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The job of the linguist, like that of the biologist or the botanist, is not to tell us how nature should behave, or what its creations should look like, but to describe those creations in all their messy glory and try to figure out what they can teach us about life, the world, and, especially in the case of linguistics, the workings of the human mind.

The job of the linguist, like that of the biologist or the botanist, is not to tell us how nature should behave, or what its creations should look like, but to describe those creations in all their messy glory and try to figure out what they can teach us about life, the world, and, especially in the case of linguistics, the workings of the human mind.

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Attribution & collection notes
Author or tradition
Arika Okrent
Attribution: attributed
Country attributed
Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin.
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Historical period not yet established
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Contributor-provided quotation collection

Supplied reference C; CSV row 108082; supplied attribution, independently unverified

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