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There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Eco's Serendipities: was Nomothete
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2. OT: Way OT - audio perception experiment
From: Sai Emrys <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3. Re: German style orthography
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4. Re: html advice (drat!)
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
5. Rejected posting to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: "L-Soft list server at Brown University (1.8d)" <[EMAIL
PROTECTED]>
6. Your message to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: "L-Soft list server at Brown University (1.8d)" <[EMAIL
PROTECTED]>
7. Re: most looked-up words
From: Roger Mills <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
8. Re: most looked-up words
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
9. Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
10. Re: most looked-up words
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
11. Re: most looked-up words
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
12. Re: most looked-up words
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
13. Re: The Need for Debate
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
14. Re: html advice (drat!)
From: Roger Mills <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
15. Re: The Need for Debate
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
16. Re: Sk�lansk - History and Babel text
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
17. Re: nomothete
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
18. Ladino verb paradigm question
From: Isaac Penzev <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
19. Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
20. Re: The Need for Debate
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
21. Re: most looked-up words
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
22. CHAT: Weird mergers in your idiolect ...
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
23. Re: Ladino verb paradigm question
From: Mike Ellis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
24. Re: CHAT: Weird mergers in your idiolect ...
From: Chris Bates <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
25. Re: USAGE: Vowel recordings
From: "Adrian Morgan (aka Flesh-eating Dragon)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 1
Date: Mon, 6 Dec 2004 23:14:11 -0500
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Eco's Serendipities: was Nomothete
Apparently, Eco uses the word Nomothete again, in his book Serendipities,
which apparently (I haven't looked at it yet) copies a lot of what he wrote
in Search for the Perfect Language. Here's what one reviewer wrote about
it, uncritical, it seems, of Eco's use of the word:
"The second essay - Languages in Paradise - of the five has the greatest
capacity for disagreement. Eco opens by stating that Adam was the Nomothete
yet claims that his use of the name Eve "is evident that we are dealing with
names that are not arbitrary". This effectively contradicts the concept that
Adam was nomothete, as a name-giver ascribes name first and meaning is a
resultant. Either Adam was nomothete or, if he was not, then the names he
gave were intrinsically correct. They cannot be both. A further question
arose in that perhaps we are newly attempting to reach a primal language
rather than return to one - to create, if you wish, a nomothete when we have
a single universal language."
Here's what Muke said:
>>
I wrote:
> Is Eco using the word incorrectly? I've always understood this to mean
> nomos + theticos. Is there any context outside of Eco's use of it here
> where this word means giving the name?
Yes. In Plato's dialogue "Cratylus" it is used it this way.
<< Socrates:
Perhaps, then, one artisan of names will be good, and another bad?
Cratylus:
Yes.
Socrates:
The name of such an artisan was lawgiver? [nomoqeths]
Cratylus:
Yes. >>
I seem to remember a detailed discussion in there of how the nomothete,
if a good one, will assign good sounds to the right words, (e.g., "rho",
a flowing sound, will go in words that pertain to fluid motion) but I'm
not sure where exactly it is right now.
But it seems that you're not the only one to think it a mistake, as
apparently "onomatothete" [onomatoqeths] was often written as a correction
of this word.
<<
Me:
Thank you, Muke! THANK YOU!
There are a bunch of questions on the Internet asking about the rightness of
Eco's use of this word, and I found a pdf. file exam preparation sheet for a
class on language and philosophy that uses Nomothete as Socrates does above.
Is this from the Loebs classics? Would I be able to find this passage with
a facing page translation of the Greek?
firrimby! firrimby!
Sally
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Message: 2
Date: Mon, 6 Dec 2004 20:41:17 -0800
From: Sai Emrys <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: OT: Way OT - audio perception experiment
Howdy.
I'm doing a research project to test a theory mentioned in my Music
108M class (UC Berkeley) - that, if you hear a sequence of sounds with
ABBABBABBABB... <i>exactly</i> the same spacing, the As being louder
than Bs, you'll perceive the As as coming "early". I'd appreciate some
help as test subjects.
