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From: laurie@quintus.UUCP (Laurie Cavanaugh)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Why can't my cat talk?
Message-ID: <170@eden.quintus.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 4-Nov-87 15:44:41 EST
Article-I.D.: eden.170
Posted: Wed Nov  4 15:44:41 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 7-Nov-87 12:03:35 EST
References: <12085@decwrl.DEC.COM>
Organization: Quintus Computer Systems, Mountain View, CA
Lines: 19

In article <12085@decwrl.DEC.COM>, glantz@yippee.dec.com (04-Nov-1987 0950) writes:

[Re: the Helen Keller hypothesis]

>   Good point. If true, this is reasonably strong evidence refuting
>   the hypothesis.


Unfortunately, this is not true.  I read a biography of Helen Keller several 
years ago in which it was made clear that Ms. Keller was not blind and 
deaf from birth.  Rather, at the age of about two a disease (I don't recall if
this was congenital or acquired) destroyed her ability to see and hear.
Thus, this is not a reliable example of a human learning speech without 
undergoing this 'crystallization period'.  I would be interested in a
supported case of blindness and/or deafness from birth and its effects 
on the acquisition of language.  


Laurie Cavanaugh