  In reply, some Chomskyans (e.g., Matthews 2001) challenge  non-nativists to produce these alternative theories and submit them  to empirical test. It's pointless, they claim, for nativists to try  to argue against theories that are mere gleams in the empiricist's  eye, particularly when Chomsky's approach has been so fruitful and  thus may be supported by a powerful inference to the best  explanation. Others have argued explicitly against particular  non-nativist theories — Marcus 1998, 2001, for instance,  discusses the shortcomings of connectionist accounts of language  acquisition.