Abductionism: An attempt to achieve symbiosis

2014 IJRSLL – Volume 3 Issue 4

Author/s:

Maftoon, Parviz
College of Foreign Languages and Literature, Science and Research Branch, IAU, Tehran, Iran (pmaftoon@srbiau.ac.ir)

Shakouri, Nima*
Islamic Azad University Roudbar, Iran (Shakouri.ni@gmail.com)

Abstract:

The logical problem of language acquisition has turned out to be a pivotal argument in favor of the nativist view on language acquisition. Although much work has been conducted in favor of inductionism and deductionism, the following paper is an attempt to cast lights upon the notion of abductionism in language acquisition in order to achieve symbiosis between deduction/induction and abduction. Though linguistic, much of Chomsky’s writings are the revisited reflection on the philosophy pioneered by Plato and Peirce. Chomsky inclination towards Peirce’s abductionism reflects the fact that Chomsky never ignores the role of input offered by the external world, although to him the role of things that are external to organism is looked from an inferior light. In sum, what the present paper tries to account that the genesis of any logic in language acquisition is best described as an integrative development of observational verification, theoretical falsification, and hypothetical explanation. Henceforth, looking at one’s own scientific method (i.e., induction, deduction, and abduction) from a superior light entails ignoring the dynamicity of language acquisition.

Keywords: abduction; deduction; induction; input; poverty of stimulus; universal grammar

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5861/ijrsll.2013.574

*Corresponding Author