Russian word for "cognate"

[Ernest Scatton]

Prof. Scatton raises a good point, but perhaps ignores a crucial point
(he will forgive me when he hears me out, I trust):

Chomsky is NOTORIOUS for failing to define anything in his writings.
I am attending a graduate seminar in syntax and trying to understand his
(lower case _h_ in _his_, for now) and people who have followed his work
seriously all seem to agree that he never defines anything.  If he refers
to his own previous work, then he slips in comments like _the natural
assumption_.  Thus, he not only fails to define things, but he implies
(in the quote Scatton provided below) that things should be.  Moreover,
Chomsky implies that stuff he's written before ARE natural, without having
defined them himself.

A disclaimer:  I am NOT someone making potshots at Chomsky just because
his theory is incomprehensible or even disagreeable to me.  I would
rather such people NOT add their tuppence's worth at this point.  I do,
however, think that those who work within a system should remain fully
sceptical of the things that this guy tries to say.  Nor do I imply that
Prof. Scatton is making a potshot in any way; it's a valid observation.

--Loren Billings (billings at princeton.edu)
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
Regarding words in linguistics with rather different meanings:

I suppose "language" is one as wellHere is something from Noam
Chomsky, Modular Approaches to the Study of the Mind, which struck
me as interesting in this regard: "In fact it [language, e.s.]
is not one of the things in the real world; that is, it isn't a thing
out there. Whatever it is, it's some sort of complex derived notion,
maybe no notion: In fact, it doesn't seem to be a linguistic notion,
at least not linguistically definable." (p. 26)

Ernie Scatton