The New ZBB Quote Thread

[Raphael]

What's this thing with Anglophones always talking about getting high during dentistry? I never got a stronger reaction than my mouth turning numb from anything I got at the dentist's.

I'm an anglophone and I don't get it either.

It must be the interdentals in English. Rare cross-linguistically, so they must provide some advantage to those that do use them…

[WeepingElf]

I'm not sure that Musk now being a trillionaire actually means that he can to go into a widget shop and buy a trillion widgets at $1 each, even assuming he already has the space to store them.

[bradrn]

I’ve been informed that the torch has been thrown to the sharks. (Well, shark singular.)

[Raphael]

Manager = person
Coach = vehicle

Football coach.



JAL

[Imralu]

Football coach.

Beat me to it! I was coming here to post that.

[bradrn]

A wonderfully withering assessment:

Not interested in reading Chomsky. He's made a professional career out of spending more than half a century talking nonsense about linguistics, while, at the same time, becoming more famous among the general public for his hobby of talking nonsense about politics.

[rotting bones]

A wonderfully withering assessment:

Not interested in reading Chomsky. He's made a professional career out of spending more than half a century talking nonsense about linguistics, while, at the same time, becoming more famous among the general public for his hobby of talking nonsense about politics.

As for the linguistics side, the theory of algorithms is based on Chomsky's work.

[Raphael]

Chomsky's main contribution to linguistics seems to have been the whole language organ thing, which is neurologically and genetically extremely implausible.

[Travis B.]

Chomsky's main contribution to linguistics seems to have been the whole language organ thing, which is neurologically and genetically extremely implausible.

However, behaviorism, which preceded Chomsky's theories, is even less plausible.

[rotting bones]

There is no theoretical computer science without Chomsky.

[Raphael]

OK, I'll grant that some of his smaller ideas about linguistics seem to have been good. The language organ is still BS, though.

[zompist]

the whole language organ thing, which is neurologically and genetically extremely implausible.

This part is true. But this:

Chomsky's main contribution to linguistics seems to have been the whole language organ thing

is nonsense.

Yes, he was big on the language organ. It's completely irrelevant to his actual linguistic theories.

Maybe I should say true-ish. A "language organ" is not a bad supposition at all, and there is evidence to support it: e.g. the wide variety of complex innate behaviors seen in the animal kingdom, the fact that babies universally pay attention to and imitate speech, and the fact that people with linguistic defects due to brain damage cannot simply replace it with general cognitive function.

However, it's just a supposition, and has to compete with the idea that our brains are good enough to acquire complex skills without dedicated brain organs. Reading or playing the violin, for instance.

There is zero evidence that the language organ supports Chomsky's linguistic theories in particular. Nor do they need any support in that direction.

[rotting bones]

I don't know much about linguistics. I don't want to be forceful in fields I'm ignorant of. My understanding is that Chomsky introduced many of the tools used for analyzing language. Scientists often have pet theories that don't pan out. It's the tools they introduce in the service of those theories that constitute their lasting contribution. For example, Newton believed in an absolute System of the World in the mind of God. Even though relativity is a better characterization of physical facts, the tools Newton introduced are still fundamental to the field.

Edit: And Newton thought his God is a heretical, non-trinitarian Christian God.

[Raphael]

the whole language organ thing, which is neurologically and genetically extremely implausible.

This part is true. But this:

Chomsky's main contribution to linguistics seems to have been the whole language organ thing

is nonsense.

Yes, he was big on the language organ. It's completely irrelevant to his actual linguistic theories.

Maybe I should say true-ish. A "language organ" is not a bad supposition at all, and there is evidence to support it: e.g. the wide variety of complex innate behaviors seen in the animal kingdom, the fact that babies universally pay attention to and imitate speech, and the fact that people with linguistic defects due to brain damage cannot simply replace it with general cognitive function.

However, it's just a supposition, and has to compete with the idea that our brains are good enough to acquire complex skills without dedicated brain organs. Reading or playing the violin, for instance.

There is zero evidence that the language organ supports Chomsky's linguistic theories in particular. Nor do they need any support in that direction.

OK, re: Chomky's general theories on linguistics, I stand corrected. I still think the idea that every possible version of every single grammatical rule is hard-coded into the human brain doesn't make sense, though.

[WeepingElf]

"Summer Solstice" and "FIlm Noir" are a reference to global warming and the impending heatwave, "Labour Party" is something to do with celebrating work, I think, or celebrating by working.

[Raphael]

In college I was given to using Arabic letters for variables at times.

But did anyone understand you?

No one ever complained.

[bradrn]

for instance, the feminine adjectives mutated because feminine nuns once ended in a vowel

Obviously a typo for feminine nouns, but I found this too funny not to preserve…

[WeepingElf]

for instance, the feminine adjectives mutated because feminine nuns once ended in a vowel

Obviously a typo for feminine nouns, but I found this too funny not to preserve…

No, not a typo. The mutation happened on the adjective following the noun.

[bradrn]

for instance, the feminine adjectives mutated because feminine nuns once ended in a vowel

Obviously a typo for feminine nouns, but I found this too funny not to preserve…

No, not a typo. The mutation happened on the adjective following the noun.

The typo is ‘nuns’ for ‘nouns’.

[Raphael]

"The feminine nuns have mutated! And they're heating up the planet!"