A linguistic house of cards: R M. Dixon

From: mkelkar2003
Message: 42485
Date: 2005-12-13

IE theorist like to circumvent the genetic evidence by "arguing" that
the dates
of IE dispersal (about 6000 BCE) are far too recent. However those
dates are
part of the problem not the soulution!

http://www1.cs.columbia.edu/%7Etraub/sloan/RenfrewXPM.pdf

"... the Indo European chronology in question depends on a view of
Indo-European origins which can scarcely be regarded as secularly
established (ibid, p. 14)."

"What has always filled me with wonder is the assurance with which
many
historical linguists assign a date to their reconstructed
language....Why
couldn't proto-Indo European have been spoken about 10,500 years ago.
.. The
received opinion of a date of 6000 bp... is an ingrained one. I
(Dixon) have
found this matter difficult even to discuss. Yet it does seem to be a
house of
cards (p. 15)."

M. Kelkar