The web page is cross-platform, though you'll need Windows Media
Player in some form. (Many thanks to <lj user="pigrew"> for making
it!)
Please go to http://diploid.med.unc.edu/~t98502/sai/ , and follow the
instructions. It's pretty simple, and I hope my explanations are
clear. You listen to the beeps, and click the link that's appropriate.
Do *not* reload pages; click the links, or go back to the root; if you
reload, it skews the votes for your last trial.
There is purposely no "equal" answer. Choose whichever you think is
closest - even if it's marginal or unsure - and if you think it's
really dead equal, just choose randomly. Bias will come up in the
statistics.
Do as many reps as you are willing to. It's random from a pool of 120.
(Gain from -6 to +6, 1dB increments, by pause 150ms to 250ms, 10ms
increments.) The number says 20, but if you're willing to do more
reps, it'd certainly be appreciated. I will need on the order of 1200
samples, and I have ~430 now.
If you're curious, the stats are at
http://diploid.med.unc.edu/~t98502/sai/stats. Columns: longer (1) /
shorter (-1); gain difference; pause (.2 is the baseline); IP;
timestamp.
Thanks for your help!
If you're interested in the results, I'll post them within a week on
my journal (http://www.livejournal.com/~saizai).
________________________________________________________________________
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Message: 3
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 07:00:07 +0100
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: German style orthography
On Mon, 6 Dec 2004 11:48:51 +0100, Philip Newton
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> (plosives)
> /p/ p
> /b/ b
> /t/ t
> /d/ d
> /k/ k
> /g/ g
> /q/ q
> (nasals)
> /m/ m
> /n/ n
> /N/ ng
> (fricatives)
> /P/ f
> /B/ w
> /T/ �
lower-case thorn
> /D/ d
d-with-stroke (as in Croatian), though I suspect Icelandic "eth" may
have been intended to match with the Icelandic "thorn"
> /s/ s
> /s_m/ sh
> /z/ S
"long s" (looks like an f without the cross-bar)
> /z_m/ Sh
long-s + h
> /C/ ch
> /j\/ jh
> /x/ χ
Greek chi
> /X/ h
h-bar, as in Maltese (aka "h with stroke")
> /h/ h
> (laterals)
> /l/ l
> /L/ l
l with stroke, as in Polish
> (approximate)
> /j/ j
> (rhotic)
> /rR\)/ (This is a simultaneous r and R\... it is fun
> to pronounce.) r
> (affricatives)
> /tT)/ t�
t + thorn
> /dD)/ dd
t + d-bar (or t + edh?)
> /ts)/ z
> /dz)/ ds
> /tC)/ tch
> /dj\)/ dj
> /kx)/ kχ
k + chi
> /qX)/ qh
q + h-bar
> ("whistlized")
> /s_m_W/ (_W represents "whistlization") sch�
> /z_m_W/ sh�
> /C_W/ ch�
> /j\_W/ j�
> /x_W/ ch�
> /t_W/ t�
> /d_W/ d�
> /k_W/ k�
> /g_W/ g�
These are all consonant(s) + u-umlaut
> Vowels are:
>
> /i/ ie
> /I/ i
> /e/ e
> /&/ �
a-umlaut
> /@/ �
e-"umlaut" (i.e. e with two dots on it)
> /u/ u
> /O/ o
> /A/ a
>
> [...]
>
> The suggestions I posted for the whistled consonants are mistaken. The
> following are consistent:
>
> /z_m_W/ Sh�
long-s + h + u-umlaut
> /x_W/ χü
chi + u-umlaut
> gryəsː
g + r + y + shwa + s + IPA lengthening mark (looks like a colon but
with two triangles on top of one another rather than round dots)
> j. 'mach' wust
Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Watch the Reply-To!
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Message: 4
Date: Mon, 6 Dec 2004 23:59:33 -0600
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: html advice (drat!)
