Linguistic Naturalism: With An Approach From Philosophic And Scientific Perspectives

Linguistic naturalism is derived from naturalism, a traditional philosophic andscientific paradigm suggesting a theorem defining the existentialism of the worldexperiences. The notion of naturalism has been advanced in reaction to the classicalmetaphysics highlighting the conceptual aspect of the knowledge about the humanworld experiences or religious doctrines attributing to the supernatural agency. Inlinguistics naturalism used to be meant to refer to the relationships between humanlanguage and what word signs or symbols denote from the philosophic perspective orthe experimental aspect of language from the scientific perspective. In a sense theprevalent linguistic naturalism serves as the epistemological tool about worldknowledge by highlighting the instrumental aspect of language to reflect or convey.Such a view is modified in the current dissertation by assuming that language, inaddition to be a vehicle of communication and a mirror of world experiences, isexistential as well. In this respect language is furthermore understood as a subject ofinvestigation. Therefore linguistic ontology based upon the hard science is advancedin reaction to the traditional linguistic epistemology consisting of a priorism,rationalism and empiricism represented by Chomsky and Quine by constructinglanguage either as a mental product or as a social product. Under the context ofnaturalism language is a natural product in general as well covering the mental andsocial ones. Be the assumptions true, linguistic naturalism would be expanded,namely the entire language system is a set of human experiences phenomenally orexistentially accounted for within the limit of the nature we know about. Language asa system in nature is bound to share the general world laws.The theoretical paradigm is established by arguing over linguistic naturalismsupplementing with the traditional trichotomy of linguistic epistemology consisting ofa priorism, rationalism and empiricism. The quadrilateral model of linguisticepistemology offers a new possibility in understanding the essence of linguisticknowledge and the actual manner language as a system behaves or influences. It isfurther argued that a priorism, rationalism and empiricism could be reductively understood under naturalism that serves as a cover label to embrace the alternativethree ones. In this respect language is not different from any other world systemsunder the context of physics and therefore methodologically linguistics as part ofphysics is validly justified instead of that as part of psychology, as part of sociologyand as part of formal logic. Linguistic physicalism is bent towards the scientific aspectof language approached by the physical means and under the current context we aresupposed to identify the dual attributes of language system universally true to thethree-dimensional space in terms of physics. Language is said to be a thermodynamicsystem of order and chaos respectively specified as linguistic determinacy andindeterminacy. Language as a competing system of order and chaos corresponds tothe physical world in the general human world knowledge. The dual attributes oflanguage system are specified as the wave-particle duality embodied in the humanlinguistic experiences socio-culturally and psychologically motivated.Linguistic naturalism, linguistic physicalism per se, is established to highlightthe physical aspect of language instead of the social and psychological aspect of it.Only by assuming the physical attributes of language system could we have a generalunderstanding of the contrastive linguistic methodologies specified as formalism andfunctionalism dominating in the current linguistic research. Both count as validepistemological tools to account for the meaning and use of language on the conditionthat they could be put in the physical domain beyond the scope of mental and socialones. Physically form and function are equivalent to order and chaos working in acompeting fashion when language is put to use. They are the very thermodynamicattributes of nature in a general sense embodied in the language system. Thereinterpretation of the linguistic dynamic equilibrium based upon form and functionalike helps us to construct an integrative model of linguistic epistemology resting withformalism and functionalism in terms of research methodology. It further serves as aphilosophical tool in reconstructing a unified linguistic model of epistemology tomerge a priorism and empiricism bridged by rationalism. The unity is validly possibleonly under the context of physics.In sum the research objective is sought for in three respects. In the first place we are expected to make tentative contributions to linguistic epistemology inunderstanding the relationships between language and nature. In this directionlanguage is itself said to be part of nature. In addition to be the social andpsychological product, language is also the natural product. In the second placelanguage, under the naturalized linguistic epistemology, is said to be an intangiblephysical system with physical properties. It is likened to a system macroscopic andmicroscopic alike subject to determinacy and indeterminacy coexisting in a competingfashion. In the third place the linguistic physicalism might offer the possibility ofaccounting for linguistics as being specified as a competing model of formalism andfunctionalism. This might lay the epistemological and ontological foundation ofmerging a priorism, rationalism and empiricism under the context of naturalism.