what does 'independent' mean

[Elizabeth Bates]

I think Greg Thomson's proposal is quite plausible, and when I say
"no one is denying that grammars exist" I mean that in the sense
that he proposes, i.e. that the child has developed a skill that
correct maps between form and meaning.  And that knowledge may not
look even REMOTELY like the grammars proposed in many formal linguistic
theories.  We all agree that grammar (in the sense of structural
facts) is a reality, but we are free to differ markedly in our
characterization of the form that knowledge takes in a real live child.
-liz bates