Roger Mills wrote:
> Would someone please take a look at
> http://cinduworld.tripod.com/supplement.htm
>
> Under the entry "la�-la�" (no doubt of interest per se), I successfully got
> the velar nasal to appear, but the glottal stop (near the end of the entry)
> doesn't show up on my browser (which uses Times New Roman I guess, which
> doesn't have a ? character, no doubt the problem). What must I do to have
> it show up correctly?)
It looks fine in Mozilla. You might need to download a font that
includes the ʔ character, if you don't have one (Gentium is one that
goes well with Times New Roman). IE has some difficulty with IPA
characters (at least older versions had problems; I don't know if the
newer ones work any better.) I have my IE font set to Thryomanes, but I
only use it when a page won't work with Mozilla for one reason or another.
> You'll note, I have specified UTF-8 in the heading.
> Must I specify a font or font-family?? (If so, I'd prefer something like
> Times New Roman if possible-- i.e with serifs).
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
You shouldn't have to specify a font with modern browsers. But Gentium
(available for free from SIL) is a good choice.
http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&cat_id=FontDownloadsGentium
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Message: 5
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:10:56 -0500
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Message: 6
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:10:55 -0500
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Subject: Your message to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Message: 7
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:30:04 -0500
From: Roger Mills <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
Tristan McLeay wrote:
> And Rosta wrote:
>
> >http://www.merriam-webster.com/info/04words.htm
> >
> >lists the top 10 words most looked up in the online dictionary
> >(excluding hard-to-spell words like _accommodate_ and words
> >whose tabooness imparts a frisson to their looking up).
> >
> >1. blog
> >2. incumbent
> >3. electoral
> >4. insurgent
> >5. hurricane
> >6. cicada
> >7. peloton : noun (1951) : the main body of riders in a bicycle race
> >8. partisan
> >9. sovereignty
> >10. defenestration
> >
Where have these people been for the last 12 months? :-(((
> >For most of the entries it's easy to see why they're on the list,
> >but _cicada_, _peloton_ (a word wholly new to me) and
> >_defenestration_ perplex me. Perhaps in my habitual failure to
> >heed the News, I have missed major stories on these topics?
> >
Cicadas (sometimes called "17-year locusts") were in the news here in the US
over the summer, when one of the huge 17-year swarms emerged (mainly on the
East Coast, NYC-Washington area, so of course that made them newsworthy).
Peloton in connection with the Tour de France?? New to me, too..... Our
public radio news also mentioned the frequency of "defenestration" the other
day, and I was surprised too. Have those crazy Czechs been at it again?
>
> I imagination 'defenestration' found it's way because it's such a cool
> word, who else would've thought there'd be a word for throwing things
> out of windows?
>
> >At any rate, I will wager that no conlang has words for all 10.
> >My conlang has no word for any of the 10. But one supersized
> >all-American kudo to the conlang with the words for the most
> >of the 10...
> >
Alas, Kash has only _yanjakrum_ (n.anim.) hurricane, typhoon (compd. of
wind+destroy). I guess I could create "electoral" quickly enough. Otherwise,
Kash political life is pretty humdrum. As for "incumbent", I'm thinking that
some legislative jobs (certainly small-town councils, and ward or
neighborhood councils in cities, maybe even the national legislature) are by
lot, like jury duty-- you're called, and by gum, you serve........
>
> Also, ten points to anyone who can tell me what a 'kudo' is.
At the risk of correcting And, IIRC it should be _kudos_ (is Greek, no?,
plural kudoi?); though we seem to treat it as sing. kudo pl. kudos. It
seems to mean, generally, "compliments"-- e.g. "Tristan's conlang has
received kudos from everyone"-- perhaps sometimes prize or reward??
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Message: 8
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 07:38:23 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
Quoting John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Tristan Mc Leay scripsit:
>
> > I imagination 'defenestration' found it's way because it's such a cool
> > word, who else would've thought there'd be a word for throwing things
> > out of windows?
>
> It also has an additional sense nowadays, not yet recognized by general
> dictionaries: "to remove Windows from a computer and replace it with
> a libre operating system."
