Re: [tied] Re: About methodology...

From: Glen Gordon
Message: 3515
Date: 2000-09-01

John:
>Drawing trees is a simplification. To do justice to comparitive and
>historical linguistics, I think, drawing "tangled bushes" would give
>an element of greater reality to our efforts.

I've already stated that trees are a simplification, yes. In order to
understand anything though, one needs to start first by simplifying things
and breaking them down into pieces. If you begin with a complex model from
the start (like is no doubt the methodology of Starostin) you will be very
confused indeed and end up with a hopeless answer, which is not to say that
a tangled bush model or wave model isn't a good model, just more complex and
more detrimental in the beginning.

>Linguistics can be two dimensionally plotted (on latititude and >longitude
>geographically), but needs a third temporal dimension. >Perhaps to
>represent the tangled bush Piotr, we all need to be >sculptors and start
>working in three dimensions ;-)

You've explained the added complexity of a "tangled bush model" perfectly,
John, and this is why a 2D tree model is best when starting out, just as
IEists had done beforehand. Notice, they started with a tree model and moved
onto a more complex model such as the wave model (for instance, dialectal
isogloss lines between IE dialects).

- gLeN

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