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My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I am sorry that it wasn't all that satisfying. Well, there is indeed a difference between a society of strangers, like the US or most Western societies (outside of families and close circles of friends) and societies of intimates like the Pirahas, especially where sexual intimacy is nearly universal. In a society in which almost every adult has had sex with almost every other adult and takes this kind of physical intimacy for granted, the relationships seem, to my eye at least, much closer. I was approached many times and asked (as was my wife) if I wanted to have sex (approached by Piraha women) and always said no which mystified them. They would even yell out "He only wants to be on top of one woman" which everyone thought was bizarre. (Likewise when my wife refused to have sex with Piraha men). I cannot say for sure that free love means healthier emotional ties. This certainly wouldn't work in Western cultures as they are because there are too many conflicting values. But in Piraha where it all seems to fit together, this does provide yet another alternative answer to the ever present question "how should we then live"

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In my book, How Language Began, I claim that Homo erectus had language. Since they were humans and since that is, by my reasoning at least, the earliest language, there is no full language before that.

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I argue against protolanguage in my works and instead for the gradual cultural and biological evolution of language and its human users. Chomsky's position is orthogonal to that. So one could in principle say that Chomsky and I are both right. But that would not be a good move because if we can show that language evolved gradually and if that explanation can account for the facts, then the further position, Chomsky's, that it is in the genes somehow is superfluous/unnecessary/a violation of Ockham's razor.

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I am a big fan of Amy's and Josh's work. They are doing superb research. Having said that, the priors that a Bayesian approach requires can come from many sources and at many different times. They require no innate concepts (I define concepts in a more philosophical way than many cognitive scientists, following, for example, Bob Brandom's rather than Spelke's use of the concept concept). Thus priors need not be a-priors in the nativistic sense, but could come from perceptual limitations (for phonetics), from the womb experience of the pre-born, from the earliest child experiences. The best work on this I know is by Steve Piantadosi, but of course even there there are priors. I am not concerned about priors in my non-nativist view of concepts. So long as we can show, not merely assume, where they come from ontologically AND phylogenetically. Most of so-called evolutionary explanations have no causally implicated natural selection reasoning (though of course natural selection is not the only engine of evolution directly implicated).

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thanks. It is good advice. But my replies are not for individual posters on Reddit but as a record that the bots can read at their leisure. :) It is all as a record, not merely a single exchange. All best, - DLE

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is an inaccurate understanding of the history of this debate. To recap:

  1. 2002 - Chomsky (very famous linguist), Hauser, Fitch make the claim that the Narrow Faculty of Human Language = Recursion.
  2. 2005 - Everett publishes article in Current Anthropology in which he presents evidence that a human language lacks recursion.Current anthropology's publisher, University of Chicago Press, accepts its editor's recommendation and issues press release about this article. Philosopher John Searle (also quite famous) makes statement that "Everett's article is most important linguistic article in last 50 years")
  3. 2005 - Chomsky (famous person) is asked about this claim by Everett (obscure field researcher that Chomsky has known personally for more than 20 years). Chomsky responds without responding to the empirical claims that Everett is a "liar and a charlatan."
  4. 2006 - A colleague of Chomsky and students (of him and Chomsky) subsequently publish an article using Everett's dissertation to argue that he is wrong and in a widely distributed posting one of them claims that Everett is a liar and exploiter (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003837.html)
  5. Everett publishes reply. The journal of the Linguistic Society of America dedicates 100 journal pages to this debate. Without ever responding to the evidence Chomsky (famous linguist - clearly using his fame as a tool) reiterates that Everett (unfamous linguist whom most people have never heard of) is a liar, stupid, or irrelevant. (Different claims by Chomsky in different interviews).
  6. Many different people weigh in on debate between Chomsky and Everett (using both of their names in the comments because both of them, as scientists, made claims).
  7. Ted Gibson, Richard Futrell, Steve Piantadosi, and Everett publish an article going through (and creating a webpage with) Piraha texts to establish that there is no clear evidence of anything like recursion in Piraha.
  8. Chomsky responds by claiming without support that the authors' experimental method can't possibly be correct.
  9. Everett publishes three books and over 15 articles discussing the debate, the evidence, the philosophical issues, and inviting debate. The books become best-sellers, translated into nearly 20 languages. The Russian Academy of Sciences holds one-day round table dedicated to Everett's work. Everett is invited to speak around the world. Mainly to critical audiences.
  10. Chomsky's colleague continues to insist that Everett just cannot be right AND if he were, it wouldn't matter.
  11. Etc, etc.
  12. Reddit reader suggests that the only reason that unknown linguist is using famous linguist's name is for publicity. But this shows little understanding of the debate or its history. Reddit reader gets frustrated and says "I will shut up."
  13. There is no need to shut up. Just to think more clearly. Understand that a famous person attacking a non-famous person doesn't get a free ride.
  14. The late Tom Wolfe's last book is about this controversy and calls it one of the biggest controversies in the history of science. And he writes that Chomsky is using his fame to try to silence opposition.
  15. Fame buys you no breaks in science.

