Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sunybcs!rutgers!att!cbnewsm!ele
From: ele@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (eugene.l.edmon)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: The Chinese Room and the Babylonian Bureaucracy
Summary: followup to snooty
Message-ID: <8527@cbnewsm.ATT.COM>
Date: 14 Jan 90 00:49:06 GMT
References: <492@berlioz.nsc.com>
Reply-To: ele@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (eugene.l.edmon,lc,)
Distribution: usa
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 21

In article <492@berlioz.nsc.com> andrew@dtg.nsc.com (Lord Snooty @ The Giant Poisoned Electric Head       ) writes:
>In article <8489@cbnewsm.ATT.COM>, ele@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (eugene.l.edmon) writes:
>> In fact, it seems to make more sense to argue that children
>> learn semantics first as they learn words then how to string
>> them together in sentences.
>	at least it's obvious to you. that's nice, but hardly counts
>	as a refutation, eugene.
>

Well let's see if this works.  I make up a new word, say acadedementia,
and tell you what it means. You then know all you need to use
the word correctly. However, if I instead tell you not the meaning
but the syntactic rules associated with use of the word,
you will not be able to use it correctly.  

Now it seems to me (and by this I don't necessarily mean obvious)
that an adult's ability to use a word correctly from learning
its meaning depends on a long history with the syntax of the
language. 
-- 
gene edmon    ele@cbnewsm.ATT.COM