Re: Can relationships between languages be determined after 80,000 y

On 2008-01-29 11:00, fournet.arnaud wrote:

> labials m w b p p?
> dentals n t d t?
> laterals l r tl tl? dl (because of Chinese)
> sibilants s ts z dz s? ts? (because of Chinese)

What has Chinese got to do with Proto-World?

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Tsalam? t?ob

Does this mean Chinese is not to be counted
among mankind's languages ?

Arnaud
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> velars g k k?
> spirants y h H
> glottal stop ?
>
> Any other system is doomed
> because it **fails** to account for all the necessary constrasts.
>
> And more phonemes are necessary to account for constrasts.
> Especially pre-nasalized phonemes.

Using the same logic you will probably add clicks a whole array of
clicks to account for Khoisan and perhaps more places of articulation
(retroflex, palatal) to accommodate Australian and Dravidian, won't you?
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No
I would first try to connect retroflex and palatal with
tl dl tl?
and I will not add clicks to the system
but try to understand what suits best.
Arnaud
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> The first book to write on macro-comparison
> is a phonological analysis of existing languages
> containing **no** cognate.
> Looking for cognates is the **last** step
> not the first one.

I most emphatically disagree. Given enough time, anything could have
happened to phonological systems. You wouldn't be able to reconstruct
even the phonological inventory of PIE, by just looking at the daughters
and speculating "what is necessary".
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Absolute *lie*
Sanscrit's system was the obvious starting point.
and Greek morphology
plus Anatolian have entailed little adjustements.
That's how it happened.

Arnaud
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