Towards a new empiricism for linguistics

Towards a new empiricism

1 Some historical background Linguists in the pre-generative period in American linguistics would happily have referred to themselves as empiricists. Foremost in their understanding of the term was the sense that empiricists were highly skeptical of what they viewed as metaphysical claims, and they shared the view that a rigorous method needed to be invoked in order to make scientific claims. T...

Towards a new empiricism: 1.4

Towards a new empiricism: 1.6

Towards a new empiricism: 1.3

Towards a new empiricism for linguistics

The view of linguistics which we will consider in this chapter is empiricist in the sense explored in Chapter One of this book:1 it is epistemologically empiricist, rather than psychologically empiricist; in fact, it is a view that is rather agnostic about psychology — ready to cooperate with psychology and psychologists, but from a certain respectful distance. It is empiricist in the belief th...