Mechanisms of Cognitive Development: Domain-General Learning or Domain-Specific Constraints?

many abstract categories (e.g., ``equivalence'') is innate. Although Plato argued with his contemporaries who advocated the empirical basis of knowledge, it was the British empiricists who most forcefully put forth the idea of the empirical basis of knowledge, with John Locke offering the famous ``tabula rasa'' argument. The first comprehensive psychological treatment of the problem of knowledge acquisition was offered by Piaget (1954), who suggested that knowledge emerges as a result of interactions between individuals and their environments. This was a radical departure from both extreme nativism and extreme empiricism. However, these ideas, as well those of empiricist-minded behaviorists, fell short of providing a viable account of many human abilities, most notably, language acquisition. This inability prompted Chomsky to propose an argument that language cannot be acquired from the available linguistic input because it does not contain enough information to ena...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2010
• Where: COGSCI
• Authors: Vladimir Sloutsky
• Keywords: COGSCI 2010, Comprehensive Psychological Treatment, Empirical Basis, Linguistic Input