Re: Grimm 's Law fact or myth: Gessman (1990)

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "fournet.arnaud" <fournet.arnaud@...>
wrote:

>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Patrick Ryan" <proto-language@...>
> >
> >> >The languages like Enlgish and German are facts but "Germanic"
> >> >languages is not a fact and so is PIE.
> >
> >
> > > 'Fido exists, but dogs don't, nor do animals'; or
> > > 'MKelkar exists, but Indians or Hindus don't, therefore MKelkar
> > > is neither an Indian nor a Hindu'.
> >
> > >Would you be satisfied with that?
> > > Torsten
> >
> >
> > ***
> >
> > Patrick:
> >
> > I think you are on the right track with this answer, Torsten.
> > Facts can be difficult to determine.
> > German and English are facts because they are observable
> > repeatedly by anyone.
> >
> =========
> Torsten's answer was indeed very sharp and relevant.
>
> I disagree with the statement that German or English is a fact.
> The problem is about defining what a language is.
> Is Dutch and German two dialects of the same language ?
> What about Schwyz ? is it German ?
> and what about Black English or Jamaican English creole ?
> Are these dialects of English or separate languages ?
>
> There is always a kind of convention about what a language is.
>
> Chinese dialects are extremely different,
> but they are not considered separate languages by the Chinese
> tradition, even though a Pekinese would never be able to understand
> anything to Haikou.
> It's about as clear as Armenian when you're an English speaker.
>
> Arnaud
> ============

We all know that.

> > Germanic and Indo-European are _not_ facts because they have not
> > been observed.
> > > They are, however, very efficient explanations of the facts we
> > > can observe.
> >
> ===========
>
> The ontological status of PIE "reconstructions" is unclear.
>
> There is a strong positivism in the word "reconstruction"
> implying that we can actually reconstruct what has disappeared.
> the first quality of "reconstructions" are to account for lexical
> "data" and the comparative method circularly tells us what the
> "data" are.
> they acquire a temporal value because we assume these algebraic
> formulas stand for something that must have existed before.
> but ultimately,
> the questions remain :
> Are these formulas real "words" ?
> Are they the shadows of real "words" on the screen of the
> comparative method
> ?
> Are they artefacts created from scratch by the comparative method ?
> Are they fake ?
> Would another method yield something different ?
> What about the 60% of the words contained in IE languages not
> accounted for by the comparative method and so called "PIE" ?
>
> Arnaud
>
> ===========
>

A reconstruction is a reconstruction. It is not the real thing,
because that has perished, leaving rubble. A reconstruction of the
Colosseum or of some vanished civilization in India is the not the
real building or civilization. But the closer a reconstruction gets to
the real thing the better it is considered to be. Obviously there are
the same methodological problems in reconstructing words as
reconstructing buildings or civilizations, but in each case what you
reconstruct is something which once existed, and no one is doubt of that.


Torsten