Re: Invention of the Alphabet

>>>>> "Des" == Des Small <des.small@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

Des> LSD! Your point is not a point, since it is false.

Des> PTD's yardstick was that one criterion for Chinese wordiness
Des> would be the headwords in the CHINESE TO ENGLISH side of a
Des> Chinese-English dictionary.

Des> For your comparison with English words to make sense, the
Des> only honest thing to do would be to consider the ENGLISH TO
Des> SOMETHING side of an English-Something dictionary.

Easy. Take English-French. What's "railway" in French? "Chemin de
fer". So, "chemin de fer" must be _one single word_, right? Even
though "chemin" means "road" and "fer" means "iron"?


Des> Of the dictionaries to hand (Collins Gem French-English,
Des> Langenscheidts Universal Wörterbuch Englisch-Deutsch, Berlitz
Des> Dutch-English, Norsted's Engelska Fickordbok), none - not a
Des> single one! - has an entry for "train station" under "train"
Des> in the English to Foreign side.

English German? Then "remember (inf.)" maps to "sich erinnern
(inf.)". So, the Germans lexicographers are all wrong to write "sich
erinnern" with a space in between. Since it's one word in English, it
must be also 1 word in German, right?



--
Lee Sau Dan

E-mail: danlee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Home page: http://www.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/~danlee
.

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