Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!usc!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bloom-picayune.mit.edu!athena.mit.edu!valis From: valis@athena.mit.edu (John O'Neil) Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy Subject: Re: Modelling reinforcement Message-ID: Date: 18 Dec 90 01:23:36 GMT References: <25667@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU> <16562@cgl.ucsf.EDU> greenba@gambia.crd.ge.com (ben a green) writes: In article valis@athena.mit.edu (John O'Neil) writes: For an excellent criticism of the behavioristic view of language and semantics, see Chomsky's review of B. F. Skinner's ``Verbal Behavior'' in Language 35: 26-58. Although not as easily available, it is a useful antidote to Skinner's work. Chomsky's review was highly influential among those who were unfamiliar with Skinner's work, and had the effect of making them think they could dismiss it. As unlikely as it might seem to you, there are people who have read Skinner -- even understood him -- and do not agree with him. However, the review missed the point of the book. Chomsky's advice to study "what language is" before "what language is for," doesn't work well when you consider language as a tool. The essence of understanding a tool is to understand first what it is for. Skinner explains what language is for in many of its aspects. This is like carping that physicists study the properties of electrons outside of their use in computers and power systems. If Bohr, Einstein, and Planck _inter alia_ had not thought about ``what electrons are'', we would have a much poorer conception of ``what electrons are for''. Chomsky's formal grammars are useful for computers, but for human languages, his approach has been discarded in favor of "pragmatics," a school which analyzes language explicitly in terms of its uses. This will come as quite a surprise to the folks on sci.lang, and as for me -- you can only imagine my shock to discover that mathematical linguistics is as dead as the pyramids. Thanks, Ben, for clueing me in on this; I guess I'll have to change fields as soon as possible. Seriously, though, you might familiarize yourself with a field before pontificating about it. John O'Neil Organlegger "From head to toe, you know where to go." Spleens a specialty.