【正文】 h the general cognitive petence to learn things including language rather than a special device for language acquisition. Despite the intense arguments on this issue, with some linguists prefer Chomsky’s LAD while others may oppose it, nowadays most linguists would agree on the innateness of language, namely, human capacity for language has a genetic basis even though the details of language have to be taught and learned. Literature reviewThe traditional behaviorism sets up the once dominant view that language is no more than habitual behavior on a stimulidespondence basis. The famous psychologist B. F. Skinner’s book Verbal Behavior fully elaborated this idea on language. Noam Chomsky’s review on this book turned a new page of linguistic studies and laid the foundation of his theory on the nature of language. Later, with a series of publications, to name a few, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax (1965), Deep Structure, Surface Structure and Semantic Interpretation (1971), Language and Mind (1972), Essays on Form and Interpretation (1977), Rules and Representations (1980), Some Concepts and Consequences of the Theory of Government and Binding (1982), The Minimalist Program (1995), Chomsky modified, improved and developed his theories on the nature of language but always insisted on the existence of the special device for language acquisition. (Zhu, 2008) As Chomsky’s theories gradually developed and matured, a group of linguists opposed his ideas in a great number of publications, . The Form of Language (1975) and Making Sense (1980) by Geoffrey Sampson, Language Learnability and Language Development (1984), The Bootstrapping Problem in Language Acquisition (1987), Learnability and Cognition (1989) and The Language Instinct: The New Science of Language and Mind (1994) by Steven Pinker, and a new view of language which argue that language acquisition is an ordinary learning process exactly like any other kinds of learning, say, learning to drive, was thus established. Theories Skinner’s Elaboration on LanguageAccording to Skinner, no plicated innate or mental mechanisms are needed to acquire language. All that is necessary is the systematic observation of the events in the external world which prompt the speaker to utter sounds. (Aitchison, 2000:7)This explanation of language by Skinner was based on his work with rats and pigeons in which the rats were supposed to learn plex behaviors under the stimuli of food through trialanderror learning which was proved to be true. Skinner believes that the same goes for the acquisition of language, and he thus holds the idea that language is due to learning. With the development of science, scholars have gained better understanding about the nature of language and gradually deserted this view. Chomsky’s Innateness HypothesisThough his theories have undergone several stages of development and attacks on his theories never deceased, Noam Chomsky never waved his belief that humans are genetically programmed with knowledge about language. This belief of Chomsky is often referred to as the innateness hypothesis. The innateness hypothesis is the core of Chomsky’s explorations into the nature of language for all his theories of language nature are based on this innateness assumption. As he puts it, “No one finds it outlandish to ask the question: what genetic information accounts for the growth of arms instead of wings? Why should it be shocking to raise similar questions with regard to the brain and mental facilities?” (Chomsky, 1979: 84) Thus he tries to find out what is exactly innately imprinted for humans in his later works on Universal Grammar (UG), D and Sstructure, and minimalist program. Here it is worthy to point out that Chomsky also admits the necessity of learning in order to fully master a language. (Zhang