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<DIV>Rob,</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Re:</DIV>
<DIV>RF> does the study of language have to be divided up in the ways you describe?</DIV>
<DIV><BR>Of course not. I was providing a framework in which to ask a question, namely, what is the purpose of your proposal? </DIV>
<DIV> Is it to further the study of language? To develop methods of implementing NL processors? </DIV>
<DIV>To form the basis for new formalisms useful in both contexts? To develop new types of corpus annotation? Or?</DIV>
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<DIV>And that was just to get at (i.e. pin down) what you are actually suggesting. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Perhaps another way of getting there is via another question: </DIV>
<DIV>given that you have an idea in mind that you seem to think is new, how would you pursue it? </DIV>
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<DIV>That words, meanings, and the contexts in which they occur are interdependent is well known. </DIV>
<DIV>What new approach are you proposing to deal with that fact? People have been struggling over it for</DIV>
<DIV>years, on both theoretical and practical levels?</DIV>
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<DIV>RB>Your comments conjure in me a rather odd picture of science where </DIV>
<DIV>> we assume everything which can be known, is already know, and it </DIV>
<DIV>> only remains to select what we want to do with that knowledge. </DIV>
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<DIV>I can't imagine how you conjured up that picture.</DIV>
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<DIV>RB> I think the idea of "informal grammar" is a muddle too. I don't think grammar is "informal", I think it is "necessarily incomplete".</DIV>
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<DIV>OK, I thought it was your term. But, and as you have been advised many times, everyone knows the latter.</DIV>
<DIV>The observation that "Any grammar leaks" is a very old one. I used to think it was by Jane Robinson, but I've recently seen</DIV>
<DIV>an attribution to Sapir.</DIV>
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<DIV>Paula</DIV></BODY></HTML>