Language and Creativity: An Interdisciplinary Essay in Chomskyan Humanism 9783110883473, 9783110133295

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BERNARD D. DEN OUDEN

LANGUAGE AND CREATIVITY AN INTERDISCIPLINARY ESSAY IN CHOMSKYAN HUMANISM

LISSE/NETHERLANDS

THE PETER DE RIDDER PRESS 1975

© Copyright reserved No part of this book may be translated or reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the author.

Printed in Belgium by N1CI, Ghent

PREFACE

This essay is dedicated to the memory of Dr. J. Maurice Hohlfeld. Dr. Hohlfeld's assistance and scrutiny in the formation and writing of this essay was a consistent source of encouragement. Special thanks are offered to Dr. Mahlon Barnes, Dr. Leighton McCutchen and Dr. Richard Underwood, whose careful reading and critical suggestions were most helpful in the formation of my manuscript. I wish also to express my appreciation to friends and colleagues, Dr. Georgio Pinton and Thomas Pisano, whose deep interest in my work triggered many long and pleasant discussions. My deepest thanks goes to my wife, Beverly, who assisted me in every facet and stage of this work.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction: Philosophical Humanism and Interdisciplinary Methodology

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I. Cartesian Linguistics: Descartes and the Port Royal Grammarians II. Early German Philosophy of Language III. Creative Language Use in View of Chomsky's Evidence . . IV. The Chomsky vs. Skinner Controversy V. Auxiliary Evidence for Chomsky's Contentions

11 23 44 60 79

Summary and Conclusion: Dialectics, Dialogue, Creativity, and Truth

94

Bibliography

104

INTRODUCTION

PHILOSOPHICAL H U M A N I S M A N D I N T E R D I S C I P L I N A R Y METHODOLOGY

Language and Creativity is an interdisciplinary study in that it draws together insights and arguments from the fields of philosophy, psychology and linguistics. The integrating center of the methodology in this essay is philosophical humanism or a philosophy that centers on man. Philosophy must look beyond itself when trying to understand 'human being' and human nature for these concerns are not the private speciality of one discipline. Philosophical humanism focuses directly on examining and discerning the nature of man, but it proceeds with narrowness and shallowness if it cannot draw upon the resources and evidence of other disciplines. In this essay, linguistic evidence and theories are central to the argument and thesis that is promoted. Theories of and from psychology are elaborated and contrasted in view of the linguistic questions and evidence that are brought to bear on the question of man. Thus it is implicitly argued in this work that philosophy, linguistics and psychology can not go their separate ways when dealing with the nature of human language and 'human being'. No one of these disciplines has man as its privileged specialty. The questions 'what is man?' or 'what is human nature?' are vexing questions loaded with assumptions and predetermined implications that are also vexing and complex. To ask the question what is man is, first of all, to assume that 'man is', which is, in part, to assume that man is a being that can be characterized by certain common qualities, characteristics and dimensions that can be designated as man's that are essential and common to 'human being'. The question 'what is human nature?' is similarly problematic, for it too assumes that there is a human nature or a common nature to a class of beings that we call human. The first assumptions hidden in these two initial questions is thus that there is a class of beings that can by their common nature be called human, and secondly, that man is, or that humans exist, assumptions that possibly cannot be decisively verified. The tack of response to this question in

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INTRODUCTION

this essay will not be that of pretentious finality in the sense of one answer that is charaded as the solution. An answer that assumes the role of a final solution has to show that the question, 'what is man?' or 'what are human beings ?' are questions that are vulnerable to finality. It may be the case that human nature is a process or an activity that cannot find or be symbolized by any permanent form, and thus final answers are the attempt to immortalize a moment of 'human being' that can only be properly understood in the context of change and activity.1 Change and activity may alter the characteristics that were taken to be essentially and permanently human. If 'human being' is more adequately understood and symbolized through concepts and words like activity and process, then also the attempt to avoid a final solution and permanent essences paradoxically implies some aspect of 'human being' that is permanent, namely, the permanence of activity, fluidity and change.2 Thus to argue that there is no final solution to this problem would be a disguised form of pretentious finality, that is, the finality of arguing that there is no finality. The tack taken in this work will be to assume a course of inquiry that may be suggestive of what it means to be human. In reference to the questions 'what is man?' and 'what is human nature?' the assumption that man is, or that humans exist, will only be dealt with in a limited fashion and thus the answer that shall be offered will be elucidated and 1 I am using the active sense 'human being' because the theory of man proposed in this essay is one of activity and process. 1 shall argue that 'human being' is human creativity, and thus it is an activated ability and capacity rather than a permanent essence. 2 The contradiction or possibly the paradox of the argument or contention that there is no final solution reversing its intention and becoming its opposite, that is, becoming a final solution is analogous to the theory of the harmony of opposite« that can be derived from some of the aphorisms of Heraclitus. Some of the aphorisms refer to the mutual interdependence of the rhythms of nature such as day and night, winter and summer, warm and cold. See John Burnet, Early Greek Philosophy (Cleveland and New York: The World Publishing Company, 1957), Aphorisms 36 and 39, p. 136. A more popular aphorism of Heraclitus that also embodies this paradox is "you cannot step twice into the same rivers; for fresh waters are ever flowing in upon you" (ibid., Aphorisms 41 and 42). This aphorism can be taken as a metaphorical statement concerning the radical processional nature of reality, that is, that essence of reality is change. If everything is changing, then there is at least one constant namely the constancy of change. Thus, the most radically processional view of reality paradoxically implies permanence or constancy in an analogous way to which the theory that there are no final solutions implies its opposite and is a final solution. This reversal or paradox, on a small scale, is comparable to Nicholas Cusanus' concept of coincidentia oppositorum, Kant's antinomies, and Hegel's dialectical logic. Each of these theories, even though directed and intended for problematics specific to the philosophers cited above, are similar in that they attempt to deal with the issue of ideas implying their opposite.

HUMANISM AND METHODOLOGY

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defended as suggestive and thus not as final. To say that the thesis offered here is suggestive is neither to say that it has no clarity or force, nor that its implications find their force merely as a suggestion. This project is an intentionally limited and direct course of inquiry that can serve as one answer to the questions 'what is man?' and 'what is human nature ?'. One of the first assumptions hidden in these questions is that man is, or that human beings do exist. The response to this assumption and the attempt to demonstrate its validity as an assumption in this work shall not take the form of proving that particular or individual human beings exist or that by some criterion I can prove that I am human or that the readers of this essay are human. 3 I would hope that the readers of this essay would share at least one assumption with me, that is, the assumption that they are human and that I am human. The contention that the reader will not be asked kindly to assume as valid is that the particular answer or suggestion oifered in this essay to the questions 'what is man?' or 'what is human nature?' is a valid answer. This answer will hopefully stand on the evidence and arguments offered as a thesis. The tack and direction of the contentions of this essay will be that there is a way intelligibly to answer the vexing questions 'what is man?' and 'what is his nature?' and that the theories of language and human creativity offered by Noam Chomsky suggest a viable answer that will not necessarily make human existence less vexing, but it will be an answer to the question of what it means to be human. The argument constructed in view of Chomsky's contentions will be that there is some meaning to the words or symbols 'human nature' and that there are distinctive capacities, faculties, and activities that can be rightfully called human. It will be assumed that human beings do exist, but it will not be glibly assumed that it is self-evidently clear that everyone agrees on what it means to be human. What it means to be human and to have a nature that can be called distinctly human is an answer I am seeking, not an assumption that I will ask anyone unreflectingly to accept. In order to use the words 'man' and 'human nature' at all, there must be some common characteristic among the various individuals in this species that makes it possible for us to specify and designate this or that 3

There are numerous anthologies, essays, and works dedicated to the problem of proving the existence of other minds. An example of this is a collection of essays and articles edited by V. C. Chappel, entitled The Philosophy of Mind (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1962). Another example is Norman Malcolm, Problems of Mind (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1971).

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INTRODUCTION

group of beings as human beings. If there is no activity or characteristic that is unique and specific to the human species, then it cannot be rightfully designated as a species. If this is so, then it is possible that mankind is a sub-class of another species. But if it can be discerned that at least one activity is distinctive with this species, a characteristic that is not trivial or incidental but outstanding, that is, it separates humans from other similar species, then man can legitimately and rightfully call himself something other than an animal. This is not to say that there is an absolute distinction between mankind and animals, but it is to say that there is a dimension that is distinctive to man, a dimension that can be designated as human nature. Turning now to the works and theories of Chomsky, an argument will be elaborated for the theory that man is a distinctive being, a being that has a dimension, faculty or capacity that distinguishes him from other beings.

CHAPTER I

CARTESIAN LINGUISTICS: DESCARTES A N D THE PORT ROYAL GRAMMARIANS Chomsky makes n o pretentious claims concerning the unprecedented novelty of his discoveries. His theory concerning the 'creative aspect of language use' he views as a theory that can be traced back in intellectual history at least as far as Descartes. Chomsky does claim, however, that his discoveries in the area of 'generative or transformational gramm a r ' are crucial evidence to support some of the contentions that Descartes promoted. There is no evidence that indicates that Chomsky began his career as an author and linguist as a Cartesian or as someone promoting a philosophical position in reference to the problems of cognition and philosophy of mind. It appears as if Chomsky discovered the similarity between his theories and those of Descartes after he had developed them independently and within the context of linguistics. Evidence for this contention can readily be found if we compare an aspect of his early works with his later works. Chomsky's first major publication, Syntactic Structures, was first printed in 1957. In this work we find many elements of Chomsky's theories concerning transformational and generative grammar. In this work the fundamental goal of Chomsky's linguistics is grammatical analysis. The fundamental aim in the linguistic analysis of a language L is to separate the grammatical sequences which are the sentences of L from the ungrammatical sequences which are not sentences of L and to study the structure of the grammatical sequences. The grammar of L will thus be a device that generates all of the grammatical sequences of L and none of the ungrammatical ones.1 A grammar in this view is a scheme or system that makes it possible to derive and distinguish the grammatical from the ungrammatical. Chomsky argues that the test of a grammar is its generative adequacy. He states this contention as follows: "One way to test the adequacy of 1

Noam Chomsky, Syntactic Structures (The Hague: Mouton, 1969).

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a grammar proposed for L is to determine whether or not the sentences that it generates are actually grammatical, that is, acceptable to a natural speaker." 2 The discovery of a grammar, thus, is the discovery of patterns and structures which the sentence of a language will assume. The key word in Chomsky's statements and contentions in terms of his later works and theories is 'generative'. Grammar is the form for generative and transformational alternatives. It is the scheme through which a native speaker generates alternative forms of expression. In Chomsky's later work, for example, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax, Cartesian Linguistics, and Language and Mind, this early notion of a grammar as generative and transformational develops into what Chomsky describes as the "creative aspect of language use". Knowledge of a language and its grammar does not, in Chomsky's view, consist of an exhaustive knowledge of its vocabulary and sentence structure but knowledge consists of competence.3 Knowledge of a language does not consist of being able to parrot various sentences or phrases, but it consists of the ability to create novel combinations of words and clauses. Chomsky stresses that language acquisition cannot be viewed as mere performance or what is referred to above as parroting, but it must be judged in terms of competence. Therefore the question of competence, grammatical generation, and transformations are inseparable. For Chomsky emphatically states that the question of competence and the generative grammars that purport to describe it, we stress again that knowledge of a language involves the implicit ability to understand indefinitely many sentences. Hence, a generative grammar must be a system of rules that can iterate to generate an indefinitely large number of structures.4 The key to language acquisition and use is thus creativity and generation 2

Ibid. The distinction that Chomsky constructs between competence and performance is derived from the father of structural linguistics, Ferdinand de Saussure. Saussure's distinction between langue and parole corresponds directly to Chomsky's distinction between competence and performance. In Aspects of the Theory of Syntax (Cambridge, Ma.: The M.I.T. Press, 1965), 4, Chomsky states: "The distinction I am noting here is related to the langue-parole distinction of Saussure; but it is necessary to reject his concept of langue as merely a systematic inventory of items and to return rather to the Humboldtian conception of underlying competence as a system of generative processes." For Chomsky, knowledge of a language consists of competence (langue) which is different from mere performance (parole). Creative language use consists of the generation of alternative forms of expression. This is radically different from mere performance which could be produced by mere memorization. For Saussure's elaboration of this distinction see Cours de linguistique générale (Paris: Payot, 1960). 4 Chomsky, Aspects, 15-16. 3

DESCARTES AND PORT ROYAL

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of alternative linguistic constructs rather than the rote memorization of verbal patterns. This creative aspect of language use is what Chomsky argues is the decisively and distinctively human dimension, an argument that he shares with Descartes. For this reason Chomsky, in his attempt to elucidate and clarify the implications of his theory, turns in one of his recent works, i.e. Cartesian Linguistics, to tracing various theories of grammar and language that anticipate his discoveries. In tracing the history of these theories, Chomsky begins with Descartes. Chomsky does not pretend that he is offering a new and decisive interpretation of Descartes or an interpretation that will redirect and radically change Cartesian studies. Chomsky's interest is to sketch out the contentions of various thinkers who have anticipated his own theories of generative and transformational grammar. The limits to his work in Cartesian Linguistics he describes as follows: Questions of current interest will, however, determine the general form of this sketch; that is, I will make no attempt to characterize Cartesian linguistics as it saw itself, but rather will concentrate on the development of ideas that have reemerged, quite independently, in current work. My primary aim is simply to bring to the attention of those involved in the study of generative grammar and its implications some of the little-known work which has bearing on their concerns and problems and which often anticipates some of their specific conclusions.5 Chomsky, thus, turns to Descartes in view of the problematics and contentions that are related to his own work in transformational grammar and its implications for theories of cognition and mind. Chomsky is particularly interested in the way that Descartes relates language use to theories of mind and his arguments concerning the distinctiveness of man. It is these arguments of Descartes that are strikingly similar to Chomsky's own views that distinguish human mental processes from those of machines and animals. Chomsky is not concerned with how these arguments fit into Descartes epistemology in general or how they were part of his rigorous skepticism of commonly accepted beliefs or his methodological doubt. Descartes was not involved in polemics with behaviorists (as later in this work it shall be shown that Chomsky is) and was not deeply involved in a culture and technology that was both served and controlled by machines. Descartes' and Chomsky's concerns and arguments are, however, strikingly similar. Chomsky acknowledges that Descartes makes only infrequent references to language but does 5

Noam Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), 2.

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CARTESIAN LINGUISTICS

not underestimate the significance of these contentions and the similarity they have to his own point of view. Although Descartes makes only scant reference to language in his writings, certain observations about the nature of language play a significant role in the formulation of his general point of view. In the course of his careful and intensive study of the limits of mechanical explanation, which carried him beyond physics to physiology and psychology, Descartes was able to convince himself that all aspects of animal behavior can be explained on the assumption that an animal is an automaton. In the course of this investigation, he developed an important and influential system of speculative physiology. But he arrived at the conclusion that man has unique abilities that cannot be accounted for on purely mechanistic grounds, although, to a very large extent, a mechanistic explanation can be provided for human bodily function and behavior. The essential difference between man and animal is exhibited most clearly by human language, in particular, by man's ability to form new statements which express new thoughts and which are appropriate to new situations.6 Descartes does not argue that it is impossible for "a machine being constituted so that it can utter words" or that through being "touched in a particular part it may ask what we wish it to say ... but it never happens that it arranges its speech in various ways, in order to reply appropriately to everything that may be said in its presence, as even the lowest type of man can do". 7 The distinctive dimension to 'human being' is in Descartes' and Chomsky's perspective the 'creative aspect of language use', a dimension that separates man from machines and animals. This is in their view the human dimension. In short, then, man has a species-specific capacity, a unique type of intellectual organization ... which manifests itself in what we may refer to as the 'creative aspect' of ordinary language use — its property being both unbounded in scope and stimulus free.8 The creative aspect of language use indicates the unique kind of freedom that is specific to human cognition. Man, in his linguistic activity, can express thoughts in languages that are responsive to new contexts and novel ideas. Man's linguistic aiblities are not chained to and totally determined by external stimuli, nor are they the inevitable response of an unreflective machine. Through observing that man can use language creatively, that is, man can alter and transform his linguistic expressions « Ibid., 3. 7 René Descartes, Discourse on Method (Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1951), 41-42. 8 Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 4-5.

DESCARTES AND PORT ROYAL

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in response to new situations, Chomsky and Descartes argue that it is plausible to contend that there is a capacity which can be called 'mind'. This, as it will be discussed later, is a contention that radically opposes strict forms of behaviorism and empiricism which argue that man is essentially mindless and that what we take to be mental states and cognition are actually the chained and determined response of man to external stimuli. Mind, in this view, strictly speaking, does not exist. Man is a nexus of causal determinations, a nexus that has no freedom and no creativity. Chomsky is and has been opposed to this kind of thinking, and it is crucial for the validity of his position how he fares in the face of the work and evidence of the behaviorist and empiricist. Ample time and care will be given to this debate and controversy after some of the history and antecedents of Chomsky's contentions have been sketched. Chomsky argues that there is a distinctively human dimension which he and Descartes call 'mind'. Chomsky's opponents and critics will argue the contrary and contend that man is nothing more than a facet of the environment, a facet that is no more or less free than any object in nature. It is Descartes' emphasis on the distinctiveness of human linguistic and mental capacities that Chomsky singles out as the crucial similarity between Descartes and his own views. The direction and intention of Descartes' argument is slightly different. Chomsky wants to demonstrate that man does have a mind and a degree of intellectual and creative freedom, but Descartes used the 'criterion of creative language use' to verify the existence of other minds. Chomsky is concerned with demonstrating that men do have minds, whereas Descartes, beginning with his 'cogito ergo sum', was certain of his own existence as a 'thing that thinks', 9 but was concerned with verifying that other beings whom he thought were thinking beings like himself were not automated machines or what Descartes refers to as 'automatons'. Chomsky does not begin with the self-imposed isolation of Cartesian subjectivity and is not concerned with proving to himself or others that some other being in addition to himself can be verified as extant. Chomsky's question is not, do other minds exist, but can it be plausibly and resourcefully argued that man has distinctive intellectual and creative capacities. Thus, the direction of Chomsky's and Descartes' arguments are slightly different, but the core contention they use to support their arguments is similar, that is, they both argue that the key to proving the existence of distinctive mental abilities and capacities in man is the 'creative aspect of language use'. 9

René Descartes, Philosophical Essays: Meditations, trans, by Laurence J. Lafleur (Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Co., Inc., 1951), 84.

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Since language is indicative of the creative and distinct aspects and dimensions of man, Chomsky argues that if creative language use is distinctive to man, then "what contribution can the study of language make to our understanding of human nature?". 10 If language is exemplary of the creative aspect of human nature, then what contributions can the study of language make towards understanding this distinctive nature ? The study of language in Chomsky's view can offer important insights concerning man's nature. If language use exhibits and reflects creativity, then the being producing the language must have creative capacities. Thus, language study has implications beyond the objective study of languages, that is, creative language use implies creativity as an essential dimension that must be taken into account in any psychological or philosophical understanding of man. Chomsky does not view linguistic studies as an isolated discipline that only has implications for the study of particular languages. The creativity of man reflected in linguistic variations, generation, and transformations implies much more than the rules of a particular grammar. It implies that man is capable of alternative expressions or creative thought. The disciplines of psychology, philosophy, and linguistics have attempted to go their separate ways and compartmentalize their work and findings in the name of objectivity and scientific rigor, but Chomsky argues that the question of language continues to reassert itself and challenge this artificial separation. This separation was not promoted in previous eras and ages and thus Chomsky argues that we can learn a great deal from the past, in particular from the 17th century formulations of the problems of language and human nature. These formulations do not foster the isolation of the disciplines. He states this contention as follows: In an age that was less self-conscious and less compartmentalized than ours, the nature of language, the respects in which language mirrors human mental processes or shapes the flow and character of thought — these were topics for study and speculation by scholars and gifted amateurs with a wide variety of interests, points of view, and intellectual backgrounds. And in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as linguistics, philosophy, and psychology have uneasily tried to go their separate ways, the classical problems of language and mind have inevitably reappeared and have served to link these diverging fields and to give direction and significance to their efforts.11 The Cartesian formulation of the problem did not reflect this artificial 10

Noam Chomsky, Language and Mind (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World Inc., 1968), 1. 11 Ibid.

DESCARTES AND PORT ROYAL

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separation of philosophy, psychology, and theories of language. Descartes used his theory of language to defend his philosophical conception concerning human mentality and his proof for the existence of man's distinctive human abilities. Descartes stimulated a tradition of philosophers that developed and elaborated his theory of language and mind. One of these philosophers was "Cordemoy, who wrote a fascinating treatise extending Descartes' few remarks about language".12 Cordemoy, like Descartes, argued that a machine or an animal could produce sounds and words, but it is in the order and the ordering of the words and sounds that the crucial difference lies. The machine would produce the sound and words according to the predetermined order it had been given. This would be similar to parroting on the part of an animal. Cordemoy states his argument as follows : Since I am well aware that a mere machine could pronounce some words, I know at the same time that if the device which would distribute the air or which makes the voice come out, if those devices had a certain order among themselves they could never change it so that when the first voice would be heard those which were accustomed to follow it would also be heard, provided that the machine had enough air. While on the other hand the words that I hear pronounced by bodies made like mine hardly ever have the same order. I observe, in addition, that these words are the same as the ones that I would use to explain my thoughts to other subjects that would conceive them. Finally, the more I take of the effect that my words produce when I pronounce them before these bodies the more it seems to me that they are understood and those which they pronounce and respond to correspond so perfectly to the sense of my own that it no longer seems a matter of doubt that a mind does in them what mine does in me.13 12

Ibid., 5. Geraud de Cordemoy, Discours Physique de la Parole (second edition, 1677). The above translation is mine. The French original as quoted in Cartesian Linguistics, 7, by Chomsky is as follows: "Car encore que je conçoive bien qu'une pure machine pourroit proférer quelques paroles, je comtois en mesme temps que si les ressorts qui distribûroient le vent, ou qui ferroient ouvrir les tryaux, d'où ces voix sortiroient, avoient un certain ordre entr' eux, jamais ils ne le pourroient changer; de sorte que dès que la premiere voix seroit entendue, celles que auroient accoustumé de la suivre, le seroient nécessairement aussi, pourveu que le vent ne manquât pas à la Machine: au lieu que les Paroles que j'entens proferer à des Corps faits comme le mien, n'ont presque jamais la mesme suite. J'observe d'ailleurs, que ces Paroles sont les mesmes, dont je me voudrois servir pour expliquer mes pensees à d'autres sujets, qui seroient capables de les concevoir. Enfin, plus je prens garde à l'effet que produisent mes Paroles, quand je les profère devant ces Corps, plus il me semble qu'elles sont entendues; et celles qu'ils profèrent répondent si parfaitement au sens des miennes, qu'il ne me paroist plus de sujet de douter qu'une Ame ne fasse en eux ce que la mienne fait en moy."

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As we see above, Cordemoy argues that it is quite possible for a machine to produce sounds and words, but the order that these words would assume would be inevitable and the machine could only order them in a sequence that had been determined by the constructor of the machine. In contrast to this, human speech varies and hardly ever has the same order. From the variation of speech patterns, or, in Chomsky's terms, from the 'creative aspect of language use' Cordemoy argues that it is possible to distinguish human intelligence from the activity and expressions of a machine. "In short, Cordemoy is arguing that there can be no mechanistic explanation for the novelty, coherence and relevance of normal speech."14 Cordemoy does not make this conclusion rashly, but argues that great scrutiny and control must be exercised or the evidence will not be decisive. "The fact that articulate sounds are produced or that utterances can be imitated, in itself proves nothing as this can be explained in mechanical terms."15 The distinctive characteristic of human speech lies in its order or coherence, its variations and novelty. Appropriateness and coherence are inseparably part of what Cordemoy and Chomsky mean by novelty and creativity. They are not talking about novelty and creativity in the sense of being randomly unique or absurdly different. The creative use of language stems from both its variations and its coherence. Creative language use is not arbitrarily novel in its response to new situations. Man is capable of integrating novelty and coherence. Cordemoy proposes tests and experiments to demonstrate that there is a decisive difference between human intelligence and the activity of machines. The person tested must pass two requirements in order for the experiment or test to be valid. His speech must exhibit variations or cognitive freedom, and he must be able to respond appropriately to the discourse of the experimenter. Another dimension of language study that Chomsky designates as 'Cartesian linguistics' is the work of Anthony Arnauld and C. Lancelot. In their work, Grammaire général et raisonée,16 the Port Royal grammarians17 anticipate the controversy and debate that Chomsky has 14

Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 7. Ibid. 16 C. Lancelot and A. Arnauld, Grammaire générale et raisonée (first published 1660; recently published: Stuttgart: Fromman-Bolzboog, 1970). 17 Daniel Yergin in "The Chomskyan Revolution", The New York Times Magazine, December 3,1972, pp. 42-43,112-127, succinctly identifies the Port Royal grammarians and summarizes their basic similarity to Chomsky in the following statement : "They were a group associated with the Parisian monastery of Port Royal. In 1660, influenced 15

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stimulated in this century between those who promote the transformational model of language interpretation and the strictly descriptive linguists who are appalled by any conclusions concerning thought and mind that is based on linguistic evidence.18 The Port Royal grammarians argue that language has two aspects. Language may be studied from the point of view of sound, a physical description, but also from the perspective of what mental capacities underlie it. In short, language has an inner and an outer aspect. A sentence can be studied from the point of view of how it expresses a thought or from the point of view of its physical shape, that is, from the point of view of either semantic interpretation or phonetic interpretation.19 The Port Royal grammarians were not content to construct grammars of particular languages, but sought a grammar that was both 'general' and 'rational'. To elaborate this kind of grammar, it was methodically necessary for them to go beyond linguistic description and discern universal elements that are common to all languages. In the terms of transformational grammar the common underlying elements are the deep structures. In addition to these deep structures Chomsky argues that there are surface structures. Using some recent terminology, we can distinguish the "deep structure" of a sentence from its "surface structure." The former is the underlying abstract structure that determines its semantic interpretation; the latter, the superficial organization of units which determines the phonetic interpretation and which relates to the physical form of the actual utterance.20 The surface structure can be studied in terms of physical description or phonemic interpretation. The sound elements can be accurately described and categorized. However, in the Port Royal grammar, as in Chomsky's transformational grammar, the attempt is made to push beyond description and to discern the underlying elements that determine the meaning of a sentence or an utterance. This is the attempt to move beyond the phonemic interpretation to the semantic interpretation. It is by Descartes, they produced a 'philosophical grammar' that suggested a distinction between deep and surface structures, and argued for psychological rules which, like Chomsky's, would permit us to 'make infinite use of finite means.' The development of descriptive and then structural linguistics effectively obscured the Port Royal work until Chomsky's recent efforts to resurrect it." 18 An example of this kind of thinking can be found in Leonard Bloomfield, Language (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1933), 6. 19 Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 32-33. 20 Ibid., 33.

