Pat Ryan:
>If *H2 were capable of *a-coloring an *e, it would surely do it while it
>still existed, would it not?
...
>If there is any "evidence" that "compels" us to reconstruct velar
>fricatives, I would certainly like to hear >it.
Peter:
So your real issue is:
(a) the evidence for vowel-colouring
(b) the evidence for the phonetic nature of the laryngeals.
These have both been discussed to death on this list and in the literature.
I am happy to accept that it is still logically possible to deny both,
although few people are persuaded to do so.
(a) We can claim that vowel colouring is mostly based on the evidence from
Greek where vowel harmony may have played a larger part that has so far been
acknowledged. Unfortunately, this claim has been tested in the lterature,
and not many people still hold to it (as far as I know). There's too much
evidence from outside Greek.
(b) You may be on safer ground here. The phonetic nature of h2 and h3 in
particular is not clear. But we can say what they are not (e.g. stops, or
resonants, or vowels). It is not certain what evidence would help us
distinguish between velar and pharyngeal fricatives.
Pat also said:
>And if it could not *a-color while it was there, surely no one will believe
>that it could *a-color when it >was not there.
Now that's just silly. The loss of a phonetic element can cause changes as
it is lost, and you know that perfectly well. So to pretend that the theory
says a laryngeal causes a change when it is not there, is not only a
misrepresentation, but a deliberate one.
Incidentally, there are one or wo cases where people have suggested changes
caused by what is not there. Lachman's Law in Latin is an example. Voicing
was lost in PIE (we think) before a voiceless stop, but Latin still shows an
effect as if voicing were there. Speakers apparently were aware of other
forms which were voiced, and responded accordingly.
Peter