Reid’s analysis of the origin and subsequent developments of language are given in his An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense. There he presents an argument for the naturalness or innateness of language. I attempt to elucidate some of the notions Reid employs in connection with his argument. After presenting Reid’s argument for the naturalness of language I turn to the views of Harre and Robinson. These authors argue that Reid’s notion of a natural language is non-linguistic. I argue that according to Reid a natural language is linguistic. Hence, Reid maintains that humans are in possession of an innate language. Although the present paper ends by dismissing the Harre-Robinson thesis it is my hope that with it out of the way connections will be made between Reid’s theory of language and contemporary theories of language that also rely on an innateness hypothesis.

Reid’s Argument for the Innateness of Language

The conclusion that Reid hopes to establish is that language is not "an invention of men." He seeks to show that "…there must be a natural language before any artificial language can be invented" (Inq. IV.ii). By natural language Reid clearly means a language possessed by all humans, a universal language of sorts, with all the properties necessary for the development of artificial language. By artificial language Reid simply means what we refer to as natural languages; that is, spoken languages such as English, French and German. The essential feature of an artificial language, as with artificial signs, is that they "…have no meaning, but what is affixed to them by compact or agreement among those who use them…" (ibid.). The essential feature of natural language is that it has "…previous to all compact or agreement, a meaning which every man understands by the principles of his nature" (ibid.). Thus, communication via language comes in two forms. First, we may communicate our thoughts by natural signs and second we may communicate our thoughts by artificial signs.

An important feature of both natural and artificial signs is that both have meaning or more broadly both have an obvious semantical element. As such, assuming that the natural language has more than one sign it would seem to follow that the natural language has syntax as well. Hence, both artificial and natural languages have a semantics and syntax.

Reid’s argument for the innateness of language proceeds on the (plausible) assumption that artificial language is actual. Given the actuality of artificial language, Reid attempts to show that there is a relation of strict dependence between artificial language and natural language, such that the former strictly depends on the latter. I distinguish strict dependence from simple dependence in the following way:

Simple Dependence: x is dependent on y iff had y been absent and all other sufficient bases been absent x would have been absent. 

Thus, this is not to say that x is only possible if y exists.  For x may be actualized if y' exists.  Strict dependence can then be rendered as follows:

Strict Dependence: x is strictly dependent on y iff had y been absent x would have been absent. 

Thus, x cannot exist without y.  There are no other sufficient bases for x. 

Reid maintains that artificial language is strictly dependent on natural language. He states, "…natural language is scanty, compared with artificial; but without the former, we could not possess the latter" (Inq. VI.xxiv). Thus, artificial language cannot exist without natural language.

We are now in a position to present his argument. He writes:

Reid’s argument amounts to the following:

The reasoning behind premise three is straightforward and may be captured with the following reductio of the contrary position (i.e. no compacts depend on natural language, which is equivalent to artificial language is the only type of language).

Clearly these arguments are valid. I will not undertake an examination into their soundness. Rather, in the next section I present and object to the recent views of Harre and Robinson on the nature of natural language in Reid’s thought.

In "What Makes Language Possible? Ethological Foundationalism in Reid and Wittgenstein" Rom Harre and Daniel N. Robinson seek to establish a similarity in the thought of Wittgenstein and Reid concerning language. As they develop their argument they attempt to establish that the inhomogeneity principle (IP) is applicable to Reid’s theory of language. IP states that foundations for something of type X are non-X. For example, IP, when applied to epistemology, states that the foundations for justification of belief in some proposition ultimately must end in something non-propositional. These authors believe that Reid (and Wittgenstein) employs something like IP when arguing for the thesis that artificial language cannot depend on artificial language. Hence, as I have characterized things, Reid’s attempt to show that artificial language strictly depends on natural language, must be understood, according to Harre and Robinson, as equivalent to saying that artificial language depends on something non-linguistic in character. They write:

Thus, the class of artificial signs includes things like words whose meaning is given through compact or agreement, gestures whose meaning is given by compact or agreement and the like. The pivotal question is whether or not in the class of natural signs we find words or anything word-like or only gestures. If IP is to be appropriately applied to Reid’s thinking here, then linguistic entities cannot be amongst the natural signs. This is the thesis that Harre and Robinson offer.

Does Reid include linguistic-like entities amongst the class of natural signs? Reid writes, "It appears evident from what hath been said on the subject of language That there are natural signs, as well as artificial; and particularly, That the thoughts, purposes, and dispositions of the mind, have their natural signs in the features of the face, the modulation of the voice, and the motion and attitude of the body" (Inq. V.iii). Prima facie it appears as though Reid does not make room for linguistic-like entities amongst the class of natural signs. Yet this is premature. Reid goes on to suggest that there are three separate types of natural signs. "The first class of natural signs comprehends those whose connection with the thing signified is established by nature, but discovered only by experience" (ibid). So, then the sign and the thing signified are connected by a principle of nature, but we come to know such a connection only by way of experience. For example, seeing smoke is a sign of fire. Yet, the connection between the particular sign (smoke) and the particular thing signified (fire) is not innate. The naturalness of the connection is much more general. A first approximation to the scheme of the general connection that is supplied by nature is the following:

General Connection Necessary for Particular Connections: if x is always observed to be conjoined with y, then x is a sign of y.

Seeing smoke conjoined with fire only once is not sufficient to establish this kind of connection. Multiple instances of smoke conjoined with fire would warrant one to take smoke to be a sign of fire. Without the general connection such an inductive procedure could not get going. As such we will call this type of natural sign ‘inductive natural signs’.

