Re: [tied] Re: Everything except the kitchen sink

On Tue, 13 May 2003, Glen Gordon wrote:

>
> Jens:
> >You don't know how frequent the *z...
>
> Ach. How many times are you going to wave everything away with
> "We don't know this and we don't know that -

As many times as it takes.

> - therefore I have
> license to propose anything I want and everyone else can stuff it."

I didn't behave that way even once.

> This is blatant proof that you don't comprehend Occam's Razor.
>
>
> Jens:
> >This boils down to the question what is evidence and what is not.
>
> Occam's Razor already answers this question for us, so it's not rocket
> science. The most likely and most efficient solution wins out. Duh.

Occam is no good if the evidence is there to disprove what was erroneously
taken to be the simplest possible solution. The simplest *impossible*
solution should be of no interest.

>
> If one theory has a bunch of unlikely probabilities strewn together and
> another combines the _likeliest_ most "boring" possibilities, we opt
> for the latter. If we have two likely candidates for a theory but one
> has ten assumptions and the other has only three, we go for the one
> with only three. We determine what is likely and what isn't based on
> evidence at hand. Frequencies in world languages are most helpful.

How does one weigh the relative complexity of the competing scenarios
against each other? I say, have regular *tos change to *sos and that to
*so, and have *se-h2 be analogically formed halfway through the process.
You say, have an irregular form *so glued on irregularly to a bare stem of
irregular syntactic use to form a nominative by irregular sound change and
by unsupported semantic change. Why is my idea more complex than yours?
And even if I am totally wrong, how can I know that your idea is correct?
I see ample space for error in both proposals. Is your theory good because
I have suggested something which you consider even worse? Surely one
cannot solve problems that way.

> This is why your theory lacks credibility. It uses the more unlikely
> possibilities (three-way length contrast, a rare phoneme in common
> affixes, etc). Sure, these things exist in _some_ languages but we
> could probably find a language somewhere to support anything.

The defense of my suggestions is not based on the mere possibility, i.e.
the mere fact that there are languages in the world that are or have been
this way. It is the opposition that has invoked their typological
impossibility, and to rebut that it is certainly of relevance that I can
point to languages that actually show these allegedly impossible
monstrosities. And it is of no relevance at all that other languages are
different from that and, if used as parallels instead, could be used to
support other things (which wouldn't work).

>
> Sure, we "don't know" ANYTHING if you want to resort to that kind
> of cheap pseudo-validation for your theories, but we equally don't
> know whether any of your million-and-one assumptions are true... so
> let's just not assume them at all! Let's just ignore you and continue
> on with our lives in logical harmony.
>
> If you can't comply with Occam's Razor, there's something
> fundamentally wrong with your brain. There's nothing in Occam's
> principle that states "we don't know anything so..." That must be the
> "Ignorance Razor" that you're using. You must have terrible skin rash.

You are not addressing the issue. Which was in part: My suggestion
accounts for some structural facts of the different example groups from
which rules concerning IE ablaut can be extracted. You apparently refuse
to account for some of these facts while at the same time ascribing strong
importance to the story of the demonstrative turned nominative marker
which to me is, at best, an idea for consideration. It is an idea with so
little to recommend it that one will give it up if it causes obstacles.
And it certainly does: The proposed underlying morphology is unique in the
language, and so is the phonological development, and the functional
account is blurred at best. It is quite hard to see what is gained. To use
your own technique: why no equate the nom. *-s with the word stem *su:
'sow' instead? That doesn't make sense either, but why prefer one
nonsensical explanation over another?


Jens