How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby tarvos » Sun Jun 25, 2017 9:29 pm

To answer the topic title's question: 9 months, plus however long it takes to learn to speak.

I mean, you can start from day 1 truly!
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby Cavesa » Sun Jun 25, 2017 10:21 pm

desitrader wrote:I stand by what I said. It is impossible for non-native people to have native-like listening comprehension.


Nope. What is and isn't possible cannot be generalized so easily.

It is possible to have native-like listening comprehension, with the quite same difficulties the natives face. Yes, it takes a lot of time to get there, but it is possible. Probably not for everyone, just like not everyone can run like Usain Bolt without putting the posibility of such an achievement in question. My comprehension limitations in my best two foreign languages are not that different from those in my native one. Some people are harder, some voices, some health conditions, some accents, some dialects, some noisy groups, some subcultures and so on, vast majority is ok. And I am still an example of a person who has not spent years in a foreign country, people who have are yet at another level.

It is possible to write like a native, all the writers who have published works in their non native languages are a proof (for example Kundera). Again, it is not possible for everyone (even writing a book in our native languages is not for everyone), and I definitely wouldn't dare to define who can and who cannot get there. And some forum members are another good example, like Blaurebel. It is possible.

It is possible to speak like a native. But it is very hard and by far not even everyone living in the country can get there. I can pass for a native French speaker from a different region (than the one the other speaker is from) on a good day, and if we don't get to stuff requiring me to focus much more on the content. That took me years. But I am definitely far from what is possible, many people moving to another country speak like natives after some time, while others don't. The fact I will probably never be totally native like, even if I spend decades in the country, doesn't make it impossible. I've met people who had achieved this.

Despite all this being possible, I don't think it is a good goal. In case we happen to be in the majority, who cannot get there, it can only damage our motivation, our enjoyment, or the deserved pride in our achievements. Don't forget that the most used assessment scale on this forum, CEFR, doesn't compare the highest level to natives.

I've read a lot of inspiring stuff on the AJATT blog. And the author talks about being functionally native-like, if I remember correctly. That means being able to live in the language and do all the stuff native adult people do and well. That still doesn't mean being completely native-like, but it is a great achievement and it destroys of all the barriers. I think it is a great goal and one I am striving for.
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby DaveBee » Mon Jun 26, 2017 12:09 am

Cavesa wrote:It is possible to write like a native, all the writers who have published works in their non native languages are a proof (for example Kundera). Again, it is not possible for everyone (even writing a book in our native languages is not for everyone), and I definitely wouldn't dare to define who can and who cannot get there. And some forum members are another good example, like Blaurebel. It is possible.
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby PeterMollenburg » Mon Jun 26, 2017 12:20 am

desitrader wrote:
aokoye wrote:So just focusing on this, what you're trying to say, desitraer, is that a. it's impossible for an L2 speaker to have the listening and speaking ability of an L1 speaker but it is possible for them to have the reading/writing ability and b. there's no way for anyone to prove otherwise? What evidence do you have that backs up those claims?


What I am trying to say aokoye, is that none of this is provable in scientific terms, and all we are doing is generalising what we have seen ourselves. So if I am talking nonsense here (as some allege), so is everyone else.


Science imo is put up on a pedastool far too often. It's useful, but not always. Nowadays we seem to cling to it as the only avenue if proof. What about anecdotal evidence and experience. Just as good imo.
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby PeterMollenburg » Mon Jun 26, 2017 5:24 am

LesRonces wrote:
PeterMollenburg wrote:
desitrader wrote:
aokoye wrote:So just focusing on this, what you're trying to say, desitraer, is that a. it's impossible for an L2 speaker to have the listening and speaking ability of an L1 speaker but it is possible for them to have the reading/writing ability and b. there's no way for anyone to prove otherwise? What evidence do you have that backs up those claims?


What I am trying to say aokoye, is that none of this is provable in scientific terms, and all we are doing is generalising what we have seen ourselves. So if I am talking nonsense here (as some allege), so is everyone else.