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the movement from description to the discovery of deep structures and forms that underlie the meaning of a sentence or judgment. Both the Port Royalists and Chomsky argue that these deep elements are universal. It is the discovery of essential propositions or kernel sentences that leads this kind of linguistic inquiry beyond surface description to deep structures. It is this contention that anticipates Chomsky's theory of linguistic universals. An example from the Port Royal grammar that illustrates the movement of analysis from surface description to key proposition and kernel sentences is found in the Port Royalist's examination of the following sentence: "Dieu invisible a créé le monde visible." For the Port Royal grammarians the preceding sentence : contains, at least in our mind, several judgments from which can be made as many propositions: as when I say God invisible created the visible world, these judgments are passed in my mind contained in this proposition. For I judged (1) that God is invisible (2) that he created the world and (3) that the world is visible. And of these three propositions, the second is the principle and the essential one of the proposition. But the first and the third are only incidental, and they are only part of the principle one for which the first composes the subject and the second the attribute.21 The deep structures or the kernel propositions are rational judgments that are the "underlying mental reality — a mental accompaniment to the utterance". 22 The surface structure need not exactly reduplicate the kernel sentences of the deep structure. The surface sentence is implied and derived from the rational proposition underlying it. "The same deep structure may be realized differently in different languages", but it is not limited to any particular language. 23 Thus, the Port Royal grammarians and Chomsky argue that there is an underlying rational level to language. This level is the basis for the meaning of language. This level is not only 'rational' but 'general in the terms of the Port Royalists. Chomsky elaborates this position in the following way: "The deep structure that expresses the meaning is common to all languages, so 21

Lancelot and Arnauld, Grammaire générale et raisonée, 68. The above translation is mine. The French original, as quoted in Cartesian Linguistics, 33-34, is as follows : "enferment, au moins dans nostre esprit, plusieurs jugements dont on peut faire autant propositions : Comme quand je dis, Dieu invisible a créé le monde visible, il se passe trois jugements dans mon esprit renfermez dans cette proposition. Car je juge premièrement que Dieu est invisible. 2. Qu'il a créé le monde. 3. Que le monde est visible. Et de ces trois propositions, la seconde est la principale et l'essentielle de la proposition. Mais la première et la troisième ne sont qu'incidentes, et ne font que partie de la principale, dont la première en compose le sujet, et la seconde l'attribut." 22 Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 34. 23 Ibid.

DESCARTES AND PORT ROYAL

21

it is claimed, being a simple reflection of the forms of thought." 24 Chomsky argues that from the discernment of deep levels or rational structures that are common to all language, there can be derived concepts and notions that reflect the inner nature of human thought and 'human being'. If linguistic universals can be discovered, then the question arises: what is the source of this universality? If there are characteristics common to all human language, then what does this universality imply? Chomsky argues that the common source of these elements is the innate rational capacities of man or man's internal nature. The issues raised by Chomsky in his linguistic studies and the theories are suggestive.25 With Descartes and the Cartesian tradition of language study that follows him, especially in the work of the Port Royal grammarians, Chomsky argues, first of all, that language is the key to an understanding of human intelligence and human freedom. The reason that language is the key to understanding the nature of man is that language in the creative aspect of its use reflects a 'species-specific' type of intelligence or a mental capacity that is not totally determined by external stimuli. The 'species-specific' characteristic of human nature is cognitive freedom. The question is, can Chomsky verify the existence of cognitive freedom through linguistic evidence? This question will be confronted directly when Chomsky's linguistic theories are discussed on their own terms. The second facet of the question that surrounds Chomsky's formulation of his theories concerning human nature and human freedom is: what internal capacities or innate characteristic and structure does man possess so that he is capable of freedom of thought ? 24

Ibid., 35. The most severe critique of Chomsky's attempt to link his work with thinkers from the Cartesian linguistic tradition has been written by Hans Aarsleff and appears in '"Cartesian Linguistics': History or Fantasy ?", Language Sciences, No. 17 (October, 1971), 1-12. Aarsleff's critique centers on attempting to prove that Chomsky's work is not adequate and is 'fantasy' rather than history. In the critique, Chomsky's work is not judged in the terms and limitations he set for it, but treated as an historian's document from a historian's point of view. The inappropriateness of this critique has been made abundantly clear by Harry M. Bracken's reply to Aarsleff's work in "Chomsky's Cartesianism", Language Sciences, No. 22 (October, 1972). Aarsleff accused Chomsky of pretending to give an "adequate account of the main line of development from the middle of the 17th century to the early decades of the 19th century". In reply to this Bracken states on page 11: "Perhaps Aarsleff makes that assumption, but as the careful reader of Cartesian Linguistics knows, it is unwarranted. Chomsky has made it perfectly clear that he is not writing the history of linguistics. He is pursuing a scholarly style that I assumed Lovejoy had long ago made acceptable by demonstrating its capacity to illuminate our ideas. Aarsleff has his own quite different notions about history — ideas that he treats as revealed truths." 25

22

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The third facet of this theory that needs examination is the question of universality. Chomsky argues, as do the Port Royalists that we have discussed, that there are linguistic universals that underlie all language and are the essential forms of thought and the ground of linguistic expression. In Chomsky's view, this inner form of language or deep structures that underlie it are the structures of the inner character of man. The question of the inner form of language which is central to Chomsky's contentions also was anticipated in a number of thinkers, some of which Chomsky discusses as predecessors of his own theory concerning deep structures and human nature. To set the background for an examination of the question of the inner form of language we will turn to this second group of thinkers that anticipate Chomsky's contentions. These thinkers and authors are Hamann, Herder, Humboldt, and A. W. Schlegel.

CHAPTER II

EARLY GERMAN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE

After tracing the French thinkers that anticipate his theories, Chomsky turns to a number of eighteenth and nineteenth century German thinkers that have made influential contributions to philosophy of language and linguistic studies. The thinkers he cites are Herder, Humboldt, and Schlegel. Chomsky argues that these German figures, who are frequently interpreted and understood as part of the Romantic movement in philosophy and literature, are strikingly similar in their emphasis to the Cartesian linguists who were traced in the previous chapter. The unifying concern between these two groups, that is, Descartes and the French Port Royalists and the German Romantics cited above, is that creative language use is distinctive to man and that language is indicative of human nature. 1 Chomsky begins his analysis of the German contribution to philosophy of language and linguistic theories with Herder. Chomsky omits, however, Hamann, who was Herder's teacher. Hamann's view can serve as a resourceful contrast to Chomsky and the Port Royalists. Hamann offers a challenge to the position of the Port Royal grammarians and those who promote the theory of a universal grammar. For the Port Royalists, language reflects rational and mental structures and capacities that are universally present in the human mind. Hamann challenged and countered the "assumption of a gemeinen Menschenverstand, the faculty of perception said to be possessed by all normal persons, and which is completely independent of language, ...". 2 For Hamann, language is not a mere product and tool of reason but language "entered into the very structure of cognition". 3 Language, in Hamann's view, 1

In Language and Mind, 19, Chomsky describes the Cartesian linguists and German Romantics as part of one tradition. It "is the tradition of philosophical grammar that flourished from the seventeenth century through romanticism". 2 Robert L. Miller, The Linguistic Relativity Principle and Humboldtian Ethnolinguistics (The Hague: Mouton, 1968), 3. 3 Ibid.

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is not formed and shaped by rational structures that are separate from it, but language is a constitutive factor in the process of reasoning and thinking. Reason and language are not separate capacities for Hamann. "Language and reason occur simultaneously, and where a logical distinction is made between them, language always comes first. Language is an Urfaktum, a primitive, representing an indissoluble unity, ...." 4 In a letter to Herder, Hamann states this position poetically and directly: Even if I were as eloquent as Demosthenes, I would have to do nothing more than repeat a single principle three times: reason is language, XÖYoq. On this marrow I gnaw and will gnaw myself to death on it. For me a darkness still hovers over these depths; I am still waiting for an apocalyptic angel with a key to this abyss.5 Reasoning is not separable from language. Reasoning is inextricably related to language; it is language. Hamann, with these thoughts and contentions, anticipates the theory of the cultural relativity of language championed in our century by Benjamin Lee Whorf. In contrast to Chomsky and the individuals who promote the theory of universal grammar, Hamann and other thinkers who argue for the cultural relativity of language contend that language does not reflect universal and rational structures of the mind, but it reflects the historical and culturally relative ideas of a particular people or linguistic group. 6 The contrasting positions thus are the following: (1) the form, words, and grammar of a language reflect the culturally relative ideas and assumptions of a particular people or linguistic group, and in contrast (2) the order, structure, and grammar of a language reflect innate and universal capacities of the human mind. The German thinkers whom Chomsky cites as anticipating his theories seem to promote the theory of linguistic relativity, yet he cites them as anticipating his own theories. Hamann promotes the first of these two theories, that is, the theory of linguistic relativity.7 The language of a people reflects but also affects 4

Ibid., 15. Johann Georg Hamann, Schriften, edited by Friedrich Roth (8 vols.; Leipzig: G. Reimer, 1821-43), VII, 151-52. The translation is mine. The German original is as follows: "Wenn ich auch so beredt wäre, wie Demosthenes, so würde ich doch nicht mehr als ein einziges Wort dreimal wiederholen müssen: Vernunft ist Sprache, Xöyoi;. An diesem Markknochen nage ich und werde mich zu Tode darüber nagen. Noch bleibt es immer finster über dieser Tiefe für mich; ich warte noch immer auf einen apokalyptischen Engel mit einem Schlüssel zu diesem Abgrund." 6 For a thorough development of the theory of linguistic relativity by its most noted proponent see Language, Thought, and Reality: Selected Writings of Benjamin Lee Whorf, edited by John B. Carroll (Cambridge, Mass.: The M.I.T. Press, 1956). 7 The most thorough study of Hamann available in English is Unity and Language: 5

EARLY GERMAN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE

25

their world view. "The lineaments of their language will thus correspond to the direction of their mentality."8 The reasoning of a people is inseparable from the order and structuring of their language. Karlfried Grander summarizes Hamann's position as follows: Language as such ... is never simply general, but rather is always the specific language. ... Each language, ... represents its own world, is bound up, ... with all thinking and realizes, as its base and support, the presence of reason in historic existence. No more than there is thought free of language, is there a suprahistorical and ahistorical reason.9 Hamann does not argue that language is the sole determinant of cognition, but he does emphatically state that language is inseparably part of the process of cognition. In Hamann's position, the language of a people is not only intrinsicly related to their cognitive processes but it also is inseparable from their world view. Rudolf Unger argues that Hamann was the "first writer in Germany to deal with the question of the influence of language on thought". 10 Hamann shares this position with an English author and thinker, James Harris. The language of every nation, in Harris' view, has its own spirit and character. Each "contains a characteristic formative principle". 11 We shall be led to observe, how Nations, like single Men, have their peculiar Ideas; how these peculiar Ideas become the genius of their language, since the Symbol must of course correspond to its Archetype; how the wisest nations,

A Study in the Philosophy of Johann Georg Hamann by James C. O'Flaherty, with an introductory note by Walter Lowrie ( = University of North Carolina Studies in the Germanic Languages and Literature 6) (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1952). A succinct and informative review of this work was written by Harold H. Basilius and published in Language, 32 (1956). The most complete collection of Hamann's writings on language in German is Schriften zur Sprache, with intro. by Josef Simon (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1967). 8 Johann Georg Hamann, Schriften zur Sprache, 90. This quotation is from a "Versuch über eine akademische Frage" [an Essay Concerning an Academic Question], In the German original it reads as: "Die Lineamente ihrer Sprache werden also mit der Richtung ihrer Denkungsart correspondiren." 9 Karlfried Gründer, Figur und Geschichte: Johann Georg Hamann's "Biblische Betrachtungen''' als Ansatz einer Geschichtsphilosophie (Freiburg, 1958), 189. Translated by Robert L. Miller, The Linguistic Relativity Principle and Humboldtian Ethnolinguistics, 17-18. 10 Miller, Linguistic Relativity, 14. 11 Ernst Cassirer, The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, trans, by Ralph Manheim (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1953), 144. The German equivalent in the Philosophie der symbolischen Formen (3 vols.; Oxford: Bruno Cassirer, 1956), I, 87, is as follows: "jede schliesst ein eigentümliches formgebendes Prinzip in sich."

26

EARLY GERMAN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE

having the most and best Ideas, will consequently have the best and most copious Languages. 12

Intriguingly, Chomsky does refer to James Harris in his work, Cartesian Linguistics, but he does not refer to Hamann. Harris precedes Hamann, who openly acknowledged the importance of Harris in a letter to his student Herder. In 1768, Hamann wrote to Herder and stated that he had ordered Harris' Hermes and described it as "a work which struck me as essential for your plan". 13 Herder's plan was to compare "the languages of several people at different cultural levels".14 Chomsky refers to Herder and Harris as individuals that anticipate his theories, but he does not deal with the dimension of their thinking that emphasizes the cultural relativity of language in contrast to universal grammar. Admittedly elements that are similar to the theories of the Cartesian linguists and Chomsky's own view are present in Harris' and Herder's thinking, but Chomsky fails to face a fundamental tension that is also present in their thought, that is, the tension between characteristics of language that are universal and their contentions concerning the cultural relativity of all languages. If language is culturally relative and reflects the world view of a people, how can it also reflect universal elements that are indicative of characteristics that are common to the nature of all human beings ? Or, as Whorf argues, if language shapes our view of the human self, then how can language embody universal characteristics that are indicative of a universal human nature? Chomsky makes his only reference to this tension between the cultural relativity of language and linguistic universality in a brief and curtailed fashion in Cartesian Linguistics. Under the impact of the new relativism of the romantics, the conception of language as a constitutive medium for thought undergoes a significant modification, and the notion that language difference can lead to differences, even incomparability in mental processes, is explored. This development, however, is not part of our main theme; its modern elaboration is familiar, and I will discuss it no further here. 15

Chomsky avoids the relativism of the romantics, but the question still 12

J. Harris, Hermes (3rd ed„ London, 1771), Bk I, ch. 6, p. 97. J. G. Hamann, to Herder, Sept. 7, 1768, Schriften, edited by Friedrich Roth and G. A. Wiener (8 vols.; Leipzig: G. Reimer, 1821-43), III, 386. German: "ein Werk, das mir zu lhrem Plane unentbehrlich zu schien." 14 Cassirer, Symbolic Forms, I, 145. On pp. 87-88 of the Symbolischen Formen this reads as: "mehrere Sprachen verschiedener Volker auf verschiedenen Stufen der Kultur miteinander zu vergleichen." 15 Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 30-31. 13

EARLY GERMAN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE

27

stands as to whether language is culturally relative or whether it reflects universal rational capacities that are present in human nature. It is this tension that Harris, Hamann, Herder, and Humboldt work with; a tension with which Chomsky does not fully contend when he argues that their views are similar to his own Cartesian linguistics. This problem seems to demand a more thorough analysis than Chomsky has given it in his works and thus we shall return to it after tracing the figures that anticipate Chomsky's views. There are elements in Harris' and Herder's position that are clearly similar to Chomsky's. Harris, for example, distinguished between the 'Brutal principle' and the 'Human principle'. The activity of animals, or 'Brutes' in Harris' terms, is uniformly in line with determined instincts. In contrast, man's activity and reflection can proceed according to rational principles. Harris states this differentiation as follows: MARK then ... the Difference between Human Powers and Brutal — The Leading Principle of BRUTES appears to tend in each Species to one single Purpose — to this, in general, it uniformly arrives-, and here, in general, it as uniformly stops — it needs no Precepts or Discipline to instruct it; nor will it easily be changed, or admit a different Direction. On the contrary, the Leading Principle of MAN is capable of infinite Directions — is convertible to all sorts of Purposes — equal to all sorts of Subjects — neglected, remains ignorant, and void of every Perfection — cultivated, becomes adorned with Sciences, and Arts — can raise us to excel, not only Brutes, but our own Kind — with respect to our other Powers and Faculties, can instruct us how to use them, as well as those of the various Natures, which we see existing around us. In a word, to oppose the two Principles to each other — The Leading Principle of Man, is Multiform, Originally Uninstructed, Pliant and Docil — The Leading Principle of Brutes is Uniform, Originally Instructed', but, in most Instances afterward, Inflexible and Indocil.16

The distinct difference between man and animals for Harris, as for Chomsky, is the freedom of human cognition. In Harris' words, man's thinking is capable of 'infinite directions'. This would correspond to Chomsky's theory of linguistic transformation or the generation of alternative forms of expression. Herder, in parallel manner to Harris, has elements in his thinking that are similar to Chomsky and the Cartesian linguists, but also elements that are different. The similarity again resides in the theory that human language is distinct from other forms of exclamation and signaling. 16

James Harris, Treatise the Third: Concerning Happiness: a Dialogue, vol. I of Works, ed. by the Earl of Malmesbury (2 vols.; London: 1801), 94. Cited in Chomsky's Cartesian Linguistics, 15-16.

28

EARLY GERMAN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE

Chomsky summarizes this contention in the following way: "Herder argues that language is different in kind from exclamations of passion and that it cannot be attributed to superior organs of articulation. ..." 17 Herder does not contend that man never speaks out of passion or does he argue that man's physiology is the same as all other animals of his kind. He does argue that human language is different in kind from the purely instinctual response of animals, and that the difference between man and animals is not purely physiological. He states this differentiation in the form of a question: "Children, like animals, utter sounds of sensation. But is not the language they learn from other humans a totally different language?" 18 But what makes this 'totally different language' possible ? According to Herder, human language occurs because man's instincts are inferior to that of animals. Animals, in Herder's view, are caught and tightly bound in a nexus of sensation and instinct. Since they are tightly bound in this nexus, there is no possibility for reflection and creative language. Animal language can only be a determined response to external or internal stimuli, that is, it occurs as a response to the environment or to internal drives. Herder seems convinced that there is this decisive differentiation between man and animals, for he says: "It seems assured that man is far inferior to the animals in the intensity and reliability of his instincts and indeed that he does not have at all what in many animal species we regard as innate artivactive skills and drives."19 The tight nexus of determination that an animal responds to focuses the animal's attention on a limited sphere of activity. This sphere is regular and uniform and the animal's life is concentrated into living out the particular activity of its species. The animal's attention is intensely particular. It is bent solely on living out the drives and needs that determine its life and activity. Herder's view of animal behavior in contrast to human behavior is summarized in the following: 17

Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 13. Johann Gottfried Herder, On the Origin of Language, Two Essays by Jean Jacques Rousseau and Johann Gottfried Herder, trans, by John H. Moran and Alexander Gode (New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1966), 99. All of Herder's major essays on language are available in German in Johann Gottfried Herder's Sprachphilosophische Schriften, edited and introduced by Erich Heintel (Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1964). The corresponding German for the passage above is found on p. 12: "Kinder sprechen Schälle der Empfindung, wie die Tiere; ist aber die Sprache, die sie von Menschen lernen, nicht ganz eine andre Sprache?" 19 Ibid, 103. Herder's Schriften, 15: "Dass der Mensch den Tieren an Stärke und Sicherheit des Instinktes weit nachstehe, ja dass er das, was wir bei so vielen Tiergattungen angeborne Kunstfähigkeiten und Kunsttriebe nennen, gar nicht habe ist gesichert; ..." 18

EARLY GERMAN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE

29

The sensitivity, the skills, and the artifactive drives of the animals increase in strength and intensity in inverse proportion to the magnitude and multifariousness of their sphere of activity. But now — M a n has no such uniform and narrow sphere where only one performance is expected of him: A whole world of ventures and tasks is lying about him. His senses and his organization are not focused on one object: H e has senses for all things and hence naturally weaker and duller senses for each one. The powers of his soul are spread over the world; there is no orientation of his conceptions toward one single object and hence n o artifactive drive, no artifactive skill — and (a point which belongs most particularly in this context) no animal language. 20 Since man's instincts are less acute, and since the power of his senses is miniscule in contrast to the senses of many animals, he is not utterly determined by his instincts and senses. In Chomsky's words: "He is not, in other words, under the control of external stimuli and internal drives and compelled to respond in a perfect and specific way." 2 1 Herder argues that it is this freedom from being dominated by internal and external stimuli that makes possible human reflection and reason. This freedom is the essence of human reason. Herder states this differentiation between m a n and animals in the following way: If m a n had the drives of the animals, he could not have what we now call reason in him; for such drives would pull his forces darkly toward a single point, in such a way that he would have no free sphere of awareness. There is only the possibility that ... If m a n had the senses of the animals, he would have no reason; for the keen alertness of his senses and the mass of perceptions flooding him through them would smother all cool reflection. 22 20

Ibid., 105. Herder's Schriften, 16-17: "Die Empfindsamkeit, die Fähigkeiten und Kunsttriebe der Tiere nehmen an Stärke und Intensität zu im umgekehrten Verhältnisse der Grösse und Mannigfaltigkeit ihres Wirkungskreises. Nun aber — Der Mensch hat keine so einförmige und enge Sphäre, wo nur eine Arbeit auf ihn wartet: eine Welt von Geschäften und Bestimmungen liegt um ihn. Seine Sinne und Organisation sind nicht auf Eins geschärft: er hat Sinne für alles und natürlich also für jedes einzelne schwächere und stumpfere Sinne. Seine Seelenkräfte sind über die Welt verbreitet; keine Richtung seiner Vorstellungen auf ein Eins: mithin kein Kunsttrieb, keine Kunstfertigkeit — und, das Eine gehört hier näher her, keine Tiersprache." 21 Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 14. 22 Herder, On The Origin of Language, 111. Herder's Schriften, 22: "wenn der Mensch Triebe der Tiere hätte, er das nicht haben könnte, was wir jetzt Vernunft in ihm nennen; denn eben diese Triebe rissen ja seine Kräfte so dunkel auf einen Punkt hin, dass ihm kein freier Besinnungskreis ward. Es musste sein, dass — Wenn der Mensch Sinne der Tiere, er keine Vernunft hätte; denn eben die starke Reizbarkeit seiner Sinne, eben die durch sie mächtig andringenden Vorstellungen müssten alle kalte Besonnenheit ersticken."

