Brian:
> No, it doesn't: you could instead be distinguishing apical
> and laminal alveolars.
Ugh, okay, then what instances of apical alveolars exist in
English if you don't mind illustrating? Before /t/ perhaps,
in "stand"? I'm talking about a _phonemic_ default and I
suspect you're talking about precise phonetics which normally
shows great variation in any language.
Sometimes you demand such precise language from me to get
through to you what I actually think that it's impossible
talking to you. You misinterpret everything I say or drown me
in the smallest facts that end up having nothing to do with
what I just said. Are you just trying to prove that you're
smart (which I fully realize already) or are you making a
relevant point about English phonemics (again, not phonetics
which I wasn't discussing in the first place)?
> Had you suggested that French [s] is more likely than
> English [s] to fall toward the dental end of the spectrum, I
> might even have believed you; this, however, is so much hot
> air.
Well, this is sheer nitpicking since words are often imprecise
and regular human beings often say imprecise things, requiring
a listener to properly parse the speaker's intended implicities.
If you aren't a successful computer programmer type which often
tend towards hyperanalysis, I'll eat my pants. I'll eat them right
off my body, in fact, without condiments. Naturally some people
get lost in minutia and aggravate people whose names are oddly
capitalized >:(
= gLeN