From: Harald Hammarström
Message: 34450
Date: 2004-10-04
> Otherwise, Proto-Algonquian wouldn't have a number system. Nor Proto-I must confess ignorance on the livelihoods of PAlg. and PAn. speakers,
> Austronesian. Don't think those guys and gals were farmers.
> >> Why should we conclude that they absolutely wouldn't need to?The reason they get confused is that you wrote
> >
> > That we don't conclude. All we conclude is that super-unlikely that
> > any had a numeral system of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, many.
>
> Alright. That conclusion I agree with then. However, as I stated before,
> Uralic only has _reconstructable_ numbers up to "6". It has to be
> understood that the term "unreconstructable" doesn't necessarily mean
> "non-existent". For some reason, people get confused.
> > No it isn't. (A sample size of say 600 languages anyway).Sure. But I don't see anyone here sampling the Native Am. lgs and
>
> I think it's not secure. Look at Native American languages for example.
> They all share certain areal features with each other. Naturally so,
> since they have been in close contact with each other on the same
> continent for thousands of years. However, if one took samples from
> only that group because they were the only ones left in the world after
> the bomb hit, one would get a distorted picture of the full spectrum
> of human languages across the globe. We'd end up thinking that the
> world's languages are mostly replete with ejectives, for one thing!
> So similarly, I can't agree with crabby ol' Brian about there not beingSure, but we may know decently what their langauge looked like before the
> a difference between the few hunter-gatherer societies left in the world
> today and the many hunter-gatherers that once lived and traded unabated
> by as-yet non-existent settled cultures some 10,000 years ago. As I said
> above, modernization of some sort is practically impossible to avoid
> nowadays. Perhaps the only safe place to preserve a true hunter-gatherer
> culture anymore is the Antarctic or another planet for god's sakes.
> > Aristotle book XV if I remember correctly.That is "Problemata" btw.
>
> Thanks, I'll check that one out.
> > 1/1 case at least doesn't disprove my thesis and certainly doesn'tCan you tell me where I can read about their subsistence patterns?
> > support yours.
>
> Proto-Algonquian and Proto-Austronesian, remember?
> > Nonsense. They are vastly different.Certainly, it could be.
>
> Then what do you think IE people were doing some three thousand years
> previous to 4000 BCE? Certainly, the time it took for these people to
> go from being hunter-gatherers to pastoralists couldn't have been
> very long
> and why would pastoralists be any more prone to havingI don't know the exact reason why but pastoralists do tend to have
> number systems than hunter-gatherers?
> Any particularly cogent reason?Evidence?
> I realize, of course, that their lifestyles are different but the
> transition between the two ways of living must have taken place amongst
> the IE nonetheless and I hardly think that pastoralism is the reason
> for *okto:u.
> > Pirahã culture is one of the most extreme cases of an culture thatYes, at least when considering the Piraha~ it seems to be the reason.
> > is not interested in technology or intellectual achievement [...]
>
> Then perhaps what you're suggesting is that the world-view or the raison
> d'etre of a society more likely shapes whether they feel a need for
> numbers than environment or lifestyle.
> So with that idea, not knowing what the overall views were of ancientI've never assumed they couldn't have a numeral system above six.
> people speaking languages like Proto-Uralic, it would be in that
> respect especially unfair to assume that they couldn't have a number
> system past 'six' if lifestyle is not a factor here.