The first thing I heard this usage, I thought the poor soul had thrown his
computer out of the window in frustration. I still think it _should_ mean that
with reference to computers.
Andreas
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Message: 9
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:40:02 -0500
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
----- Original Message -----
From: "Muke Tever" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> On Mon, 6 Dec 2004 19:13:07 -0500, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote:
>> Is Eco using the word incorrectly? I've always understood this to mean
>> nomos + theticos. Is there any context outside of Eco's use of it here
>> where this word means "giving the name"?
>
> Yes. In Plato's dialogue "Cratylus" it is used it this way.
>
> << Socrates:
> Perhaps, then, one artisan of names will be good, and another bad?
> Cratylus:
> Yes.
> Socrates:
> The name of such an artisan was lawgiver? [nomoqeths]
> Cratylus:
> Yes. >>
>
> I seem to remember a detailed discussion in there of how the nomothete,
> if a good one, will assign good sounds to the right words, (e.g., "rho",
> a flowing sound, will go in words that pertain to fluid motion) but I'm
> not sure where exactly it is right now.
Okay, I've had a look at this. With great good fortune, I found my Loeb
Classic Cratylus, and I have transliterated the Greek (probably badly) so
the rest of you can see it (who need transliterations, as I do, for
clarity). And I see here that he uses three compounds: nomothetus (for
"lawgiver"), onomatourgon, for "name-giver or crafter," and onoma thesthai,
"to give or bestow names." Here's the Greek with Fowler's translation:
Sorry for the lack of diacritical marks; perhaps Greek experts can correct
me:
Socrates: Ar ouchi o nomos dokei soi o paradidous aura?
"And do you not think it is the law (nomos) that gives them to us?"
Hermogenes: "Very likely."
Socrates: Nomothetou ara ergo chresetai o didaskalikos, otan onomati
chrestai?
"Then the teacher, when he uses a name, will be using the work (ergo) of a
lawgiver (nomothetou)?"
(i.e., "lawgiver's work (acc) would use a teacher (nom), when he uses a
name"??)
Hermogenes: "I think so."
Socrates: Nomothetus de soi dokei pas einai aner e o ten techne echon?
"Do you think every man is a lawgiver, or only he who has the skill?"
(I don't know how this sentence is structured, except that Nomothetus is
nominative. What is dokei?)
Hermogenes: "He who has the skill."
Socrates: Ouk ara pantos andros, O Ermogenes, onoma thesthai, alla tinos
onomatourgon outos d'estin, os eolken, o nomothetus, os de ton demiourgon
spaniotatos en anthropois gignetai.
"Then it is not for every man, Hermogenes, to give names (onoma thesthai),
but for him who may be called the name-maker (onomatourgon); and he, it
appears, is the lawgiver (nomothetus), who is of all the artisans among men
the rarest."
(This seems like an argument for prescriptive grammarians!)
What this tells me is that the Greek word for lawgiver has become conflated
or confused with onomatourgon, simply because of the identification of the
lawgiver with the namegiver. But technically, nomothete is "law-giver" and
"onomatothete" or "onomatourge" is "namegiver."
My question is this: should I follow Eco in this identification or should I
challenge him? Do you know of any others besides Eco that use nomothete as
"namegiver" or is he alone in this identification? Is it European? Is it a
"Greek" thing? a "Plato" thing? I see in the following pages that
"lawgiver" has now supplanted the term "name creator": "Then, my dear
friend, must not the lawgiver also know how to embody in the sounds and
syllables that name which is fitted by nature for each object?" etc. etc.
"Must he not make and give all his names with his eye fixed upon the
absolute or ideal name, if he is to an authoritative giver of names?
(onomaton thetes)" No, I guess I'm wrong. But the identification is
certainly there. Any others want to weigh in on this?
Wow, this is a fabulous text for the conlanger. I've been silly to overlook
it
> But it seems that you're not the only one to think it a mistake, as
> apparently "onomatothete" [onomatoqeths] was often written as a correction
> of this word.
