Universal Ontological Knowledge and Linguistic Relativity: A Review of the Experimental Procedure

The thesis of the Ontogenesis of Reference by Quine (1960, 1969, 1973) has aroused the interest of certain authors in developmental psychology. This theory claims that ontology is acquired only through language learning by the child, rejecting the possibility of an innate conceptual ontology. Developmental psychologists have attempted to test the plausibility of this hypothesis by conducting several experiments with children, generally concluding that Quine was mistaken. However, it will be argued that none of the experiments really affect Quinean philosophy. For this, a deep insight into his philosophical position is needed, to properly understand the theoretical notions that the psychologists confuse in their experiments.