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The weakness of the human senses makes possible the distance of reflection and reasoning. Man, in Herder's view, does not speak out of instinct yet the nature of man, that is, reason and reflection makes it possible for language to be natural to man. This appears to be paradoxical, if not contradictory. Man, in Herder's view, does not speak naturally, yet language is a natural result of his intellectual capacities. Chomsky deals with this paradox or apparent contradiction in the following way: Free to reflect and to contemplate, man is able to observe, compare, distinguish essential properties, identify, and name. It is in this sense that language (and the discovery of language) is natural to man, that "Der Mensch ist zum Sprachgeschöpf gebildet." On the one hand, Herder observes that man has no innate language — m a n does not speak by nature. On the other hand, language in his view is so specifically a product of m a n ' s particular intellectual organization that he is able to claim: "Könnte ich nun hier alle Enden Zusammennehmen u n d mit einmal das Gewebe sichtbar machen, was menschliche Natur heisst: durchaus ein Gewebe zur Sprache." The resolution of the apparent paradox lies in his attempt to account for human language as a consequence of the weakness of human instinct. 23

Language, thus, is a result of man's freedom to reflect. Language arises out of human, intellectual freedom. It is the act of creative language that is specific to human linguistic activity and naturally follows from man's intellectual freedom. This theory of Herder's corresponds directly to Chomsky's contention concerning the creative aspect of language use. In Chomsky's terms "the normal use of language is innovative".24 This is to say that, even in its most common and basic use, language is creative. For Herder this means that language is a natural result of man's creative and reflective intellect. In Herder's words: Man, placed in the state of reflection which is peculiar to him, with this reflection for the first time given full freedom of action, did invent language. F o r what is reflection? What is language? This reflection is characteristically peculiar to man and essential to his species; and so is language and the invention of language. Invention of language is therefore as natural to m a n as it is to him that he is man. 2 5 23

Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 14-15. Chomsky, Language and Mind (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1968), 10. 25 Herder, On the Origin of Language, 115. Herder's Schriften, 23-24: "Der Mensch in den Zustand von Besonnenheit gesetzt, der ihm eigen ist, und diese Besonnenheit (Reflexion) zum ersten Mal frei wirkend, hat Sprache erfunden. Denn was ist Reflexion? Was ist Sprache? 24

EARLY GERMAN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE

31

The importance of Herder for this study does not lie in his contentions of how man invented language. The concern of this essay is not directly parallel to Herder's concerns. Herder's primary work on language deals with the 'origin' of language. The concern of this essay is what language reflects concerning human nature and human being. The question of the historical origin of language is an open and probably unanswerable question. It is probably unanswerable because there would be no way of verifying how language arose. Some years ago, the French Academy decided not to accept any more papers on the subject. "A great many ingenious theories have been promulgated, so many that more than a century ago the French Academy announced that it would entertain no more."26 The question of the origin of language or of how language first arose is a question that is interesting to speculate about, but there does not appear to be any verifiable way of making the conjectures concerning this question something more than interesting speculation. Herder claims that man invented language in a process similar to that of naming new objects or beings that man confronted for the first time. He describes this process through his famous example of man's first confrontation with sheep. Let that lamb there, as an image, pass by under his eyes; it is to him, as it is to no other animal. N o t as it would appear to the hungry, scenting wolf! N o t as it would appear to the blood-lapping lion. — They scent and taste in anticipation! Sensuousness has overwhelmed them. Instinct forces them to throw themselves over it. ... — N o t so with man! As soon as he feels the need to come to know the sheep, no instinct gets in his way; no one sense of his pulls him too close to it or too far away f r o m it. It stands there, entirely as it manifests itself in his senses. White, soft, woolly — his soul in reflective exercise seeks a distinguishing mark — the sheep bleats! His soul has found the distinguishing mark. The inner sense is at work. This bleating, which makes upon m a n ' s soul the strongest impression, which broke away f r o m all the other equalities of vision and of touch, which sprang out and penetrated most deeply, the soul retains it. 27 Diese Besonnenheit ist ihm charakteristisch eigen und seiner Gattung wesentlich: so auch Sprache und eigne Erfindung der Sprache. Erfindung der Sprache ist ihm also so natürlich, als er ein Mensch ist!" 26 In Giles W. Bray and C. M. Wise, The Bases of Speech (3rd ed., New York: Harper & Bros. Publishers, 1959), 455, and also in Otto Jespersen's Language: Its Nature, Development and Origin (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1964), 96, we find that when the French 'Société de linguistique' was founded, in 1866, the statues of the society indicate an aversion to the question of the origin of language. 27 Herder, On the Origin of Language, 115. Herder's Schriften, 24-25: "Lasst jenes Lamm, als Bild, sein Auge Vorbeigehn: ihm wie keinem andern Tiere. Nicht wie dem

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Even in this example Herder is not trying to deal with an exact analysis of the historical origin of language. He is describing the process of reflection and the inventiveness that man brings to bear through thinking and language. For the purpose of this essay, it makes little difference whether Herder's contentions are a correct theory concerning the historical origin of language. Since the question of the historical origin of language appears to be a question for only speculation and conjecture, it would be difficult to decisively defend or refute Herder's theories even if it was deemed necessary for this project. The importance of Herder for the project at hand is that he develops a theory of human nature and language that is comparable to that of Chomsky. Herder argues that man uses language inventively and thus creatively. In this respect he is crucially similar to the concerns and theories of Chomsky, which center on the creative aspect of language use. In contrast to Chomsky, Herder, like Harris and Hamann, emphasizes the importance of linguistic relativity. Like Hamann, Herder argues that language and reason are essentially and intimately related. The reasoning we engage in and the words through which we symbolize this process are not separate facets of the cognitive process. Herder does not go so far as to say that language completely determines thought, but he does contend that language is the mold and form of thought. In his words: "If words are not merely signs, but also, as it were, the forms in which we see our thoughts, then I would regard a whole language as a great range of thoughts having become manifest." 28 Language is thus the mold of thought. It is the form in which thought becomes manifest. Furthermore, "if it is true that we cannot think without thoughts, and that we learn to think through words, then language gives to the whole of human

hungrigen, witternden Wolfe, nicht wie dem blutleckenden Löwen! — Die wittern und schmecken schon im Geiste, die Sinnlichkeit hat sie überwältigt, der Instinkt wirft sie darüber her! ... Nicht so den Menschen! Sobald er in das Bedürfnis kommt, das Schaf kennen zu lernen, so stört ihn kein Instinkt, so reisst ihn kein Sinn auf dasselbe zu nahe hin oder davon ab; es steht da, ganz wie es sich seinen Sinnen äussert. Weiss, sanft, wollig — seine besonnen sich übende Seele sucht ein Merkmal — das Schaf blökt\ sie hat ein Merkmal gefunden. Der innere Sinn wirkt. Dies Blöken, das ihr am stärksten Eindruck macht, das sich von allen andern Eigenschaften des Beschauens und Betrachtens losriss, hervorsprang, am tiefsten eindrang, bleibt ihr." 28 Herder Sämtliche Werke, ed. Bernhard Suphan (33 vols.; Berlin: 1877-1913), II, 12. German: "Wenn Wörter nicht bloss Zeichen, sondern gleichsam die Hüllen sind, in welchen wir die Gedanken sehen: so betrachte ich eine ganze Sprache, als einen grossen Umfang von sichtbar gewordenen Gedanken, als ein unermässliches Land von Begriffen."

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knowledge its limits and contours." 29 Language is not a mere product of thought. "We think in language."30 Language is neither the mere tool of a separate process or function nor is it the mere form that thought shapes it to be. It is not formed and determined by a capacity separate from it. Herder regarded "language as the means, the content, and the form of human thoughts". 31 Herder argued that language was that most distinctively human activity. It was most indicative of man's nature. Thus, the study of language and also a comparison of different languages would be the most incisive way to develop a 'philosophy of the human understanding'. Not only would the study of language be the best approach to the study of human understanding; it would be the most valuable method for comparing the thinking and ideas of different peoples and nations. "Every nation speaks often and according to the way it thinks, and thinks according to the way it speaks: As varied as the viewpoint was from which a nation looked at a thing, it designated it the same way." 32 Again, as was the case with Harris and Hamann, Herder's view is comparable to that of Chomsky in terms of the relationship between language and human nature or language and human creativity. In contrast to Chomsky, who emphasized the importance of linguistic universals, Harris, Hamann, and Herder emphasized the cultural relativity of language. In spite of the difference, the similarity remains between Chomsky and the German thinkers dealt with above. This similarity is that human language is uniquely indicative of the creativity that is intrinsically a part of human nature. Chomsky reflects particular interest in Humboldt's formulation of the theory of language and human creativity. Chomsky views Humboldt as continuous with the Cartesian tradition in his emphasis upon the creative aspect of language use. Chomsky describes Humboldt's position in the following way: The Cartesian emphasis on the creative aspect of language use, as the essential and defining characteristic of human language, finds its most forceful expression in Humboldt's attempt to develop a comprehensive theory of general 29 Ibid., 17. German: "Ist's wahr, dass wir ohne Gedanken nicht denken können, und durch Worte denken lernen: so giebt die Sprache der ganzen menschlichen Erkenntniss Schranken und Umriss." 30 Ibid., 18. German: "Wir denken in der Sprache." 31 Ibid., 24. German: "als das Werkzeug, den Inhalt, und die Form menschlicher Gedanken." 32 Ibid., 18. German: "Jede Nation spricht also, nach dem sie denkt, und denkt, nach dem sie spricht. So verschieden der Gesichtspunkt war, in dem sie die Sache nahm, bezeichnete sie dieselbe."

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linguistics. Humboldt's characterization rather than ergon ("Werk"), as "eine Erzeugtes", extends and elaborates — the formulations typical of Cartesian of language and aesthetic theory.33

of language as energeia ("Thätigkeit") Erzeugung" rather than "ein todtes often, in almost the same words — linguistics and romantic philosophy

Language, in Humboldt's view, is energy (energeia) and activity. It is action and agentic in contrast to a static and solidified product. The words that Humboldt uses are of utmost importance to his position and theory. He characterizes language as Thätigkeit, which connotes action and creativity rather than a dead and lifeless product. This contrast is further visible if we compare two other words and phrases that he uses, that is, 'eine Erzeugung' and 'ein todtes Erzeugtes'. 'Erzeugung' means potency and the ability to procreate. It also means creativity and generation. This for Humboldt is language. It is a living, dynamic form of energy and creativity. It is not 'ein todtes Erzeugtes', a dead product, but it is the living creativity of the human being. Language, in this view, is not an external product that is alien to human nature. Language is intrinsically related to man's nature, or, in the words of Marianne Cowan, language is "man's intrinsic humanity". 34 Mankind and language are decisively inseparable. Language is not a possession that man comes to acquire. Language, Humboldt is convinced: ... must be looked upon as being an immediate given in mankind. Taken as a work of man's reason, undertaken in clarity of consciousness, it is wholly inexplicable. Nor does it help to supply man with millennia upon millennia for the "invention" of language. Language could not be invented or come upon if its archetype were not already present in the human mind. For man to understand but a single word truly, not as a mere sensuous stimulus (such as an animal understands a command or the sound of the whip) but as an articulated sound designating a concept, all language, in all its connections, must already lie prepared within him. There are no single, separate facts of language. Each of its elements announces itself as part of a whole.35 33

Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 19. The most comprehensive group of selections and readings of Humboldt's that are published in English are found in the book, Humanist Without Portfolio, trans, and intro. by Marianne Cowan (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1963). She entitled the section of this book which is on language, "Man's Intrinsic Humanity: — Language." 35 Wilhelm von Humboldt, Humanist Without Portfolio, 239-40. In Wilhelm von Humboldt's Gesammelte Schriften, ed. by Albert Leitzmann (7 vols.; Berlin: B. Behr, 1903-1918), IV, 14. The corresponding German is: "Muss zwar, meiner vollesten Ueberzeugung nach, als unmittelbar in den Menschen gelegt angesehen werden; denn als Werk seines Verstandes in der Klarheit des Bewusstseyns ist sie durchaus unerklärbar. Es hilft nicht, zu ihrer Erfindung Jahrtausende und abermals Jahrtausende einzuräumen. Die Sprache Hesse sich nicht erfinden, wenn nicht ihr Typus schon in

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35

Language is thus a living creative organism, not a dead, inert artifact. Its processes and activities are not the inevitable response of a determined mechanism, but the living organic functioning of a creative being. The concept of 'organism' is central to Humboldt's view. The importance of the words 'organic' and 'organism' for Humboldt and other thinkers of this era cannot be overestimated. The organismic view of man and the world was central to the reaction against the mechanistic interpretation of the world and of human activity. Benziger, in his study concerning the importance of the concept of organic unity for many thinkers in this era, states the following: As the eighteenth century closed and the nineteenth opened, the word organic was no ordinary word. It was bursting with cosmic suggestion, with intimations as to the structure of the universe. It had been little used in the days when the older thought of Descartes and Locke had reigned supreme.... But increasingly in the eighteenth century European investigators of nature devoted themselves to the study of the biological sciences.36 The concept of 'organism' was thus opposed to the mechanistic theories and schemes of interpretation. Thinkers such as Humboldt, Kant, Goethe, and Schlegel developed this theory for areas of human inquiry and understanding that they thought were not vulnerable to mechanistic theories and constructs. Kant, for example, uses organismic concepts and language in his aesthetics. In his third Critique, that is, The Critique of Judgement, Kant sought to move beyond the mechanistic interpretation of objects in nature that he had developed in his first critique. In his first Critique, that is, The Critique of Pure Reason, Kant had argued that we know the natural world as determined and regimented according to inevitable laws of cause and effect. In the Prolegomena he states this as follows: "Nature is the existence of things so far as it is determined according to universal laws." 37 Scientific perception, thus, interprets dem menschlichen Verstände vorhanden wäre. Damit der Mensch nur ein einziges Wort wahrhaft, nicht als blossen sinnlichen Anstoss, sondern als articulirten, einen Betriff bezeichnenden Laut verstehe, muss schon die Sprache ganz, und im Zusammenhange in ihm liegen. Es giebt nichts Einzelnes in der Sprache, jedes ihrer Elemente kundigt sich nur als Theil eines Ganzen an." 36 James Benziger, "Organic Unity, Leibnitz to Coleridge", Publications of the Modem Language Association of America, LXVI (March, 1951), 33. 37 Immanuel Kant, Prolegomena To Any Future Metaphysics (New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1950), 42. In Kant's Sämmtliche Werke, ed. by G. Hartenstein (6 vols.; Leipzig: Leopold Voss, 1867), IV, 43, this reads as: "Natur ist das Dasein der Dinge, sofern es nach allgemeinen Gesetzen bestimmt ist." Goethe reacted consistently and harshly against mechanistic and deterministic interpretations of nature. Goethe's many observations of plants led him to a theory of organic struct-

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nature as a machine or a mechanism that is chained to a causal sequence. In The Critique of Pure Reason he states this in the following way: "All alterations take place in conformity with the law of the connection of cause and effect." 38 However, in the third Critique, Kant does not argue that scientific perception is wrong, but that we have other forms of judgment through which we can perceive nature in yet another way. These forms are aesthetic judgments. Scientifically, we perceive nature as a machine and as determined. Aesthetically, we perceive it as a purposeful organic unity. Kant gives the example of a tree and specifies how its activity is not the mere response of a mechanism: ... a tree produces itself as an individual. This kind of effect we no doubt call growth; but it is quite different from any increase according to mechanical laws, and is to be reckoned as generation ... 3 9

The difference in Kant's view between a mechanism and an organism is that an organism thrives on mutual interrelatedness and interdependence. It does not derive its energy and order solely from external pressures and direction. It has internal purpose and design. The reciprocity of an organism, according to Kant, is embodied in the organic unity of a tree. He states that "each part of a tree generates itself in such a way that the maintenance of any one part depends reciprocally on the maintenance of the rest". 40 The point of Kant's emphasis upon the interdependence of the organism does not merely stem from his desire to point out its mutual interrelatedness. A machine, too, has interrelated and interdependent parts. The difference is that an organism has its own intrinsic design and purpose. In this sense, an organism generates and creates out of internal and innate design and structures, in contrast to a machine which is determined by external causes and purposes. In an ure, in contrast to mechanical principles and theories that were prominent in his time. For an outstanding discussion of this problem see Erich Heller, The Disinherited Mind, Meridian Books (Cleveland and New York: The World Publishing Company, 1967), especially Chapter 1, "Goethe and the Idea of Scientific Truth", 3-34. 38 Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1965), 218. The German equivalent in the Sämmtliche Werke, HI, 173 is as follows: "Alle Veränderungen geschehen nach dem Gesetze der Verknüpfung der Ursache und Wirkung." 39 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgement, trans, by J. H. Bernard (New York: Hafner Publishing Company, 1966), 217. The German equivalent in the Sämmtliche Werke, V, 383, is as follows: "... erzeugt ein Baum sich auch selbst als Individuum. Diese Art von Wirkung nennen wir zwar nur das Wachsthum; aber Zunahme nach mechanischen Gesetzen gänzlich unterschieden, und einer Zeugung, ..." 40 Ibid., 218. Kant's Kritik der Urtheilskraft, 384: "erzeugt ein Theil dieses Geschöpfs auch sich selbst so, dass die Erhaltung des einen von der Erhaltung der andern wechselsweise abhängt."

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organism, contends Kant, the parts not only are reciprocal, but they produce each other. In such a product of nature every part not only exists by means of the other parts, but is thought as existing for the sake of the others and the whole, that is as an (organic) instrument. Thus, however, it might be an artificial instrument, and so might be represented only as a purpose that is possible in general; but also its parts are all organs reciprocally producing each other. This can never be the case with artificial instruments (even for those of art). Only a product of such a kind can be called a natural purpose, and this because it is an organised and selforganising being. 41

It is the generative quality of the organism that makes the creativity of organic life comparable to that of linguistic activity. It is for this reason Humboldt uses organic metaphors in describing linguistic processes. Language reflects the generation of internal creativity in a parallel manner to that of a plant or tree. Its activity is certainly related to external stimuli, but its order and purpose is intrinsic rather than an inevitable and mechanical response that is solely determined by external causes. A. W. Schlegel, in his lectures "On Dramatic Art and Literature", makes the same distinction that Kant uses to differentiate scientific and aesthetic judgments. This is parallel to the distinction that Humboldt uses to distinguish his organismic view of language from a mechanistic view which would approach language as an inert mass of sound and signs. For Schlegel, this is the difference between organic form and mechanical pressure. He makes this distinction as follows: Form is mechanical when it is imparted to any material through an external force, merely as an accidental addition, without reference to its character. ... Organic form, on the contrary, is innate; it unfolds itself from within, and reaches its determination simultaneously with the fullest development of the seed. ... In the fine arts, just as in the province of nature — the supreme artist — all genuine forms are organic. ... 42 41

Kant, Critique of Judgement, 220. The German equivalent in the Sämmtliche Werke, V, 386, is as follows: "In einem solchen Producte der Natur wird ein jeder Theil, so, wie er nur durch alle übrige da ist, auch als um der andern und des Ganzen willen existirend, d.i. als Werkzeug (Organ) gedacht; welches aber nicht genug ist, (denn er könnte auch Werkzeug der Kunst sein, und so nur als Zweck überhaupt möglich vorgestellt werden;) sondern als ein die andern Theile, (folglich jeder den andern wechselseitig) hervorbringendes Organ, dergleichen kein Werkzeug der Kunst, sondern nur der allen Stoff zu Werkzeugen (selbst denen der Kunst) liefernden Natur sein kann; und nur dann und darum wird ein solches Product, als organisirtes und sich selbst organisirendes Wesen, ein Naturzweck genannt werden können." 42 A. W. Schlegel, On Dramatic Art and Literature, as quoted in Roger Langham Brown, Wilhelm von Humboldt's Conception of Linguistic Relativity (The Hague: Mouton, 1967), 47.

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Language, like other organic forms, unfolds from within in the sense that it issues from capacities and structures that are intrinsic to human being. Language, for Humboldt, is "an intellectual instinct of the human mind". 43 By instinct, Humboldt means that language is inseparably part of the innate capacities of human intelligence and creativity. In his words: "In language, the creative, archetypal energies of humanity are active — that deep reservoir of capacity in us whose existence and nature can neither be understood nor denied." 44 By instinct and innate archetypal capacities, Humboldt does not mean that language is solely the result of determined innate capacities or the inevitable surfacing of innate ideas. Language is neither completely determined by external causes nor is it the inevitable result of innate capacities that function oblivious to external reality. For Humboldt, "language is a dimension which lies midway between the external, phenomenal one and our own inwardly active one". 45 It functions as an organism, that is, it is a responsive part of its environment, but it is also directed and designed according to its own intrinsic and innate structures. In contrast to Hamann and Herder, Humboldt adopts and adapts Kant's epistemology and integrates it into his linguistic theory. Both Hamann and Humboldt were highly critical of Kant's work and argued that Kant's epistemology, which he elaborates in the Critique of Pure Reason, was inadequate because Kant had failed to deal with the relationship between language and thought. Hamann wrote a critique of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. He entitled it the Metakritik über den Purismus der reinen Vernunft.46 Herder followed in the example of his teacher with his own 'metacritique' in Eine Metakritik zur Kritik der reinen Vernunft.*1 Both of these essays were highly critical of Kant because he had not dealt with the question of language in the development of his epistemology. Humboldt, however, takes a different stand and integrates and transforms Kant's epistemology into his philosophy of language. It is Kant's theory concerning the synthetic and creative activity 43

Humboldt, Werke, IV, 15. German: "so kann man ... die Sprache einen intellectuellen (Instinct) der Vernunft nennen." 44 Ibid., 249. German: "Bei der Sprache sind die schaffenden Urkräfte des Menschen thätig, das tief liegende Vermögen, dessen Daseyn und Natur nicht begriffen, aber nicht abgeläugnet werden kann." 45 Humboldt, Werke, HI, 167. 46 Johann Georg Hamann, Schriften zur Sprache, 219-28. 47 Johann Gottfried von Herder, Verstand und Erfahrung: Eine Metakritik zur Kritik der reinen Vernunft (Leipzig: J. F. Hartnoch, 1799).

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of the mind that Humboldt brings to bear on his linguistic theories. Miller, in his book on Humboldt, describes Humboldt's appropriation of Kant's epistemology in the following manner: Language is for Humboldt what the synthesis of judgment is for Kant: a creative act of the mind. Just as synthesis for Kant is not the mere uniting of previous 'givens', but rather determines the nature of the constituents themselves, so language for Humboldt is not the mere appending of words on ideas detached from these words, but rather enters into the cognitive process itself.48 Language, for Humboldt, is the form and formation of thought. It is the shape and pattern that thought assumes. It is synthetic and constitutive activity of thought. In and through language, thoughts are synthesized into intelligible forms. Kant would argue that what we know is inseparable from the constitutive action of the mind; whereas Humboldt would argue that this constitutive activity takes place through linguistic processes: Language is the formative organ of thought. Intellectual activity — thoroughly psychic, internal, and, so to speak, flitting by without a trace — becomes, through the sounds of speech, externalized and perceptible to the senses. It and language are therefore one, and inseparable from one another. It is, however, by its very nature forced to enter into union with the speech sound; thinking cannot otherwise attain to clarity, nor can conception (Vorstellung) become concept.49 Ernst Cassirer, in The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, makes numerous references to Humboldt, especially in his volume on language.50 Cassirer argues directly that Humboldt applies Kant's epistemology to his philosophy of language. Kant's 'critique of cognition' becomes Humboldt's 'critique of language'. 51 As was related above, Kant argued that what we know of the world is inseparable from the process of cognition. For Humboldt, knowledge is inseparable from linguistic activity. Cassirer draws the parallel between Humboldt and Kant in the following manner: Humboldt applies the Kantian critique to the philosophy of language. ... In Kant the object, as "object in experience", is not something outside of and apart from cognition; on the contrary, it is only "made possible", determined 48

Miller, Linguistic Relativity Principle, 26. Ibid. 50 Ernst Cassirer, Symbolic Forms, 1. Cassirer, it is interesting to note, makes more references to Humboldt in this volume than to any other thinker that he cites or analyzes. 51 Ibid., 157. In Der Symbolischen Formen, I, 102, this reads as "Kant's Kritiker der Erkenntnis" and "Humboldt's Kritiker der Sprache". 49

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and constituted by the categories of cognition. Similarly, the subjectivity of language no longer appears as a barrier that prevents us from apprehending objective being but rather as a means of forming, of "objectifying" sensory impressions.52 The creative and synthetic activity of language that Humboldt derives from Kant's epistemology is similar to Chomsky's view of the creative aspect of language use. From Humboldt, Chomsky derives his notion of the infinite variability and transformations of the finite form language. The creative and synthetic process that Kant and Humboldt argued is the essence of human knowledge, Chomsky contends is exemplified in linguistic processes: "To use the terminology Wilhelm von Humboldt used in the 1830's, the speaker makes infinite use of finite means. His grammar must, then, contain a finite system of rules that generates infinitely many deep and surface structures, appropriately related." 53 Cassirer, in describing Humboldt's view, emphasizes a similar relationship between the finite nature of language and boundless infinity of human expression. According to Humboldt, in Cassirer's interpretation: "Each individual speaks his own language — and yet, precisely in the freedom with which he employs it, he is aware of an inner spiritual constraint. Language is everywhere an intermediary, first between infinite and finite nature." 54 There is thus a dimension to language that is finite, limited and historical. There is also an aspect or facet of language that makes it boundless and capable of infinite variability. In this sense, Chomsky's view of the creative aspect of language use may not be entirely incompatible with the theories of linguistic relativity. Humboldt appears to integrate both of these positions. Language is a finite means, but it is capable of infinite variations. The finite and historical reality of language is the particular language of particular peoples. Their thoughts and values are inseparably related to their language. In Hum52

Ibid., 158. In Der Symbolischen Formen, 1, 102, this reads as: "Humboldt zieht die sprachphilosophische Konsequenz aus Kants kritischer Lehre. ... Wie bei Kant der Gegenstand, als, "Gegenstand in der Erscheinung", der Erkenntnis nicht als ein Äusseres und Jenseitiges gegenübersteht, sondern durch deren eigene Kategorien erst "ermöglicht", erst bedingt und konstituiert wird — so erscheint jetzt auch die Subjektivität der Sprache als keine blosse Schranke mehr, die uns von der Erfassung des gegenständlichen Seins trennt, sondern als ein Mittel der Formung, der "Objektivierung" der sinnlichen Eindrücke." 53 Chomsky, Language and Mind, 15. 54 Cassirer, Symbolic Forms, I, 156. In Der Symbolischen Formen, 100, this reads as: "Jedes Individuum spricht seine eigene Sprache — und doch wird es sich gerade in der Freiheit, mit der es sich ihrer bedient, einer inneren geistigen Bindung bewusst. So ist die Sprache überall Vermittlerin, erst zwischen der unendlichen und endlichen Natur."

