--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "stlatos" <stlatos@...> wrote:
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "david_russell_watson" <liberty@> wrote:
> >
> > I was joking myself, actually, with the recent sitar thread in
> > mind, though I find now in the archives that Piotr did indeed
> > once suggest such an etymology. Those messages can't be found
> > searching for 'kantele', however, as 'kant&le' was used.
> >
> > See http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/48755
> > and http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/48756 .
>
> Well, some odd things have apparently happened since I last
> looked here.
- edit -
> Also, I was absolutely stunned when I saw "I was joking myself".
> There was no reason he, or I, would think you were joking. The
> reason? Because kantele and *kantlo- are so obviously related
> that no one with any knowledge of linguistics and of right mind
> could think otherwise
No, it would require besides some specific knowledge of
Estonian or Finnish (to whichever the word is supposed
to belong), but which I do not myself have.
So by me *kan-tlom could indeed have only been offered
jokingly, not by any means with certainty.
> (I wouldn't even expect anyone who connected them to make an
> argument, just showing the two words should be enough, as in
> Piotr's message).
No, merely showing the two words shouldn't be enough.
> I dislike being accused of incompetence by someone who could
> not only make this error but then assume his interpretation
> was so right and obvious that he could make an ironic statement
> otherwise that would be immediately clear.
You don't seem to like being accused of incompetence
by _anybody_, but then you've never really responded
to any of mine or others' very specific criticisms of
your method.
Instead you repeatedly make claims like your recent
one that you "use established and proven methods of
linguistic reconstruction (including borrowing,
metathesis, and dissimilation), mostly regular rules
(and those that aren't mostly optional", but which
have led you to radically different conclusions from
those of all others claiming to use the same methods.
So either you don't truly understand those methods, or
else you alone do and nobody else does, for you seem
to stand entirely alone in your conclusions.
Are we truly to believe that only Sean and Sean alone
in all the world has the intelligence to see the truth
while all others are blind fools?
> I don't know why you seem so opposed to ancient borrowings that
> you would take this path,
Nothing I've ever said justifies the assumption that I'm
opposed to ancient borrowings.
> though your apparent contempt for my work may have influenced
> you.
My "contempt" for your work (I thought I was always more
polite to you than that) did indeed influence me to make
the joke, but it didn't influence what I thought about
'kantele', because I really had no opinion about it in
the first place. I have never studied Finnish, I have
never studied Estonian, and I have never before given any
serious thought to the etymology of 'kantele'.
As far as my so-called contempt goes, I think I arrived
at it quite justifiedly, from such claims as the one of
yours that "All known languages not currently classified
as IE are actually from one branch of IE: Indo-Iranian",
archived at
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/62316 .
I'm sorry that my comments so deeply bothered you that
they stuck in your craw and brought you back to respond
after all this time, I truly am, but, if you really need
to have the last laugh, it's such claims as the above
that you are going to have to prove.
David