Word: pinker
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Pinker focused on the reasons that children make errors as they learn a language...
...Language comes so easily to us, we tend to forget how complex it is," Pinker said. He analyzed in detail the reasons that irregular verbs exist and the differences between English and other languages in an attempt to explain the origins of the "vast expressive power of language...
Ever wonder why we say that a baseball player "flied out to center" instead of "flew out to center"? Pinker explained that the meaning of the word 'fly' has changed as the word changed from a verb to the noun 'fly ball' and then back to a verb. Over that transformation, the suffix for the past tense has also changed...
Using the complexity of the German language to prove his assertions, Pinker argued that both the rules of grammar and the rote memorization of words play essential roles in the development of language...
...Pinker conceded that although change in the English language and the function of words is inevitable, he said that some degenerative transformations "ought to be resisted on aesthetic grounds...