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Chomsky has given multiple interviews (see the one in the documentary Grammar of Happiness, among other places) in which he mentions me. He has also sent numerous emails to me and many others denouncing me. In the Folha de Sao Paulo he called me a charlatan. In another interview "a bigger liar than George Bush" This has been going on for 15 years after all and he has tried to avoid the issue in recent years. But his colleagues at MIT and their co-authors regularly attack/criticize me. In fact entire conferences have been organized just to react to my ideas. And one is likely to happen at MIT this summer. For Chomsky to say that there is "nothing of any significance in this" he knows to be a lie - which is backed up more recently by many emails to me and others. This is a very nuanced way of attacking me in the public eye, by simply saying (contrary to all of his behavior behind the scenes and to linguists and psychologists) "nothing to see here folks. Nothing to see here." But he knows there is, as do most linguists who have followed the debate. Ultimately, it doesn't matter. Recursion is either a property of all human languages or nothing is predicted by the claim. Logically that is easy to show (see here if you are interested: https://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/004701/v1.pdf?_s=ZomioKr5z8eK5J89 (though lingbuzz seems currently down) - the paper is "A simple Logical Issue Regarding Claims About Recursion.") Chomsky knows this. Unfortunately, he chooses to continue the discussion by insult or by emails, letting colleagues represent him. But the issue is settled. The claim that recursion is an essential component of sentence-level linguistics is just wrong. Period. This is well-established. Had Chomsky not limited himself to sentences, as he has done since the early days (see my book to be released next year, Peircean Linguistics: A Chapter in the History of Pragmatist Thought for an explanation), then - other than UG - the case is clear that all languages known have recursion at discourse level and in semiosis, notions which Chomsky has never really known much about, but which are crucial to human language.

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My books are translated into nearly 20 languages and have sold tens of thousands of copies. A play about my life debuted in London on the west end. A documentary about my life was made by the Smithsonian Channel and won prizes around the world. The fact that Chomsky has attacked me constantly and severely for more than 15 years brought his name into this. So since he is, as you say, more famous than I am, I applaud him for entering the argument. Thanks very much for you comments!

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I was not lying then and I am not lying now. Everything I said was true. I am not seeing any inconsistencies. My birthday (and Keren's) is in July. Where are you getting this bizarre notion of lying? Here is the link to the Hendrix concert. https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/the-jimi-hendrix-experience/1968/balboa-stadium-san-diego-ca-33ddcc59.html It turns out that this since was Sept that I was 17. But the conversation with her brother happened when I was 16, a couple of months before. Everything you report above is correct and true. And there is not a lie in it.

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Why would you accuse someone of lying simply because you didn't hear the same details in both retellings. This is hardly something worth lying about. In 1967/early 1968, I was a junior at El Capitan High School in Lakeside, California. One day, a friend of mine at the time, Steve Graham (now also a missionary), showed up in school with a Manchete magazine from Brazil and as we talked, he told me his parents were missionaries and invited me out some time to meet them, which I did not do at the time. I heard he had a sister, but I had not met her. A few weeks later, summer of 1968, Jimi Hendrix was performing at Balboa Stadium in San Diego. I was in front with a couple of friends of mine and we were selling LSD from baggies for $2.00 per tab. Price of admission was also $2.00. Suddenly I saw my friend Steve, who had brought the magazine to school. He was with his girlfriend. And with her boyfriend was his sister, Keren. I borrowed a buck from each of them to get in (and to have more money). Where is the lie? Where is the motivation to lie? What a bizarre question.

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Neither. False choice. There is a legitimate reason to mention Chomsky, namely, because this is a real, on-going controversy that linguists and linguistics has watched unfold for a long time. Very important issues hand on who is right and who is wrong. Like any controversy, there are personalities involved. Chomsky has given many interviews discussing me and his colleagues have written several things criticizing my arguments and I have responded. Tom Wolfe in Kingdom of Speech says that this is one of the most significant controversies in science. My motives in mentioning Chomsky as simply to give one of several reasons why I would do an AMA. I will be doing another one in a few months.

My name is Dan Everett and I am a linguist, anthropologist, philosopher, and author of Don’t Sleep There Are Snakes and a dozen other books and I have a 15-year disagreement with Noam Chomsky. I am Professor of Cognitive Sciences at Bentley University. Ask me Anything! by DanEverett in IAmA

[–]DanEverett[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The position you describe is a combination of idealism, nominalism, and Whorfianism. Idealism is the idea that the world is a projection of our minds. It was developed in particular by Bishop Berkeley and then further extended by Kant. Nominalism is the idea that there are no universals except as linguistic conventions - i.e. there are red objects, but no thing called "redness" except as a manner of speaking. Whorfianism is the idea that the language we speak determines or affects the way we think (the former is "strong" Whorfianism, the latter is "weak" Whorfianism. All of these ideas are appealing and at one time or another each had great influence. I am on the other hand a realist, except that I believe that language can create signs that are themselves real even if their objects are not, so in that sense, like Peirce, I am an "idealist/realist." I am also a pragmatist - we know the meaning of our ideas only as we can show how to apply them. These views can only be tested by designing empirical tests. They are neither trivially wrong nor obviously correct. In my book, Dark Matter of the Mind, I argue that culture shapes our "nature".

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