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Dis-integrating Perspectives of Language Acquisition

A Response to Eubank and Gregg

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2008

Bob Jacobs
Bob Jacobs
Affiliation:
The Colorado College
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Abstract

I wish to warn young men against the invincible attraction of theories which simplify and unify seductively. Ruled by the [reticularist] theory, we who were active in histology then saw networks everywhere [italics added].… This [reticularist theory] was admirably convenient, since it did away with all need for the analytical effort involved in determining in each case the course through the gray matter followed by the nervous impulse. It has rightly been said that the reticular hypothesis, by dint of pretending to explain everything easily and simply, explains absolutely nothing; and, what is more serious, it hinders and almost makes superfluous future inquiries regarding the intimate organization of the centers [italics added]. (Ramóny Cajal, 1989, pp. 303–337)

Type
Responses
Information
Studies in Second Language Acquisition , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , March 1995 , pp. 65 - 71
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

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References

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