Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!fluke!ssc-vax!bcsaic!rwojcik From: rwojcik@bcsaic.UUCP (Rick Wojcik) Newsgroups: comp.ai Subject: Re: How fast can one learn a language? (Re: IQ is not static ...) Message-ID: <14061@bcsaic.UUCP> Date: 15 Aug 89 20:30:14 GMT References: <3549@csd4.milw.wisc.edu> <4431@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> <3558@csd4.milw.wisc.edu> <504@dcdwest.UUCP> <3612@csd4.milw.wisc.edu> <485@edai.ed.ac.uk> <3800@csd4.milw.wisc.edu> Reply-To: rwojcik@bcsaic.UUCP (Rick Wojcik) Organization: Boeing Computer Services AI Center, Seattle Lines: 26 In article <3800@csd4.milw.wisc.edu> markh@csd4.milw.wisc.edu (Mark William Hopkins) writes: > What, indeed, are our limits? Well this is a question that has come to >mind a couple days ago. With the right material and right kind of training: > How fast can a human being master the basic essentials of a human >language? There is a vast difference between learning a human language and mastering a body of knowledge. First of all, when can you say that a language has been 'learned?' When you can use it? For what purposes? Asking directions? Discussing nuclear physics? Secondly, by bringing the subject up in connection with IQ, you imply that language learning has something to do with intelligence. But, except in cases of obvious brain damage, all human beings acquire a language. All humans suffer decreasing ability to acquire a new language with age (with a phonological threshold at puberty and a syntactic threshold in the late teens. By 'threshold' I refer to a dramatic change in the capacity to assimilate a new language.) There is no evidence that speed of acquisition correlates with overall intelligence. In fact, very poor language learners can be highly intelligent people. (Do I hear sighs of relief out there in netland? :-) -- Rick Wojcik csnet: rwojcik@atc.boeing.com uucp: uw-beaver!bcsaic!rwojcik