Thinking Sentences

Language of Thought

BRENT SILBY
Unlimited (UPT)
Language of thought theorists claim that mind operates according
to rules concerning manipulation of symbols

They think mind is a digital processor running on parallel neural

structure of brain. Much like a computer.

Two different types of Language of Thought Theory

1 Language of thought is built in to brain: mentalese

(see work by Jerry Fodor and Steven Pinker)

2 Language of thought is natural language (e.g. English)

(see Sapir, Whorf, and Wittgenstein)
According to the second view, our thoughts are constructed from
natural language sentences

...thought may be no more conceivable, in its genesis and daily practice,

without speech than is mathematical reasoning practicable without the
lever of an appropriate mathematical symbolism (Sapir 1921: pg 14).

Strong claim. Not only are our thoughts dependent upon

natural language sentences; our thoughts actually are natural
language sentences.

Seems plausible as it certainly seems as if our thoughts are in

natural language. Our inner voice always talks in our native
language.
Of course, seeming like something is the case does not show that
it is the case.

Pinker argues that our thoughts are independent from natural

language. He suggests that people born deaf can obviously think.
He also claims that animals have thought processes despite lack
of natural language.

In this course I will argue that Pinker is wrong. I’ll show that we
must draw a line between linguistic and non linguistic creatures.

I will show that language users employ a different type of thought

process to non linguistic creatures.
My argument for this course goes like this:

1. Human thinking exhibits productivity and systematicity

2. Productive and systematic thoughts require syntactic structure
3. The required syntactic structure can be explained by either mentalese or
natural language
4. We should favour economy in our ontology (this is to say: we should avoid
positing the existence of something that we cannot locate in the empirical
world if the phenomenon in question can be explained by something that we
can locate in the empirical world).

5. We cannot locate mentalese or the brain mechanism responsible for

mentalese
6. We can locate natural language and there is good evidence to support its
role in thinking
7. Therefore, natural language should be used to explain the syntactic
manipulation required for producing productive and systematic thinking
8. Therefore, our thoughts should be explained by our use of natural language
I am not claiming that animals and prelinguistic humans do not
think. I am attempting to account for fully developed human
thought, which is more flexible than thoughts of animals.

My claim is that language restructures the mind giving humans

a new way of thinking.
So, what exactly is the differences between the two theories.

The traditional “Language of Thought Hypothesis”

Put forward by Jerry Fodor in 1975

When a person thinks “grass is green”, this is represented in

mind by a sentence, but not English or Japanese. It is represented
in an innate language of thought (mentalese).

We are born with mentalese, but we are not aware of it.

But just like English, mentalese is structured according to rules

of syntax, which determine how sentences are formed to give
semantic (meaningful) content.
Mentalese is like the machine language of a computer.

Input is converted into strings of symbols to be operated upon by

brain processes. My thought “grass is green” is written in my
brain as a mentalese sentence.

Importantly, the symbols that make “grass is green” are like words
in English…their meanings are constant.

Hard to find mentalese in brain…not like the on/off switches in

a CPU. But Fodor says

There must be mental symbols because ... only symbols have syntax,
and ... the only available theory of mental processes ... needs the picture
of the mind as a syntax-driven machine (Fodor 1990a: pg 23).
Explaining the mind through symbol manipulation can show us
how reasoning takes place.

Mental symbols are latched on to mechanisms (rules) that move

them and lock them in to new locations, giving rise to new
mental sentences.
Mentalese sentences must be structured according to rules…
syntactic structure

This structure determines how words are strung together.

We can see the importance of syntax by looking at the English

sentence:
“The tree was tall and green”

This is correctly structured, while the sentence:

“Tall and tree the was green” is not.
As well as syntax, sentences need to be semantic. They need to
be meaningful.

Consider these two sentences:

The tree was tall and green.

And…

The noise was tall and green.

Same structure (syntax), but one is meaningless.

Sentences get meaning from words and the syntax used to string
words together.
Consider these two sentences:

Romeo loves both Juliet and his pet dog

And…

Juliet loves both Romeo and his pet dog

Same words, but different meaning because of the way the words
have been combined.
This is an important point, which Fodor calls the systematicity
of language.

In general, if I can understand the sentence a loves b, I will be able

to understand the sentence b loves a. Both sentences are meaningful
even though their parts have been systematically rearranged.
Language is also productive

We can create new sentence with different meanings by simply

applying a syntactic rule and another word to an existing sentence.

In fact, with a finite set of syntactic rules and finite words I could
generate an infinite number of sentences. For example.

Romeo loves both Juliet and his pet dog

I think that Romeo loves both Juliet and his pet dog
John knows that I think that Romeo loves both Juliet and his pet dog
Nobody cares that John knows that I think that Romeo loves both Juliet
and his pet dog

We could continue this forever…

What’s the point?

If Language of Thought hypothesis is correct, it will explain the diversity

of human thought, and our capacity to create new thoughts.

We can correctly claim that sentential representation is more versatile

than rival systems of representation

To clarify this point, consider a different representational system

containing only picture such as road signs.

One sign may contain a picture of a car sliding across the road. It
carries the meaning: WARNING! ICE ON ROAD.

Another sign contains a picture of two children, which means:

BE AWARE! CHILDREN CROSS HERE
With no syntactic rules it is impossible to combine these two signs to
carry the meaning:
CHILDREN CROSS ON ICE, or

BE AWARE! ICE ON CHILDREN

A mind containing a “road sign” system would not exhibit the

productivity and systematicity of thought that our minds exhibit. Such a
mind would be rigid and inflexible.
Language of thought also lets us see how thought evolves through
reasoning.

For example:
If black holes exist, then Roger Penrose was correct.
Black holes exist.
Therefore: Roger Penrose was correct.

Many of our thoughts evolve like this, just like in a computer.

The symbols are operated upon by a rule called Modus Ponens

If P, then Q
P
Therefore Q

You can substitute symbols for P and Q

First part of the job is done:
We can see that the Language of Thought is plausible.

Next time, we will look at some problems with the idea that Language of
Thought operates behind the scenes and is innate.

Then we will work towards the idea that natural language can do all the
work of mentalese.
Powerpoint by BRENT SILBY

Produced at UPT
Christchurch, New Zealand
www.unlimited.school.nz