The ideas of grammatical lacunarity were implicitly contained in the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis of linguistic
relativity more than 100 years ago. According to the strong version of this hypothesis, language,
understood as a set of multilevel units, radically affects human consciousness and world perception. More
often, however, the fact that the consciousness of an individual is formed and developed under the
influence of extralinguistic and linguistic factors proper is also taken into account, therefore, the decisive
role of language in this process is not discussed. Although the study of the language influence on
consciousness and thinking is a subject of research in philosophy, biology, psychology, linguistics, as
well as in cultural studies, however, over more than a century history of this comprehensive hypothesis
existence the answers to the questions about what most of all affects human consciousness formation,
why the representatives of different nations and cultures percept the surrounding reality in different ways,
have not been given. The linguistic approach to substantiating the determinism of language and thinking
is based on the study of language as a system. The term “system” (Greek systema - consisting of parts)
dates back to the time of Aristotle, when ancient philosophers started using it in the meaning of “many,
union”. The systematic approach makes it possible to single out the universal and particular features in
the system of a particular language.