Science imo is put up on a pedastool far too often. It's useful, but not always. Nowadays we seem to cling to it as the only avenue if proof. What about anecdotal evidence and experience. Just as good imo.

I like your thinking.

Science is mainly used to prove to others.

If i have seen something with my own eyes and heard it with my own ears, I don't need science to tell me anything, but others might still not believe without science backing it up.

Anecdotal evidence is king in my opinion. But only to those who have experienced it. Everyone else needs proof.


Indeed. And another issue with heavy reliance on science is, human beings take it, generally, for granted. Or the opposite. We either believe it 100% because it's been scientifically proven via studies etc, or we switch off, because people don't feel they can trust anything in the end because many studies contradict others. This is in part because science is biased and it's limited. The real world is not a lab, the real world contains many more variables than science would like to admit. People like to think science is flawless but it's not, and for the most part I'd like to believe it's not flawed.

However much of my own personal discovery has led me to conlude that much science has an agenda behind it. For example governements FUND scientists. There's an invested interest behind funding certain avenues of research and not others. Who funded the research? Who encourages governments to fund certain avenues of research? They make out they are independent, they are not. As for the scientists, you think they ALL will refuse a paycheck because of their moral code of eithics? They have to eat too, so they go we're the funding is.

My point is, don't rely on science as the end of discussion, as science is often under the influence of something also, even if it's simply the scientists themselves hoping for a particular outcome. The power of the mind? All in all, I do rely on science a lot, just to be clear, I'm not a science hater, but all things must be considered.

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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby aokoye » Mon Jun 26, 2017 5:51 am

LesRonces wrote:
PeterMollenburg wrote:
desitrader wrote:
aokoye wrote:So just focusing on this, what you're trying to say, desitraer, is that a. it's impossible for an L2 speaker to have the listening and speaking ability of an L1 speaker but it is possible for them to have the reading/writing ability and b. there's no way for anyone to prove otherwise? What evidence do you have that backs up those claims?


What I am trying to say aokoye, is that none of this is provable in scientific terms, and all we are doing is generalising what we have seen ourselves. So if I am talking nonsense here (as some allege), so is everyone else.


Science imo is put up on a pedastool far too often. It's useful, but not always. Nowadays we seem to cling to it as the only avenue if proof. What about anecdotal evidence and experience. Just as good imo.

I like your thinking.

Science is mainly used to prove to others.

If i have seen something with my own eyes and heard it with my own ears, I don't need science to tell me anything, but others might still not believe without science backing it up.

Anecdotal evidence is king in my opinion. But only to those who have experienced it. Everyone else needs proof.

I think it all depends. I think there's a time and a place for data and anecdata. In general I prefer data, however that is not always the end all be all for me. I don't, for instance, go to forums in search of data for the most part.
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby tarvos » Mon Jun 26, 2017 8:00 am

Some people here truly haven't the foggiest how science actually works (experience and anecdotes actually can and do form a part of data sets and empirical reasoning), but I don't want to get into that debate even further here when it comes to politics and so on.

The thing is that science rarely if at all proves things 100% correct - doesn't really happen. We mostly state things in terms of probability and likelihood, and anything with above x% likelihood is usually treated as fact (evolution, quantum mechanics, atomic theory and so on).

But we don't get that kind of certainty with most social sciences and therefore, drawing conclusions from imperfect data sets is a terrible idea. Usually the result is something like "you can't really know." Which is why I find desitrader's statements bold, to say the least.
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby tarvos » Mon Jun 26, 2017 8:53 am

LesRonces wrote:But the problem isn't science, it's those who claim that something is true because scientific consensus agrees despite evidence to the contrary. Or worse still people that say you need 'empirical data' and suchlike. You might need empirical data to prove to someone else something you already know as fact. Not providing that data doesn't change your truths.


That really, really depends on the topic. There are some issues I would take with this statement:

For a first, scientific consensus only exists in certain cases where we are very, very certain how certain things work. I'm talking about evolution, gravity, molecular and atomic theory, and so on. The reason we accept gravity as a theory is because when you drop a rock from a tenth-story window, it falls to the ground every time. You can try it a million times but it will do the same thing.