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boldt's words: "The spiritual characteristics and the linguistic structure of a people stand in a relationship of such indissoluble fusion. ... Language is the external manifestation, as it were, of the spirit of a nation." 55 This side of Humboldt's work is a well known phenomena in the field of philosophy of language and linguistic studies. Cassirer, as was stated previously, makes numerous references to Humboldt, many of them in recognition of his emphasis on linguistic relativity. An example of this is Cassirer's succinct summary that "for Humboldt each single language is an individual view of the world". 56 Two other major studies in the field of linguistics are also directed towards the Humboldtian theme of linguistic relativity. These are Wilhelm von Humboldt's Conception of Linguistic Relativity by Roger Langham Brown and The Linguistic Relativity Principle and Humboldtian Ethnolinguistics by Robert L. Miller. Each of these works deals with Humboldt's statements and theories on linguistic relativity in detail. The compatibility and comparison that is being sought in the present stage of this work is that of reconciling the strong emphasis upon linguistic relativity, that is so important to the German authors that have been traced above, with Chomsky's theory of linguistic universals and his contention that language reflects universal capacities of human nature and human being.57 The key to reconciling and resolving this tension between arguing that language reflects universal capacities versus arguing that language is culturally relative and that it embodies a world view which is unique and particular to each linguistic group lies in the German tradition that has just been traced. 58 55

Humboldt, Humanist Without Portfolio, 277. Cassirer, Symbolic Forms, 1, 159. In Der Symbolischen Formen, I, 104, this reads as: "jede einzelne Sprache zu einer solchen individuellen Weltansicht." 57 Another way of substantiating the importance of reconciling or synthesizing linguistic relativity with linguistic universality is found in an essay by Julia M. Penn, entitled Linguistic Relativity Versus Innate Ideas: The Origins of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis in German Thought (The Hague: Mouton, 1972). In this work a very cogent argument is presented concerning extreme forms of linguistic relativity. The author maintains that if language determines thought in toto, then the only possible explanation for the origin of language is a theory of divine origin. If language is not dependent upon thought in any way, and if thought is totally dependent upon language, then language must have occurred prior to thought. The only possible explanation for this according to Penn is that language was given to man, thus at least suggesting the possibility of the divine origin of language. If man could not have created language through his own capacities, then man could not have been the source of his own language. Thus, extreme forms of linguistic relativity could only be explained in conjunction with a theory of the divine origin of language. 58 The difference between linguistic universality and linguistic relativity can not be trivialized, as Oswald Ducrot argues in an essay entitled "Le structuralisme en lin56

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It was noted previously that Chomsky recognized and describes Herder, Schlegel, and Humboldt as thinkers who anticipate his own theory of creative language use. It was also noted that Chomsky pays very little attention to the facets of their work that point strongly in the direction of linguistic relativity. The question that must be resolved is: Can Chomsky's emphasis on grammatical universality be reconciled with the view that language is also linguistically relative ? On the surface, the two views seem irreconcilable, that is, either language reflects linguistic relativity or it reflects universal human characteristics. For Herder and Humboldt it reflects both. Language, for Herder and Humboldt, as for Chomsky, is a species-specific capacity that is indicative of the unique intellectual capacities of man. This unique capacity is what Chomsky argues is reflected in the creative aspect of language use. Human nature, thus in the Chomskyan perspective, is very closely related to human creativity. Herder and Humboldt, as was previously indicated, argued a similar point and contend that language is indicative of unique intellectual capacities that are specific to man. Herder and Humboldt maintained, however, that language as a species-specific capacity is also linguistically relative. Their resolution of the tension between universal human characteristics and linguistic relativity is basically the following: Language in its creative and innovative function is unique to and with man. As such, it reflects a universal characteristic, that is, it reflects the unique human ability to think and communicate creatively. Language, in addition to reflecting this unique human ability, also reflects the world view or mental patterns of a particular linguistic group. Thus, man is capable of being creative within the patterns and structures of his own language. The patterns, structures, and grammar of his language are historically and culturally relative, but the way he uses and creatively transforms his language will be parallel to the variation that man is able to bring about in any language. Thus, the ability to generate alternative phrases and to transform the order of words and phrases is not unique and particular to any one language. It is a universal ability of man and a universal characteristic of human language. This makes Chomsky's guistique" found in Qu'est-ce que le structuralisme ? (Paris : Seuil, 1968). The difference, I will argue, is not an incompatible difference. Ducrot contrasts these two positions by comparing Humboldt with the Port Royalist grammarians in the following on p. 28 of the above: "La différence avec la grammaire de Port-Royal nous semble considérable. Il ne s'agit pas, pour Humboldt, de trouver un type déterminé de construction commun à toutes les langues, et qui refléterait la forme immuable du jugement. Selon lui, au contraire, la raison universelle peut s'exprimer, non pas malgré, mais dans la spécificité linguistique."

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emphasis upon universal grammar compatible with theories of linguistic universality. Particular languages may be linguistically relative in the world views they reflect, but how they are generated and transformed in creative language use is analogous and parallel to the creativity that is reflected in any human language. To make clear what Chomsky means by universality and how he attempts to prove his case linguistically, an examination will be necessary in order to discern if universality and relativity are compatible as suggested above, or if the Humboldtian synthesis we have suggested is a plausible interpretation and use of Chomsky's works. Turning now to Chomsky's works and the linguistic evidence he presents, the problem elaborated above shall be addressed on Chomsky's terms and with his own evidence.

CHAPTER III

CREATIVE L A N G U A G E USE IN VIEW OF C H O M S K Y ' S E V I D E N C E

There are many issues that Chomsky is trying to contend with and answer in and through his linguistic theories. One of his central issues has been dealt with, in part, in the previous two chapters. This is Chomsky's contention concerning the creative aspect of language use. Through his theories of generative and transformational grammar he attempts to argue first, that there is creativity in language use; and second that his grammar, since it is generative and transformational, can account for and serve as evidence in demonstrating the infinite variety of linguistic expressions. He describes his own theories as generative and transformational grammar. The word 'generative' symbolizes the human ability to select or generate novel expressions. Generative grammar, as a theory, implies that language is a living and creative form rather than a lifeless mechanism that can only be formed and shaped by external forces and stimulation. Chomsky's emphasis on the generative adequacy of a grammar focuses on the issue of constructing a grammar that is not closed in its forms and structure, but a grammar that is open to the diversity of human creativity. "Hence, a generative grammar must be a system of rules that can iterate to generate an indefinitely large number of structures." 1 From his theories of generative grammar, Chomsky argues that there must be a capacity that generates various and diverse expressions. Thus it is plausible to argue that man has a creative capacity that can be called 'mind'. Jerrold J. Katz, a student and follower of Chomsky, contends that the movement of Chomsky's argument attempts to discern the hidden and "underlying reality of language".2 Transformational and generative grammar does not focus on the mere description of a language, but it is the attempt to penetrate beyond appearance 1 Noam Chomsky, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax (Cambridge, Mass.: The M.I.T. Press, 1965), 15-16. 2 Jerrold J. Katz, The Underlying Reality of Language and its Philosophical Import (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1971).

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and surface phenomena into the underlying reality. In Katz's words: Science and philosophy sometimes attempt to show that things are not what they seem to be on the basis of direct experience. Some of these attempts to penetrate beyond appearances to an underlying reality have only led to bogus conceptions of what is real. Others, however, have established that certain appearances are deceiving and have thereby led to genuine advances in theoretical knowledge, ranking among the supreme achievements of human intelligence that have thereby revealed a world of strangeness and beauty lying beneath the surface in the commonplace things of life.3 According to Katz, Chomsky's linguistic theories are comparable to the atomic theory of matter. On the surface, matter appears continuous and permanent. It does not seem to be a nexus of molecular and atomic activity. The underlying reality of matter is thus quite different from its appearance. This is also the case with language. On the surface, language is made up of the sounds we hear spoken and the words we write and read. As such, it is an object of direct experience. It can be described, catalogued, and categorized as any other object in our experience. This is the taxonomic view of language. In taxonomic theory, the grammar of a natural language is conceived of as an elaborate data-cataloguing system, similar to book classification schemes in library science. In transformational theory, a grammar is conceived of as a theory that explains how speakers can associate acoustic signals with the meaning those signals have in the language, a theory similar in form to theories in other sciences that explain a body of data by showing that it can be deduced from general principles about the structure of objects which provide the reason why the facts are as they are. Thus while the model on which the taxonomic grammarian bases his conception of a grammar is a scheme like the Dewey Decimal System, the model on which the transformational grammarian bases his is a theory like the atomic theory.4 In contrast to descriptive linguistics, the transformational theory with its emphasis on generative grammar implies that there is an underlying reality to language. Katz, again, draws upon the comparison between theories of nature and of language in the following: Just as the physicist distinguishes between the nature of matter and its observable behavior, so the transformationalist distinguishes between the speaker's linguistic competence (the internalized rules that he knows) and his linguistic performance (what he does on the basis of knowing such rules). A grammar, then, is a theoretical statement of what speakers know about the inherent structure of their language, and thus of their linguistic competence rather than 3 4

Ibid., 1. Ibid., 50-51.

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their linguistic performance, though linguistic performance provides all the empirical data for the investigation of competence.5 The speakers' knowledge of the inherent structure of their language in the Chomskyan perspective is not something derived from external and surface phenomena. There is a depth-dimension to language that goes beyond surface structure. The speaker and the listener know this inherent structure for they use it in their conversation. This underlying dimension or structure of language is what makes possible creative language use. In our ordinary conversations, and especially in our extraordinary conversations, we frequently speak and hear new sentences. Certainly, we also use polite phrases that are clichés and phrases of greeting and cordiality that are mere repetitions. However, there is a more remarkable dimension that is rather different from the rote repetition of clichés and socially-accepted phrases. Katz summarizes this differentiation in the following: The most remarkable fact about human speech communication is that, except for cliches and bits of social ritual like "How do you do ?", the sentences we speak and hear daily are new sentences that bear little or no physical resemblance to familiar ones. Yet we understand almost every new sentence we encounter and our understanding is immediate. This is in striking contrast to our attempts at understanding new machines or gadgets, which often take considerable time and effort, and sometimes never succeed at all. Linguistic competence is the source of the creativity that makes such understanding possible, and the way this creativity operates suggests two principles to the transformationalist. First, the speaker's internalized rules must recursively generate each of the infinitely many sentences of his language, so that a new sentence, though new in the sense that no utterance of it has yet occurred, is not new in the sense of being outside the set of sentences defined by these rules. Second, these rules must embody a general function for associating the phonetic representation of acoustic signals with their meaning. Thus, it is this function, operating in the generation of sentences, that makes immediate understanding of new sentences possible.6 The remarkable dimension of human being and human language is that man can understand and create sentences and phrases that he has never heard or spoken before. This is not to say that man creates new words and new grammatical structures as he speaks, but that he generates and transforms word combinations and grammatical structures to create statements that may have no exact parallels in previous English usage. Furthermore, man can understand the creativity of others and he has 5 6

Ibid., 51-52. Ibid., 52-53.

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no insurmountable difficulty in understanding phrases and sentences he has never heard before. It is this creative dimension of language use that Chomsky argues has been neglected and ignored in descriptive linguistics. Linguistic competence does not merely result from the determinations of external stimuli, as it is assumed in descriptive linguistics. If it resulted completely from external causes, then we could only speak and understand the phrases and sentences that we had previously heard or confronted. Thus, it would be impossible to begin to learn or understand. All learning occurs in response to a capacity for learning. Just as the child possesses an organic structure and a bodily from, so also is it plausible to argue that the child's mental capacities have organic unity and structural integrity. If the child's body has structure, organic integrity and form, why should it be assumed that the child's mind is an amorphous blob totally vulnerable to external stimuli? Clearly, if the child's body has the capacity for life and growth, then it does not seem irrational to assume that the mental capacities of a human being have a similar structural and organic integrity which is necessary for learning and development. In contrast, learning and creativity would be impossible in a deterministic scheme of linguistic and epistemological theory. Even if one could learn, all speaking and hearing would be a rote and determined response to the linguistic conditioning to which the speaker and hearer had been exposed. What is at stake in Chomsky's theories is not a minor controversy within an esoteric area of the specialized field of linguistics. Chomsky's generative and transformational grammar has broad epistemological implications that extend far beyond the scientific study of language. The philosophical and psychological implications of his views are also of significant import. In philosophy, the epistemological controversy between rationalism and empiricism has an extremely long and complex history. A complete examination of this problem and its history is impossible in this present study because it would involve a thorough examination of the controversy and debate between the medieval nominalists and realists. It would press back into a comparison of Plato and Aristotle, and include nearly every modern philosopher from Descartes to Hegel. A study that would trace this history would be vast and far beyond the possible scope of the work at hand. Instead, two philosophers that represent the opposite poles of the controversy and debate that Chomsky has triggered shall be examined. Chomsky's theories place him well within the camp of rationalistic

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philosophy. The rationalist, in contrast to the empiricist, argues that not all knowledge is derived from and determined by sense experience. At least some knowledge, according to the rationalist, results from the innate and inherent principle and structures of the mind. Extreme forms of rationalism, for example, those of Plato, would promote the theory that all knowledge results from the innate properties of the mind or soul. In the Meno (85-86), Plato propounds this theory and argues that the soul contains truth within itself. Learning, for Plato, is thus a recollection and remembering of what is innately present in the soul. Kant represents a far more moderate position on the rationalistic hypothesis and the theory of innate ideas. Kant's rationalistic epistemology is most akin to Chomsky.7 According to Kant, sense experience is vital to the knowledge process, but it is not the sole factor that makes knowledge possible. Knowledge occurs through combining sense experience with the organizing activity of the mind. Kant argues that sense experience is necessary to set the innate capacities in operation, but this does not mean that all knowledge is solely determined and derived from experience. "But though all our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it all arises out of experience."3 Chomsky, like Kant, does not underestimate the importance that experience or sense impressions make in activating the learning or intellectual process. He, like Kant, argues that external stimulation is necessary for the innate capacities to awaken, but this does not mean that all knowledge is determined by sense experience. In reference to the origin of the ability to communicate and use language, it would appear superficially that 7

Intriguingly, Chomsky, in the closing paragraph of Cartesian Linguistics, admits that he has neglected Kant in the tracing of the antecedents to his theory. He states the following: "It is important to bear in mind that the survey that has been presented here is a very fragmentary and therefore in some ways a misleading one. Certain major figures — Kant, for example —• have not been mentioned or have been inadequately discussed ..." (p. 73). David E. Cooper, in "Innateness Old and New" found in The Philosophical Review, LXXXI, No. 4 (October 1972), 465-83, maintains that Chomsky's views are not as similar to Descartes' theories of innate ideas as it would seem from Chomsky's writings and contentions. Cooper cites numerous examples from Descartes' writings that imply an extreme from of the innate ideas hypothesis. Cooper is correct in maintaining that these extreme forms of this theory are not compatible with Chomsky, but he fails to deal with the similarity between Chomsky and Descartes on the issue of 'creative language'. Furthermore, Cooper never mentions Kant and thus has missed the most viable epistemological option for Chomsky's theories concerning the active contribution of the mind to the knowledge process. 8 Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, 41. The German equivalent in the Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 33, is as follows: "Wenn aber gleich alle unsere Erkenntniss mit der Erfahrung anhebt, so entspringt sie darum doch nicht eben alle aus der Erfahrung."

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all communication and language results from the determination of external stimuli. However, it does not follow that because external stimulation is necessary, that it solely produces the resultant knowledge or learning. Chomsky specifically applies this scheme to the question of how communication and reasoning arises. "Communication with an already formed intellect is necessary for reason to awaken. But external stimulation is only required to set innate mechanisms to work; it does not determine the form of what is acquired."9 In this passage, Chomsky is referring to Schlegel's epistemology and theory of language. Schlegel, like Chomsky and Kant, emphasizes the importance of innate capacities in the learning and communication process.10 On the basis of the theory of innate capacities of the mind, Chomsky and Kant develop parallel epistemological positions. For Kant, the common structuring, ordering, and synthesizing of the mind makes possible human knowledge and communication. Since the human mind organizes sense perception in a common and similar manner, man has a common ground for thinking and understanding.11 Chomsky arrives at a similar conclusion on the basis of his linguistic findings and theories. Like Kant, Chomsky advocates the theory of the active intellect. The mind is active in the process of perception. It does not merely receive data in dead passivity. The mind actively organizes and responds to sense perception. Chomsky's argument is similar to Kant's, in that he also maintains "that there are uniformities in what is learned that are in no way uniquely determined by the data itself. Consequently, these properties are attributed to the mind, as preconditions for experience."12 For Chomsky, as for Kant, the common basis for communication and knowledge is the universal structures and structuring of the human mind. These are the preconditions for experience. Evidence for these 9

Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 63-64. For Schlegel, as for Chomsky, innate structures are the basic source of the order and coherence of language. Chomsky cites Schlegel in this view: "In a certain sense, language is innate to man; namely, im echteren philosophischen Sinne, wo alles, was nach der gewöhnlichen Ansicht dem Menschen angeboren scheint, erst durch seine eigene Tätigkeit hervorgebracht werden muss." (Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 64). Chomsky quotations from Schlegel are taken from Kritische Schriften und Briefe, II: Die Kunstlehre (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1963). Another available source of Schlegel's writings on language and poetry is Vol. I of this series, which is, Sprache und Poetik. 11 Kant 's contentions concerning the common structuring of perception are developed in the Critique of Pure Reason, especially in the first two sections, that is, "Part I, Transcendental Aesthetics, and Part II, Transcendental Logic". 12 Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 65. 10

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universal capacities and structures stems from the fact that a child can learn any language. If there is not something basically similar about all languages, then it would be impossible for anyone to know or learn more than one language. If languages are entirely different, both in their grammatical structures and patterns and also in their world-view, and if our minds are locked within the relativity of our own language, then we could neither learn a second language nor become aware of the difference between our language and the language of another linguistic group. There must be a basic similarity in all languages and language use. The child's ability to acquire proficiency and competency in any language is ample evidence that there is a strong structural similarity between the ordering and patterning of his mind and structures and grammatical processes of any language. This universality is found in the generative and transformational quality of all languages. Creativity occurs in a parallel manner in all languages. Every language can be transformed and altered in infinite variability through the generation of linguistic alternatives. This generative ability of man, which is exhibited in linguistic transformations, is what Chomsky argues is universally present in all human language and thus also in all mankind. It is the essence of linguistic communication and creativity. This is the underlying system out of which man generates his linguistic alternatives. It follows, then, that both the perceptual mechanisms and the mechanisms of speech production must make use of the underlying system of generative rules. It is because of the virtual identity of this underlying system in speaker and hearer that communication can take place, the sharing of an underlying generative system being traceable, ultimately to the uniformity of human nature.13 On the basis of this underlying uniformity, Chomsky can state with Humboldt that "Der Mensch uberall Eins mit dem Menschen ist", that is, "man is one with mankind through this unique capacity". 14 The universal human ability of language use implemented and exhibited through the generation of alternative forms of expression indicates a uniformity of human abilities that can appropriately be called human nature. This underlying reality or human nature methodologically is a hypothesis that follows from the conclusion that creative human language cannot be solely accounted for by claiming that all linguistic activity results from external determination. Chomsky argues that man 13 14

Ibid., 70-71. Ibid., 65.

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is capable of understanding and generating different and unique forms of expression. If this is possible, it is necessary to hypothesize a mind or capacity that creates these expressions. By constructing this hypothesis concerning mind, we can account for the possibility of human creativity. By positing the generative and transformational qualities as that of the minds, we can account for the novelty exhibited and understood in and through human language. In Chomsky's words : "by attributing such principles to the mind, as an innate property, it becomes possible to account for the quite obvious fact that the speaker of a language knows a great deal that he has not learned." 15 This view is in direct contrast to the Lockian theory of the mind. According to Locke, the mind is a capacity that is totally determined by external impressions. The mind, in Locke's view, is tamquam tabula rasa.16 It is like a clean tablet or slate upon which nothing has been written. 17 Ideas and concepts result completely from experience and are solely derived from external impressions. Locke, however, distinguishes between two classes of perceptions. First, there are external perceptions that are the result of external imprintation and stimulation. Secondly, there are internal perceptions which do not result from immediate impressions but from reflection upon previous external perception. Internal impressions result from what the clean slate of the mind has accumulated. Thus, all reflection is ultimately dependent upon external impressions or sense perception for its perceptions and ideas. The mind, in this view, is totally impressionable and completely determined by sense impressions. All responses that are not immediately traceable to a specific external object are the result of a conglomerate of previous impressions. This is the position of the empiricist. As an epistemological theory, empiricism explains all knowledge as the result of sense impress15

Ibid., 60. Julian Marias, History of Philosophy (New York: Dover Publications, 1967), 255. 17 In Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding (see Philosophical Works of John Locke, ed. by J. A. St. John (London: George Bell and Sons, 1, 1902)). He does not use the term tabula rasa. He does refer to a sheet of white paper or an empty cabinet upon which and in which nothing has been written (p. 142). Leibnitz, in his New Essays Concerning Human Understanding, trans, by Alfred G. Langley (LaSalle, Illinois: The Open Court Publishing Company, 1949), uses the term many times (see pp. 4, 10,15,42, 65, 105). Leibnitz uses this term in his interpretation and scrutiny of Locke, but since Leibnitz did not read English and read Locke in French translation, it is highly probable that Leibnitz took the term to be Locke's, whereas it was the Latin term used by Coste, who translated Locke in French. The term tabula rasa, for example, occurs on p. 40 of the French translation of Locke's Essay. See Oeuvres de Locke et Leibnitz, ed. by M. F. Thurot (Paris: Chez Firmin Didot Frères, 1846). 16

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ions. The mind, in this view, has no autonomy or creativity. It is totally determined by external factors. Thus, rationalism and empiricism are two decisively different epistemological options. 18 The rationalist argues that the mind plays an active and significant role in the learning, cognitive, and perceiving processes. In contrast, the empiricist argues that the mind as a distinct and creative capacity does not exist. The empiricist looks for the sources of man's knowledge in observable phenomena. The rationalist argues that observable phenomena cannot totally account for the complexity and creativity of human knowledge. The epistemological differences also imply methodological differences. This differentiation is succinctly summarized by John Searle in a recent article on Chomsky's revolution in linguistics.19 According to Searle, there has been a fundamental methodological and epistemological controversy that has pervaded the history of the study of man. Throughout the history of the study of man there has been a fundamental opposition between those who believe that progress is to be made by a rigorous observation of man's actual behavior and those who believe that such observations are interesting only in so far as they reveal to us hidden and possibly fairly mysterious underlying laws that only partially and in distorted form reveal themselves to us in behavior. ... Noam Chomsky is unashamedly with the searchers after hidden laws.20 The empiricist would advocate the first of these two options. A scientific study of man would limit itself to a rigorous scrutiny of man's observable behavior. In this view, an explanation of man's acts would be limited to observable causes. Underlying laws that were not perceivable through direct sense experience would be precluded from this kind of scrutiny. Chomsky moves in a rather different direction. In his view and method, 18

In the section entitled the Antimonies of Pure Reason in the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant argues that rationalism and empiricism are not mutually exclusive theories. Hegel also developed similar arguments in his Phenomenology of Mind. Their criticisms are effective and thoroughly constructed but frequently forgotten or ignored in contemporary discussions and debates. The essential thrust of their critiques that is relevant to a study on Chomsky is that all the empirical or factual data that can be accumulated does not constitute knowledge. A rational principle must be elaborated in view of the data in order to be knowledge. This is parallel to Chomsky's contention that empirical causes are necessary for thinking and language to develop but are not the sole source of knowledge. Kant and Hegel would disagree as to where the rational principles reside, that is, for Hegel there is reason and order in every existing or real entity; but for Kant, rational principles are inseparable from the cognitive processes of the mind. 19 John Searle, "Chomsky's Revolution in Linguistics", The New York Review of Books, A Special Supplement XXVIII, No. 12 (June 29, 1971). 20 Ibid., 16.

