26
For many years, I have been intrigued by two problems concerning human knowledge. The first is the problem of explaining how we can know so much given that we have such limited evidence. The second is the problem of explaining how we can know so little, given that we have so much evidence. The first problem we might call "Plato's problem," the second, "Orwell's problem," an analogue in the domain of social and political life of what might be called "Freud's problem."

The essence of Plato's problem was well expressed by Bertrand Russell in his later work when he raised the question: "How comes it that human beings, whose contacts with the world are brief and personal and limited, are nevertheless able to know as much as they do know?" In certain domains of thought and understanding, our knowledge is vast in scope, highly specific and richly articulated in character, and in large measure shared with others who have similar backgrounds and experience. The same is true of systems of belief and expectation, modes of interpretation and integration of experience, and more generally what we may call "cognitive systems," only parts of which qualify as actual knowledge. The problem that arises when we consider the matter with a little care is one of "poverty of the stimulus." Although our cognitive systems surely reflect our experience in some manner, a careful specification of the properties of these systems on one hand, and of the experience that somehow led to their formation on the other, shows that the two are separated by a considerable gap, in fact, a chasm. The problem is to account for the specificity and the richness of the cognitive systems that arise in the individual on the basis of the limited information available. Cognitive systems result from the interaction of experience and the organism's method of constructing and dealing with it, including analytic mechanisms and the intrinsic determinants of maturation and cognitive growth. The problem, then, is to determine the innate endowment that serves to bridge the gap between experience and knowledge attained-or cognitive systems attained, abstracting from the truce-requirement for knowledge and generalizing to other systems that involve belief, understanding, interpretation, and perhaps more.

The study of human language is particularly interesting in this regard. In the first place, it is a true species property and one central to human thought and understanding. Furthermore, in the case of language we can proceed rather far toward characterizing the system of knowledge attained - knowledge of English, of Japanese, etc. - and determining the evidence that was available to the child who gained this knowledge; we also have a wide range of evidence available about the variety of attainable systems. We are thus in a good position to ascertain the nature of the biological endowment that constitutes the human "language faculty," the innate component of the mind/brain that yields knowledge of language when presented with linguistic experience, that converts experience to a system of knowledge.

Much of the interest of the study of language, in my opinion, lies in the fact that it offers an approach to Plato's problem in a domain that is relatively well circumscribed and open to inspection and inquiry, and at the same time deeply integrated in human life and thought. If we can discover something about the principles that enter into the construction of this particular cognitive system, the principles of the language faculty, we can progress toward a solution for at least one special and quite important case of Plato's problem. We can then ask whether these principles generalize to other cases, or if not, whether an approach that meets with a degree of explanatory success in the case of human language can at least serve as a suggestive model for similar inquiries in other cognitive domains. My own belief is that the principles do not generalize, that they are in crucial respects specific to the language faculty, but that the approach may indeed be suggestive elsewhere, both in its achievements and their apparent boundaries.


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1. Knowledge of language as a Focus of Inquiry, pp.33-35

The study of language has a long and rich history, extending over thousands of years. This study has frequently been understood as an inquiry into the nature of mind and thought on the assumption that "languages are the best mirror of the human mind" (Leibniz). A common conception was that "with respect to its substance grammar is one and the same in all languages, though it does vary accidentally" (Roger Bacon). The invariant "substance" was often taken to be the mind and its acts; particular languages use various mechanisms-some rooted in human reason, others arbitrary and adventitious for the expression of thought, which is a constant across languages. One leading eighteenth century rational grammarian defined "general grammar" as a deductive science concerned with "the immutable and general principles of spoken or written language and their consequences; it is "prior to all languages," because its principles are the same as those that direct human reason in its intellectual operations" (Beauzée). Thus, "the science of language does not differ at all from the science of thought." "Particular grammar"' is not a true "science" in the sense of this rationalist tradition because it is not based solely on universal necessary laws; it is an "art"' or technique that shows how given languages realize the general principles of human reason. As John Stuart Mill later expressed the same leading idea, "The principles and rules of grammar are the means by which the forms of language are made to correspond with the universal forms of thought.... The structure of every sentence is a lesson in logic." Others, particularly during the Romantic period, argued that the nature and content of thought are determined in part by the devices made available for its expression in particular languages. These devices may include contributions of individual genius that affect the "character" of a language, enriching its means of expression and the thoughts expressed without affecting its "form," its sound system and rules of word and sentence formation (Humboldt).

With regard to the acquisition of knowledge, it was widely held that the mind is not "so much to be filled therewith from without, like a vessel, as to be kindled and awaked" (Ralph Cudworth); "The growth of knowledge... [rather resembles]... the growth of Fruit; however external causes may in some degree cooperate, it is the internal vigour, and virtue of the tree, that must ripen the juices to their just maturity" (James Harris).' Applied to language, this essentially Platonistic conception would suggest that knowledge of a particular language grows and matures along a course that is in part intrinsically determined, with modifications reflecting observed usage, rather in the manner of the visual system or other bodily "organs" that develop along a course determined by genetic instructions under the triggering and shaping effects of environmental factors.

With the exception of the relativism of the Romantics, such ideas were generally regarded with much disapproval in the mainstream of linguistic research by the late nineteenth century and on through the 1950s. In part, this altitude developed under the impact of a rather narrowly construed empiricism and later behaviorist and operationalist doctrine. In part, it resulted from the quite real and impressive successes of historical and descriptive studies conducted within a narrower compass, specifically, the discovery of "sound laws 音變定律" that provided much understanding of the history of languages and their relationships. In part, it was a natural consequence of the investigation of a much richer variety of languages than were known to earlier scholars, languages that appeared to violate many of the allegedly a priori conceptions of the earlier rationalist tradition. After a century of general neglect or obloquy, ideas resembling those of the earlier tradition re-emerged (initially, with virtually no awareness of historical antecedents) in the mid-1950s, with the development of what came to be called "generative grammar"-again, reviving a long-lapsed and largely forgotten tradition.

The generative grammar 生成語法 of a particular language (where "generative" means nothing more than 'explicit 明確的') is a theory that is concerned with the form and meaning of expressions of this language. One can imagine many different kinds of approach to such questions, many points of view that might be adopted in dealing with them. Generative grammar limits itself to certain elements of this larger picture. Its standpoint is that of individual psychology. It is concerned with those aspects of form and meaning that are determined by the "language faculty," which is understood to be a particular component of the human mind. The nature of this faculty is the subject matter of a general theory of linguistic structure that aims to discover the framework of principles and elements common to attainable human languages; this theory is now often called "universal grammar" (UG) 普遍語法, adapting a traditional term to a new context of inquiry. UG may be regarded as a characterization of the genetically deterined language faculty. One may think of this faculty as a "language acquisition device," an innate component of the human mind that yields a particular language through interaction with presented experience, a device that converts experience into a system of knowledge attained: knowledge of one or another language.


[Source: Noam Chomsky - Knowledge of Language: Its Nature, Origin, and Use,1985 ]