Evidence to the contrary is a very, very controversial way to state your opposition. What is evidence to the contrary? For something to be evidence, it has to be falsifiable, and anecdotal evidence can be taken to be falsifiable when we repeat certain experiences. (This is why miracles don't count as evidence.) If scientific consensus agrees on a certain theory, what that means is that the evidence in favour of a certain theory is so strong it is practically not refutable by any means. Sure, there are cases in which gravity doesn't pull things down to earth (for example, when other forces are in play), but again, that's all well documented. There cannot be, a priori, scientific consensus on an issue if there is too much evidence against a certain theory. Every good scientist knows that anything else would be someone trotting out their hobby horse - and most scientists denounce that.

In terms of the topic we're talking about, there is little evidence that runs counter to the idea we expressed that bilingualism has loads of benefits and that people's understanding of non-native languages can exceed that of their native tongue (heritage speakers are just one of the examples we can give here).

And we can only establish facts by consensus and empirical data. A fact is not a fact just because someone stated it on the internet. A fact is a fact because we can repeat a certain phenomenon and always get the same result whatever happens. Science isn't about convincing people of certain themes at all; it's about finding out what is true and what isn't by doing experiments. People are convinced simply because the science works; if it doesn't, we discard the theory (that's why Lamarckian genetics isn't used any more, but other genetic models are).

The fact that in the modern day and age there is a lot of dishonest research being done doesn't invalidate science or the methodology. It requires critical thinking because in reality, experiments always show you the truth. And when someone says something that is illogical at first glance, it's your job to be critical of them and see whether you can prove them wrong and repeat the experiment (something done far too little especially in social sciences).

The only thing is that all the variables are much more complex in social sciences than in natural sciences because we're dealing with much more complex systems.

So please, just stop it with the scientific nonsense you're all pulling in this thread. It's not how science works. You can't believe in science - it's a priori impossible due to the methodology. Anyone who tells you anything else is pushing an agenda.
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby tarvos » Mon Jun 26, 2017 9:10 am

LesRonces wrote:
tarvos wrote:And we can only establish facts by consensus and empirical data. A fact is not a fact just because someone stated it on the internet.

Not strictly true. A fact is a fact if the thing in question happened. It's irrelevant where it is stated or whether it's not even stated anywhere. If someone has done something, and people witnessed it, however unbelievable it is, it's fact.

The truth doesn't need consensus and empirical data.

The notion that consensus establishes facts is sketchy at best.

And anyway, science is being criticised here not for how science in itself works in principle, but on how science is pushed and perceived by others as overriding fact in all cases. Just look around the internet. There are millions if not hundreds of millions of people who will believe nothing unless that thing is backed up by 'science'. You can swear blindly along with hundreds of other people that you've seen people do things and yet in the absence of a study people will just not believe it.

It's the notion of science being the all-mother that is being attacked here, not science in and of itself.


I'm sure millions of people have seen the Virgin Mary appear. That doesn't make it true, my friend. Yes, it does need empirical data. The fact that hundreds of people believe something doesn't make it true. And yes, we will believe things if we're given concrete, tangible evidence for their existence. That's skepticism for you.

That's exactly the point, and that's exactly why we need scientific consensus and experiments.

If I claim to have seen the Flying Spaghetti Monster appear and that his Noodly Appendage touched my evening meal of spaghetti, brie and pecan nuts, you cannot claim anything to the contrary. Many people will testify that his Noodly Appendage did so. Hundreds of people, in fact.

But it's not falsifiable and that's why we discard it.

Honestly, I'm glad these people didn't believe everything they saw with their own eyes. The brain is a devilish trickster.

In fact, I do not believe in anything. I don't believe. I know, or I suspect, but I don't believe - because faith is always trickier than evidence. So yes, I do want evidence to believe something, and I hope you can understand that if we don't demand evidence then you should be open to the existence of the Flying Spaghetti monster, Illuminati, fairy lizards and so on populating the world. I mean, people did claim to see the monster of Loch Ness, after all.
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Re: How many years does it take to learn the second language as your native?

