Re: schoen

Peter T. Daniels wrote:

> Reinhold (Rey) Aman wrote:
> > Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > > Reinhold (Rey) Aman wrote:

[...]

> > > > Anyone who henceforward misuses "Middle" for "Central"
> > > > when speaking of *regional* languages/dialects
> > > > is dumber than a lobotomized wombat.

> > > There are three Federal judicial disctricts in Tennessee, one to
> > > the east, one to the west, and one between them. It's called the
> > > Middle District of Tennessee.

> > That's fine, but I have been limiting the Central/Middle distinction
> > to the names of LANGUAGES/DIALECTS (see, e.g., my statement above)
> > and have been avoiding references to GEOGRAPHICAL designations and
> > toponyms.

> But you based your (artificial) distinction

This is not an (artificial) distinction but a real, useful and
scientific one. You professional linguists want to have your field of
study and research considered a *science* -- and yet you are clinging to
the ambiguous, polysemous and downright sloppy term "Middle" rather than
using the precise and scientific terms "Middle" and "Central." That's
as "scientific" as sociology and psychiatry.

> on the claim that in English "Middle" refers only to time
> and "Central" only to place. This is empirically incorrect.

Christ Almighty. Do I have to point out once again your well-known
thickness and lack of reading comprehension? Perhaps the following
blunt rephrasing will *finally* get my message into your skull:

My statement that "Middle" refers only to time and "Central" only to
place is LIMITED TO DENOTING FUCKIN' *LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS*, NOTHING ELSE.

I've been talking about, e.g., MIDDLE English, which refers only to
*TIME* (an era, epoch; ca. A.D. 1100 to 1500) and CENTRAL Bavarian,
which refers only to *PLACE* (an area, region; located between North
Bavarian and South Bavarian). Is this finally FUCKIN' CLEAR now?

If you still want to challenge what no reasonable and intelligent person
would challenge, someone else will have to jump in and restate my
information in even simpler, semantically and syntactically less complex
and demanding terms for you to grasp. I'm done.

> I quote your passage that you snipped above:

I snipped it because I've already stated it. Attention-span problems again?

> > > Koekkoek's astute distinction is obvious when considering the two
> > > precise English meanings of "Central" (place only) and "Middle"
> > > (time only) for the ambiguous German _Mittel-_ (time or place):

> English has no such "precise" meanings for the two words.

Jesus. Lemme repeat this to refresh your low-retention brain cells:

I'm talking about FUCKIN' *LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS*, NOTHING ELSE.
"Central" (place only) and "Middle" (time only) are very precise. See
above for precise examples of time (era) and place (area).

> > The reason is simple: names of geographical areas and their trans-
> > lations are a mess. There's CENTRAL America and MIDDLE America,
> > The MIDDLE East, The MIDDLE West, The MIDDLE Kingdom, etc., etc.

> And all those terms, and many more, have clear and distinct referents,
> and they do not confuse the people who use them.

You mean your undefined "experts" who immediately know whether "Middle
Swedish" refers to a stage of Swedish between Old Swedish and Modern
Swedish or to a Central Swedish dialect? The rest of us mortals --
99.99% of literate folks -- will need a definition of "Middle Swedish"
or have to figure out from context whether it refers to time or place.

The terms "Middle American," "Central American" and "Meso-American"
[from Greek _mesos_, middle] have confused even scholars of Amerind
languages who definitely know more about those languages than you do.
Read the _Newsletter_ of The Society for the Study of the Indigenous
Languages of the Americas_ if you don't believe me.

What you fail to grasp is that I didn't just fall off a
_Zuckerrübenlastwagen_, you know. Before I moved to languages, I used
to be an analytical chemist in Germany, a petroleum chemist in Canada,
and a metallurgist in the USA, all fields in which precision is a _sine
qua non_. Because of that training and experience in "hard" sciences, I
insist on *precise* and *unambiguous* terminology. If you are content
with literary-interpretation-type sloppiness, don't call yourself a scientist.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

BTW, you wrote in another thread:

"You have not perhaps savored every one of Miss Jones's postings. Her
bitchitude has little or nothing to do with her stupidity, and her
stupidity has little or nothing to do with her ignorance. If you go
through her record, you'll find that "snippy little bitch" was an
appropriate epithet."

Kindly refrain from calling others "snippy little bitch" (TM). This
term is reserved for you only. I coined this perfect epithet
specifically for you (around 1998). Thank you.

~~~ Rey ~~~

Reinhold Aman
Santa Rosa, CA 95402, USA
http://www.sonic.net/maledicta/
.