Technically, the correctors are right, though. Look at the text.
Sally
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Message: 10
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 00:43:37 -0600
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
From: Tristan Mc Leay <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> I imagination 'defenestration' found it's way because it's such a cool
> word, who else would've thought there'd be a word for throwing things
> out of windows?
My question is: was the word actually invited for the most famous
instance of that act in 1618 igniting the Thirty Years' War? I suppose
one could rather easily discover the truth by looking in the OED, for
English citations at least. I suppose the word was originally coined
in Latin.
> Also, ten points to anyone who can tell me what a 'kudo' is.
_kudo_ [k_hudo/@u] is a backformation from _kudos_ [k_hudo/@uz](pl.),
which is itself a reanalysis of Greek _kudos_ [ku:dOs] 'glory', which
is usually said to originate in British schoolboy slang.
==========================================================================
Thomas Wier "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637
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Message: 11
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 07:46:15 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
Quoting John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Mark Reed scripsit:
>
> > (*) Similarly, the sandwich formed by wrapping up a mostly-lamb meat
> > mixture in a pita is pretty universally referred to as "a gyro"
> > /'ji.ro/ in the US, despite the singularity of the source "gyros".
>
> I more often hear /'dzairo/, as if it were the word "gyro" = "gyroscope".
In Germany, it seems to be pronounced as /ji:ros/ with such regularity that one
wonders if someone has carried out a massive educational campaign in modern
Greek orthography.
I rarely see the stuff in Sweden, but I suppose most people who use the word at
all say /jy:ros/.
Andreas
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Message: 12
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:49:31 -0500
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
----- Original Message -----
From: "And Rosta" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> At any rate, I will wager that no conlang has words for all 10.
> My conlang has no word for any of the 10. But one supersized
> all-American kudo to the conlang with the words for the most
> of the 10...
And what if we cheat?
:P No, really, Teonaht boasts only two: karrenda ganddon, "huge
whirlwind" (for "hurricane"), randoahtle, "kingliness" (for
"sovereignty"--not the closest match), and three if you want to stretch it:
tsyttsytsa for "cricket." Since cicada can also mean cricket in Latin. :)
Actually, tree-cricket, so it's a stretch. Tsytsytsa etont: "tree cricket."
There.
And didn't we have a recent Conlang Relay where somebody or something got
thrown out of a window? :)
Sally
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________________________________________________________________________
Message: 13
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 00:56:54 -0600
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
From: Chris Bates <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> I guess I was just thinking of things like galileo and the church when I
> talked of the church and state preventing debate. :)
This particular episode is actually considerably more complicated
than the vast majority of people make it out to be. The short
answer is that it's an incoherent statement, because Galileo
had both opponents and supporters within the Church, and that
it had more to do with who was proclaiming doctrine than whether
doctrines were false.
> But I certainly got the impression from my teacher in
> school that the church especially supressed progress for centuries,
> indeed I'm sure he gave this as the reason why there was so little
> advancement in a lot of areas.
This is something of a caricature of the position that opponents
of the Church (then and today) had. The fact is that the vast
majority of the scientific and philosophical remains from antiquity
were *exclusively* handled, preserved, and, where possible, improved
upon, by Church officials in most parts of Europe for the better part
of a thousand years. There were *no* nonreligious intellectual
institutions for this entire period. The fact that they didn't get
very far says much more about the extent to which Western Europe had
lost contact with antique culture during the Dark Ages: they simply
didn't have much to go on. Aristotle's teachings were almost unknown
in Western Europe until the Spanish reconquista made some headway and
Moorish libraries were translated and digested under the likes of
Archbishop Raymond of Toledo. As Ray has already noted, this spawned
great debates, so great in fact that a papal bull was issued in 1272
and again in 1277 banning certain topics of debate in the University
of Paris (not, notably, banning them in general), not so much to
suppress dissent (the Pope himself had taught there and was a moderate
theologically IIRC), but to keep tempers to a manageable level.