Postby PeterMollenburg » Mon Jun 26, 2017 9:45 am

tarvos wrote:
LesRonces wrote:
tarvos wrote:And we can only establish facts by consensus and empirical data. A fact is not a fact just because someone stated it on the internet.

Not strictly true. A fact is a fact if the thing in question happened. It's irrelevant where it is stated or whether it's not even stated anywhere. If someone has done something, and people witnessed it, however unbelievable it is, it's fact.

The truth doesn't need consensus and empirical data.

The notion that consensus establishes facts is sketchy at best.

And anyway, science is being criticised here not for how science in itself works in principle, but on how science is pushed and perceived by others as overriding fact in all cases. Just look around the internet. There are millions if not hundreds of millions of people who will believe nothing unless that thing is backed up by 'science'. You can swear blindly along with hundreds of other people that you've seen people do things and yet in the absence of a study people will just not believe it.

It's the notion of science being the all-mother that is being attacked here, not science in and of itself.


I'm sure millions of people have seen the Virgin Mary appear. That doesn't make it true, my friend. Yes, it does need empirical data. The fact that hundreds of people believe something doesn't make it true. And yes, we will believe things if we're given concrete, tangible evidence for their existence. That's skepticism for you.

That's exactly the point, and that's exactly why we need scientific consensus and experiments.

If I claim to have seen the Flying Spaghetti Monster appear and that his Noodly Appendage touched my evening meal of spaghetti, brie and pecan nuts, you cannot claim anything to the contrary. Many people will testify that his Noodly Appendage did so. Hundreds of people, in fact.

But it's not falsifiable and that's why we discard it.

Honestly, I'm glad these people didn't believe everything they saw with their own eyes. The brain is a devilish trickster.

In fact, I do not believe in anything. I don't believe. I know, or I suspect, but I don't believe - because faith is always trickier than evidence. So yes, I do want evidence to believe something, and I hope you can understand that if we don't demand evidence then you should be open to the existence of the Flying Spaghetti monster, Illuminati, fairy lizards and so on populating the world. I mean, people did claim to see the monster of Loch Ness, after all.


The point I was getting at that it can be dangerous relying on science as the be all and end all in terms of validating something, as science is skewed by many factors. Take the example of medical journals- shown to have a positive bias for publishing postive results of pharmaceutical trials and research.... because the same journals (even the most respected) receive a good deal of their funding from... you guessed it... pharmaceutical companies. And that's not taking into account the processes such companies undertake to validate efficacy of their products. Research into alternatives to pharmaceuticals are largely absent from mainstream (the vast majority) medical journals (wonder why?). So when I hear scientifically proven in relation to a medecine/drug... I pay no attention to this. The whole process is flawed and skewed. Not to mention the drugs are either poorly tested in combination with other drugs or not at all. This is just one example of poor science pervading a whole sector of modern society.

That said, of course there is a large degree of reliability with science, otherwise there'd be no point to it, but it's ludicrous that people place 100% faith in scientific evidence. And in fact, when you look at how you were discussing probability then why do we use the words 'scientifically proven' when it comes to scientific evidence. Probably because it's useful for marketing. And this is how science is often used- despite, as you discussed, a probability of something occurring/existing/whatever, people too often see science as 100% proof. So I agree with LesRonces, it's about the perception of science here.

If you were alluding to me having no clue, one of my close family members has been involved in medical research and has published the findings, so I do know what goes on, and understand where and how data could be skewed. Your comment, whether aimed at me or not, felt derogatory or arrogant, even if you didn't mean it to come off that way. I'm not attacking you here, just telling you how it felt. I don't wish to start a conflict. We can agree to disagree, respectfully, right?

As for illuminati, I suggest people learn to get their (lack of) information elsewhere than mainstream media and a bunch of so-called experts who receive paychecks from grants and go on telling us how we should live our lives. Everyone needs to put food on the table and have a roof over their head, so do scientists.
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