Chapter 2 - Grammatical Foundations: Structure(3) sentence
Kate claimed
Geoff jeopardised the expedition
If it is grammatical for one sentence to contain another, then it follows that the
contained sentence can contain another sentence and indeed that that sentence can
contain another, etc. In fact there should be no limit to how many sentences can be
contained one within the other. That this is so is exemplified by nursery rhymes of the
following kind:
(4) a this is the house [that Jack built]
b this is the malt [that lay in the house [that Jack built]]
c this is the mouse [that ate the malt [that lay in the house [that Jack built]]]
d this is the cat [that chased the mouse [that ate the malt [that lay in the house
[that Jack built]]]]
e etc.
Potentially, this rhyme might go on forever, limited only by the parent’s imagination
and the fact that their children will one day grow up and want to listen to pop music
instead. One might argue that no one could ever produce an infinitely long sentence as
they would forget what they were saying after a relatively short time, and for the same
reason no one would be able to understand it. Furthermore, they would die before they
got to the end of it. Admittedly it would be a fairly pointless thing to do, but that is not
the issue. Facts about people’s imagination, their likes and dislikes, their attention
spans and even their mortality have nothing to do with the language system. This is, as
we have pointed out, a set of rules that enables us to produce and understand the
linguistic expressions that make up an E-language.
Now, if those rules tell us that sentences can contain sentences then it follows that
infinitely long sentences are grammatical regardless of whether or not anyone could
ever produce or understand such a sentence due to external considerations.
Indeed, there would be no point in adding limitations to the grammar to make it fit
with these other limitations. For example, suppose we determined that sentences with
more than 9 other sentences embedded in them go beyond the human mental capacity
to process (it is clear that it would be virtually impossible to come up with a definite
number which was applicable to all humans on all occasions – when I get up in the
morning, for example, my capacity to process sentences seems to be limited to one! –
but for the sake of the argument let us assume this number). Let us pretend,
nonetheless, that the grammar is limited to producing only 9 or less embedded
sentences. This would be an extra complication to the grammatical system as it adds a
limitation to it. Yet the situation would be exactly the same if we did not add the
limitation: humans would still be able to process sentences with 9 or fewer embedded
sentences, because of their mental restrictions, no matter what the grammar was
capable of defining as grammatical. So the extra complication to the grammar would
sentence