> There's also often the problem of
> perspective: for instance, the "barbarians" (Goths, Vandals etc) who
> eroded the roman empire near the end. Were they really that bad? Was
> there nothing important that was good to say about them?
Well, yes and no. By the late Empire, the Romans had themselves become
so debased in terms of cultural sophistication that it was scarcely
possible to distinguish them -- especially as barbarians had been
highly Romanized, as with Stilicho.
==========================================================================
Thomas Wier "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637
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Message: 14
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:57:38 -0500
From: Roger Mills <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: html advice (drat!)
I wrote:
> Would someone please take a look at
> http://cinduworld.tripod.com/supplement.htm
>
..entry "la�-la�"-- and complained because my browser displayed the [N] but
not the glottal stop.) Anyhow, I added some <font> tags, which now works for
me, but I wonder if I've screwed up other people???? Maybe I should just
stick to CXS..........
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Message: 15
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 07:36:11 +0000
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
On Monday, December 6, 2004, at 08:34 , Chris Bates wrote:
> I guess I was just thinking of things like galileo and the church when I
> talked of the church and state preventing debate. :)
Ah! But Galileo (1564 - 1642) is most certainly post-Medieval, especially
in Italy where the Renaissance had been underway for a hundred years or so
before Galileo was born :)
Galileo's problem was that he was born during the Reformation when debate
on both sides of the religious divide was not exactly encouraged.
Dissenting in Calvin's Geneva was at least as dangerous as dissenting in
Catholic Rome.
Before Galileo was even a twinkle in his father's eye:
- Luther had nailed up his Thirty Nine Theses and the Reformation had got
under way,
- Henry VIII had broken with Rome, married Anne Boleyn and executed her;
- Calvin had established a Presbyterian theocracy in Geneva;
- the Council of Trent had begun.
It was, alas, a time of entrenched positions which ain't good for open
debate. But the medievals were great debaters.
[snip]
> read up on it. But I certainly got the impression from my teacher in
> school that the church especially supressed progress for centuries,
> indeed I'm sure he gave this as the reason why there was so little
> advancement in a lot of areas. *shrugs* I think there's always the
> problem of propaganda in history: old lies develop strong roots and then
> its very difficult to get rid of them.
Exactly. It sounds very much like the teaching we got when I was at school
in the 1950s. I thought things had moved on - but it seems not. I am
absolutely certain that my parents had no intention of lying to me about
what Catholics do and believe, but they were way off the mark as I
discovered when I converted. I'm sure most of my teachers were speaking in
good faith, but as you say "old lies develop strong roots and then its
very difficult to get rid of them."
> There's also often the problem of
> perspective: for instance, the "barbarians" (Goths, Vandals etc) who
> eroded the roman empire near the end. Were they really that bad? Was
> there nothing important that was good to say about them?
Yes, particularly the Goths.
> Surely there
> was something more to them than going around killing romans and creating
> chaos. But I've never heard anything about them apart from that fact.
They don't figure much in school history. But have a browse in the history
section of a good bookshop, or visit Amazon. My son who lives in south
Wales is keen on medieval history and related periods & has quite a few
interesting books. I'm afraid I don't remember any titles. But it shouldn'
t be too difficult to track down some stuff.
> Their claim to fame for most people is as destroyers.
...which as you say is rather one-sided and negative. The same with the
Vikings - ask most people about Vikings and you will told about helmets
with horns and pillaging & raping. In fact AFAIK there is no evidence for
horned helmets - it is IIRC due to a fanciful illustration in some
Victorian history book - and they did actually settle and develop quite
civilized communities, for example, at Jorvik (York), in Iceland &
elsewhere,
> That was a little random, but I often tend to ramble. :)
Well, why not? :)
Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
===============================================
Anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight,
which is not so much a twilight of the gods
as of the reason." [JRRT, "English and Welsh" ]
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Message: 16
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 08:36:38 +0100
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Sk�lansk - History and Babel text
On Mon, 6 Dec 2004 19:14:07 -0500, Pascal A. Kramm <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> There are some other nifty features, like VSO syntax (which is pretty rare),
It's used in at least some Polynesian languages -- e.g. Niuean is
arguably VSO (if you don't consider it ergative, in which case it's
VAP).
