J. O'Connor on Chomsky

Michael Pollak mpollak at panix.com
Wed Nov 4 19:20:31 PST 1998



> I've been looking for an account that links Chomsky's radical humanism in
> politics with his universal grammar and other scientific work. I guess that
> the former has something to do with the latter. Anyone know any discussion
> of this.
> Jim O'Connor

I read an interview with him 20 years ago where the interviewer asked him exactly that question. And he answered, Nothing. This was back in the days when semiotics and Levi-Strauss-flavored thinking was big, and everyone seemed to think that our innate language skills were connected to the rest of our social world. But he said, Nope, as far as he could see, there was no connection at all -- maybe someday in the future someone might find one, but as far as he was concerned, they hadn't yet.

Michael

__________________________________________________________________________ Michael Pollak................New York City..............mpollak at panix.com



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