[Ads-l] "The root of all languages"

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

Back in March 2014 Stephen Goranson located some excellent citations
establishing a connection between the notion of "absence of evidence
is not evidence of absence" and Dugald Bell in 1895. On the same
thread I shared a precursor in 1891.

http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2014-March/131658.html

If you are updating probabilities using a Bayesian strategy then I
think this principle may not hold. (It depends on your framework of
assumptions.)

Garson


On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 8:48 AM, Jonathan Lighter
<wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "The root of all languages"
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>
> Absence of evidence is not *proof* of absence.
>
> But if you've been looking unsuccessfully  for evidence, absence of
> evidence can be very good evidence of absence.
>
> JL.
>
>
>
> On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 3:08 AM, W Brewer <brewerwa at gmail.com> wrote:
>
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>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       W Brewer <brewerwa at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: "The root of all languages"
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> GSN: There's no evidence of bandanas or jai alai cestas in Cro Magnon
>> excavations. So there's that...
>> LH: Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
>> WB: Yes, we have no bandanas.
>>
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