Inductive natural signs allow for the learning of connections between particular signs and particular things signified. This is to be distinguished from Reid’s second class of natural signs. "A second class is that wherein the connection between the sign and thing signified, is not only established by nature, but discovered to us by a natural principle, without reasoning or experience" (ibid). Reid places within this type "…the natural signs of human thoughts, purposes, and desires, which have been already mentioned as the natural language of mankind" (ibid). That Reid notes that we can discover the connection between the sign and the thing signified without reasoning or experience should not be interpreted too rigidly. Rather, he means to contrast this second type with the first type. Thus, where the first type of connection was learned by multiple experiences, this second type is triggered by only one experience. For example, a frown is immediately associated with sadness. All that is required to make this connection is the one experience of frowning.

The connection between the sign and the thing signified in this second class is itself given by nature and hence innate. So in contrast to inductive natural signs, where a general connection is natural and particular connections are learned, the second class of natural signs is comprised of particular connections. Thus, this class is much more robust than the first, having as its members each connection between particular sign and particular thing signified, when learning is not involved. Reid writes:

We may accordingly call this type of natural sign ‘particular natural signs’ noting that all of the particular natural connections are found within this type.

The third type of natural sign is more complicated than the first two. It is however, connected to the second type of natural sign. Reid writes, "A third class of natural signs comprehends those which, though we never before had any notion or conception of the things signified, do suggest it, or conjure it up, as it were, by a natural kind of magic, and at once give us a conception, and create a belief of it" (ibid). This third type of natural sign is intimately connected with Reid’s account of perception. With respect to the latter Reid states, "…that the perception of an object implies both a conception of its form, and a belief of its present existence. I know moreover, that this belief is not the effect of argumentation and reasoning, it is the immediate effect of my constitution" (Inq. VI.xx). The third type of natural sign is such that the connection between the sign and the thing signified is grounded in a natural principle so that when I conceive of the thing signified I immediately have a belief of it. This is virtually identical to his formulation of perception.

The distinctive features of particular natural signs are their being rightly interpreted on the basis of one experience alone and there being numerous instances of this type. The same can be said with respect to this third class. What does distinguish them from particular natural signs is that "…we never before had any notion or conception of the thing signified…" The conception that is present after the right sort of experience is one that was absent before the experience. This is not the case with respect to particular natural signs. For particular natural signs the conception of the thing signified (e.g. sadness) is present before the sign (e.g. frowning). For the third class the conception of the thing signified (e.g. hardness) is not present before the sign (e.g. relevant sensations).

The above-mentioned difference between particular natural signs and the third class of natural signs, although significant for Reid’s realism, should not overshadow the obvious similarity. Both types of natural signs are such that the sign triggers a conception of and belief in the thing signified. As such we will call this third type of natural sign ‘magical particular natural signs’; noting first that the conceptions gained by this type are distinctly different than the signs sufficient to yield them and second that they nevertheless belong as a sub-class to particular natural signs because of the noted similarities.

With respect to the entire class of particular natural signs it is evident that certain experiences simply trigger an interpretation of signs in such a way that the interpretation is itself natural. Hence, Reid places meanings of certain signs squarely within ones natural constitution. That is, one of the principles of our human constitution is that certain meanings are built into our nature. This stands in sharp contrast to the thesis proposed by Harre and Robinson. IP is applicable to Reid’s theory of language, according to them, precisely because Reid’s notion of a natural language is not linguistic in the way that artificial language is. However, as we have seen Reid places meanings at the center of his natural sign theory. Meanings are central to artificial language and so this similarity is sufficient to warrant our calling both natural and artificial languages.

As we have shown magical particular natural signs are a sub-class of particular natural signs. What about artificial signs? How are these connected to natural signs? According to Reid these are strictly dependent on particular natural signs. So, for example, acquired perception is strictly dependent on original perception, where original perception is perhaps located in magical particular natural signs. Thus, IP does not apply to Reid’s account of perception. The same reasoning can be appropriated to language. Artificial language is strictly dependent, according to Reid on natural language such that both share certain properties classifying them as language, but differ with respect to the mode of acquisition.

Reid makes it clear that just as acquired perception is strictly dependent on and similar to original perception, artificial language is strictly dependent on and similar to natural language. Reid writes, "…both [perception and language] are partly natural and original, partly acquired by custom. Our original or natural perceptions are analogous to the natural language of man to man…" (Inq. VI.xx). The analogy consists in both possessing signs. Perceptual signs, just as linguistic signs, signify things either by a connection between sign and thing signified that is natural or by a connection that is conventional. Reid writes:

The analogy between perception and language is so close that if similarities exist between original perception and acquired perception such that both or rightly called perception, the same type of similarity should be found between natural language and artificial language.

Speaking about acquired perception Reid notes that "[t]he connection between the sign, and the thing signified, is established by nature: and we discover this connection by experience; but not without the aid of our original perceptions, or those which we have already acquired" (ibid). The relevant thing to notice is that in both acquired and original perception there is a connection between sign and thing signified. According to Reid the connection is given by nature. Although with respect to artificial language the connection between sign and thing signified is not given by nature, there is nevertheless the obvious connection. It is simply the connection between sign and thing signified that operates both at the acquired/artificial level and the original/natural level that is enough to show the relevant similarities between each respective level. It is safe to say that for Reid IP is not applicable either to his theory of perception or to his theory of language.