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the study of man should attempt to discover and discern the hidden and underlying laws or structures that are the source of human being and human creativity. To only delineate observable causes is to limit the study of man to factors of external determination and to preclude the possibility of discovering that man is other than a determined being. Chomsky argues that the 'creative aspect of language use' implies that man is a being whose nature is not exhausted in and through external determinations. Thus, methodically the study of man should focus on the elucidating and understanding of the underlying laws and structures of human being and selfhood. The underlying laws, since they are universal, are an indication of the nature of man. Superficially, various men and languages appear to be different; but behind and below the surface structure and visible phenomena, there is a universal capacity that is essentially related to human nature. In this position, Chomsky is opposing the emphasis upon cultural relativity and the corresponding linguistic relativity that is so important to much of the discussions in linguistics and anthropology of this century. The Port Royal grammarians, who Chomsky cites as his predecessors, argued that there was a universal rational essence to man. In many linguistic studies of this century, relativity was strongly emphasized. Bloomfield, for example, sought to direct linguistics into a rigorous scientific discipline. This could be accomplished, he contended, by the careful description of particular languages.21 The important factor in linguistic inquiry was the discovery of the unique grammar and system of each individual language. In a parallel manner, Benjamin Lee Whorf argued that different language groups implied different concepts and theories of man. Whorf's famous contrast is made between the Hopi view of man as action and process, embodied in the fact that the Hopi use a verb for symbolizing man and man's being, and what is the case in Western European languages, where the word for man is consistently a noun, connotating permanence and static essences. This implies that there are different views of man embodied and reflected in different languages.22 Thus, in the Whorfian view, language is particular and relative. It reflects the world-view of a particular linguistic group. The particular language that is used shapes and determines the 21

Leonard Bloomfield, Language (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1933), 6-7. Whorf, Language, Thought and Reality. Especially in the last three essays of this work Whorf argues that language reflects 'world-views', not reality. Whorf's contrasts are largely based upon his studies in the Hopi language and the comparisons that he constructs between the Hopi language and Western European languages. 22

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thoughts and beliefs of a people. This is the well-known Whorfian hypothesis, which strongly emphasizes that all ideas, beliefs and languages are culturally relative.23 According to Chomsky, relativity certainly exists, but it is a surface phenomena. The deep structures of all languages have universal elements and dimensions. On this issue, Chomsky finds the traditional rationalistic grammars to contain more insight than contemporary relativistic theories. He makes this contrast in the following way: It is commonly held that modern linguistic and anthropological investigations have conclusively refuted the doctrines of classical universal grammar, but this claim seems to me very much exaggerated. Modern work has, indeed, shown a great diversity in the surface structures of languages. However, since the study of deep structure has not been its concern, it has not attempted to show a corresponding diversity of underlying structure, and, in fact, the evidence that has been accumulated in modern study of language does not appear to suggest anything of this sort. The fact that languages may diifer from one another quite significantly in surface structure would hardly have come as a surprise to the scholars who developed traditional universal grammar. Since the origins of this work in the Grammaire générale et raisonnée, it has been emphasized that the deep structures for which universality is claimed may be quite distinct from the surface structures of sentences as they actually appear. Consequently, there is no reason to expect uniformity of surface structures, and the findings of modern linguistics are thus not inconsistent with the hypotheses of universal grammarians.24

As was stated in the previous chapter, Chomsky does not offer a thorough examination of the theories of linguistic relativity. However, he does not blindly oppose these theories, but adds that there is a depth dimension to language that is beyond surface differences. This, again, reflects the Humboldtian synthesis that is central to Chomsky's views. Language is a finite form which can be used to create infinite variations. It is historical, particular, and relative to its native speakers. The speakers, however, are not mere Hopi-human, English-human, and German-human. They participate in the universal essence of mankind. They possess a shared capacity and capability for creativity. The actual creativity that they enjoy and generate is particular, historical, and indigenous. The capacity for creativity, however, is universal. All peoples, in all languages, can transform, recreate, and generate alternative forms of expression. 23

The Whorfian hypothesis is more accurately described as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. Whorf studied under Sapir at Yale University. Many of the contentions that Whorf elaborated and developed can be found in Sapir's Language (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1921). 24 Chomsky, Aspects, 118.

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Languages are historical and particular in their appearance and visible dimension. But creative language use is universally present in all human languages. The universal structures that Chomsky maintains are present in all languages are phrases, or the fact that all languages use phrases. If all human beings structure their languages in phrases, then there must be a c o m m o n structuring capacity that produces phrases in all languages. Chomsky states that there is a c o m m o n rational essence to all mankind, but this is to press the contention beyond its viability. Because the human mind orders sentences and perceptions does not mean that all human beings are rational, unless we mean, by rational, order and ordering. It can mean that all human beings structure and order their utterances. T o argue that this ordering is a rational order is to restrict all intelligibility, understanding and communication to rational activity. 2 5 Adhering to the less restrictive definition of reason as order and structure and relating this to the contention that all languages are structured in phrases, a clearer and more direct statement of Chomsky's contentions can be formulated. A s a rationalist in his epistemology, Chomsky affirms that the human 25

An example of a mode of expression and communication that is not rational in the strict sense of the term would be myth. Many studies in mythology from differing perspectives and assumptions have shown that myth has a logic and form of its own. Cassirer, for example, in his Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, especially Vol. II: Mythical Thought, interprets myth as a way of symbolizing the world of human experience. Cassirer argues that myth is a symbolic form or a cultural mode with its own integrity and order. Like science, it is a way of symbolizing. The symbolic nature of myth is also an important dimension of the arguments elaborated in depth psychology of C. G. Jung. Myth, in Jung's view, ultimately refers to an archetypal unity in human being and meaning (see C. G. Jung, Collected Works, IX, Part I: The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious (1959), and Part II: Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self (1959), trans, by R. F. C. Hull (20 vols. ; Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959 —)). Thus, for Jung, in a paiallel manner to Cassirer, myth is a symbolic mode that has a form and order that directs man from appearances to the ground of being and meaning. Myth is not an argument for an archetypal ground of being as might be attempted in philosophical theology and systematic theology. Myth represents the archetypal unity of being symbolically. The logic and order of myth is a symbolic and logical order. Claude Lévi-Strauss, in a different, yet similar manner, applied a structural approach to myth. His studies in myth are attempts to elaborate mythic structures. Again the argument is made that myth has a logic and order that is not strictly speaking rational. Intriguingly, Lévi-Strauss' four volume work on myth is entitled Mythologiques, which in its English translation appears as an Introduction to a Science of Mythology (see The Raw and the Cooked, trans, by John and Doreen Weightman (New York: Harper and Row, 1969)). It's curious that Mythologiques is translated as a Science of Mythology rather than the logic of mythology. Mythologiques suggests that Lévi-Strauss is studying and elaborating the logic or logics of myth, ee Clau de Lévi-Strauss, Mythologiques (4 vols.; Paris: Librarie Plon, 1964-71).

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intellect orders and structures language into units of intelligibility, which are phrases. This ordering of the mind exhibited in language is not a determined and inevitable order. Structure is present in language and languages and insofar as they can be used to communicate and to produce intelligibility and understanding, languages assume the form of phrases. Yet, within the necessary structuring of phrases, there is freedom and variability. The sequence of a group of phrases can be changed or rearranged. Words and phrases can be added and deleted. Phrases can be conjoined and embedded.26 Very simply, alternative meaning and order can be generated through transformation alternatives. Through the vast, if not infinite, possibilities for linguistic conjunction, rearrangement, and embedding, language exhibits the boundless horizons of human creativity. Using the following example, some of the many aspects of linguistic variability can be exhibited. From a basic sentence, (1) 'John's project reflects thought', many different sentences can be generated through linguistic transformations. Some sentences will reflect alternative ideas. Some will follow logically from (1), for example, (2), 'John can think', (logically) follows from the statement, 'John's project reflects thought'. In addition to logical deduction from (1) phrases can be added or conjoined to (1) in the following manner: (3) 'John's project reflects thought and social concern'. Further additions can be made which generate additional meaning to the sentence, as in (4) 'John's project reflects thought, thoroughness and social concern'. A further qualification of this sentence can be brought about by embedding a phrase in (1) and producing (5): 'John's project, which is his Ph.D. dissertation, reflects thought'. The possibility for adding, conjoining, embedding, and deleting seems numerous, if not infinite. Words can be deleted from (1) and change the meaning of sentence (1) to form (6), (7) and (8): (6) 'John reflects', (7) 'John projects', (8) 'John thinks, projects and reflects'. The linguistic variations, even within the use of a limited number of words, could be extended far beyond the simple starting point of sentence (1). It is this generative and transformational flexibility that Chomsky argues must be accounted for in a grammar that hopes to serve as an adequate interpretation of the structures and processes of language. If it is possible for the human mind to generate and transform ideas and linguistic expressions, then both in grammar and in epistemology this must be taken into account. If language universally exhibits structure 26 Many of the different ways of combining and relating phrases are described in a section of H. A. Gleason's An Introduction to Descriptive Linguistics (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1955), Chapter 12, 171-94.

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and the potential for flexibility and creativity within structure and order, then, in the forming of epistemological views in philosophy and in psychology, this creative dimension must be taken into account. Further evidence for the validity of generative and transformational grammar can be found in the necessary movement from surface description to deep structure or semantic analysis. In the following example, the difference between surface structure and deep structure is clearly exhibited. In comparing the two sentences, it is clear that they are similar in surface structure and appearance, but very different in meaning or deep structure: 1. John is eager to please. 2. John is easy to please. The surface structure is exactly the same, and thus descriptively it could not be differentiated. However, the two sentences are decisively different in meaning. In sentence (1), John is eager to please someone other than himself. Sentence (2), however, implies that John can be pleased easily. In (1), he is the actor, and in (2), he is the potential receiver of the action. Thus Chomsky rightly maintains that surface description is not the sole factor in grammatical analysis. The underlying meaning of a sentence can be radically different though the surface structure is the same. Before Chomsky's contentions can be used for the further elaboration of their implications concerning human nature and human knowledge, basic critical questions must be asked which will be helpful in determining the scope and validity of Chomsky's work. Central to his view, as has been stated previously, is the conception of 'grammatical universality'. Chomsky contends that his generative and transformational grammar is universally applicable to all languages. The critical question that can be raised in view of this contention is: "How can it be demonstrated that this scheme of grammatical analysis and understanding applies to any and all language ?" Is it not methodologically improbable, if not impossible, for a theory such as Chomsky's transformational grammar to be tested and tried in all languages? Do we have to wait for many decades, while teams of scholars set about testing the scheme over against any and all languages? Furthermore, are there other languages beyond the present and extant linguistic phenomena? Are there not always developing and evolving languages? It would seem that it would be problematic to decisively verify Chomsky's views because of the practical difficulty of testing them in all extant and possible languages. This problem is not, however, unique to Chomsky's contentions and arguments.

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If it is possible to say anything at all about man, this must be accomplished and verified through a means other than that of the observation of every human being or future manifestation of humankind. If it is only possible to make general statements and contentions after observing all specimens of humanity, then it would be methodologically and practically impossible to construct any theory or verifiable contention concerning man. For the mere reason that every extant and observable or even possible form of humankind is not practically available, this need not preclude any plausible contention concerning man. To state or contend that any theories about man can only be verified if and when all humankind is observed is, in itself, a contention that cannot meet its own requirements for scrutiny and validity. This is a generalization about man that itself must be verified by the requirements it delineates for all generalizations about man. To know that man can only be known through exhaustive empirical evidence of all humankind is a knowledge that itself could only be attained by observing all human beings present and future. Even to construct and bring about an extensive and exhaustive observation of all existing and future possible human beings would assume a similarity or commonality in the beings to be observed. If this similarity is not recognizable, how could an observation of all mankind occur? Certainly if there is a class or species of beings to be observed, then it must be possible to separate and distinguish these beings from other beings. Thus, there must be a commonality to humankind, a commonality that is assumed and recognized even in the most relativistic theories of man. In a completely relativistic conception of man, blatant contradictions are implied. If it is contended that man is radically and completely different from culture to culture, this is a contradiction. The contradiction consists in stating that man is radically and completely different from culture to culture. If man is completely different, how is it possible to say that man is this being? There must be some continuity that is basic for any comparison and contrast of cultural differences. In a parallel way, if languages are so completely different that the essence of linguistic theory is to capture and symbolize this difference and uniqueness in descriptive grammar, then how is it possible to know that two completely different linguistic phenomena are still language ? Language must possess a basic similarity for it to be recognized as language. If man is so completely different from culture to culture, and languages are likewise radically different from each other, comparison, differentiation, and contrasting would be impossible. Complete relativism and complete

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differentiation is a contradictory and unintelligible theory or state of affairs. Differences imply similarities which serve as the basis for the contrasted differentiations. In view of the contradictions implied in complete linguistic relativism, and in view of the plausibility of the contention that in order to speak of man at all, there must be some common essence to the human being that is universally recognizable as man, Chomsky's emphasis upon universality acquires a degree of validity. Even though it is practically impossible from an empirical point of view to exhaustively verify Chomsky's contentions, he would not preclude as evidence any linguistic examination of any language which could test the adequacy of generative and transformational grammar. Chomsky could merely state that even though it is practically impossible to verify his theories with empirical evidence from any and all languages, he would be open to counter examples to his theories in any languages that could be brought to his attention. Further critical questions can be found in the contemporary discussions of his theories. In the previous chapters, an examination of Chomsky's view has been made in view of the thinkers that anticipated his theories. From the historical antecedents of Chomsky's work, the transition was made to the Chomskyan position on its own terms. It is now necessary to examine his views in terms of the contemporary debate which he has triggered. In particular, an examination of the Chomsky vs. Skinner controversy must be made, inasmuch as Skinner is an example par excellence of the type of empiricism and behavioristic determinism that Chomsky so radically opposes. Turning now from Chomsky's predecessors, and from his views in his terms, a critical scrutiny of his contribution will be continued by examining the debate or controversy that has developed in the last decades.

CHAPTER IV

THE CHOMSKY VS. S K I N N E R CONTROVERSY

In the past decade and a half, that is, from approximately 1957 to the present, Chomsky has been engaged in a debate with various thinkers who approach the study of language and man in ways that are radically different from his own. This debate and controversy began, as far as Chomsky is concerned, with Skinner's publication of Verbal Behavior.1 In the previous chapter the epistemological differences between rationalism and empiricism were discussed by examples from Kant and from Locke. In the present chapter, the contemporary debate between rationalism and empiricism will be examined with a particular focus upon the Chomsky vs. Skinner controversy. As was suggested earlier, Chomsky's contentions concerning the 'creative aspect of language use' are not merely relevant to esoteric and isolated questions in linguistics. The significance and implications of 'creative language use' are also crucial for philosophical and psychological interpretations of man. In Verbal Behavior, Skinner applies the assumptions and methodology of behavioristic psychology to the study of language. In this work, the author elaborates a 'functional analysis' of language which treats language as a form of behavior. The function of 'verbal behavior' is taken to be the essence of verbal language use. Skinner is convinced that this kind of analysis will result in an adequate and precise understanding of verbal language use. He states this in the following: It would be foolish to underestimate the difficulty of this subject matter, but recent advances in the analysis of behavior permit us to approach it with a certain optimism. New experimental techniques and fresh formulations have revealed a new level of order and precision. The basic processes and relations which give verbal behavior its special characteristics are now fairly well understood. Much of the experimental work responsible for this advance has been carried out on other species, but the results have proved to be surprisingly

1

B. F. Skinner, Verbal Behavior (New York: Appleton, Century, Crofts, 1957).

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free of species restrictions. Recent work has shown that the methods can be extended to human behavior without serious modifications.2 The goal of this kind of inquiry is to elicit and describe the sources and the effects of verbal behavior. It is the attempt to view language as a behavioristic component that is determined by various stimuli. Understanding verbal behavior is thus equated with being able to predict its occurrences. "The extent to which we understand verbal behavior in a 'causal' analysis is to be assessed from the extent to which we can predict the occurrence of specific instances. ...'^Understanding and knowing verbal behavior is equated with causing it to occur. It is viewed as a conditioned response and the precision of the knowledge and understanding of language that is attained is determined by "the extent to which we can produce or control such behavior by altering the conditions under which it occurs".4 Language and speech are equated with verbal behavior. Language, in toto, is a visible phenomena, that is, its essence is exhausted in surface connections and relations. Language is a form of human behavior, and it is erroneous in the Skinnerian perspective to assume that language and speech have "an independent existence apart from the behavior of the speaker".5 To be concerned with language is to be concerned with behavior, and to study behavior properly and accurately the causal determinants for this behavior must be specified and predicted exactly. In contrast to Chomsky, Skinner views and studies language as a determined response. With Jespersen, Skinner offers the following definition of words: "The only unimpeachable definition of a word is that it is a human habit." 6 Phrases or groups of words are merely a larger complex of habitual responses or units of verbal and linguistic behavior. His study focuses on how units of verbal behavior can be produced and what determinates can be specified as the causal sources of verbal behavior. Controlling variables are the loci of explaining the how and what of language. Interpersonal linguistic exchange is the exchange of verbal stimuli and reinforcement. As a result, control and conditioning become the key words in this analysis. Language is a determined and conditioned response. To predict the controlling variables 2

Ibid., 3. Ibid. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid., 7. 8 Otto Jespersen, Language, Its Nature, Development and Origin (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1922). 3

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is to determine the cause and source of language because language is merely one aspect of human behavior, an aspect of a larger complex of behavior which is also conditioned and determined.7 Chomsky, in 1959, wrote a review of Skinner's study on language. Chomsky regarded the book as the actualization of the hopes and desires of many linguists and philosophers. A great many linguists and philosophers concerned with language have expressed the hope that their studies might ultimately be embedded in a framework provided by behaviorist psychology, and that refractory areas of investigation, particularly those in which meaning is involved, will in this way be opened up to fruitful exploration.8 The technique and method of behavioristic psychology could now be applied to the study of language or verbal behavior. The 'functional analysis' of human behavior was now applied to one aspect of human behavior, that is, language. Just as the study of habits and patterns in human activity could be traced to specific conditioning and external control, this was now, in Skinner's work Verbal Behavior, also to be demonstrated as the method for the study of language. The cause and essence of language in this view is the controlling variable. An exacting knowledge of language was to be attained through specifying variables that elicited particular responses. The variables are limited to those of external control and are to be described completely in terms of such notions as stimulus, reinforcement, deprivation, which have been given a reasonably clear meaning in animal experimentation. In other words, the goal of the book is to provide a way to predict and control verbal behavior by observing and manipulating the physical environment of the speaker.9 Chomsky does not and cannot argue that Skinner was completely wrong in his findings and conclusions. It would be patently incorrect to argue and conclude that behavioristic psychology has not contributed anything to understanding human nature and human action. The vast studies of mental illness and abnormal behavior, and also the studies that clearly indicate that behavior can be changed, demonstrates that there is a role that is both valid and valuable for behavioristic analysis and therapy. 7

For Skinner's development of these contentions see Verbal Behavior, Part II: "Controlling Variables", especially Chapter IV which is "Verbal Behavior Under the Control of Verbal Stimuli", 52-80. 8 Noam Chomsky, a review of Skinner's Verbal Behavior, Language, 35 (JanuaryMarch, 1959), 26. 9 Ibid.

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If being human is equated with human behavior, and if mental illness is equated with abnormal behavior or behavior that is so painful for the individual that he or she would like it changed, then, behavioristic methods and techniques are certainly valuable and resourceful. If healing is equated with change in behavior, then it seems clear that conditioning and reinforcement patterns can serve in manipulating and changing human action and behavior.10 To argue that this kind of behavioristic control is not possible or resourceful is to pretentiously and irrationally cling to a view of human freedom that is implausible and impossible. Man cannot be completely free. Complete freedom is an impossible state of affairs. To be completely free is to be totally unrelated to anyone or anything. If man is free from everything, he is also free for nothing. Freedom implies choices. Choice is the selection of alternatives. Selection of alternatives is only possible when man is related to alternatives. Man is not free to create any alternatives in an arbitrary and complete freedom, because in complete freedom man is free from every alternative. Freedom always necessitates determination or ways in which we are not free. Even a thinker such as Jean-Paul Sartre, who strongly promotes a view that appears to border on the notion of complete freedom, consistently argues that freedom always occurs in the face of oppression. Freedom, in Sartre's view, is always that harsh and difficult task of selecting alternatives that appear at times to be equally absurd. Freedom, in his view, is the process of choosing or choice. It is the selection of alternatives. The radical freedom that Sartre affirms is logically based on his assertion that, since man is a conscious being, alternatives are always available for selection.11 The question of human freedom is central to the debate and controversy triggered by Chomsky's review and attack on Skinner's assertions in Verbal Behavior. Chomsky does not pretend that what Skinner has promoted in his linguistic theories and his parallel contentions in psychology is totally and irresponsibly wrong. He merely argues that it is severely limited and superficial. Chomsky states this in the following: It is important to see clearly just what it is in Skinner's program and claims that makes them appear so bold and remarkable. It is not primarily the fact 10

B. F. Skinner, in Beyond Freedom and Dignity (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1971), 13, argues that what man fears is not his feelings but his behavior. If we can control or change our behavior, the therapeutic solution is gained. 11 See Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness (New York: The Citadel Press, 1968), especially Part IV, Chapter I, 409-532.

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that he has set functional analysis as his problem, or that he limits himself to study of 'observables', i.e. input-output relations. What is so surprising is the particular limitations he has imposed on the way in which the observables of behavior are to be studied, and, above all, the particularly simple nature of the 'function' which, he claims, describes the causation of behavior. One would naturally expect that prediction of the behavior of a complex organism (or machine) would require, in addition to information about external stimulation, knowledge of the internal structure of the organism, the ways in which it processes input information and organizes its own behavior.12 What is remarkable about Skinner's study and assertions is the severe limitation that he has placed on his own inquiry coupled with the audacious claims he makes from a radically limited perspective. This severe and audacious limitation of Skinner's work is what Chomsky takes to task. Chomsky does not slip into the convenient, defensive, and widespread position of saying that Skinner is bad because he has not allowed room for the spiritual dimension of man. Whether or not man has a spirit, or is in some way spiritual, is completely beside the point in the Skinner vs. Chomsky debate. Skinner seems to enjoy being referred to as evil because this, in his view, reduces his critics to emotionality and religiousity. An example of this is in Skinner's own description of his visit to the classroom of I. A. Richards, the well-known co-author of The Meaning of Meaning.13 In this statement, Skinner also describes the relationship that he has had with Richards over the past four decades: For nearly forty years Ivor Richards and I have respected each other while disagreeing rather violently. I have never been able to understand why he feels that Coleridge made an important contribution to our understanding of human behavior, and he has never been able to understand why I feel the same way about pigeons. He has at times been deeply distressed. He once asked me to lecture to his freshman course in general education. I turned up at the appointed hour, he made a few announcements, and then he said, "I now present the Devil", and sat down.14 To be referred to as the devil conveniently places Skinner in an awesome mythological position. From this kind of position it would be easy for Skinner to pass off his critics as irrational and emotional. This easy polarity between Skinner as rational and scientific vs. critics who are irrational and unscientific does not work with Chomsky. Chomsky's criticism centers around Skinner's lack of scientific scope. 12

Chomsky, review of Verbal Behavior, 27.

13

C. K . Ogden and I. A. Richards, The Meaning of Meaning: A Study of the Influence of Language upon Thought and of the Science of Symbolism ( L o n d o n : Kegan

Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd., 1936). B. F. Skinner, "On 'Having' a Poem", Saturday Review, July 15, 1972, 32-35.

14

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By reducing the study of man to the specification, and tracing of external causes and their resulting effects, Skinner has systematically precluded a recognition of the structural or organic integrity of the organism, that is, the human being. Skinner's thesis is that external factors consisting of present stimulation and the history of reinforcement (in particular the frequency, arrangement, and withholding of reinforcing stimuli) are of overwhelming importance, and that the general principles revealed in laboratory studies of these phenomena provide the basis for understanding the complexities of verbal behavior. He confidently and repeatedly voices his claim to have demonstrated that the contribution of the speaker is quite trivial and elementary, and that precise prediction of verbal behavior involves only specification of the few external factors that he has isolated experimentally with lower organisms.15 It seems incredible that Skinner would dogmatically conclude that human behavior could be simply reduced solely to factors of external causation. Any scientific inquiry which would have for its goal thoroughness and comprehensiveness would not preclude a complex variable that was central to its concern. If the study of man is limited to the tracing of external causes and the resulting responses, then it is impossible from the very outset of such an inquiry to ever discover any underlying pattern or structure that is part of the organism itself. What Chomsky is criticizing Skinner for is simply a dogmatic, methodological position. Skinner has methodically precluded from his study of 'stimulus-response' the discovery of any structural and organic integrity in the organism in question, that is, the human being. He has limited his method in order to insure his results. If an inquiry is limited in scope and only deals with causal determination, it necessarily follows that any results of this inquiry could not be anything more than determined factors. Certainly, if it assumed from the beginning that the specification of conditioned responses is the goal of research into the nature of man, then any evidence for human freedom or creativity is methodologically precluded. It cannot be recognized because the study is open only to determined factors. Therefore, for Skinner to use this method as a way of showing that man is not free is to assume that man is not free from the beginning. To shape a method that could not recognize freedom even if it did exist, and then conclude that it does not exist, seems to be nothing more than to assume a conclusion and employ it as method in order to prove itself. Certainly, if man is not free, then he is not free. The failure of Skinner's scheme and argument lies in the patent circularity and remark15

Chomsky, review of Verbal Behavior, 27-28.

