Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!ames!uhccux!lee
From: lee@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (Greg Lee)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Intelligence (was: IQ), Categorization (was: Racism)
Message-ID: <4431@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu>
Date: 26 Jul 89 18:29:13 GMT
References: <3549@csd4.milw.wisc.edu>
Organization: University of Hawaii
Lines: 23

From article <3549@csd4.milw.wisc.edu>, by markh@csd4.milw.wisc.edu (Mark William Hopkins):

>... Have you ever actually sat down and try to formulate what was involved in
>learning a language.  If so, you will realise the enormous power it takes
>to learn it.  Nothing even comes close in comparison.  The fact that
>we can do it "effortlessly" is a reflection on the emormous power of our
>minds that too many people deny in themselves. ...

Since no one understands the nature of human languages or how they are
learned, accessing the effort or power of mind involved is a purely
speculative endeavor.  One opinion about the matter has the language
capacity largely innate and separate from intellectual ability.  If that
should turn out to be correct, then the accessment might turn out to be:
not much effort needed nor much power of mind.

There is probably a fallacy of thought embedded in this line of
speculation that proceeds from the difficulty of characterizing language
and how it is acquired.  Suppose one asks:  have you ever sat down and
tried to formulate the relative motions of two gravitational bodies?
Difficult problem.  It must be very hard for bodies to learn to behave
this way, or they must be wonderfully gifted to be able to learn this
lesson.
			Greg, lee@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu