Commenter questions the evidential basis for substrate hypothesis
4 Sep 18 8:26 AM · 5d ago · 2 comments · 1 source · development 4 of 4
Linguist empath75 argued that lack of known etymology is weak evidence for borrowing from a substrate language, noting that many common English words (dog, pig, boy, girl) have no known etymology yet almost certainly did not come from substrate languages.
“"not having a known etymology" is weak evidence for borrowing, full stop, let alone for borrowing from a substrate language. Languages invent new words and sound patterns endogenously all the time.”
empath75Danny Hieber Linguist and newsletter authorTFNA Hacker News commenter
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Ya, barrrrmp! disagree, the main thesus is lingustic evolution as sort of hereditary characteristics whose exact origins are difficult to elucidate, kind of like apples and horses, that also share the same general geographic origins. Various lists of words show conclusivly how many words are conserved over very broad geographic, temporal, and…
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Also, “not having a known etymology” is weak evidence for borrowing, full stop, let alone for borrowing from a substrate. There are lots of very common words in english (dog, pig, boy, girl) that have no known etymology which are incredibly unlikely to impossible to have come from a substrate language.Languages invent new words and sound patterns…
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