Re: [tied] Laryngeal theory as an unnatural

From: Patrick C. Ryan
Message: 19162
Date: 2003-02-24

Dear Peter:

----- Original Message -----
From: "P&G" <petegray@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 23, 2003 2:04 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] Laryngeal theory as an unnatural


> > It's not a matter of opinion. Acoustic phonetics is a branch of
> > applied phyisics.
>
> But how a particular wave function is perceived depends on the speaker and
> the language. One person's /d/ is another person's /t/, and so on. So
> some linguistic questions cannot be adequately and totally answered by an
> appeal to physics.

[PCR]
In my opinion, a voiced dental or coronal or alveolar stop should have a physical definition that is independent of the perception of any individual.

Pat

PATRICK C. RYAN | PROTO-LANGUAGE@... (501) 227-9947 * 9115 W. 34th St. Little Rock, AR 72204-4441 USA WEBPAGES: PROTO-LANGUAGE: http://www.geocities.com/proto-language/ and PROTO-RELIGION: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/2803/proto-religion/indexR.html "Veit ec at ec hecc, vindgá meiði a netr allar nío, geiri vndaþr . . . a þeim meiþi, er mangi veit, hvers hann af rótom renn." (Hávamál 138)