🚀 go-pugleaf

"Peter T. Daniels" <grammatim@verizon.net> wrote in message 
news:1188908467.409393.89540@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
> On Sep 4, 7:38 am, "Glen M. Sizemore" <gmsizemo...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> "Peter T. Daniels" <gramma...@verizon.net> wrote in 
>> messagenews:1188872493.332157.31480@19g2000hsx.googlegroups.com...
>> > On Sep 3, 9:17 pm, Doug Morse <mo...@edoug.org> wrote:
>
>> >> >  The notion of "concept" is generally invoked when the stimuli
>> >> > controlling
>> >> >  behavior
>>
>> > Maybe the single most important contribution of Noam Chomsky to
>> > linguistics happened in 1959 and had little or nothing to do with the
>> > "transformational-generative grammar" he was just beginning to
>> > develop. He showed that behaviorism -- specifically, Skinner's *Verbal
>> > Behavior* -- was unable to explain anything about human language.
>> > Language is _not_ an example of stimulus and response.
>>
>> Chomsky showed nothing of the sort, and Skinner's is not a
>> "stimulus-response" position. Skinner's book remains cogent but only
>> behaviorists read it since Chomsky's "review." BTW, Chomsky never read 
>> the
>> book - ask Searle.
>
> Yeah, Searle is a reliable witness to _anything_ regarding Chomsky.

Even if you think that Searle was lying, it is painfully obvious to anyone 
that has read both VB and Chomsky's "review" that Chomsky was criticizing 
his vision of what some kinds of behaviorism suggested, not what Skinner 
wrote. Perhaps you would be interested in: MacQuorcodale, Kenneth. A reply 
to Chomsky's Review of Skinner's Verbal Behavior, but my guess is that you 
aren't interested in what behaviorists actually say. It is too easy and 
popular to simply misrepresent it. In any event, the paper can be accessed 
through the JEAB website. Just google "jeab."


>
> Name some contributions of behaviorist psychology to the study and
> understanding of language?



Well, you can do your own leg work, but like I said, I'm guessing that you 
are more interested in the simplistic misrepresentations that abound. One 
thing is clear, though, when there are special populations that do not 
"automatically acquire language," it is applied behavior analysts that are 
called in to establish whatever functional repertoire is possible. Further, 
I know of no finding that contradicts Skinner's analysis -certainly nothing 
you could come up with. Some would be orthogonal to it (behavior analysis is 
not about "brain stuff").



Finally, one might ask what proportion of the stuff said to contribute to 
the "understanding of language" is actually junk? I'm sure we would differ 
in our ideas in this regard. There is no question that what is perceived to 
be behavioristic is unpopular but this is largely due, it seems to me, to 
its widespread misrepresentation, and the fact that animism has never truly 
died out.


>