Re: PIE-Arabic Correspondences (was Brugmann's Law)

From: Patrick Ryan
Message: 51628
Date: 2008-01-20

To try to put my position in perspective, I am not convinced I have proved my hypothesis.
 
I do feel that enough connections have been made to warrant the hypothesis.
 
I have been in communication with Bomhard for many years, and before I began independent work, I offered him a few suggestions which, it is fair to say, he absorbed but without acknowledgment.
 
After I began my own work, I tried to see if his correspondences and mine could be reconciled but he was not interested in the enterprise. I wrote a critique of his methods which is a partial fulfillment of your requirements, and posted it at my website, hoping it would motivate him into a mutually productive exchange but my efforts proved fruitless.
 
If anyone has any interest in this, it is available at Nostratic Dictionary - Critique of Bomhard
 
Patrick
 
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday, January 20, 2008 10:01 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] Re: PIE-Arabic Correspondences (was Brugmann's Law)

On 2008-01-20 16:47, Patrick Ryan wrote:

> A very 'fair and balanced' appraisal of the state of affairs, Piotr.
>
> But forget PAA for a moment, do you not agree that sufficient data has
> been collected and analyzed to warrant a 'probable' connection between
> Semitic and PIE?

If you mean a genetic connection, I think it remains "possible" rather
than "probable". Several people have tried to establish systematic
correspondences between the two, in each case achieving what might be
construed as partial success, but there is no "consilience of
inductions" as Whewell put it, and the competing reconstructions can't
be reconciled with each other. I know how much confidence you have in
your own analysis, but so do others who have tried the same. The
strength of the subjective conviction that one is on the right track
does not mean having a strong case.

Piotr