# negative evidence

**URL:** <http://discourse.iapct.org/t/negative-evidence/14375>\
**Category:** CSG1992\
**Created:** [October 26, 1992, 2:30pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/negative-evidence/14375 "1992-10-26T14:30:11Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![\_Avery\_Andrews](http://discourse.iapct.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/_/848f3c/32.png) [@\_Avery\_Andrews](http://discourse.iapct.org/u/_Avery_Andrews)\
**Post date:** [October 26, 1992, 2:30pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/negative-evidence/14375/1 "1992-10-26T14:30:11Z")

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[Avery Andrews 921026.0928]  
(Gary Cziko 921025.0145)

> I realize that this "uniqueness principle" has also been proposed by others  
> looking at language acquisition, but I can't remember the explanation for  
> linguistic forms which seem to be quite synonomous and yet continue to  
> survive as different ways of saying the same thing. While the second of

The usual explanation is that the forms aren't really in free variation:  
there are circumstances that call clearly for one, others that call  
clearly for the other, and they only look like free variants in the  
decontextualized `can you say this' interrogation setting. But I  
think it is pretty clear that in certain settings, there is often  
free choice between forms. So Labov finds that in various `r-less'  
urban dialects, people put the `r's in in formal settings, leave them  
out in informal ones, and fluctuate in intermediate cases (or so I think  
I remember it).

But I'd agree that this little story of mine would stand or fall on the  
basis of careful examination of this kind of case. But if this story  
falls, we're probably left with something like GB as the best bet for  
a theory of grammar!!.

Avery.Andrews@anu.edu.au