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Anti-Empire

offsite link North Korea Increases Aid to Russia, Mos... Tue Nov 19, 2024 12:29 | Marko Marjanovi?

offsite link Trump Assembles a War Cabinet Sat Nov 16, 2024 10:29 | Marko Marjanovi?

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Human Rights in Ireland
Indymedia Ireland is a volunteer-run non-commercial open publishing website for local and international news, opinion & analysis, press releases and events. Its main objective is to enable the public to participate in reporting and analysis of the news and other important events and aspects of our daily lives and thereby give a voice to people.

offsite link Top Scientists Confirm Covid Shots Cause Heart Attacks in Children Sun Oct 05, 2025 21:31 | imc

offsite link Fraud and mismanagement at University College Cork Thu Aug 28, 2025 19:30 | Calli Morganite

offsite link Deliberate Design Flaw In ChatGPT-5 Sun Aug 17, 2025 09:04 | Mind Agent

offsite link AI Reach: Gemini Reasoning Question of God Sat Aug 02, 2025 21:00 | Mind Agent

offsite link Israeli Human Rights Group B'Tselem finally Admits It is Genocide releasing Our Genocide report Sat Aug 02, 2025 00:54 | 1 of indy

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Lockdown Skeptics

The Daily Sceptic

offsite link Milei Wins Landslide in Argentina, Confounding Doubters of State-Shrinking Agenda Mon Oct 27, 2025 11:11 | Will Jones
Argentine President Javier Milei?s party has won a landslide in midterm elections, with voters confounding doubters by backing his cost-slashing, state-shrinking agenda and?deregulation of the economy.
The post Milei Wins Landslide in Argentina, Confounding Doubters of State-Shrinking Agenda appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Shock New Report Lays Out the Full Scale of Environmental Damage Caused by Onshore Wind Turbines Mon Oct 27, 2025 09:00 | Chris Morrison
New evidence exposes wind turbines as bat-chomping crucifixes wreaking havoc on birds, bugs and entire ecosystems, says Chris Morrison ? hidden carnage Net Zero zealots would rather ignore.
The post Shock New Report Lays Out the Full Scale of Environmental Damage Caused by Onshore Wind Turbines appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Heard About the US Democrat Who Hopes For Someone to Shoot Dead His Opponents? Children? No? That?s ... Mon Oct 27, 2025 07:00 | Steven Tucker
A Democrat candidate jokes about shooting his rivals' kids ? and the press look the other way. Steven Tucker exposes the jaw?dropping hypocrisy of the mainstream media.
The post Heard About the US Democrat Who Hopes For Someone to Shoot Dead His Opponents? Children? No? That?s Because the Media Don?t WANT You to Know About Him appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link News Round-Up Mon Oct 27, 2025 01:16 | Richard Eldred
A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the ?climate emergency?, public health ?crises? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Top Therapist ?Ousted? After Trans Activist Row Sun Oct 26, 2025 19:42 | Richard Eldred
The leader of one of Britain's largest therapy groups has faced death threats after raising concerns about the safety of treatment for gender-questioning children.
The post Top Therapist ?Ousted? After Trans Activist Row appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Lockdown Skeptics >>

Voltaire Network
Voltaire, international edition

offsite link Will intergovernmental institutions withstand the end of the "American Empire"?,... Sat Apr 05, 2025 07:15 | en

offsite link Voltaire, International Newsletter N?127 Sat Apr 05, 2025 06:38 | en

offsite link Disintegration of Western democracy begins in France Sat Apr 05, 2025 06:00 | en

offsite link Voltaire, International Newsletter N?126 Fri Mar 28, 2025 11:39 | en

offsite link The International Conference on Combating Anti-Semitism by Amichai Chikli and Na... Fri Mar 28, 2025 11:31 | en

Voltaire Network >>

Noam Chomsky on Language Reassessed

category international | education | other press author Sunday February 07, 2010 19:08author by John Cornford Report this post to the editors

Chris Knight examines Noam Chomsky’s ‘scientific’ fairy tales about language and its origins

Prof Chris Knight of the Radical Anthropology Group really sticks the boot into Chomsky. He weighs Chomskys credentials in the balance and finds then wanting. Full text at link.

