In On Nature and Language Noam Chomsky develops his thinking on the relation between language, mind and brain, integrating current research in linguistics into the burgeoning field of neuroscience. This 2002 volume begins with a lucid introduction by the editors Adriana Belletti and Luigi Rizzi. This is followed by some of Chomsky's writings on these themes, together with a penetrating interview in which Chomsky provides the clearest and most elegant introduction to current theory available. It should make his Minimalist Program accessible to all. The volume concludes with an essay on the role of intellectuals in society and government. Nature and Language is a significant landmark in the development of linguistic theory. It will be welcomed by students and researchers in theoretical linguistics, neurolinguistics, cognitive science and politics, as well as anyone interested in the development of Chomsky's thought.

" Noam Chomsky's work in linguistics has revolutionized our understanding of language. In these remarkable, nontechnical Reflections, Chomsky considers the point and purpose of studying language and explores some of the more general intellectual implications that result from the study of linguistics. The questions he considers are the classical ones. From Plato to the present time, philosophers have been baffled and intrigued by how human beings, with their limited and personal experience, achieve such rich systems of knowledge, beliefs, and values-- systems that guide their actions and their interpretations of experience. In answer to this fundamental question, Chomsky argues that the growth of language is analogous to the development of a bodily organ and is in large measure predetermined by genetic factors. Throughout these Reflections, Chomsky offers incisive analyses of the controversies raging today among psychologists, philosophers, and linguists over the acquisition of cognitive structures, the way language interacts with other mental organs, and the way cognitive structures enter into and guide human activity. He explores the social and intellectual factors that have led to the dominance of certain ways of thinking, and asks why the study of mind and behavior has so often followed a path remote from the general approach of the natural sciences. In examining some of the implications of recent work, her suggests that the conception of man as totally malleable not only is false but also serves naturally as a support for reactionary social doctrines."-- Publisher.

As Norbert Hornstein writes in his foreword, "it underestimates Chomsky's impact in linguistics, philosophy, and psychology to describe it as immense." In Rules and Representations , Noam Chomsky lays out many of the concepts that have made his approach to linguistics and human cognition so instrumental to our understanding of language. In this influential and controversial work Chomsky draws on philosophy, biology, and the study of the mind to consider the nature of human cognitive capacities, particularly as they are expressed in language. He arrives at his well-known position that there is a universal grammar, genetically determined, structured in the human mind, and common to all human languages. Aside from his examination of the various principles of the universal grammar--its "rules and representations"--Chomsky considers the biological basis of language capabilities and the possibility of studying mental structures and capacities in the manner of the natural sciences. Finally, he also explores whether there may be similar "grammars" of perception, art, human nature, scientific reasoning, and the unconscious. Based on Chomsky's lively 1978 Woodbridge Lectures, this edition, first published in 1980, contains revised versions of the original lectures and two new essays. It also includes an extensive foreword by Norbert Hornstein, discussing Chomsky's ideas and their wide-ranging impact.