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able superficiality. Skinner has pretended to understand a remarkably complex phenomena by omitting it as a factor in research. Chomsky succinctly describes this failure in the following: "The magnitude of the failure of this attempt to account for verbal behavior serves as a kind of measure of the importance of the factors omitted from consideration, and an indication of how little is really known about this remarkably complex phenomenon." 1 6 The problem with the behaviorist's interpretation of language is that a complex being such as man and man's language falls victim to simplistic reduction. Chomsky continued his critique and opposition to Skinner in his later publications. The theme of simplistic reductionism seems to prevail in all of these critiques. Chomsky argues that the 'essential weakness' in behaviorist approaches to these topics is the faith in the shallowness of explanations, the belief that the mind must be simpler in its structure than any known physical organ and that the most primitive of assumptions must be adequate to explain whatever phenomena can be observed. Thus, it is taken for granted without argument or evidence (or is presented as true by definition) that a language is a "habit structure" or a network of associative connections, or that knowledge of language is merely a matter of "knowing how", a skill expressible as a system of dispositions to respond. Accordingly, knowledge of language must develop slowly through repetition and training, its apparent complexity resulting from the proliferation of very simple elements rather than from deeper principles of mental organization that may be as inaccessible to introspection as the mechanisms of digestion or coordinated movement.17 Chomsky's critique of Skinner is thus not a critique that can be reduced to emotionality and religiousity. It focuses on the very nature of Skinner's work, that is, it demonstrates how Skinner's contentions are scientifically inadequate. This critique is continued in Chomsky's most recent response to Skinner's work, which is a review of Beyond Freedom and Dignity.™ In this review Chomsky states even more strongly his opposition to the reductionism of the behavioristic method. He says of Skinner: His speculations are devoid of scientific content and do not even hint at general outlines of a possible science of human behavior. Furthermore, Skinner imposes certain arbitrary limitations on scientific research which virtually guarantee continued failure.19 16

Ibid., 28. Noam Chomsky, Language and Mind (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1968), 22. 18 Noam Chomsky, "The Case Against B. F. Skinner", The New York Review of Books, XVII, No. 11 (Dec. 30, 1971), 18-23. 19 Ibid., 18. 17

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The continued failure lies in the inability of the Skinnerian method to discover any aspect of 'human being' aside from the causal factors related to man's behavior. The failure stems from the radical reduction of possible avenues for research and study. If Skinner is convinced of what a science of human behavior must discover, then he is restricting the scope of scientific inquiry to what must be found. This kind of argumentation occurs explicitly in Beyond Freedom and Dignity. In order to survive and face the problems of today, in Skinner's works, we must "naturally turn to the thing we do best". 20 The science and technology of today have given us successful ways of controlling the physical environment; now we need to apply similar controls to the human world. "What we need is a technology of behavior." 21 Skinner argues that our understanding of man is outdated, if not archaic. Fantastic advances have been made in physics and biology, but in our understanding of 'human being' and human affairs, little advance has been made. He states this directly in the following: Twenty-five hundred years ago it might have been said that man understood himself as well as any other part of his world. Today he is the thing he understands least. Physics and biology have come a long way, but there has been no comparable development of anything like a science of human behavior. Greek physics and biology are now of historical interest only (no modern physicist or biologist would turn to Aristotle for help), but the dialogues of Plato are still assigned to students and cited as if they threw light on human behavior. Aristotle could not have understood a page of modern physics or biology, but Socrates and his friends would have little trouble in following most current discussions of human affairs. And as to technology, we have made immense strides in controlling the physical and biological worlds, but our practices in government, education, and much of economics, though adapted to very different conditions, have not greatly improved. 22

Skinner concludes that since the Greeks were dealing with questions of human value and 'human being' in a way that is at least not foreign to philosophical and humanistic inquiries of today, that no advance has been made which would improve our understanding of man. This argument is not valid, because it is loaded with Skinnerian assumptions that determine its conclusion. Skinner assumes that man is different from what he was in the time of the Greeks. This assumption is based upon his theory of environmental conditioning. The Greeks lived in a different environment than we do now, therefore, their values and modes of in20 21 22

Skinner, Beyond Freedom, 3. Ibid., 5. Ibid., 5-6.

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quiry do not apply science evolved, but led somewhere, but states this pompous

to us. Furthermore, according to Skinner, Greek their philosophy is still with us. The Greek sciences Greek philosophy was and is a dead end. Skinner and audacious contention in the following:

Whereas Greek physics and biology, no matter how crude, led eventually to modern science, Greek theories of human behavior led nowhere. If they are with us today, it is not because they possessed some kind of eternal verity, but because they did not contain the seeds of anything better. 23 To argue and conclude in two short paragraphs that Greek philosophy has 'led nowhere' is clearly indicative of the cavalier dogmatism that pervades Skinner's work. He not only wants to reduce scientific inquiry concerning the nature of man to his own deterministic problematics, but he correlates this dogmatism with a glib and irresponsible attitude towards other disciplines. It may be the case that Greek philosophy was and is a dead end, but given the vast literature on this subject, any author, thinker, or writer with even a semblance of responsibility would want to produce a far more extensive argument and study that would demonstrate how and why Greek philosophy failed. Skinner's method of inquiry consistently turns toward reductionism rather than explanation. His method is decisively closed even to the possibility that m a n might in some way be free. Skinner not only concludes that a technology of behavior is the answer, but he limits the focus of scientific inquiry so that his reductionism seems valid. Chomsky describes this dogmatic element as follows: The dogmatic element in Skinner's thinking is further revealed when he states that the task of a scientific analysis is to explain how the behavior of a person as a physical system is related to the conditions under which the human species evolved and the conditions under which the individual lives. ... The task of scientific analysis is not — as Skinner believes — to demonstrate that the conditions to which he restricts his attention fully determine human behavior, but rather to discover whether in fact they do (or whether they are at all significant), a very different matter. If they do not, as seems plausible, the "task of a scientific analysis" will be to clarify the issues and discover an intelligible explanatory theory that will deal with the actual facts. Surely no scientist would follow Skinner in insisting on the a priori necessity that scientific investigation will lead to a particular conclusion, specific in advance. 24 Thus, Chomsky argues that Skinner must demonstrate that man is no different f r o m any other physical object rather than assume it. 23

24

Ibid., 6.

Chomsky, "The Case Against B. F. Skinner", 19.

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Skinner argues that physics made great leaps forwards when it stopped treating objects as having 'wills' and 'personified causes'. 25 The sciences that study 'human being' and behavior will likewise advance when they also are limited to external description. Chomsky, in return, contends that Skinner is probably quite right in arguing that physics advanced in its study of rocks and gravity by ceasing to assume that a rock fell only when it 'wished' to fall. However, for Skinner to argue that, since this shift of method works for rocks, it will also work for man, it is necessary for him to prove so rather than merely assume that it's the case. "If people do differ from rocks in this respect, then a science of human behavior will have to take account of this fact." 26 Since physics advanced by turning away from theorizing about the internal states of an object, this is not to say that the study of man will make a similar leap forward. Chomsky does not advocate turning away from scientific evidence and a return to speculation, but he does advocate a move beyond evidence and data to the underlying processes that produce human action and human language. Behaviorism turned toward the data itself and has taken it to be the only dimension to scientific inquiry. By limiting the study of man to the study of causes and effects, the human dimension has been totally reduced to external aspects or observable facts. This betrays the preoccupation with data rather than explanation. In Language and Mind, Chomsky states his position in reference to this issue. Behavioral science has been much preoccupied with data and organization of data, and it has even seen itself as a kind of technology of control of behavior. Anti-mentalism in linguistics and in philosophy of language conforms to this shift of orientation.27 Language, in this view, is regarded as a totally empirical phenomenon. The hidden and underlying dimensions of language that Chomsky argues are also crucial for understanding the nature of language are completely disregarded. Given the rigor, clarity and widespread publication of Chomsky's critiques and reviews, it is remarkable that Skinner has made no thorough reply. He has been questioned on this subject and his reactions are as intriguingly inadequate as his method and theories. In a recent interview and article entitled, "I have been misunderstood. ...", Skinner was asked why he hasn't replied to his critics. 25 26 27

Skinner, Beyond Freedom, 9. Chomsky, "The Case Against B. F. Skinner", 19. Chomsky, Language and Mind, 58-59.

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Q: Do you attempt to reply to any of your critics? Skinner: No. I have not replied to any, and tend not to. I have considered making replies, particularly when a violent review such as that by Noam Chomsky in The New York Review appears. I read only the first paragraph of that, but my friends have told me about it and they cannot understand why a man of Chomsky's distinction would write that way. I will not answer that. I did not, as a matter of fact, answer his famous review of my book Verbal Behavior and for the same reason: he doesn't know what I am talking about and for some reason is unable to understand it. 28 If Chomsky has misunderstood Skinner, it would be helpful and revealing for Skinner to demonstrate that this is the case rather than merely assert it as a truth that needs no verification. In another article, that is, "On 'Having' a Poem", Skinner responds to Chomsky's criticism in a similarly weak and indecisive manner. Let me tell you about Chomsky. I published Verbal Behavior in 1957. In 1958 I received a fifty-five page typewritten review by someone I had never heard of named Noam Chomsky. I read half a dozen pages, saw that it missed the point of my book, and went no further. In 1959 I received a reprint from the journal Language. It was the review I had already seen, now reduced to thirtytwo pages of type, and again I put it aside. But then, of course, Chomsky's star began to rise. ... Eventually, the question was asked, Why had I not answered Chomsky? My reasons, I am afraid, show a lack of character. In the first place I should have had to read the review, and I found its tone distasteful. It was not really a review of my book but of what Chomsky took, erroneously, to be my position. I should also have had to bone up on generative grammar, which was not my field, and to do a good job I should have had to go into structuralism, a theory that Chomsky, like Claude Lévi-Strauss, acquired from Roman Jakobson. According to the structuralists, we are to explain human behavior by discovering its organizing principles, paying little or no attention to the circumstances under which it occurs. If anything beyond structure is needed by way of explanation, it is to be found in a creative mind — Lévi-Strauss's savage mind or Chomsky's innate rules of grammar. No doubt I was shirking a responsibility in not replying to Chomsky, and I am glad a reply was supplied in 1970 by Kenneth MacCorquodale in the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior.29 Again, Skinner contends that he has been misunderstood and that Chomsky is not criticizing his work but merely offering a reaction based on misunderstanding. MacCorquodale's reply does not offer much to aid the clarification of Chomsky's alleged misunderstanding or Skinner's misinterpreted 28

B. F. Skinner, "I have been misunderstood...", The Center Magazine, V, 2 (March/ April 1972), 63. 29 Skinner, "On 'Having' a Poem", 32.

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position. MacCorquodale, instead, argues that Skinner is an enigma and his importance lies in the influence that he has had on the study of language in the past decade. Skinner's defender curiously admits that Skinner's work is devoid of factual content and thus profoundly unsatisfactory to any empiricist. He openly admits that there were and are no facts to defend Skinner's position. The reader should realize in advance that there were and are no directly relevant facts to be brought to bear in this discussion. Although his thesis is empirical, Skinner's book has no experimental data involving the laboratory manipulation of verbal responses which definitively demonstrate that the processes he invokes to explain verbal behavior are in fact involved in its production.30 What then can be the nature and scope of Skinner's work? Is he an empiricist with no empirical evidence ? It seems so, and thus, his contentions are radically insufficient on his own criteria and grounds, and blatantly contradictory. At best the Skinnerian view is an interesting speculative hypothesis that cannot be demonstrated unless it assumes its conclusions as self-evident and deduces contentions and theories in patent circularity. Chomsky's debate and disagreement with Skinner is part of a broader controversy that is not limited to a personal disagreement between two individual positions. Chomsky's reaction against behaviorist methodology is also a transformation that he thinks is necessary and decisive for the field of linguistics. Chomsky's early training in linguistics was under Prof. Zellig Harris. This placed Chomsky's early work well within the camp of the Bloomfieldians. Bloomfields' method was well known for its insistence upon scientific accuracy and objective description.31 As John Lyons contends in his book on Chomsky, "Bloomfield ... did more than anyone else to make linguistics autonomous and scientific. ,.." 32 The method that Bloomfield promoted was that of restricting the scope of linguistics to those aspects of language that could be described with scientific accuracy. This meant that "he was prepared to restrict the scope of the subject, excluding from consideration many aspects of language which he believed 30

Kenneth MacCorquodale, "On Chomsky's Review of Skinner's Verbal Behavior", Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 13, 1 (January, 1970), 84. 31 The relationship between Harris and Bloomfield has been described to me by Professor J. Maurice Hohlfeld. Dr. Hohlfeld, like Chomsky, studied under Prof. Zellig Harris at the University of Pennsylvania. 32 John Lyons, Noam Chomsky (New York: The Viking Press, 1970), 28.

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could not yet be treated with sufficient precision and rigor". 3 3 Bloomfield's criteria for testing the adequacy of work in linguistics was that of an insistence on descriptive accuracy and precision. This again, as with Skinner, resulted in the methodical preclusion of any phenomena or aspect of language that was not vulnerable to immediate observation and accurate description. This is a parallel restriction of scientific inquiry and an importing of behavioristic assumptions into the field of the scientific study of language. Bloomfield and Skinner shared a similar understanding of the scientific. Lyons describes this view in the following: As Bloomfield understood the term "scientific" (and this was a fairly common interpretation at the time), it implied the deliberate rejection of all data that were not directly observable or physically measurable. J. B. Watson, founder of the so called "behaviorist" approach in psychology, took the same view of the aims and methodology of science. According to Watson and his followers, psychologists had no need to postulate the existence of the mind or of anything else that was not observable in order to explain those activities and capacities of human beings that were traditionally described as "mental" or "rational." The behavior of any organism, from an amoeba to a human being, was to be described and explained in terms of the organism's response to the stimuli presented by features of the environment. 34 Bloomfield's insistence on the importance of direct observation and his adoption of behavioristic methods becomes explicit in the second chapter of his major work, Language.35 Here he argues that the 'stimulusresponse' approach to the study of man can also be applied to understanding the human use of language. The insistence on direct observation and accurate description led the Bloomfieldians to study language without addressing themselves to the issue of meaning. A language, they contended, could be adequately and objectively described without dealing with the relationship between language and meaning. Linguistics, in this perspective, became the study of the grammatical form, that is, syntax and the sound or phonological dimensions of language. John Lyons argues that the Bloomfieldians carried this tendency even further than Bloomfield had in his own work: Bloomfield's followers carried even further than he did the attempt to formulate the principles of phonological and syntactic analysis without reference to meaning. This effort reached its culmination in the work of Zellig Harris, notably in his Methods in Structural Linguistics, first published in 1951, though completed some years before. Harris's work also constituted the most ambitious 33 34 35

Ibid. Ibid., 29-30. Bloomfield, Language, see Chapter II, 21-41.

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and the most rigorous attempt that had yet been made to establish what Chomsky was later to describe as a set of "discovery procedures" for grammatical description. 36

It was in this kind of method that Chomsky was trained in his work under Professor Zellig Harris at the University of Pennsylvania. 37 In this type of training, Chomsky was directly exposed to the empiricist and behavioristic assumptions that he would eventually call into question. After Chomsky had taken an undergraduate degree at Penn, he proceeded to Harvard to do graduate work. It was a time in which the behavioristic approach to the study of man was accepted as the solution. Chomsky describes this period of his life in the following: I arrived at Harvard as a graduate student shortly after B. F. Skinner had delivered his William James Lectures, later to be published in his book Verbal Behavior. Among those active in research in philosophy or psychology of language, there was then little doubt that although details were missing, and although matters could not really be quite that simple, nevertheless a behavioristic framework of the sort Skinner had outlined would prove quite adequate to accommodate the full range of language use. There was now little reason to question the conviction of Leonard Bloomfield, Bertrand Russell, and positivistic linguists, psychologists, and philosophers in general that the framework of stimulus-response psychology would soon be extended to the point where it would provide a satisfying explanation for the most mysterious of human abilities. 38

Chomsky's position is that this empiricist and behavioristic paradigm is severely limited. It is a limitation that is shared by Skinnerians and the Bloomfieldians because this method only is able to deal with what has been discussed in previous chapters as surface structure. Any movement beyond surface structure to the deep structures of language is methodologically precluded. For Chomsky, the movement beyond surface structure into the study of depth structures will indicate decisively that language and "linguistic competence is qualitatively different from anything that can be described in terms of the taxonomic methods of structural linguistics, the concepts of S-R psychology, or the notions developed within the mathematical theory of communication or the theory of simple automata". 3 9 To study man as if he is a simple machine is to 36

Lyons, Noam Chomsky, 33-34. For Chomsky's own description of his student days, see an article and interview with Chomsky by Ved Mehta, "Onward and Upward with the Arts", The New Yorker, May 8, 1971, 44-81. 38 Chomsky, Language and Mind, 2. 39 Ibid., 4. 37

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preclude the possibility of recognizing the organic and creative integrity of human being. This is not to say that man must be understood in metaphysical terms and categories, or the being of man interpreted by theories that include the supernatural. It is merely to say that taxonomic description and the accurate and objective analysis of external causes and responses are not adequate to exhaust the complexity of human thinking and being. A contemporary Bloomfieldian, Charles F. Hockett, has been recognized as Chomsky's foremost critic in the field of linguistics. Hockett's response and critique of transformational grammar finds its clearest form in The State of the Art.40 In this work Hockett argues that all of language use which Chomsky states is indicative of human creativity can be explained in terms of analogy and editing. Man responds to novel situations only by constructing an analogy from something familiar. It may be the case that human thinking functions by and large through analogy. In order to prove this, Hockett would have to elicit an analogy from every novel sentence, past, present and future. Furthermore, in deducing an analogy or editing from a sentence, Hockett would have to prove that this is what the native speaker intended and thus demonstrate that the analogy is an explanation rather than a reduction. Hockett's Bloomfieldian dogmatism is more clearly visible in a personal interview with Ved Mehta. The empirical and positivistic assumptions become blatantly obvious in the following statement. 41 Criticizing Chomsky, he contends, "to prove his theory of language, he postulates certain entities that cannot be confirmed by the empirical method". 42 Thus, like Bloomfield and Skinner, Hockett reduces the study of human language to that which is immediately observable. Again in this reduction, the behaviorist dogmatism concerning internal states and mind are exhibited. Again, the scope of science is limited to rule out the possibilities of human creativity and freedom. Hockett states this emphatically in response to Mehta's question concerning the narrowness of his empiricism. "I know we wouldn't have much science if we didn't explain observable things in terms of non-observable things. ... But the trouble with Chomsky is that he resorts to a dualistic terminology of mind and body. He is a mentalist. No good scientist talks about 40

Charles F. Hockett, The State of the Art (The Hague: Mouton, 1968). I mean by positivism the absolute insistence that empirical evidence is the only criteria for meaning and truth. An example of this kind of positivism is A. J. Ayer in his work, Language, Truth and Logic (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1946). 42 V. Mehta, "Onward and Upward with the Aits", The New Yorker, May 8, 1971, 44-87. 41

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mind." 43 Hockett is correct in stating that Chomsky uses terminology that is usually equated with a dualism between body and mind. However, Chomsky is not in any sense promoting or assuming a dualism in his methodology or theory. All his findings, he predicts, should and could be verified in further research in genetics (how the innate capacities are inherited) and brain physiology (how can the selection of alternative forms of expression take place). The remarkable feature of Chomsky's research and work is that it has exposed an intriguing dualism hidden in behavioristic methodology. The behaviorist could not argue that it was impossible and illegitimate scientifically to posit the existence of various bodily organs such as the heart or stomach. Certainly, they also could not argue that these organisms have a capacity and design that was formed through genetic messages and thus have innate design and abilities at birth. The mind and the brain are a different matter from their point of view. It must be assumed that it does not exist, or else the study is unscientific. Is it implausible to assume that the mind, too, has innate design and structural integrity ? To assume it does not, results in a dualism that the empiricist wants to avoid at all costs. All other organs of the body have inherited design and capacity, but the mind and brain are totally vulnerable to external stimuli. This is a dualism of the most obvious sort. The empiricist's insistence on ruling out all metaphysical and spiritual explanation concerning mind inverts and contradicts itself by making the mind and brain other than and different from the body. If the body is highly organized and structured, and often rejects external stimuli, then it would be also rational to assume that the human brain is a complex structure capable of selection and rejection. The contemporary debate in which Chomsky is engaged has three fronts. The first is the debate with Skinner. In this controversy Chomsky, with his contentions concerning the 'creative aspect of language use', radically opposes the Skinnerian insistence that man is determined and controlled and can only be studied as such. The second front for disagreement is within the field of linguistics. This, as was indicated previously, is essentially a disagreement between Chomsky and the Bloomfieldians, who have imported Skinner's assumptions into their methodology. The third front for disagreement is the discussion and debate that Chomsky is carrying on with contemporary philosophers from the empirical tradition. This debate centers on the question and issue of innate ideas. 43

Ibid.

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A direct confrontation on these issues occurred at the Innate Ideas Symposium of the American Philosophical Association, held in Boston in December, 1966.44 At this symposium, Chomsky stated the following contention: "What I would like to suggest is that contemporary research supports a theory of psychological a priori principles that bears a striking resemblance to the classical doctrine of innate ideas." 45 Hilary Putnam, one of Chomsky's critics at this conference, admitted that if man has no innate capacities, learning would be impossible. How could something with no innate intellectual equipment learn anything? ... To be sure, human 'innate intellectual equipment' is relevant to language learning, if this means that such parameters as memory span and memory capacity play a crucial role. But what rank behaviorist is supposed to have ever denied this ?46 Putnam is thus arguing that no behaviorist would ever deny the existence of some innate equipment or capacities. 47 If this is the case, then Hockett's insistence, which precludes the concept of mind from any scientific inquiry is curiously deficient, if not contradictory to Putnam's contentions. If there is innate equipment that shape and structure the stimuli, then it is not possible to adhere to a strictly empiricist and behaviorist epistemology. If innate capacities shape, and possibly transform the stimuli in the process of cognition, then the mind is hardly a tabula rasa and thus it is an active part of the knowing process. W. V. O. Quine, in his response to and critique of Chomsky's theory of innate ideas, offers an argument that is parallel to Putnam. Quine also suggests that innate capacities are central to the procedures, method, and position of the empiricist and behaviorist approach. With Chomsky's theory directly in mind, Quine states: "The behaviorist is knowingly and cheerfully up to his neck in innate mechanisms of learning readiness. ... Innate biases and dispositions are the cornerstone of behaviorism." 48 Searle, in his article on "Chomsky's Revolution in Linguistics", argues that if the empiricists and behaviorists are willing to concede that innate capacities are crucial to the learning process, then they have 44

Ibid., 45. Ibid. 46 Ibid. 47 An example of the kind of behaviorism that includes the contribution of the organism which modifies the S-R theory to an S-O-R is that of D. O. Hebb in a book entitled Organization of Behavior: A Neuropsychological Theory (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1949). 48 W. V. O. Quine, "Linguistics and Philosophy", Language and Philosophy, ed. by Sidney Hook (New York: NYU Press, 1969), 95-96. 45

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admitted that Chomsky's case is at least, in part, valid. "If innateness is the cornerstone of behaviorism what then is left of the dispute ?" 49 There is a core of disagreement left because Chomsky is promoting something more than "innate mechanisms that make the stimulusresponse patterns work". 50 The disagreement still remains. Chomsky is arguing not simply that the child must have "learning readiness", "biases", and "disposition", but that he must have a specific set of linguistic mechanisms at work. Claims by behaviorists that general learning strategies are based on mechanisms of feedback, information processing, analogy, and so on are not going to be enough. One has to postulate an innate faculty of language in order to account for the fact that the child comes up with the right grammar on the basis of his exposure to the language. 51

The core of Chomsky's argument is that the syntactical base or deep structure of any language is so complex, complicated, and specific in its form that a child could never learn a language unless he had the rudiments and deep structures genetically programmed into his brain and thus innately present at birth. The amazing ability that children have for acquiring competence in a language at very young age, when their mastery of other symbolic systems and knowledge of other kinds in comparison is strikingly deficient, is clear evidence in Chomsky's view for language acquisition being essentially dependent on the activation of innate mental structures that correspond directly to the deep structures of language. The behaviorist, who concludes the complexity of grammar and is not satisfied with Skinner's reductionism, is faced with a dilemma: either he relies solely on stimulus-response mechanisms, in which case he cannot account for the acquisition of the grammar, or he concedes, & la Quine, that there are innate mechanisms which enable the child to learn the language. But as soon as the mechanisms are rich enough to account for the complexity and specificity of the grammar, then the stimulus-response part of the theory, which was supposed to be its core, becomes uninteresting; for such interest as it still has now derives entirely from its ability to trigger the innate mechanisms that are now the crucial element of the learning theory. Either way, the behaviorist has no effective reply to Chomsky's arguments. 52

If the behaviorist or empiricist admits that to solve the question of the complexity of human language and of how man is capable of understanding and generating an infinite number of sentences, one must resort to the concept of innate capacities, then the stimulus-response model 49 50 51 52

Searle, "Chomsky's Revolution in Linguistics", 21. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid.