> * It was decided to put the verb at the beginning, followed by subject
> and object, since this structure was not found in any other known languages.
I think OSV is the rarest word order, with few known natlangs using it.
Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Watch the Reply-To!
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Message: 17
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 08:45:00 +0100
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: nomothete
On Mon, 6 Dec 2004 22:29:57 -0500, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Then what is -thete? "placer?"
Something like that, I'd say.
> from Greek tithenai, "to put"?
Yup. As far as I know, yes.
Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Watch the Reply-To!
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Message: 18
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 09:42:51 +0200
From: Isaac Penzev <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Ladino verb paradigm question
Hi ppl,
can somebody point me to a sample paradigm of a regular verb in Ladino? I
need to see it so that I could make final tuning of Ajami conjugation.
Regards,
-- Yitzik
P.S. Happy Chanukah to whom it may concern!
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Message: 19
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 08:51:52 +0100
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:40:02 -0500, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Socrates: Nomothetus de soi dokei pas einai aner e o ten techne echon?
> "Do you think every man is a lawgiver, or only he who has the skill?"
> (I don't know how this sentence is structured, except that Nomothetus is
> nominative. What is dokei?)
My 0.5 cents:
"dokei" = "to seem", I think... "dokei soi" = "it seems to you
that...; you think (opine, consider, hold) that ..." (soi, of course,
being the dative of the 2sg personal pronoun.)
So you have the verb "einai" (to be) with the two complements "pas
aner" (every man) and "nomothet�s" (lawgiver).
The second bit being "�" = "or" followed by "ho t�n techn� ech�n" =
"the the skill having" = "the one having the skill".
Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Watch the Reply-To!
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Message: 20
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 09:04:51 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
Quoting Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> ...which as you say is rather one-sided and negative. The same with the
> Vikings - ask most people about Vikings and you will told about helmets
> with horns and pillaging & raping. In fact AFAIK there is no evidence for
> horned helmets - it is IIRC due to a fanciful illustration in some
> Victorian history book - and they did actually settle and develop quite
> civilized communities, for example, at Jorvik (York), in Iceland &
> elsewhere,
Horned helmets was used back in the bronze age, in both Scandinavia and the
British Isles. There seems to be no evidence that actual vikings used them,
tho.
Presumably they were part of formal attire rather than for combat - they're
rather big and clumsy.
One shouldn't make blanket statements whether the Vikings were destructive or
not; _some_ certainly were mere destroyers, pillagers and killers, who
civilization would have done better without; others were constructive, setting
up cities and trade routes. And, of course, most Scandinavians of the period
weren't Vikings at all.
Andreas
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Message: 21
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 08:56:48 +0100
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 07:46:15 +0100, Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> In Germany, it seems to be pronounced as /ji:ros/ with such regularity that
> one
> wonders if someone has carried out a massive educational campaign in modern
> Greek orthography.
I don't know; I hear /"giros/ ["gi:\ROs] quite bit.
Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Watch the Reply-To!
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Message: 22
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 10:33:48 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: CHAT: Weird mergers in your idiolect ...
I was just reflecting on the fact that in my idiolect, [hA:t] can be i) the noun
_hat_ "hate", and ii) the contraction _ha't_=_ha det_, lit "have it", short for
_ha det bra_, lit "have it good", a farewell phrase signifying "have a good
time till we see one another again". Now, for syntactical reasons, confusion is
unlikely, but it's rather odd anyway.
Got any similar ones in your idiolect? Or in your conlangs?
Andreas
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Message: 23
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 04:41:37 -0500
From: Mike Ellis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Ladino verb paradigm question
Isaac Penzev wrote:
>Hi ppl,
>can somebody point me to a sample paradigm of a regular verb in Ladino? I
>need to see it so that I could make final tuning of Ajami conjugation.