Chomsky was about to deliver a lecture in Delhi. Setting aside the usual niceties, his host - a certain professor Agnihotri of Delhi University - introduced the visiting speaker with a challenge. He was bewildered that a person “so deeply touched by human suffering” could ignore the roots of both happiness and suffering in his scientific work. Noam Chomsky, continued the professor, insisted on viewing language as a “purely biological cognitive system” unconnected with “sociological power-games”. But isn’t language a key tool used by the powerful to deceive, exploit and oppress? How can Chomsky turn a blind eye to such things in his linguistic research?[8]

Many in that Delhi audience still seemed puzzled. Why was Chomsky so ambivalent? Was he, perhaps, holding something back? His two temptations seemed to pull him in opposite directions. He would invoke Rousseau, Marx and other great revolutionary thinkers as sources of political inspiration. Yet would any of these figures have shared his difficulties in connecting politics with science? Rousseau’s 1762 treatise, The social contract, was both scholarly and incendiary. Marx intended his Capital to change the world. Is science itself not revolutionary? Why should the pursuit of truth - scientific truth about language, for example - require different methods or pull in a different direction from the pursuit of social equality and justice?

Related Link: http://www.cpgb.org.uk/article.php?article_id=1002551
author by GrammertonClericpublication date Mon Feb 08, 2010 07:02author address author phone Report this post to the editors

The powers that be use Fallacies, cheap rhetoric and emotive language to persuade. These aspects of particular USES of language are well known. Noam chomsky studied the theory of language itself at a more fundamental level. They are not quite the same thing.

This is just an excuse to have a cheap go at a distinguished but elderly man who in his time has contributed a great amount to science and to furthering our awareness of the misuse of political power. He was and still is a man of principle.

He deserves much better than this. Kudos Noam!

author by pat cpublication date Mon Feb 08, 2010 12:42author address author phone Report this post to the editors

I have not formed an opinion on this article but I admire Chomsky for his political activities. Just as I admire Chris Knight who is also a great class struggle activist. Chris lost his job due to his activities during the G20 Summit in London last year.

More info about Chris at: http://www.chrisknight.co.uk/

Chris in Tophat
Chris in Tophat

Related Link: http://www.chrisknight.co.uk/
author by Mark C - Nonepublication date Mon Feb 08, 2010 13:44author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Let's also not forget Chomsky's great essay/talk on 'Language and Freedom' available in Chomsky on Anarchism or at the link below.

A PDF of the talk (with an introduction to it) is available here:
http://www.chomsky.info/books/state02.pdf

A audio of a related talk is available here:
http://www.almanews.unibo.it/04_05/chomeibl/video/chmsk...1.ram

Related Link: http://www.chomsky.info/index.htm
author by Celia Spublication date Mon Feb 08, 2010 19:03author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Great article. Chomsky is an enigma all right. Is his LAD theory not a case of 'biology making the argument for anarchism' i.e., without the imposition of society/the state/institutions etc., the human being would flourish - language is not learned, it is innate and we are all born with the full 'code' for perfect, and 'natural', language production - it is 'society' that imposes upon/restricts overall 'free' human development, and explains 'Orwell's Problem'. An asocial explanation too far methinks.

I am surprised that the article makes no reference to Engels' "The Part played by Labour in the Transition from Ape to Man" by way of explaining the role of social relations in the development/evolution of humankind and (by necessary extension), language.

Related Link: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1876/part-played-labour/index.htm
author by pat cpublication date Mon Feb 08, 2010 19:29author address author phone Report this post to the editors

In other writings by Chris Knight he certainly references Engels on Ape to Man. You can find more articles here: http://www.radicalanthropologygroup.org/new/RAG_Home.html

Many of Chris Knights articles and books are available online at:
http://www.chrisknight.co.uk/publications/

author by Pissing contestpublication date Tue Feb 09, 2010 12:50author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Is how humble he is and how he doesn't always try to engage in these pissing contests to show how great he is. He's always willing to entertain criticism. Thats special for an academic of his standing. Sorry to see that it's not such a common trait. Not even on indy comments sections.

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