Thread:User talk:WaitingforGodot/Pinker v. Chomsky/reply (3)

I think the problem with these theories is that they are defining "language" as purely verbal. It may be that symbolic manipulation co-evolved with verbal language. If you look at the neuroscience of certain languages, they are less verbal or less "language-y" than we would normally consider language. ASL and Mandarin Chinese, for example, show more processing in the right hemisphere. Patterns of activation in ASL look more like spatial processing mixed with patterns more common in, say, the Romance languages. Mandarin is slightly more "musical" because the pitch of certain words will determine their definitions. I'm speculating here, but it could be that UG is essentially correct, but modified or mediated by the use of visual or pitch-related cues. Some form of UG, though is widely accepted, though the details are disputed, as the entry in the MIT encyclopedia notes.