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is admittedly deficient and superficial. It is only a surface manifestation of a far more complex process. The aspects of Putnam and Quine's critique that does seem to be valid is their attack on Chomsky's view of ideas being innate. Chomsky is on safe ground when he argues that this position resembles the classical theory of innate ideas. However, when he broaches on arguing that ideas as such are innate, he is pushing his contentions beyond the valid scope of his evidence. Chomsky's transformational and generative grammar has opened a resourceful arena for re-explaining and re-examining the question of human creativity and knowledge. He has offered significant evidence for the position that the mind or innate mental capacities and structures contribute to learning and creativity. He has not, however, proven any ideas as such to be innate. He has developed a hypothesis that is relevant to ideation or the process of forming and reforming ideas. His position resembles the position of the classical theory of innate ideas, but he has not proven ideas as such to be innate in origin. If Chomsky's position is qualified to mean that human creativity and knowledge are essentially related to innate mental capacities, and these mental capacities correspond to the depth structures of language, then his theory has validity and is not pushed beyond the evidence and argument that can prove its resourcefulness. In previous chapters, the plausibility of Chomsky's view has been discussed and defended through arguments and evidence of thinkers that have preceded him. In the last two chapters, Chomsky's evidence and arguments were elaborated in his own terms and in view of the empiricists that offer opposing views. In the next chapter, auxiliary evidence will be explored that will support and supplement the Chomskyan view of human creativity and its essential relationship to language.

CHAPTER V

A U X I L I A R Y E V I D E N C E FOR CHOMSKY'S CONTENTIONS

Auxiliary evidence for Chomsky's views seems to be emerging today in a number of different ways in the fields of psychology and philosophy. Chomsky refers to his own particular scheme of linguistics as a "branch of cognitive psychology".1 Linguistics is implicitly and explicitly promoting or assuming a theory of cognition, and thus psychology and linguistics, even though attempting to go their separate ways in the name of scientific rigor, overlap in such decisive ways that it is necessary to explore the essential epistemological connections and disputes shared by these disciplines. In the field of psychology, two figures stand out distinctly as promoting positions that in part support Chomsky's theories concerning the innate structures of the mind and the importance of language in the process of creativity. Konrad Lorenz, in the field of comparative 'ethology', is one thinker who also argues that innate or a priori capacities are essential factors in learning and development. Jacques Lacan, a contemporary French psychoanalyst, through theories decisively distinct from those of Lorenz, consistently contends that the transformation and the generation of alternatives in language are the key to the therapeutic process. These views, although different from each other, supplement and reinforce Chomsky's position concerning the innate capacities of the mind, the 'creative aspect of language use' and its relationship to human nature and human selfhood. In a series of lectures given at the University of California at Berkeley in January, 1967, Chomsky, in abbreviated and summary form, discussed his work in linguistics under three subdivisions, "Past, Present, and Future". 2 The lecture or section entitled "Past" dealt with the Cartesian linguists and German romantic philosophers who were discussed in the first two chapters of this essay. "Present" dealt with contemporary work 1

Chomsky, Language and Mind, 1. Chomsky, Language and Mind. The chapters respectively are "Past", "Present", and "Future". 2

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in generative and transformational grammar. "Future" is an indication on Chomsky's part as to what other thinking and research of the contemporary scene is leading towards constructs and hypotheses similar to his own. One of the sources Chomsky cites and quotes is Konrad Lorenz. Lorenz bases most of his studies on his observations of animal behavior. His method, however, is quite different from the controlled experiments of the behaviorists. Lorenz bases his hypothesis upon observing the activity of animals in their natural habitat. From this data, Lorenz has developed a theory of the "evolution and modification of behavior". 3 He does not argue that an organism inherits a predetermined self or character but that, for example, an animal has innate capacities or "a limited range of possible forms in which an identical genetic blueprint can find its expression in phenogeny (sic)".4 Inherited and, thus, innately present in the organism is a structured range of possibilities. These structures are a priori and thus are not the result of conditioning or external stimuli. Lorenz cites many examples to verify his contentions. A hen, for example, without being conditioned to the sound of a chick "treats every moving object within the nest as a enemy, unless it utters the specific note of the chick". 5 Thus, without learning or conditioning, the hen innately knows that a being emitting a certain sound is her own and is able to separate it from other creatures and objects. In contrast, if the hen is unable to hear a sound, she will attempt to destroy the foreign object. "A deaf hen invariably kills all of her own progeny immediately after hatching." 6 The a priori capacities and structures are thus present in the organism. Sensation is needed to activate their potentialities, but it is not the source of the competency involved. Lorenz's a priori forms are analogous to Chomsky's deep structures. Both are the base and source of competency. Experience is necessary for their activation, but experience is not the source of the competence involved. It is merely the occasion for its coming to expression. This, as was asserted earlier, is the epistemological issue on which Chomsky's position strongly resembles Kant's. The 'strong Kantian flavor' of Lorenz's contentions concerning innate forms links not only Chomsky and Lorenz's work directly, but also through a shared similarity to 3

Konrad Lorenz, Evolution and Modification of Behavior (London: Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1966). 4 Ibid., 1. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid.

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Kant's epistemology. In the following passage from Lorenz, the epistemological similarity between Chomsky, Kant and Lorenz is evident: One familiar with the innate modes of reaction of subhuman organisms can readily hypothesize that the a priori (sic) is due to hereditary differentiations of the central nervous system which have become characteristic of the species, producing hereditary dispositions to think in certain forms. ... Most certainly Hume was wrong when he wanted to derive all that is a priori from that which the senses supply to experience, just as wrong as Wundt or Helmholtz who simply explain it as an abstraction from preceding experience. Adaptation of the a priori to the real world has no more originated from 'experience' than adaptation of the fin of the fish to the properties of water. Just as the form of the fin is given a priori, prior to any individual negotiation of the young fish with the water, and just as it is this form that makes possible this negotiation, so it is also the case with our forms of perception and categories in their relationship to our negotiation with the real external world through experience. In the case of animals, we find limitations specific to the forms of experience possible for them. We believe we can demonstrate the closest functional and probably genetic relationship between these animal a priori's and our human a priori. Contrary to Hume, we believe, just as did Kant, that a 'pure' science of innate forms of human thought, independent of all experience, is possible.7 Chomsky's own research has not brought him into the field of animal studies. He has consistently argued that 'creative language use' is that dimension and capability that makes man distinctly human. The similarity between Lorenz' and Chomsky's positions does not lie in their views of language, but in epistemology. Both Chomsky and Lorenz argue that there are a priori or innate structures that are the basis of learning and knowledge. Lorenz uses his discoveries of a priori structures in animal behavior as a foundation for his theories concerning human knowledge. Chomsky postulates that human kind have distinct a priori capacities that are the source of language and creativity in language use. Chomsky is well aware of the many areas of disagreement between his own position and that of Lorenz, who is reviving a theory of instinct. He states this differentiation with emphasis placed upon the question of the origin of innate capacities: In any event, I would not want what I am saying to be confused with other, entirely different attempts to revive a theory of human instinct. What seems to me important in ethology is its attempt to explore the innate properties that determine how knowledge is acquired and the character of this knowledge. Returning to this theme, we must consider a further question: How did the 7

K. Lorenz, "Kants Lehre vom apriorischen im Lichte gegenwärtiger Biologie",

in Blätter fur Deutsche Philosophie, 15 (1941), as quoted in Chomsky's Language and Mind, 81.

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human mind come to acquire the innate structure that we are led to attribute to it? Not too surprisingly, Lorenz takes the position that this is simply a matter of natural selection.8 Chomsky's theories of innate capacities, although analogous epistemologically to the concept of instinct, are different in that instinct implies an inevitable propensity toward a certain kind of action and activity; for example, in Lorenz's scheme, aggression. Chomsky is certainly not contending that man is inherently aggressive, but is asserting that man has innate capacities for reasoning and creativity. Contrary to Lorenz, he is not convinced that natural selection is the answer to how this capacity is inherited or transmitted. Chomsky is not denying that man has acquired this capacity through natural selection, but is contending that to propose that this is the case does not answer the crucial question and issues involved. At this point, we do not know enough to make natural selection a substantial explanation. In Chomsky's words: In fact, the processes by which the human mind achieved its present stage of complexity and its particular form of innate organization are a total mystery, as much so as the analogous questions about the physical or mental organization of any other complex organism. It is perfectly safe to attribute this development to "natural selection", so long as we realize that there is no substance to this assertion, that it amounts to nothing more than a belief that there is some naturalistic explanation for these phenomena.9 Chomsky is not convinced as to how the occurrence of creative language use can and will be explained in physical terms, but he is certainly not arguing that it is necessary to look beyond the physical for explanations and theories. The question for Chomsky is an open question, but this does not lead him to assume principles and categories that are antiphysical or metaphysical. It is Chomsky's judgment that it is an open question as to how creative language use and the complexity of human thinking can be explained physiologically. It is an interesting question whether the functioning and evolution of human mentality can be accommodated within the framework of physical explanation, as presently conceived, or whether there are new principles, now unknown, 8

Chomsky, Language and Mind, 82. In this passage Chomsky asserts that Lorenz relies solely on natural selection for explaining the origin of innate capacities. This does not take into account Lorenz's emphasis upon 'intercalation'. Learning capacities and abilities are never simply innate or simply genetic in origin for Lorenz. Some of the 'innate' capacities evolve under the need to adapt and survive. Thus the learning capacities are not solely and simply innate in origin but develop in a subtle interrelationship with the environment. See pp. 5, 18, 44 of Lorenz's Evolution and Modification of Behavior. 9 Chomsky, Cartesian Linguistics, 83.

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that must be invoked, perhaps principles that emerge only at higher levels of organization t h a n can n o w be submitted to physical investigation. W e can, however, be fairly sure that there will be a physical explanation for the phenome n a in question, if they can be explained at all, for a n uninteresting terminological reason, namely that the concept of "physical explanation" will n o d o u b t b e extended to incorporate whatever is discovered in this domain, exactly as it was extended to accommodate gravitational a n d electromagnetic force, massless particles, a n d n u m e r o u s other entities a n d processes that would have offended the c o m m o n sense of earlier generations. But it seems clear that this issue need n o t delay the study of the topics that are n o w open to investigation, a n d it seems futile t o speculate a b o u t matters so remote f r o m present understanding. 1 0 In years to c o m e this m a y be o n e o f the areas where C h o m s k y ' s

findings

are m o s t interestingly challenged or verified. 1 1 T h e decisive or pivotal epistemological

or m e t h o d o l o g i c a l

issue surrounding the

possibility

o f further inquiry i n this area is the necessity o f challenging the d o g m a t i c empirical a n d behavioristic assumptions that m a y preclude a n d exclude the recognition o f anything m o r e than determined dimensions o f the brain's activity. A s in p s y c h o l o g y a n d linguistics, a shift is needed in m e t h o d o l o g i c a l a n d epistemological assumptions i n other disciplines. Research in brain p h y s i o l o g y m u s t be o p e n e d t o the possibility o f dis-

10

Ibid., 83-84. The most promising research and theorizing in the field of biology that bears directly on Chomsky's theories is that of Eric H. Lenneberg. Lenneberg promotes the idea of a biological propensity for language and relates this to chromosomes function. His contentions are based on the discovery of chromosome damage in individuals with speech defects. See Eric H. Lenneberg, New Directions in the Study of Language (Cambridge, Mass.: The M.I.T. Press, 1966), 75. He does not, however, make audacious and final claims and admits with Chomsky that "language is due to a yet unknown species-specific biological capacity" (ibid., 85). Jacques Monod, Chance and Necessity: An Essay on the Natural Philosophy of Modern Biology (New York: Vintage Books, 1972), maintains that in the development of man language "was not only the product but one of the initial conditions of this evolution" (ibid., 130). Linguistic proficiencies in man thus are not the mere result of the development of man's mental ability, they were a crucial factor in stimulating this evolution. Monod's contentions are therefore further reinforcement for the essential relatedness of 'creative language use' and human nature. In context he comments on the validity of Chomsky's theories: "According to Chomsky and his school, in-depth linguistic analysis reveals, beneath their boundless diversity, one basic "form" common to all human languages. Therefore Chomsky feels this form must be considered innate and characteristic of the species. Certain philosophers or anthropologists have been scandalized by this thesis, in it discerning a return to Cartesian metaphysics. Provided its implicit biological content be accepted I see nothing wrong with it whatsoever. On the contrary, it strikes me as a most natural conclusion, once one assumes that the evolution of man's cortical structures could not help but be extensively influenced by a capacity for language acquired very early and in the crudest possible state." (ibid., 136). 11

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covering that human mentality has organic unity, intrinsic structure and creativity. A great amount of important research has been done in the area of 'physical control of the mind'. Jose Delgado has offered a significant contribution to this area of study in his work as a researcher and author. 12 Delgado's work moves largely in the direction of electrical and chemical control of the brain. His key experiments involve electrode implants in the brain and the external stimulation and control that can result through electrical stimulation. Delgado's research has made it at least initially plausible that the transmission of messages throughout the brain are electrical in nature. Since various responses can be triggered by electrical stimulation, with no apparent adverse effects on the organism in question, Delgado has made an important discovery concerning the function of the mind. Even within this remarkably deterministic scheme there is a detectable opening towards the shift of methodological assumptions necessary to recognize the validity and importance of Chomsky's work. At first reading Delgado's work appears to be dogmatically empirical and behavioristic. Even though the theory of a mindless being totally vulnerable to impression is promoted as a necessary hypothesis, it is not doggedly judged to be the absolute or final solution. Delgado suggests it is an hypothesis that aids the attainment of clarity: The concept of the mindless new born brain is a useful hypothesis because it clarifies our search for the origin of the mind. If this origin depended on genetic endowment, then mental functions should appear in the absence of other external elements (as respiratory functions do). If genetic determination alone is not sufficient, then we must investigate the source and characteristics of the extracerebral elements responsible for the appearance of the mind as the baby matures.13 It is important in this context to recall that Chomsky's theories of deep structures and innate ideas do not imply the inevitable activation of these capacities without external stimulation. Here the Kantian aspect of Chomsky's argument is important. "Although all knowledge begins with experience it does not follow that its sole source is experience."14 Translated into terms appropriate to Delgado's contentions, Chomsky and Kant could assert, "because behavior can be triggered and suppressed 12

Jose M. R. Delgado, M.D., Physical Control of the Mind: Toward a Psychocivilized Society, ed. by Ruth Nanda Anshen (New York: Harper and Row, Publishers, 1969). 13 Ibid., 46. 14 Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, 41.

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by electrical stimulation this does not mean that electrical energy is the sole necessary explanation for activity and knowledge". Delgado readily admits that the emphasis upon external control is not adequate and that the classical polarity between innate capacities and environmental influence is too simplistic. The classical controversy about the nature-nurture dichotomy has lost its original simplicity. The problem is not to separate innate from learned behavioral patterns, because in most cases there is a reciprocal influence between pre-existing and acquired factors. The problem is to identify the specific roles and mechanisms in the collaborative effort between heredity and environment. To be specific, let us consider language as the most outstanding manifestation of human mental qualities. The potentiality to talk depends on genetic factors which exist in man at the moment of birth, while they are lacking in the rest of the zoological scale, including the big apes. It is known that after the most patient training, some chimpanzees living with human foster parents have been able to pronounce a few simple words such as "papa" and "mama" and "cup" but they have never learned to converse or to say complex phrases.15 As can be seen in the above statement, Delgado's experiments and views are not decisively incompatible with Chomsky's. Delgado certainly moves too far in the Skinnerian direction of equating understanding with being able to control and determine. Understanding the mind and brain is too easily associated with triggering and suppressing its functions. Again in this view, an organism is reduced to a mechanism. The internal structural integrity of the mind is recognized by Delgado but the understanding sought is gaged and couched in methods and terms that reflect deterministic assumptions and conclusions. Delgado moves far in the recognition of the importance of innate capacities and the complexities of language. He does not, however, provide the epistemological options that could open the study of brain physiology to the generative and creative capacities that Chomsky holds are crucial and basic to linguistic processes. Chomsky's most substantial auxiliary evidence from the field of psychology can be found in the work of a contemporary French psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan. For Lacan, language and linguistic processes are crucial and central to the therapeutic enterprise. The first and most immediate way that linguistic processes are crucial lies in the obvious fact that a greater part of the therapeutic process is verbal and thus, linguistic in nature. Lacan is perplexed as to "how could a psychoanalyst of today not realize that his realm of truth is in fact the word, when 15

Delgado, Physical Control, 57.

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his whole experience must find in the word alone its instrument, its framework, its material, and even the static of its uncertainties. ...", 16 Since this is the case, Lacan asserts that analysts must be "masters in the functions of the Word". The reason for this is that the unconscious depths of human existence are "structured like a language". Symptoms appear, are discussed, and dealt with in language. The unconscious chapter of human existence is both structured linguistically but also revealed linguistically. The unconscious is that chapter of my history which is marked by a blank or occupied by a falsehood: it is the censored chapter. But the Truth can be found again; it is most often already written down elsewhere. That is to say: — in monuments: this is my body — that is to say, the hysterical nucleus of the neurosis where the hysterical symptom reveals the structure of a language and is deciphered like an inscription which, once recovered, can without serious loss be destroyed; — in archival documents also: these are my childhood memories, just as impenetrable as are such documents when I do not know their source; — in semantic evolution: this corresponds to the stock of words and acceptations of my own particular vocabulary, as it does to my style of life and to my character;17 The resolution of the past and the discovery of the lost chapter or lost 'other' occurs in and through language. As Lacan suggests, Freud's technique of 'free association' was a freely associative process but yet a linking of words that revealed the unconscious dimension of man's being. A symptom, states Lacan, "resolves itself entirely in a language, because the symptom itself is structured like a language". 18 The function of language in psychoanalysis is thus the key issue for Lacan. The tension and dynamics of analysis in this perspective is the interplay and dynamics of the 'Empty Word' and the 'Full Word'. 19 It is Lacan's intent to show that words always contain or hide truth. As he states it, "there is no Word without a reply even if it meets no more than silence, provided that it has an auditor: this is the heart of its function in psychoanalysis".20 Linguistic discourse is the process of "compelling and con16

Jacques Lacan, "The Insistence of the Letter in the Unconscious", in Structuralism, edited by Jacques Ehrmann (Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1970), 103. 17 Jacques Lacan, The Language of the Self: The Function of Language in Psychoanalysis, trans, by Anthony Wilden (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1968), 21. 18 Ibid., 32. 19 Ibid., 9. 20 Ibid.

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straining truth". 21 In order to clarify Lacan's contention on this issue, dream analysis can serve as an example.22 In the analysis of dreams in the therapeutic process, the dreams of the patient are not immediately accessible to the therapist. The dream material is only available through the description and verbal report of the patient. "Dr. Lacan never tires of reminding us — that all the material available to the analyst is verbal : what is analyzed in the psychoanalytic interview is not the patient's dreams, but the patient's report of his dreams." 23 Linguistic activity is not merely the means we have to use, but it is the most appropriate means. The unconscious is not only readily uncovered and known through analysis, slips of the tongue, puns, linguistic associations, and dream reports, but the "structure of the unconscious is the structure of language". 24 The slips, associations, and dream descriptions betray that 'other' side of the human self that has been lost, obscured and repressed. The self betrayal and self recovery in these slips of the tongue and dream interpretations is the dynamics of the 'Word' in its dialectic between emptiness and fullness. The patient can seek to further avoid the lost 'other' or the unconscious self through the repetitious expression of empty words. The therapist, however, should 'compel and constrain' truth and in the discourse recover the 'other' or the language of the 'self that is hidden and lost. The compelling and constraining of truth is the process of language that is most akin to Chomsky's theory of generative and transformational grammar and the 'creative aspect of language use'. For Lacan, the full 'Word' occurs when the patient moves from avoiding the 'other' or the 'unconscious self' through repetitive and empty words. The patient is caught neurotically in a repetitious and compulsive circle of behavior, but also in a linguistic circle. The sick person is not only a victim of his own repetitive neurotic compulsions, but is also ensnared in a set of phrases that he or she uses repeatedly to justify and explain the behavior. The psychic breakthrough is thus intrinsicly related to a linguistic breakthrough. The patient must be able to generate and transform the linguistic structuring of his experience in order to transform the ordering of his 21

"Avertissement", in Cahiers pour l'analyse, No. 1 ("La Vérité"), Cercle d'épistémologie de l'E.N.S. (January, 1966), as quoted in the prefatory note of Lacan's The Language of the Self. 22 Lacan's work is consciously and consistently indebted to Freud. Lacan is developing a position on Freudian analysis that he contends has been neglected. 23 Jan Miel, "Jacques Lacan and the Structure of the Unconscious", in Structuralism, 97-98. 24 Ibid.

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behavior. This does not merely mean the free and easy 'talking it out'. For Lacan, as for Freud, therapy and verbal association is extremely hard work that demands a disciplined form of attentiveness and openness. The truth that is found and recovered in this process of transformations is a truth that recognizes the lineaments between past and future. The freedom of the 'now' or present is a freedom to become aware of past and forgotten pressures and pleasures and move into the future with alternative and creative ways of living with them. Lacan does not suggest that man is easily freed or magically liberated by words. It is the cautious Freudian freedom of coping, and the Chomskyan freedom of selecting alternatives. In this process, truth is the selection of alternatives and linguistic resurrecting of the 'Self' into fullness. Lacan summarizes the truth process as follows: I might as well be categorical: in psychoanalytical anamnesis, it is not a question of reality, but of Truth, because the effect of a full Word is to reorder the past contingent events by conferring on them the sense of necessities to come, just as they are constituted by the little liberty through which the subject makes them present. 25

The truth process is thus linguistic in nature for it is a recovery of the fullness of 'Self' through the fullness of the 'Word'. The linguistic nature of human being and the way in which the self can be ensnared in and through language is also a problem that has been dealt with by two contemporary philosophers, namely, Wittgenstein and Heidegger. In order to further examine Lacan's view of the function of language in psychoanalysis and its similarity to Chomsky's view of 'creative language use', Wittgenstein's and Heidegger's theories of language can serve as resources for comparison and further elaboration. Wittgenstein promotes a theory of linguistic relativity comparable to the Whorfian hypothesis that was described and discussed earlier. Wittgenstein asserts that man is caught in a circle of language or a 'language game' into which he is born. Learning to use and speak a language means accepting the grammar and words of the language or the rules and content of the game. The meaning that man apprehends and conveys is thus merely an accepted and common mode of playing a game. The questions that are asked and the issues examined are merely those permissible within a particular 'linguistic circle' or 'language game'. 26 Focusing Wittgenstein's theory of 'language game' on the 25

Lacan, The Language of the Self, 18. Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, trans, by G. E. M. Anscombe (New York: Macmillan Co., 1953), 4-7. 26

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question of the 'function of language in psychoanalysis', his terms and theories can be used to explicate Lacan's position. The patient in a neurotic state is caught in a repetitive circle of activity that is his own personal language game or circle of repetitious and compulsive behavior. The meaningless circle of compulsions and anxiety are taken to be the real world, and the equally repetitious and compulsive verbalization about the source of the neurotic bind are taken to be the true explanation. Therapeutic breakthrough for Lacan consists of breaking what Wittgenstein calls the 'language game'. The fullness of the 'Word' occurs when man leaves the security of empty words and seeks and realizes an alternative set of linguistic symbols in order to transform his being through language of the 'Self'. The function of language in psychoanalysis is thus that of transforming itself and transforming the patient into alternative modes of expression and being. Therapeutic transformation can occur, according to Lacan, because the structure and structuring of language corresponds to the structure of the self. This is clearly parallel to Chomsky's theories concerning 'creative language use' and the correlation between deep structure and human nature. The innovative and creative possibilities of language use in the Chomskyan perspective indicate a unique characteristic of man, that is, the ability to respond creatively with alternative expressions. For Lacan, human being and human creativity are likewise inseparable. The 'creative aspect of language use' Chomsky postulates is typical of language even in its normal function. Lacan asserts similarly that linguistic creativity is the key to the therapeutic process. In both cases the depths and essence of language correspond directly to the depths and essence of human nature and being. This depth or essence is creativity or the ability to generate alternatives. Heidegger, like Chomsky and Lacan, also asserted that the questions 'What is man?' and 'What is language?' are inseparably related. In the poetic words of Heidegger, "language belongs to the closest neighborhood of man's being". 27 To assert this, however, for Heidegger is not to answer the questions. He argues with Humboldt that man has language by nature, but also contends that language by its nature holds man. 28 Man is not only man through language, but man dwells in language. In an essay on "Hölderlin and the Essence of Poetry", Heidegger refers 27

Martin Heidegger, Poetry, Language, Thought, trans, by Albert Hofstadter (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1971), 189. 28 Ibid. 29 Martin Heidegger, Existence and Being, intro. by Werner Brock (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1965).

