Darwin-L Message Log 4: 26–65 — December 1993

Academic Discussion on the History and Theory of the Historical Sciences

Darwin-L was an international discussion group on the history and theory of the historical sciences, active from 1993–1997. Darwin-L was established to promote the reintegration of a range of fields all of which are concerned with reconstructing the past from evidence in the present, and to encourage communication among scholars, scientists, and researchers in these fields. The group had more than 600 members from 35 countries, and produced a consistently high level of discussion over its several years of operation. Darwin-L was not restricted to evolutionary biology nor to the work of Charles Darwin, but instead addressed the entire range of historical sciences from an explicitly comparative perspective, including evolutionary biology, historical linguistics, textual transmission and stemmatics, historical geology, systematics and phylogeny, archeology, paleontology, cosmology, historical geography, historical anthropology, and related “palaetiological” fields.

This log contains public messages posted to the Darwin-L discussion group during December 1993. It has been lightly edited for format: message numbers have been added for ease of reference, message headers have been trimmed, some irregular lines have been reformatted, and error messages and personal messages accidentally posted to the group as a whole have been deleted. No genuine editorial changes have been made to the content of any of the posts. This log is provided for personal reference and research purposes only, and none of the material contained herein should be published or quoted without the permission of the original poster.

The master copy of this log is maintained in the Darwin-L Archives (rjohara.net/darwin) by Dr. Robert J. O’Hara. The Darwin-L Archives also contain additional information about the Darwin-L discussion group, the complete Today in the Historical Sciences calendar for every month of the year, a collection of recommended readings on the historical sciences, and an account of William Whewell’s concept of “palaetiology.”

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DARWIN-L MESSAGE LOG 4: 26-65 -- DECEMBER 1993
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DARWIN-L
A Network Discussion Group on the
History and Theory of the Historical Sciences

Darwin-L@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu is an international network discussion group on
the history and theory of the historical sciences.  Darwin-L was established
in September 1993 to promote the reintegration of a range of fields all of
which are concerned with reconstructing the past from evidence in the present,
and to encourage communication among academic professionals in these fields.
Darwin-L is not restricted to evolutionary biology nor to the work of Charles
Darwin but instead addresses the entire range of historical sciences from an
interdisciplinary perspective, including evolutionary biology, historical
linguistics, textual transmission and stemmatics, historical geology,
systematics and phylogeny, archeology, paleontology, cosmology, historical
anthropology, historical geography, and related "palaetiological" fields.

This log contains public messages posted to Darwin-L during December 1993.
It has been lightly edited for format: message numbers have been added for ease
of reference, message headers have been trimmed, some irregular lines have been
reformatted, and some administrative messages and personal messages posted to
the group as a whole have been deleted.  No genuine editorial changes have been
made to the content of any of the posts.  This log is provided for personal
reference and research purposes only, and none of the material contained herein
should be published or quoted without the permission of the original poster.
The master copy of this log is maintained in the archives of Darwin-L by
listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.  For instructions on how to retrieve copies of
this and other log files, and for additional information about Darwin-L, send
the e-mail message INFO DARWIN-L to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.

Darwin-L is administered by Robert J. O'Hara (darwin@iris.uncg.edu), Center for
Critical Inquiry in the Liberal Arts and Department of Biology, University of
North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, North Carolina 27412 U.S.A., and it
is supported by the Center for Critical Inquiry, University of North Carolina
at Greensboro, and the Department of History and the Academic Computing Center,
University of Kansas.

