At one point you talked about the change from language acquisition to language development. And I think that's a very significant idea. Language isn'… - Noam Chomsky
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At one point you talked about the change from language acquisition to language development. And I think that's a very significant idea. Language isn't really learned; it just grows in the mind. It's something that develops naturally, automatically [...]. It's almost like learning to walk. You don't learn to walk, it just comes automatically. At a certain point a child stands up, starts moving, figures it, gets to understand how to distribute your weight. Nobody's taught you this, but, a lot of calculation and computation goes into simply walking down the street. You don't know the rules, you couldn't know the rules, maybe some biologist could figure out what they are. But that's not the way you pick up walking.
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About
Noam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky (born 7 December 1928) is an American linguist, analytical philosopher, cognitive scientist, political analyst, human rights activist and anarcho-socialist.
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Wikimedia Commons, Augusto Starita / Ministerio de Cultura de la Nación (CC BY-SA)
We certainly shouldn't trust to deal with <nowiki>[</nowiki>Saddam Hussein<nowiki>]</nowiki> anyone who supported him through his worst crimes, that's insane.
You can find things in the traditional religions which are very benign and decent and wonderful and so on, but I mean, the Bible is probably the most genocidal book in the literary canon. The God of the Bible - not only did He order His chosen people to carry out literal genocide - I mean, wipe out every Amalekite to the last man, woman, child, and, you know, donkey and so on, because hundreds of years ago they got in your way when you were trying to cross the desert - not only did He do things like that, but, after all, the God of the Bible was ready to destroy every living creature on earth because some humans irritated Him. That's the story of Noah. I mean, that's beyond genocide - you don't know how to describe this creature. Somebody offended Him, and He was going to destroy every living being on earth? And then He was talked into allowing two of each species to stay alive - that's supposed to be gentle and wonderful.
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Science is a bit like the joke about the drunk who is looking under a lamppost for a key that he has lost on the other side of the street, because that's where the light is. It has no other choice.
