PIE vs. Proto-World (Proto-Language)

[Rick Mc Callister]

	Unless you're saying that language arose in the last 100,000 years
[i.e. before humans left Africa], then I don't think you can make a serious
claim that there are any true isolates. Basque and Burushaski are surely
related to other languages but the lumpers are going to have to work a lot
harder to prove it.
	My understanding is that language arose before humans left Africa,
so any claims of polygenesis would have to be examined among African
languages. Given that the only existing language families in Africa are
Niger-Kordofanian, Nilo-Saharan, Afro-Asiatic and the Khoisan languages
[which may be between 1and 5 families], it seems that the onus of proof is
on the polygenesists.

[snip]

>Ralf-Stefan wrote:

>> And, if I may insert this much to Pat's chagrin, the notion that human
>> language is a monogenetic phenomenon is aprioristic ideology. Even the
>> notion that every known language, as Basque, Burushaski or whatnot, has to
>> be related to some other language is ideology. "Having consonants" may be a
>> universal feature of human language, "Being related to some other lg."
>> simply is not.

>Pat responds:

>There is no *tangible* way for us to ever know whether languages arose
>monogenetically or polygenetically however most linguists, even when they
>deny its recoverability, have correctly weighed the odds of mono- vs.
>polygenesis, and subscribe to monogenesis. If a probablistically calculated
>hypothesis is "ideology", then everything done in historical linguistics is
>"ideology".

[snip]

Rick Mc Callister
W-1634
Mississippi University for Women
Columbus MS 39701