Found one!
http://www.orbilat.com/Languages/Spanish-Ladino/Grammar/Ladino-Verb-Tenses_Simple.html
Table of contents is at:
http://www.orbilat.com/Languages/Spanish-Ladino/Grammar/index.html
M
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Message: 24
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 10:03:25 +0000
From: Chris Bates <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT: Weird mergers in your idiolect ...
*waits patiently for examples from French to flood the list* The only I
remember from french is... I think, "glass", "earth worm" and "green"
are all the same or very similar aren't they?
>I was just reflecting on the fact that in my idiolect, [hA:t] can be i) the
>noun
>_hat_ "hate", and ii) the contraction _ha't_=_ha det_, lit "have it", short for
>_ha det bra_, lit "have it good", a farewell phrase signifying "have a good
>time till we see one another again". Now, for syntactical reasons, confusion is
>unlikely, but it's rather odd anyway.
>
>Got any similar ones in your idiolect? Or in your conlangs?
>
> Andreas
>
>
>
>
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Message: 25
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 20:59:52 +1030
From: "Adrian Morgan (aka Flesh-eating Dragon)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: USAGE: Vowel recordings
taliesin the storyteller wrote:
> I recommend Praat for this. Complex, but worth it.
> <http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/>
Note that praat doesn't read mp3 files; it wants wav or similar. This
is disappointing because wav files are so big!
Tristan McLaey wrote, quoting myself:
> > I am not aware of any dialect of Australian English in which 'steam'
> > has a diphthong! It's always /sti:m/ as far as I know.
>
> /sti:m/, perhaps, though my sometimes inability to distinguish between
> [i] and [I] without a context suggests otherwise, but certainly not
> [sti:m] for the most part. And this isn't perculiar to Australian
> English either, it's kin in England often have a diphthong. It's
> something like [Ii] or [EMAIL PROTECTED], with the second element being
> dominant.
Glide, certainly, depending somewhat upon the syllable onset. But the
difference between a diphthong and a glide really only boils down to
whether or not the 'diphthong' is present at the phonemic level as
well as the phonetic.
> I think of 'holy' etc. with the 'goatee' vowel being a thing of posh
> old-fashioned British women (or perhaps posh old-fashioned Australian
> women pretending to be British). I didn't realise it was current amongst
> any dialects... Very definitely the 'oldie' vowel for me. On a related
> note, do you distinguish between 'poll' and 'pole' and similar?
No distinction between 'poll' and 'pole'.
I've uploaded another file, which demonstrates the words:
"Holy, wholly, holly"
followed by the sentence:
"This is our purest tour where all our tourists are pure".
http://web.netyp.com/member/dragon/say/vowels2.mp3
> > I've standardised on 96kbps as the resolution for all my mp3 files.
> > It's an adequate resolution for all home use purposes (including music)
> > while also resulting in respectably compact file sizes.
>
> I've found 96 kbps MP3s to be too tiny with all but mid-quality speakers
> for music---most of what I rip is roughly 192 kbps Ogg Vorbis files,
> mostly because that's my software's default. But I spose that's a
> different issue altogether.
With wma files I use 64 kbps because wma is significantly more
efficient than mp3. With mp3 I find that 96 kbps is necessary.
Just to prove I'm not mad, I've uploaded a couple of music samples on
a strictly temporary basis (i.e. they'll be deleted when I see you've
replied to this post). Each sample is approximately twenty seconds
long.
First, an extract from "Across the Waters" by Jimmy Gregory. This is
an mp3 copy of a 64 kbps .wma original.
http://web.netyp.com/member/dragon/temp/WaterSample.mp3
Second, an extract from a song sung in Hebrew. This is an extract from
a 96 kbps .mp3 original.
http://web.netyp.com/member/dragon/temp/ShaarSample.mp3
Now, granted these would not be good quality if played through an
expensive concert-hall speaker to an audience of a thousand, but using
the average sort of speakers associated with a home computer I find
this level of quality fulfils all of my relevant needs.
Adrian.
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