Plato's Problem - Contemporary Parallels - Linguistics - Universal Grammar

Universal Grammar

There are several concepts important to the Chomskyan (or generativist) approach to linguistics. The most fundamental of these ideas is the theory of universal grammar (UG). Simply put, and as implied by the name, UG refers to those grammatical properties thought to be shared by all (to be universal to all) derivations of human language (anything from Amharic to Zhuang).
Per this conceptualization, UG is innate to all humans – people come "pre-wired" with this universal grammatical structure. A person's individual grammar (that which is unique to the person) develops from the interaction between the innate universal grammar and input from the environment, or primary linguistic data. This "analytic triplet" (McGilvray, ed., 2005, p. 51), UG + input = grammar, is the functional core of the theory.
'Language acquisition
Several questions (or problems) motivate linguistic theorizing and investigation. Two such taken up in Chomskyan linguistics are the process of language acquisition in children, and "Plato's Problem". These subjects are interrelated and viewed as evidence in support of the theory of UG.
One of the simplest ways to approach the concept of universal grammar is to pose a hypothetical question about an aspect of language acquisition in children – why does a child learn the language that it does. As a specific example, how can a child of Asian descent (say, born of Chinese parents) be set down in the middle of Topeka, Kansas and acquire "perfect English?" The answer is that the child does not start with "Chinese", or any other conventionally defined language, in its head. The child does start with general grammatical rules that determine linguistic properties.
Children come equipped with universal grammar, from which any natural human language will develop – without instruction. All that is needed is passive input during the critical period—defined in linguistics as that period within which a child must have necessary and sufficient exposure to human language so that language acquisition occurs; without sufficient exposure to primary linguistic data, the UG does not have the necessary input for development of an individual grammar; this period is commonly recognized as spanning from birth to adolescence, generally up to 12-years-old, though individual variations are possible. If what the child predominantly hears (or sees via sign) as it is maturing through this critical period is the English spoken in Topeka, Kansas, then that is what the child will acquire. This is why, regardless of a child's ethnic/racial background (or any other non-relevant factor, the child will know Cockney English, Egyptian Arabic, or isiZulu if the child's primary linguistic input is Cockney English, Egyptian Arabic, or isiZulu, respectively.
The hypothetical question posed addresses a common misconception about what is instantiated in the mind/brain of an individual when it comes to language. It does not address the "logical problem" of language acquisition, i.e., how children transition from ostensibly having no knowledge of language to having full knowledge, in what may be described as a very limited time with apparently limited input.
Plato's problem
To address the issue of apparently limited input, one must turn to what is possibly the most quoted of all arguments in support of universal grammar and its nativist interpretation – Plato's Problem. The phrase refers to the Socratic dialogue, the Meno; Noam Chomsky is often attributed with coining the term. Plato's Problem particularly refers to a point in the dialogue when Socrates is talking with an uneducated servant and shows, through this interaction, that the servant knows the Pythagorean Theorem though he has never been explicitly taught any geometry. How does the servant know without having ever been taught? Plato's suggestion is, essentially, that people have innate knowledge.
In the field of linguistics, Plato's Problem is the problem of finding an explanation for how a child acquires language though the child does not receive explicit instruction and the primary linguistic data a child does receive is limited. This PLD is the input, or stimuli, from the environment, necessary for the development of an individual's grammar – language – via input into UG. This limited environmental stimulus is referred to as poverty of the stimulus. Specifically, the stimuli to which children are exposed during the critical period do not encompass every lawful example of grammatical structure relevant to the particular language.
For instance, consider that a child might hear the following examples:
Who do you think that Jack will kiss first? Who do you think Jack will kiss first?
From this, the child might determine that the word that is optional and from this analogize to the following examples:
Who do you think will kiss Jill first? *Who do you think that will kiss Jill first?
Clearly, the second example is not a grammatically well-formed sentence in English. A child knows this and does not form sentences such as the one marked by the asterisk. How does the child know, without being explicitly taught, that the ungrammatical example is, in fact, ungrammatical? From the linguistic perspective being described here, the answer to this question is that such knowledge pre-exists as part of UG.
Plato's Problem describes the disparity between input (poverty of the stimulus) and output (grammar). As Plato suggests in the Meno dialogue, the bridge between input (whether limited or lacking) and output is innate knowledge. Poverty of the stimulus is crucial to the Platonic argument and it is a linchpin concept in Chomskyan linguistics. For this reason, Plato's Problem is often used synonymously to mean poverty of the stimulus. Specific to linguistics, the formulation of this problem is evidence for the existence of universal grammar. Plato's Problem, as conceived here, informs much of the theory in this branch of linguistics.

Read more about this topic:  Plato's Problem, Contemporary Parallels, Linguistics

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