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to language as the most dangerous of all possessions.29 Language is threatening and dangerous because within its use lie the possibilities of confusion and destruction, but also creativity and hope. It is this menacing potential that Heidegger suggests is so close to the functioning essence of language. Heidegger describes the close relationship between language and human being in the following way: It is language which first creates the manifest conditions for menace and confusion to existence, and thus the possibility of the loss of existence, that is to say — danger. But language is not only the danger of dangers, but necessarily conceals in itself a continual danger for itself.30 The danger of language and human being is similar and analogous. The danger and potential of language is that man meets and deals with language through language just as he confronts his nature through his own being. Man must respond to and understand language in language that is appropriate for language. In Heidegger's words: We do not wish to reduce the nature of language to a concept, so that this concept may provide a generally useful view of language that will lay to rest all further notions about it. ... We would reflect on language itself, and on language only. Language itself is — language and nothing else besides. Language itself is language. The understanding that is schooled in logic, thinking of everything in terms of calculation and hence usually overbearing, calls this proposition an empty tautology. Merely to say the identical thing twice — language is language — how is that supposed to get us anywhere? But we do not want to get anywhere. We would like only, for once, to get to just where we are already.31 In this view the understanding that is sought is not a transcendental supra-linguistic understanding that defies all words and all language. Rather, what is sought is an understanding of language that can be linguistically symbolized and elaborated. In this sense the goal is to let language to itself in order to know it and to know it in its own functions. The paradox or problem raised through Lacan's and Heidegger's insights on language is 'how can language deal with itself or how can language bring about linguistic freedom'. Chomsky's reply to this could be that the linguistic freedom or creative language use is present in normal language use and thus the recognition of creative language use, although not necessary for creativity in language in itself, is an alternative that can transform and transcend the behavioristic and deterministic 30 31

Ibid., 275. Heidegger, Poetry, Language, Thought, 190.

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views. Linguistic freedom is already present even before it is recognized and dealt with linguistically, but a further evidence of human freedom is man's ability to deal with his nature through that creative aspect of his being which is his language and its source, the creative self. In response to Lacan, Chomsky could assert that, in therapy, language is returned to the 'creative aspect of its use' and the circular, confined, and repetitious binds of language are abnormal. Language in its normal function is creative; only when man is neurotically and abnormally caught or bound does it become determined and repetitious. With Heidegger, Chomsky could argue that it is appropriate to deal with language in language and with man linguistically. Linguistic creativity is that which is most uniquely indicative of his being; therefore, it must also be uniquely appropriate for exposing and understanding human being. The paradox or circularity of dealing with language in language is thus a necessary and fruitful one. As Heidegger suggests, to go beyond or away from language is to turn away from language in order to understand it. In language, man must seek the depth and essence of language. In the Chomskyan perspective this would mean that in linguistics man must seek to recognize and promote the 'creative aspect of language use'. In contrast to Wittgenstein, Chomsky would assert that man is not totally caught or determined by a circle of language. The ability of man to generate and transform his finite language in an infinite number of variations and forms indicates that human language is not a closed set of symbols or a limited system of signs. Man has the creative freedom to alter and transform his forms of expression. Chomsky is not suggesting that man is totally free in linguistic activity, but that human language within the individuality and particularity of their own grammar and vocabulary can be transformed and altered ad infinitum. Freedom, in creative language use, is not a wild and arbitrary freedom that has no form and bounds. Freedom in language implies that man is in part determined by language. Man is determined by the particular historical language into which he is born. Thinking and communication occurs in a particular grammar and a particular vocabulary. In this way, man's language is relative to and determined by his own historical language. Yet, within the particular historical form of a language, there is the possibility of generating alternative sentences and meanings. Without being determined in part by language man could not be free in it. Freedom implies choice and selection, thus, necessitating alternatives that are not arbitrary and absurd, but distinct and definite. If man were completely free in language usage, language would have no form. Since

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particular languages do have forms or grammars, it is possible to generate and select alternatives that are not arbitrary and chaotic. Freedom in language is only possible when there is order in language. Freedom that is complete is irrelevant and impossible because it is unrelated to anything and everything. Complete freedom, linguistic or otherwise, is impossible because freedom must be freedom from some option or choice and thus it is related to specific occurrences and options that it can select or reject. To be completely free linguistically is to be free from all alternatives because an alternative is itself a limitation into a choice and a definite form or possibility.32 It is clearly discernible, therefore, that Chomsky's theories have a validity of their own and on their own terms; furthermore, a significant number of theorists on the contemporary scene, by their own methods and intentions, offer hypotheses and positions that reinforce Chomsky's theories and statements. From Lorenz, Chomsky derives auxiliary evidence for his theory of innate capacities and structures. From Lacan, Chomsky's concept of creative language use is verified through examining the 'function of language in psychoanalysis'. From Lenneberg, his theories move in the direction of eventually being grounded in a complementary biological theory. The auxiliary evidence for the 'creative aspect of language use' is not final, nor can it be expected that it ever will be. If man is creative he will continue to respond to his creativity creatively. Thus to argue that there is a validating factor in the auxiliary evidence that has been explained 32

Further testing and challenging of Chomsky's views could be carried out by developing a dialogue between linguists working in transformational and generative grammar and psychologists in the field of developmental and cognitive psychology. In developmental and cognitive psychology there is a shared differentiation from behavioristic methodology and assumptions. The developmentalists, for example, Jean Piaget, do not merely elaborate the variants of environmental stimuli in the development of a child, but study stages or levels of competency that a child passes through on his or her way to becoming an adult. See Jean Piaget, The Language and Thought of the Child, trans, by Marjorie Gabain (New York: The World Publishing Company, 1955). For verification and testing of Piaget's theories see Burton White, "The Initial Coordination of Sensorimotor Schemas in Human Infants: Piaget's Ideas and the Role of Experience", Cognitive Studies, ed. by Jerome Hellmuth (New York: Brunner/Maze Publishers, 1970), 26. Further auxiliary evidence for Chomsky's theories could be developed through a comparison of his work with John Searle's Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969) and Kenneth Burke's Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968). For both Searle and Burke, language is an activity rather than a rote and determined response. This is comparable to the agentic and creative dimension of language that is central to Chomsky's position.

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and cited is not to contend that the case for human creativity in language use is closed and complete. Viewed consistently, a theory of creative language use should serve to facilitate the further amplification of human being and creativity in and through the creative aspect of language use. Thus, in the summary and conclusion to follow, the question of human nature and creativity shall be elaborated in view of the evidence and arguments that have been examined.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

DIALECTICS, D I A L O G U E , CREATIVITY A N D TRUTH

To more clearly illuminate the view of man projected and defended in this essay, a summary and recapitulation of the evidence and arguments of the previous chapters will serve to conclude this study. On the basis of this summary, implications shall be derived for a theory of human discourse, dialectics and truth. The resourceful and defensible element of the Cartesian argument is that human language is uniquely indicative of capabilities and capacities that distinguish man from animals and automata. In Cordemoy's position, the ordering and reordering of human language is not determined and inevitable, as is the case with the sounds and words that a machine could be made to produce, or the limited range of signals emitted by animals. Man can generate and transform his statements into an infinite variety of meaningful and appropriate forms. In order to explain the source of this competency, Lancelot and Arnauld posited that at the basis of human language there was a rational capacity that was universally present in all mankind. Thus, the important dimension to be discerned and defined in grammatical studies was the universal and rational elements that are allegedly present in all language. The emphasis upon grammatical universality that was championed by the Port-Royal grammarians cited above was challenged by a number of early German philosophers of language and philologists. Hamann, for example, was one of the first proponents of the theory of linguistic relativity. Instead of positing a universal rational basis for language, Hamann contends that the reasoning of a people is inseparable from their language. There is no universal, rational basis for language in this view because 'reason is language'. Linguistic relativity rather than linguistic universality becomes the central concern for Hamann. The theory of a unique linguistic form in every language and the distinct way of perceiving the world that stems from it, counters and replaces the emphasis

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upon linguistic universality that was central to the Cartesian linguist's perspective. In Herder, Hamann's emphasis upon linguistic relativity is continued but coupled with the Cartesian emphasis upon linguistic creativity. Herder contends that man is not completely determined by instinct as is an animal, but that 'human being' is distinctive in its ability to reflect and reason. Man's unique abilities, in Herder's view, stem from the weakness of his instincts and senses, or the cognitive distance that develops since he is not totally determined in the nexus of stimulus and response. Language use for Herder exemplified this creativity and distance. Man can reflect on objects of his perceptions and name them. The unique dimension of 'human being' is verified through inventive language use. Man is not totally overwhelmed by a sensual response to an object; he can reflectively name it. A defensible synthetic position that draws together the insights of both the German and French traditions that we have traced is found in Humboldt. For Humboldt, language is an agentic dimension of the human being, an energy that stems from man's archetypal and primordial capacities for creativity. Language is living and organic, it is not a determined mechanism that has no intrinsic design and integrity. Language is generated and selected rather than determined. The proof for this, as has been demonstrated earlier, is that a mechanistic and deterministic view of language cannot account for the flexibility and innovative dimension of language use. Furthermore, linguistic ability does not consist of learning specific responses to specific situations. It is not mere performance, but it is competence. Linguistic competence consists of the ability to generate and transform linguistic expressions in ways that are appropriate to new situations. In Humboldtian language, this is the 'infinite variation of a finite form'. The Humboldtian synthesis is one of combining universality with relativity. Man has capacities for 'creative language use' that are universally present in all language. The universal syntactical form is the phrase, and the manner in which phrases in all languages can be changed, altered, deleted and rearranged to form novel expressions. The universal depths of all language is thus not strictly rational in the sense of the Port Royal grammarians, but it is the structure or order that is revealed in phrases. The relative dimension of language is the particular vocabulary and grammar of each language. A people's spirit and concepts of reality are subtly embodied in their words and sentences. This argument, stemming from the German thinkers who have been traced, has found its most forceful form in B. L. Whorf's

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conception of linguistic relativity. Synthesizing relativity with universality would mean that men are universally creative, but they symbolize their creativity in historically contingent and indigenous ways. The Skinnerian and behavioristic challenge to a theory of 'human being' that centers on creativity would be the specification of variables that can be linked to human behavior. This would seem to imply that man's being and language are determined rather than creative. The strength of the behaviorist's argument, however, lies largely in the restrictive nature of its scope. Human being in this view is understandable and knowable in so far as causal determinants can be specified and conditioning factors discerned. Any facet or dimension in which human kind is creative or free is unknowable through this method. Since knowledge can only consist of the specification of determinants, then obviously the narrow case can be drawn for contending that man is totally determined by external stimulation. The Chomskyan view is far more comprehensive than the behaviorists' theory of stimulus-response determination. Certainly human beings are determined in significant ways by their biology and their environment. However, to merely study determined responses is to preclude the possibility of recognizing the complex activation of 'human being' and man's creative capacities. Stimulation and response are not the only factors in 'human being' and action. External stimulation also activates innate capacities that are the source of creativity and freedom. An example of this is 'creative language use'. 'Creative language use' or the transformation and alteration of linguistic expressions in innovative ways would be impossible if mankind were solely determined by external stimulation. Linguistic competency requires a degree of cognitive freedom because it is the generation of language rather than the rote memorization of words and phrases. It is Chomsky's work in generative and transformational grammar that has offered evidence not only to radically change the methods and assumptions of modern linguistics, but also to offer significant evidence to buttress a humanistic view of man. The evidence for 'creative language use' which Chomsky developed crucially challenges, if not decisively refutes, deterministic and mechanistic views of man, language and human nature. Since deterministic methods cannot account for the creativity and flexibility of human language, it is necessary to posit innate capacities that are the source of human nature and human being. It is impossible at this point to specify exactly what these capacities are, but they are revealed and known through 'creative language use'. Linguistic creativity is uniquely indicative of man's nature and, thus, the key to human being.

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The importance of 'creative language use' is also defended and elaborated by Jacques Lacan in the field of psychoanalysis. Lacan maintains that therapeutic breakthroughs and linguistic transformations are inseparable. A neurotic patient is caught in a circle of repetitious and compulsive behavior, and a parallel circle of repetitious language. Psychic freedom and linguistic freedom are thus intrinsically related.1 Man must find creative ways of symbolizing and understanding his illness in order to be free from its compulsive binds. He can either avoid himself through repetitious and redundant language, or he can seek to transform his language in order to recover the creativity that is necessary for his wholeness. The structure of language, Lacan maintains, is essentially related to the structure of the self. The self that is caught and determined in a neurotic bind is only released when linguistic creativity can occur. Rigid, determined, and repetitious language is paralleled in a compulsive and determined self. 'Creative language use' is thus necessary for man to be truly man. If his language is circular and determined, his nature will lie paralyzed and hidden. For Lacan, as for Chomsky, 'creative language use' is not only uniquely indicative of 'human being', but also essential for a humane existence. There are numerous implications of maintaining and plausibly defending a view of man that centers on 'creative language use' and its correlary or source, the creative self. The implications for human dialogue and dialectics would be a position decisively opposed to much of what is accepted as the common and necessary way to engage in scholarly and academic discourse and research. The goal of much of academic dialogue, in both its written and oral forms, is that of challenge and refutation. A successful scholarly or academic view is frequently equated with a position out of which all other related views and theories can be challenged, while the correct view can be decisively defended. The goal of dialogue and dialectics is thus the polarization into right and wrong positions.2 In this scheme, language is merely a tool in and of rational refutation. Language serves as a means of getting at the so-called 'objective truth'. 1

Ernest Becker, Beyond Alienation: A Philosophy of Education for the Crisis of Democracy (New York: George Braziller, 1967), 154. Becker maintains that "neurosis is not man's fate, because it is not due to the inevitable frustration of man's animal nature; it does not reflect the grip of instincts, but rather the bind of symbols". 2 Ibid., 258. Becker has a severely critical view of the state of university discourse and the relationship between the disciplines. He states: "today our universities breed competition, separateness, hate, war; we may call them whatever we will — 'batcheries', 'uninurseries' — but not universities. That institution has not yet dawned in any land on this planet."

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Reasoning, grounded in 'solid evidence' and 'hard facts', dispells the ambiguous and saves man through the security of objective certainty. In contrast, a view of man that takes creativity and innovation to be central to human nature and human knowledge would imply and require a theory of dialogue that would not emphasize polarization and refutation. If man's nature is activated and maintained through transforming and altering his linguistic expressions in novelty and coherence, then dialogue should serve to facilitate an ongoing generation and transformation of human language and being. Instead of seeking polarization and objectification into defensive positions, dialogue and dialectics should promote an ongoing regenerative process that has for its goal meaningful and coherent change rather than the permanence of objective finality. To maintain that truth should be objective is to assume that truth must refer to objects that have permanent essences. To assert that man only knows himself when he attains objective certainty is to assume that man is an object whose permanent essences can be known. In contrast, from maintaining that creativity is distinctive to man and the feature or capacity that makes man truly man, it follows that man has a capacity that can be known objectively through creative language use, but that man himself is not knowable as an object. Man is a living organism or a complex nexus of innate capacities activated and responsive to external stimulation. If man's being is distinctive in its creative acts, then the uniqueness of 'human being' is an activity rather than a permanent essence. Creativity, although a necessary characteristic, is not a permanent, ever present essence in man. It can be untapped or lost. The function of dialogue and dialectics should thus be the stimulation of 'creative language use'. This is clearly the case for Lacan. It need not, however, be limited to Lacan. The transforming function of language in psychoanalysis and the regenerative dimension of 'creative language use' could be extended to all linguistic exchange. In academic discussion and dialogue, winning an argument and refuting an opponent would no longer be the object or goal of discourse. The transformation of language and thinking, through the generation of novelty, would instead facilitate the process of human creativity rather than limiting it and suppressing it. This is not to say that all refutations are non-creative, but the function of dialogue should not be refutation or winning an argument. If winning is the object, then the dynamics and hostility once expressed and exposed in physical combat are merely being transported into the arena of verbal combat. Instead of inflicting a wound with a club, sword, or gun, the attempt is made to verbally lacerate one's

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opponent. Instead of finding joy in reducing an enemy's city, goods, and person to ruin, his position and theories become the target for an equally barbaric desire for destruction and supremacy. Rather than seeking to mutually enhance and expand each other's humanness in dialogue, victory is sought rather than creativity. Obviously, many human beings throughout the history of discourse have not merely sought self-aggrandizement in dialogue and have sensitively responded to and triggered the transformation of fellow human beings in their discourse and writings. The curious question still remains as to why refutation and polarization of positions is held so dear to academic life; a life that should be permeated with creative openness in the search for truth. A clear example of creative interchange that did not hold winning and polarization as the goal can be found in a record of the Kennedy and Khrushchev relationship during the Cuban missile crisis. The key to President Kennedy's action, discourse, and decisions through the entire crisis was that of "placing ourselves in the other country's shoes". 3 In each step of negotiation and action, Kennedy scrutinized the options that his acts would leave for Khrushchev. Instead of polarizing the situation into fear and threats of war, Kennedy sought a reciprocity that would allow both the Soviet Union and the United States to retain their national interests and objectives. The goal was not "to humiliate the Soviet Union, not to have them feel they would have to escalate their response because their national security or national interests so committed them". 4 The objective was thus, not to push the Russians into a role of humiliation or defeat, but to search for a mutually satisfactory answer and solution and thus 'coming out better than the Russians' was not the goal to be attained. Preserving national security and gaining the objectives could be accomplished without forcing the opponents into a conciliatory role. The President symbolized this position by stating: If anybody is around to write after this, they are going to understand that we made every effort to find peace and every effort to give our adversary room to move. I am not going to push the Russians an inch beyond what is necessary. 5

Successful diplomatic relations were thus attained through setting aside the petty desire for victory and supremacy. 3

Robert F. Kennedy, Thirteen Days: A Memoir of the Cuban Missile Crisis, intro. by Robert S. McNamara and Harold Macmillan (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1969), 125. 4 Ibid., 124. 5 Ibid., 127.

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Georges Gusdorf, a contemporary French philosopher, promotes a view of language that is similar to Chomsky's. For Gusdorf, language use is essential to the creative development of human personality. In language, we seek ourselves and others. Language is not merely for man's personal individualization, because, if man were alone, language would be superfluous. In language, man can amplify and extend himself, or he can retreat into the security of monologue. The key to interpersonal existence is to be open to the speech and statements of others. This openness to others is not an openness that seeks polarization and refutation, but amplifies creativity and originality. In Gusdorf's words: To be open to the speech of others is to grasp it in its best sense, continually striving not to reduce it to the common denominator of banality, but to find in it something original. By doing this, moreover, by helping the other to use his own voice, one will stimulate him to discover his innermost need. Such is the task of the teacher, if, going beyond the monologue of instruction, he knows how to carry the pedagogical task into authentic dialogue where personality is developed. The great educator is he who spreads around himself the meaning of the honor of language as a concern for integrity in the relations with others and oneself.6 The common form of academic response and discourse is that of forcing an opponent's contention into a trivial or contradictory form that would obscure and override the distinctive or original element that was part of the position presented. The fabric of the human self is subtly related to creative elements in the statements that are written or spoken. A response that would cherish the integrity of language and human being would not seek to reduce human language or human being to commonality. The creative dialectician would respond to and cultivate the potentially novel statements and ideas that were asserted. Central to Gusdorf's work is an ethic of language. Since language is man's unique possession, and since it is most intimately related to the distinctiveness of his being, then it requires the closest scrutiny and concern. 'Human being' can only be attained and developed through language. It also can be readily lost through language. Man can amplify another self and language through language, but also tyrannize others through his concern for victory and superiority. Man can courageously extend himself in words, or he can protect himself in the security of a verbal fortress. If human language promotes genuine openness and interchange in dialogue, then reciprocity and mutuality can be attained. 6

Georges Gusdorf, Speaking, trans, with intro. by Paul T. Brockelman (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1965), 125.

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Dialectics and dialogue would thus move towards equilibrium rather than victory. Claude Lévi-Strauss maintains that this kind of balance and reciprocity can be found in the games of various primitive tribes. The games function as a ritual to maintain a cosmic balance or harmony. The "Gama of New Guinea" are a people "who have learnt football but who will play, several days running, as many matches as are necessary for both sides to reach the same score".7 It would take this kind of endurance and dedication to make dialogue and dialectics reciprocal and mutually-amplifying. The criticism that could be offered of this view of dialogue and academic scholarly interchange is that it may lead to a less aggressive and less rigorous search for truth. If winning and refutation are put aside and reciprocity, mutual enhancement, the enrichment of ideas and persons is the goal, then will not an effete and passive attitude develop? An answer lies implicitly in the example of the 'Gama game' cited by Lévi-Strauss. It would be far more difficult to carry on a game or a discussion until both sides are creatively regenerated rather than the mere maneuvering to victory of one of the sides. It would be extremely demanding to continue to challenge one's so-called opponent until he too succeeded in elaborating his ideas and theories in a vivid and intriguing way. In reversing the criticism, it could be defended that it is far more difficult to respond in-depth to the thoughts and statements of another than to refute or to verbally outmaneuver him. Reciprocity thus might be far more difficult, whereas an intense drive for success and superiority might be a sign of weakness. Nietzsche, for example, maintained that seeking superiority or power over others is the most deceptive and destructive form of the 'will to power'. The self can be enslaved in its desire for victory and can be cut off from the resourceful challenge of a 'good enemy'. 8 Mutual reciprocity should not be the passive acceptance of any idea from anyone in an amorphous friendliness that accepts all and cherishes nothing. A 'good enemy's' concern would be the interpersonal tapping of strength and creativity. The broader criticism could be raised in this context as to the scope and function of thinking, given the emphasis that has been placed on human creativity in this essay. The emphasis in the previous pages and chapters has been on the proof and defense of a theory of human crea7

Claude Lévi-Strauss, The Savage Mind (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1962), 30-31. 8 See Friedrich Nietzsche, The Portable Nietzsche, ed. by Walter Kaufmann (New York : The Viking Press, 1954), 167-69, on the issue of the good enemy and friendship.

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tivity. Thus, the intent and goal was to prove that man as an individual is creative rather than totally-determined. This would be to focus on the human being and human nature in its individual form. The broadest contrast, therefore, is interpersonal exchange or dialogue between human beings. The broader issue as to the function of thinking and the function of a philosophy that takes for its primary concern the scrutiny of 'human being' and human knowledge would be the relationship between philosophy and culture or between individual creativity and social systems and processes. The function of philosophy would be the regeneration or transformation of culture, just as the function of 'language in the creative aspect of its use' is to transform expressions, ideas, and individuals. As Whitehead maintains: "The use of philosophy is to maintain an active novelty of fundamental ideas illuminating the social system. It reverses the slow descent of accepted thought towards the inactive commonplace." 19 The function of philosophy is thus to maintain an active novelty and a regenerative creativity. The task of philosophy is thus both to cultivate and stimulate creativity for individuals and cultures. The continuation of a culture is not possible without a novel growth of ideas and actions. Likewise, human nature, as we have seen with Lacan and Chomsky, depends on the ongoing process of creativity and transformation. Culture, like 'human being', is a living organic reality. Its character and integrity depend upon transformation and the growth of new orders and symbolism. The crucial ideas that are brought to the foreground through the 'Chomskyan revolution' in linguistics is that language is creative rather than a rigid, mechanistic form. If this is the key to understanding human language and human being, then creative language use is likewise crucial for human culture. Culture is a human activity and, thus, a living dynamic culture can only be maintained through the cautious and conscientious transformation and generation of language and thought. If a culture retreats into a circle of comfortable and reinforcing language and symbolism, then it will cut itself off from the creative energies that are its life source. An analogy as to the kind of creative change that is necessary for the continual regeneration and transformation of cultural and also for the parallel and necessary creative aspect of language use can be found in Alfred E. Emerson's essay, "Dynamic Homeostasis". 10 Biological or9

Alfred North Whitehead, Modes of Thought (New York:The Free Press, 1938), 174. Alfred E. Emerson, "Dynamic Homeostasis: A Unifying Principle in Organic, Social, and Ethical Evolution", Zygon, III (June, 1968), 129-68.

10

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ganisms and human culture thrive on the same dynamics. A human being or society must seek a mode of existence that promotes the greatest possible dynamism or creativity. This movement towards change and regeneration is tempered and modified by the equally necessary need for 'homeostasis'. Continuity and equilibrium temper the creative change into forms that make it constructive rather than arbitrary and chaotic. Human language, human nature and human culture all exist in a subtle dialectic between dynamism and equilibrium. 'Creative language use' is necessary to maintain this process and homeostasis. A culture like a human being that secures itself in a rigid, mechanical, and repetitious language and turns against transformation and regeneration will slowly destroy itself by denying its vital needs as an organism. Truth, as a result, is a regenerative process rather than a search for finality and certainty. For an idea to be true, it must be capable of variations and transformations. Truth promotes individual and cultural vitality and growth. It activates the depths of man, and does not merely manipulate him as an object. Truth taps the deep structures of language and selfhood. It stimulates human freedom and creativity. Truth amplifies man's existence as an organism and does not reduce him to a mechanism. It activates the innate and intrinsic integrity of human being. Truth is the critical and crucial protection that guards human language and being against 'semantic aphasia'. 11 Words and phrases over-used and repeated redundantly lose their vitality and meaning. A true word does not emasculate or trivialize meaning. Truth is the activation and culmination of meaningful discourse. Truth is the guardian of 'human being' and language. It is the critical and cautious use of thought and language that insures the continued life of human culture. An idea or sentence is not true merely because it is novel. Nonsense can assume consistently novel forms. Truth is creative, ordered, and appropriate. It is not arbitrary, reckless and haphazard. Truth activates human being and maintains it. Truth, human nature and creative language are thus inseparable. Human nature is that distinct capacity and ability to respond with appropriate and meaningful novelty. 'Creative language' is, therefore, the 'species specific capacity' that is demonstrated in the generation and transformation of language. Truth sustains and insures the continuation of this capacity. Thus, it is the vital cultivation of human nature.

11

Melvin Maddock, "The Limitations of Language", Time, March 8, 1971, 36-37.

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