Re: [tied] Timing of ablaut

From: Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen
Message: 26085
Date: 2003-09-27

On Sat, 27 Sep 2003, Glen Gordon wrote:

>
> Miguel:
> >I have given _nothing but_ internal evidence.  To wit:
> >
> >1. Brugmann's law
> [...]

> Evidently you fail to see the difference between internal
> evidence that matters and internal evidence that has no
> relevance to what you're saying.
>
> 1. Brugmann's Law is a post-IE rule.
>
>     It's IRRELEVANT unless you have the gull to completely
>     overhaul IE phonetics yourself with confused & confusing
>     rules of your own.

Now, this is an objection itself without relevance. There is nothing
absurd in the mere thought that PIE phonology is not completely known.
Many advances in that field have begun with a problem of einzelsprachlich
standing which could only be handled when it was finally realized that the
PIE basis had to be adjusted in the process.

It is not a priori excluded that some IE language shows a difference
continuing a difference of vowel timbre in original /H3e/ as opposed to
plain /o/. It is just one of those things for which we would feel obliged
to subject any proposed evidence to particularly sceptical scrutiny. In
this, we apparently have different subjective limits.

Jens