Ambridge argues persuasively for the importance in language learning of a rich database of input exemplars. However, a fuller account must also consider the importance of on-line and developmental competition between rote exemplar-based storage and emergent patterns that can optimize retrieval. [For Ben Ambridge's "Against Stored…

Ambridge's proposal cannot account for the most basic observations about phonological patterns in human languages. Outside of the earliest stages of phonological production by toddlers, the phonological systems of speakers/learners exhibit internal behaviours that point to the representation and processing of inter-related units ranging in size…