Pat:
>"I am including Proto-Language forms in the examples I discuss. I am not
>going to argue for a wider inclusion of language-families
>with Nostratic into a higher grouping in this essay. I would hope
>that those who reject such an idea a priori would regard >the
>Proto-Language forms as simply pre-Nostratic."
Hoping is irrelevant. The important question is whether the method
in which you reconstruct your Nostratic or Proto-World
terms is a logical one. Made-up cognates aren't proper components
in this logical method. I'm glad you have opened your
reconstructions up for debate. I hope you can accept the arguements
against them and play nice...
... AND SO I EXPLICITLY ASK YOU TO STOP THE INSULTS IF WE
ARE TO DEBATE IN RATIONAL FASHION...
This is my critique of your six reconstructions
(Une 'tite indice: "cinq" veut dire "five" et non "six").
These critiques have no bearing on you personally and should not
be seen as a personal attack (even if I may be very tempted) so
please discontinue the unneeded remarks:
1) The use of double asterisk means that a form is unattested,
or rather "guessed at". You write S "**gin-na (n.) 'child'"
which ironically disqualifies Sumerian altogether. Bomhard
lists /gan/ without double asterisk.
Showing all the grades of an IE root is redundant and
it would simply suffice to write PIE *g^en-. However, there
is nothing invalid about this root.
You have Dravidian *ken.- and yet Bomhard lists *kan-.
There is incongruence here that needs to be explained.
As for AA, Bomhard lists *k?an- with initial velar ejective.
You have no such ejective present here and yet you continue
to reconstruct an ejective for Nostratic anyway! If Nost *k?
becomes AA *k, one wonders what Nostratic phoneme becomes
AA *k? or rather what conditions cause *k? to become *k in
one instance and *k? in another.
Overall, there are sound correspondance issues and
cognate credibility issues that need to be resolved before
asserting that this is a valid Nostratic item. Only two
forms (IE and AA) seem to truely exist here at all.
2) Again, it would suffice to write simply IE *ger-.
To include Uralic and Dravidian forms here, you must first
explain away the *-k- endings. (Bomhard doesn't do a good
job of this either).
There are two problems with this root however. First is that
it is onomatopoeic and thus untrustworthy. Second is that
the word, if existant, is only present in Bomhard's
Eurasiatic branch of Nostratic, meaning that this can hardly
be claimed to be a _Nostratic_ word.
3) The IE root is incorrectly written. It is not *ger- but
*g^er-, unless you're going for the uvular model (*g^ = *g
and *g = *g.).
You then write "PAA *kar- 'to (re)turn'" with unsettling
use of parentheses. There is a large semantic leap between
"return" and "turn". Not very likely.
For your Uralic cognate, please define "limited distribution".
Limited how? Limited only in FinnoUgric? If so, then it is
to be written with PFU and not PU. You can't reconstruct
a Uralic form "based on Finnic-Samic".
So, for this one, we have an AA form with bad semantics,
and a Uralic form that may not even be Uralic!
4) For your fourth reconstruction, incorrectly labeled as "3",
IE *g^er- is used a second time, and again incorrectly
written as *ger-.
The AA form is reused yet again to prove a different root
and STILL we have the problem of the large semantic rift
between "return" and "turn", cleverly fused with parentheses.
The Sumerian and Altaic forms are the same presented by
Bomhard under #239.
The reusage of the same terms for 4) as with 3) smells of
smoke and mirrors.
5) (Incorrectly labeled "4") Again, please just write
*ghebhel-. Even the amateur IEists are fully aware that
the other grade forms are implied. Bomhard's #219 is
a weak claim. I suspect this *ghebhel- form is merely
Germanic at best. I'd be surprised if it could be said
to be IE. Any thoughts on this from the peanut gallery? :)
What is surprising for the AA form is that we now see that
Nostratic *k?- is supposed to become AA *k- while *k?x-
is supposed to become a voiced *g (??).
Even just one asterisk on Sumerian forms disqualifies them
and so, as for *kap, it's off to the city dump with it.
Here we have a suspect "IE" form, a suspect reflex of *k?x-
in AA, and a suspect "reconstruction" for an already written
language!
6) (Written as "5") Absolutely nothing wrong with the IE forms
aside from the usual grade-form overkill.
Again *k?x- becomes AA *g- which just strikes me as odd and
incongruent with the typical phonology given for AA, which
includes all the things we see for Nostratic (ejectives,
voiced stops, voiceless stops). In other words, the twisting
sound correspondances don't explain the AA phonology very
well.
With Dravidian, you seem confused about your own sound
correspondances. Do you want to present *ci:r- or *ker-?
Even then, it's not **ker- at all. It's *kir- according
to Bomhard. Does *k?x- become Dr *c or Dr *k?? If you're
unsure, how can you possibly expect people visiting your
site to accept your work?
Altaic has a weird *-ga suffix that goes unexplained.
Parentheses are being used in a suspicious manner for the
Sumerian forms. Is the "(i)" just another whim on the part
of Patrick or is it actually there?
Here, the IE form is alright but the rest is very iffy.
- gLeN
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