untermensche
Contributor
All human languages have to comply with this constraint of a linear delivery.
Yes I have said this several times. But only in communication. Not in thought.
It is not necessary to think linearly. You don't have to think in complete sentences. You can think with a word here and a picture there and a memory there. Think of several things at the same time. Thinking is not necessarily a linear operation. Although a person can think linearly, think in complete sentences if they choose. It is not necessary and a waste of time however.
But when language is communicated it must be communicated in a linear fashion.
But Chomsky contends the language capacity works hierarchically and communication occurs in a linear manner based off the hierarchy. And there are a few ways of arranging the same hierarchical array into a linear array. So the variations seen in the linear order of two different languages do not exist when looking at the languages hierarchically.
human thought is also structured
It does not have to be. Thoughts can whirl around and contain many elements that are not language.
This is creative thought as opposed to thought reduced to communication. The key word being "reduced".
All birds broadly share the same mental capacity.
Source?
We already have a thinking capability.
I have said this several times.
Chomsky sees the language capacity as a thinking capacity that was able to be used for language. He proposes that humans were just using sound for communication, not language, prior to this capacity. Like the way dogs use sound for communication.
The thinking capacity was also the capacity that allowed the creation and understanding of mathematics.
It is called the language capacity when it is the service of either producing or understanding human language.
Also, vision is a perception. Language is not.
Please!
I never came close to saying they were the same exact capacity. Only that you need a capacity to have vision and you need a capacity to have language.
No, gorillas and chimps don't have our mental capability by a long shot.
Again, source?
They lack language. They have memory and the ability to manipulate objects. The ability to recognize themselves.
They have communication with sound and gesture.
But they do not have a language capacity.
How would you behave if you never had any exposure to a language?