Re: Origin of *h2arh3-trom 'plough'

At 6:57:04 PM on Sunday, June 3, 2012, Tavi wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski
> <gpiotr@...> wrote:

>> If you can't explain the formal details and correlate
>> them with the trajectories of borrowing, *plu-iH/o- and
>> *plo:Ga/u- remain just a pair of lookalikes, not
>> cognates, whether inherited or borrowed.

> In that case, we could recurr to Afrasian *pVlaX- 'to
> split, to cut', as Vennemann did.

And if you can't 'explain the formal details and correlate
them with the trajectories of borrowing', you're no better
off: you're just exchanging one look-alike for another.

>> Given the attested pattern of vowel substitution between
>> Germanic and Slavic (*o: -> *u), Slavic *plugU is likely
>> to be a loan from Germanic rather than the other way
>> round. I don't pretend to know its ultimate source, but I
>> prefer to admit my ignorance on matter this than to patch
>> it up with so-so stories.

> I'd call this the ostrich approach.

Which is one of the reasons that you're not actually doing
linguistics: you're the linguistic counterpart of a von
Däniken or one of the Pyramidiots and can't tell (or don't
care about) the difference between a just-so story and a
closely reasoned, well-argued case.

(And your just-so stories aren't nearly so entertaining as
Edo Nyland's!)

>>> IMHO these Germanic-Afrasian (especially Semitic)
>>> isoglosses must reflect the languages spoken in Central
>>> Europe Neolithic.

>> I can see what your opinion is, but it still looks
>> completely unfounded.

> Why so?

For the obvious reason that no evidence for it is
apparent. You've certainly offered none.