Re: The meaning of life: PIE. *gWiH3w-

From: etherman23
Message: 52721
Date: 2008-02-12

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Patrick Ryan" <proto-language@...>
wrote:
>
> Mr. Keene, tracer of lost vowels!
>
> What does it take for you to understand that PIE *i comes from
avocalic *y;
> and PIE *u comes from avocalic *w.
>
> Those are consonants.

How do you know that *w and *y are not non-syllabic variants of the
vowels *u and *i?