Re: Orthography supporting sound changes?

Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
>
> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > Aidan Kehoe wrote:
> >
> > > > So you switched the topic, without notice, from spelling pronunciation
> > > > to "language shift." They may look to you like the same thing, but they
> > > > most assuredly aren't.
> > >
> > > The topic was how spelling pronunciation interacts with sound changes. I
> > > haven't seen anything ruling out language shifts between related dialects
> > > and the changes of sound inherent in that as "sound changes" in the
> > > specialised sense, and indeed the definitions I've seen leave room for such
> > > an interpretation; please provide something ruling this out, if you have it.
> >
> > No. Scientists don't bother thinking up explanations for why every
> > imaginable contingency does not occur. You provide an example of it
> > happening, and we'll try to explain why it does.
>
> Depends on the science. Mathematicians frequently study why things
> don't happen. A famous example being Fermat's Last Theorem. A huge
> amount of effort has been expended over the years to prove that
> something does not happen. Squaring the circle and trisecting angles
> are other examples of a lot of effort spent on proving something
> impossible.
>
> If a scientist (hard sciences anyway) said that something could not
> happen, I would expect him to be willing to explain why he thought
> that. It seems very strange to me that in linguistics, you are allowed
> to say that something cannot happen yet refuse to justify your claim.
> Do you see a difference between "has not happened yet" and "cannot
> happen"? If you are merely saying that something has not happened then
> I would feel it sufficient to justify it by saying: "Can you show me a
> case when it did happen?". But if you are saying that something cannot
> happen then I would expect a better justification.

Do you not see the difference between "does not" and "cannot"?

When we find an example, we'll investigate it. But we haven't found any
in 100+ years of paying close attention to regional dialects, and in 40
years of investigating social dialects.
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@xxxxxxx
.

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