Noam Chomsky is widely known and deeply admired as the founder of modern linguistics, as one of the founders of cognitive science, and perhaps as the most widely read political theorist and commentator of our time. In these lectures, he presents a life filled with philosophical reflection on all three areas of research to which he has contributed for over half a century.

In clear, precise, and non-technical language, Chomsky explains fifty years of scientific developments in the field of language research and outlines how his own work has impacted the origins of language, the close relationship between language and thought, and their ultimate biological basis. He discusses and critiques many alternative theories, such as those emphasizing the social, communicative, and referential aspects of language. Chomsky reviews how new discoveries about language overcome assumptions that were once considered highly problematic in the past. He also examines the apparent scope and limits of human cognitive abilities and what the human mind can seriously investigate, in light of the history of science, philosophical reflection, and current understanding. From the topic of language and mind to society and politics, he concludes with a profound exploration and philosophical defense of a position he describes as libertarian socialism, tracing its connections to anarchism as well as to the ideas of John Dewey and even to the ideas of Marx and Mill, demonstrating their conceptual growth from our historical past and the urgent relationship to current affairs.