Re: The AmE 'o' sound

From: Bob Cunningham (exw6sxq_at_earthlink.net)
Date: 11/10/04 

Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 13:36:37 GMT

On Fri, 05 Nov 2004 21:56:11 GMT, "Peter T. Daniels"
<grammatim@worldnet.att.net> said:

> Bob Cunningham wrote:
 
> > On Fri, 05 Nov 2004 18:10:56 GMT, "Peter T. Daniels"
> > <grammatim@worldnet.att.net> said:
 
> > > Bob Cunningham wrote:
 
> > > > On Fri, 05 Nov 2004 12:51:03 GMT, "Peter T. Daniels"
> > > > <grammatim@worldnet.att.net> said:
 
> > > > [...]
 
> > > > > (Never mind, Cunningham will never understand. Yet
> > > > > he keeps crossposting his confusion to sci.lang.)
 
> > > > Not that I care what the muddleheaded Peter T Daniels thinks
> > > > of anything I say, but I would like to comment for the
> > > > benefit of readers who may mistakenly believe what he has
> > > > said.
 
> > > > He has demonstrated an inability or a disinclination to
> > > > understand what he's reading before he responds. He
> > > > typically remembers my saying things I haven't said.
 
> > > > He once agreed completely with some remarks I made about
> > > > using square brackets versus slashes, but went on to say
> > > > that that wasn't what I had said in the past. I have never
> > > > changed what I have had to say on that subject since long
> > > > before I first mentioned it in sci.lang.
 
> > > Perhaps Mr. Cunningham got it right once in the past, but
> > > the message he sent to sci.lang yesterday continued to
> > > reveal the confusion he usually displayed.
 
> > Daniels likes to hint at error without being specific. That
> > way he's harder to pin down. So far as I know I said
> > nothing yesterday that was any different from what I've
> > always said about square brackets versus slashes, and I
> > continue to believe that what I said was correct.
 
> > If Daniels were a respectable sort of person, he would be
> > specific about what he thought was wrong with what I said.
> > But he doesn't seem to be, so he probably won't. I would
> > expect to find that anything he claims was wrong with what I
> > said can be supported by references to the literature.
 
> > Daniels should put up or shut up. Of the two I would prefer
> > the latter, so long as it was permanent.
 
> I got tired of explaining it to him. If he didn't get it the first dozen
> times, I doubt he'll get it the thirteenth.

I don't think Daniels *ever* explained *anything* to me, but
if he did, it got lost in the flood of rude, arrogant
remarks he likes to produce.

Mostly what he likes to do, in response to a straightforward
question with a straightforward answer, is tell people to go
read a book. Anyway, I don't need explanations. My
knowledge of phonetics is more than adequate for what I want
to do with it. If I ever want to learn more, I'm sure I can
find a more reliable and congenial source of information
than the insufferably arrogant Peter T Daniels.

By the way, note that by using the vague "explaining it" he
carefully avoids saying what "it" is. He doesn't want to
say what he thinks I got wrong, because he's afraid it might
turn out I'm right. By being vague, he can say he meant any
of several topics that were discussed in the posting in
question. Slippery Pete slithers again.

> > > > One example of his foolishness was when he thought he had
> > > > found dozens of questions in a posting of mine in which I
> > > > had asked only one or two.
 
> > > Mr. Cunningham likes to harp on the fact that he was
> > > unfamiliar with the phenomenon of "indirect question."
 
> > Daniels still fails to understand that he fantasized
> > indirect questions where there were no indirect questions.
 
> I don't know why he thinks anyone cares, but if anyone do,
> they can find the message for themself. It was many years ago.

I mentioned it only as a good example of Daniels's
foolishness. If anyone is interested in reading the
posting, it's at http://tinyurl.com/4xn6p , or Message ID
<OlNYOZ0HVt5iipkTt4BYl0fX2MWV@4ax.com>. Anyone reading that
posting should see that I stated firm opinions but asked no
questions beyond the two in the paragraph I've quoted below.

My main reason for crossposting to sci.lang was to ask if
anyone could tell me of a place on the Web where I could
find an explanation of the symbols Labov uses in his vowel
charts in various publications.

The actual wording of my courteous request, which was at the
end of a very long posting in which I rambled somewhat but
didn't ask any of the questions Daniels imagined that I
asked, was

   With some uneasiness I'm going to crosspost this to
   sci.lang. Often when I poke a limb into sci.lang I
   pull back a bloody stump, but maybe this time will be
   different. It would be quite helpful if someone over
   there could provide a table of definitions of Labov's
   symbols in articulatory terms, or could point to a
   specific place where such a table can be found. I
   would also hope to evoke some statements of informed
   opinion about the meaning of statements like '/oh/
   has moved'.

No one bothered to tell me, although I have little doubt
that there were people in sci.lang who could have. After a
determined session of Web surfing, I finally found a key to
the symbols by myself. You can read about that incident in
a thread at http://tinyurl.com/68lwn , or Message ID
<CQlbORBgCFMUG8XKftgYjoR0DHvo@4ax.com>#1/1 .

About "/oh/ has moved", I later learned that, impossible as
it seems to believe, linguists actually conceive of phonemes
drifting from place to place in the vowel quadrilateral
while retaining the symbols that stood for them in their
original locations. How can that not lead to chaos?
(Rhetorical question.)

ObAUE: About "many years ago": There have been discussions
in AUE about the meanings of "several", "many", and "a few".
Daniels may like to think of AD 2000 as "many years ago".
Given "several", "many" or "a few", I choose to think of it
as a few years ago. Several years ago would be like 1970.
Many years ago would be like 1860.

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