In virtually every respect, generative linguistics rests on the classical theory of categorization as it has been interpreted in the Fregean tradition-the assumption that the humanly relevant notion of a category can be adequately represented via a set-theoretical version of an objectivist theory of categories.
- Lakoff (1987), a pag.181

Generative linguistics (in the Chomskyan tradition) takes for granted that there is an autonomous language faculty that makes no use at all of general cognitive capacities. [...]. It is an assumption that is necessary in order to maintain the basic metaphor on which generative linguistics is based, namely, A GRAMMAR IS A FORMAL SYSTEM. A formal system is a collection of rewriting rules that can mimic an algorithmic computation.
- Lakoff (1987), a pag.181