Change and What Remains

[Larry Trask]

On Fri, 24 Sep 1999 X99Lynx at aol.com wrote:

> I wrote:
> <<When was the last time Larry Trask mentioned in a post the phrase
> "the central fact of ceaseless language change" to support any point
> he was making about Basque?  Ever? How could the central fact about
> Basque escape mention?>>

[LT]

> <<Steve, forgive me, but this is just silly.  I have in fact written a
> 500-page book on the history and prehistory of Basque.  I have also made
> frequent references, on this list, to changes in Basque, mainly (though
> not wholly) in response to postings from Roz Frank and Jon Patrick.
> Whatever are you talking about?>>

> Larry, what you know about Basque blows me away every time.  But
> that's not the issue.  The question I asked was <<When was the last
> time Larry Trask mentioned in a post the phrase "the central fact of
> ceaseless language change" to support any point he was making about
> Basque?>> I checked some. Never saw it and you've written a great
> deal about Basque on this list.

Yes, but that's because, in posting to this list, I assume I can take it
for granted that everybody on it is deeply familiar with the fact of
ceaseless language change, so there's no reason to mention it
explicitly.  That is, I see no point in declaring at frequent intervals
"Oh, by the way, folks -- the IE languages have changed an awful lot."
But, in my discussions with you, this point appeared to become
necessary.

> It's a rather specific question.  We're talking about buzz phrases.
> And my point was that you wouldn't use THAT buzz phrase in
> discussing substantive matters where you had material points to
> make.

Sure, because I wouldn't see any need.  And I still object to that term
"buzz phrase", which I consider entirely inappropriate.

> I'll try to tell you why that might be.

> The Antique Roadshow was on PBS the other day and I just happen to
> overhear a fellow from Sotheby's telling the owner of some antigue
> not to worry about what's disappeared in the piece, because "it's
> what remains that counts."

> To say that change is "the central fact" about IE languages is a
> curious thing.  Because if change were the central fact, then you
> wouldn't really be concerned about what "remained."  In studies
> where change IS the central fact - like chaos and fractals and
> random number theory - one never mentions ancestry or "antiquity" or
> cognation.  (On the other hand, "the central fact" when classic
> physics or chemistry looks at change is continuity - i.e., the
> conservation of energy and matter.)

Well, if languages never changed at all, then historical linguistics
could not exist, and we would have nothing to do.  It is the fact that
languages *do* change that is responsible for the existence of
historical linguistics, and for the existence of the problems that make
the field interesting.  As far as my own field of historical linguistics
is concerned, ceaseless change really is the central fact.

> When you talk about the <<the evidence for the antiquity of the
> aspiration in Basque is large and of various kinds>>, you are not
> talking about change. You are talking about what stayed the same.

Well, rather, if *something* doesn't "stay the same" in some rather
vague sense, then the changes can't be identified.  But take an example.
We reconstruct the Pre-Basque word for `wine' as *<ardano>.  Now, this
word is nowhere recorded, because it did not "stay the same" anywhere.
Even so, we can, by applying comparative and internal reconstruction,
conclude very safely that *<ardano> was the original form.

> If you had written "there can be no evidence for the antiquity of
> the aspiration in Basque because the central fact of ceaseless
> change SWEEPS ALL SUCH EVIDENCE AWAY", it would be a different
> story.  But the central fact in your actual statement relates to the
> evidence that remained despite change.

It's not so simple.  We find aspiration in some varieties but no
aspiration in other varieties.  It is not *a priori* obvious which one
of these states of affairs is more conservative -- in fact, it's not
even certain that either of them is more conservative, since it could be
that both represent independent developments of an original system
different from both.  However, in this case our understanding of the
principles of change, and of the principles of the study of change,
leads us to conclude that the aspiration is conservative -- though not
*maximally* conservative, since it is possible to show that certain
instances of the aspiration arose in words which had, still earlier,
lacked it.

> It may be hard to see this because sound laws are so much about the
> rules of "change" between languages (oops! or whatever they're
> called).  But if these were a complete change without something
> remaining, you'd never recognize any kind of descent or cognation.
> Change would obliderate the evidence.  If change were as thorough as
> it is in other areas, there'd be no evidence left of a PIE.  Or a
> proto-Basque.  That's what pure change does.  The sound rules (the
> predictability of changes) are nothing more than bridges that allow
> you to overcome changes and find continuity.

Of course, but we can only do this in cases in which ceaseless change
has not yet obliterated the evidence of common origin.  When such
evidence *has* been obliterated, there is nothing we can do.

> If you find any connection between Basque and proto-Basque, it's
> going to be because SOMETHING stayed the same.  That is "the central
> fact."  Change is actually only an obstacle to your finding what the
> connection is between the present and the past.

Well, this is a very curious way of putting it: change is "only an
obstacle"?  Perhaps, but it's a bloody big obstacle.  If there were no
change, then the present would be indistinguishable from the past, and
there would be no historical disciplines.

> In one of my other lives, I'm intensely involved with the American
> electronic media.  I see change in language at roaring rates.
> "Ceaseless change" is not the news here.  What withstands "ceaseless
> change" is really the hot question.  Because in the end that's all
> that allows us understand each other.  The sounds and meanings we
> recognize above the din.

But that's a different issue altogether.  In effect, it's an aspect of
the Saussurean Paradox -- a fascinating issue, but one that I think has
now been pretty well dealt with.

> (As far as how this relates to your statement that an ancestor
> cannot co-exist with a daughter language, the rate and degree of
> change is really the question.  Simply bringing up "ceaseless
> change" tells us nothing about whether enough "remained" of ancestor
> so that it could co-exist with the daughter.)

Sure.  But your position appeared to be that absence of change in a
living language was a serious possibility, and that's what I was
objecting to.

> I never expected to have a particularly friendly reception on this
> list to the approaches I've taken.  I expected to be called far
> worse than tiring or silly.  I do hope - or did for a time - that a
> bit of open-mindedness might at least give these ideas an accurate
> hearing - if not necessarily a fair one.

Well, I can't see that you've been treated unfairly at all, but, as it
happens, the moderator has pulled the plug on this thread, so I can't
respond further.

Larry Trask
COGS
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QH
UK

larryt at cogs.susx.ac.uk