Accordingtothe"principles-and-parameters"theory,"principles"refertohighlyabstractpropertiesofgrammarwhichareappliedtolanguageingeneralandwhichgeneratephrasesandatthesametimerestrainthepowerofMovea,while"parameters"allowgeneralprinciplestooperateincertainrestrictedways,accordingtowhichparticulargrammarsofnaturallanguagesvary.

If you are walking away from a clock tower ，you will hear the ticking of the clock fade to a point ________ it cannot be heard.

Youngerchildrenarecurious________howthingswork，andmanyofthemwanttotakeaparteverythingwithintheirreach.

The reply, when it finally came, was ________ the negative.

I asked him to ________ me a few minutes so that we could go over all the problems.