[tied] Re: Convergence in the formatin of IE subgroups

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Patrick Ryan" <proto-language@...>
wrote:

>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Piotr Gasiorowski<mailto:gpiotr@...>
> To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com<mailto:cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, May 09, 2006 1:22 PM
> Subject: Re: [tied] Re: Convergence in the formatin of IE

subgroups

>
>
> On 2006-05-09 18:21, Daniel J. Milton wrote:
>
> > Are others as persuaded as Mssrs. Melkar and Ryan by

Ballester's

> > paper:
> >

http://www.continuitas.com/ballester_equilibrium.pdf<http://www.contin
uitas.com/ballester_equilibrium.pdf>

> > that linguistic change was slower in the Paleolithic than since

(or

> > elsewhere)?
> > It seems the sort of speculation that can't be proved or

refuted.

> > My reaction is just a shrug.
>
> May I join you? [Shrug, shrug.] The argument is specious. First,

there

> are some straw men there: few mainstream linguists, including

students

> of IE, would subscribe to the view that the rate of language

change is

> even roughly constant (many have said so openly, and Ballester

himself

> quotes them); the estimated age of PIE is _not_ based on any

assumed

> rate of change.
>
> <snip>
>
> ***
> Patrick:
>
> But the idea of semi-constant language change sufficient to

obliterate any traces to a very early ancestor of PIE and PAA was
advanced on this list not too long ago, was it not?

>
> That is why Ballester is significant. He questions the validity

of this view - rightly, in my opinion.

>

I wrote this in Nostratic-L. Perhaps it bears repeating here:

Words for "dog" of the type *kWVn/r- etc are found all over the
place, in the most diverse language families. According to recent
research, dogs were domesticated 14,000 years ago. If we assume that
the word travelled with the article, we have an example of a
recoverable root which is 14,000 years old, which is much older that
the usually assumed age of recoverability, approx. 4-5000 years (PIE)
or 6-10,000 years (Nostratic).



cf http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/2498669.stm

Now if 14,000 year old roots are recoverable that easy, it means that
roots that are more difficult than that to recover are 14,000+ years
old. That means ice age, and hunter-gatherer bands. Now if it is
true, as it seems, that (almost) all the major language families of
the world have become major because their ur-ancestor community
adopted farming, the prospect is bleak that something like Nostratic
should be recoverable; the possible time depth is too great, and I
can't see a common technology for them that would have made them
multiply, as happened with agriculture. Which means 'Nostratic' might
be a mirage, created in our minds by post-farming loanwords (of which
the "dog" word is one).

This is rather loose; any objections?



Torsten