Personal Pronouns

[Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen]

On Sat, 1 May 1999, Patrick C. Ryan wrote:

[...]
> What is so "intangible" about supposing that *te is the basal form, that
> there was an inflection - *-wV which produced -*twe, and that the original
> significance of -*twe being lost, both forms came into use as bases for
> other forms but with a bias towards the form with -*wV for the nominative
> (through its former topical use): -*tu/u:?

That you have to postulate a change before you even start. You are
disqualifying the evidence which points in a different direction than you
want to go. And it is _very_ unsatisfactory to have the preform of *swe
'oneself, sich' be a nominative.

[...]

> > [On Gk. mo:^mar : amu:'mo:n as reflecting *mwoH-/*muH-:]
[...]
> > And, are you asserting, that IE *mow(V)- could *not* result in Gk. mo:{^}-?

Of course I am.

> <snip>

> Whether you agree with my reasons for those assumptions or not, until I find
> better reasons, and make other assumptions, I will have to stick to what I
> have said.

That may be a very basic difference of attitude. Look, I would change _my_
assumptions even if I had come up with _no_ reasons of my own, but only
saw that _yours_ were good. Are you rejecting the dialectic ideal of
scholarly progress?

Jens