Who is Noam Chomsky from The Language Instinct and what is their importance?

Noam Chomsky is a philosopher, linguist, historian, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor (Emeritus) in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Chomsky has often been referred to as the "father of modern linguistics" and has been credited with the development of the Universal Grammar Theory, creator of the Chomsky hierarchy, and the co-creator of the Chomsky-Schützenberger theorem. Chomsky, author of more than 100 books, has been cited as a source more than any living scholar during 1980-1992

Chomsky is a mentor to Steven Pinker, although Pinker has argued against some of Chomsky's works regarding the basic development of language. Chomsky relates generative grammar to a subject's body of knowledge.