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<4:26>From CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu  Wed Dec  8 20:06:13 1993

Date: Wed, 08 Dec 93 20:08 CDT
From: Tom Cravens <CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu>
Subject: Re: extinction and speciation
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

In response to various postings:

One of the major distinctions between evolutionary biology
and historical linguistics appears to be that in the latter field, most
people would shy away from notions of teleology of purpose (and even of
function). "Drift" -- which is so vague as to not be employed as more
than a cover term in my experience -- does indeed refer to the strong
current, or momentum, but while it has its internal motivations, it does
not have a goal. In the extreme reading, then, the vast majority of
linguistic changes are random and non-directed. I should point out that
this refers to *systematic* changes, such as the incipience and spread of a
[d] pronunciation of /t/ under defined circumstances. These appear to be
pushed forward by the collective momentum of the community of speakers,
blind to any unfortunate results (waiter and wader sounding the same, etc.).
When real problems occur, it is not the system that adjusts, but individual
items, as necessary. A vulgar but clear example is the past of the verb
"shut", which came out in normal phonological evolution as "shit". As the
noun suffered pejoration (folks decided it was a naughty word), it appears
that the variant "shut" from other dialects was selected to replace it.
The point here (if there is one; I feel I'm rambling) is that in one sense
all linguistic systematic change is random, if that means non goal-oriented.

If, however, we recognize that any language state is a result of earlier
language states, and that there is really no such thing as stasis, but only
constant becoming (Henning Andersen's words, more or less), then we find that
much (most? all????!!!) linguistic change is weakly predetermined (i.e. not
the precise result, but that change will very likely occur in environment x).
The Latin-to-Spanish example may serve to illustrate. Whether the cause is
to be found in the languages spoken by Iberians or in Latin itself is a
hot topic (although it's beginning to look to many like the latter), but
the fact is that from the pan-chronic view of Latin to modern varieties of
Spanish, consonants between vowels are reduced. Latin geminates simplify
(VACCA > vaca), Latin voiceless consonants voice (AMICU > amigo), and
Latin voiced consonants are lost (LEGO > leo). Nowadays, the secondary
voiced consonants are being lost, and in a few varieties, most notably
Canary Islands, the voiceless consonants which derive historically from
voiceless geminates are being voiced ([g] in vaca). Hispanists don't
speak in these terms, but this may be said to be a sort of drift. What would
surprise an experienced Hispanist, I think, would be reports of systematic
movement in the opposite direction. The movement is in the direction of
consonant reduction bewteen vowels (and elsewhere; just listen to Puerto
Rican!).

In sum: systematically speaking, all change is random in that there is no
"good reason" why it should come about, yet it is necessarily (banally, in
some sense) determined by the currents already in force when any individual
speaker comes on the scene and has to deal with what's presented to her/him.
And--a crucial difference vis-a`-vis biology I would think--the change doesn't
stick unless the community accepts it (see James Milroy's new book, Language
variation and change).

One last word. Linguists, too, speak of extinct or dead languages for
convenience, even when it makes very little sense. As has been pointed out,
Latin didn't die; it just now has several names, and several different
varieties. As Roger Wright has observed on many occasions, it's really
in great part politico-historical accident that different names haven't
been established similarly for varieties of what are called English.

(I await the clarifications of Maggie, Scott, Sally, etc.)

Tom Cravens
cravens@macc.wisc.edu
cravens@wiscmacc.bitnet

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<4:27>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Wed Dec  8 22:30:58 1993

Date: Wed, 08 Dec 1993 23:37:21 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: Extinction and pseudoextinction
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

Diane Nelson's original query about the different meanings of "extinct"
is an interesting one, as witnessed by the many replies it has generated.

Greg Mayer is correct in saying that in evolutionary biology we usually
distinguish between genuine extinction and "pseudoextinction" (taxonomic or
morphological extinction: no organisms exist today that _look_ like the
"extinct" taxon, but modified descendants of it do exist).  This point
recently came up in one of my classes in the context of Darwin's description
of his tree diagram in the _Origin of Species_.  This diagram has a row of
capital letters across the bottom, standing for several species in a genus,
and then a range of branches leading up from some of them to the top of the
diagram where the end-points are given small letters and numbers.  Part of
the description of the diagram reads:

  "If then our diagram be assumed to represent a considerable amount of
  modification, species (A) and all the earlier varieties will have become
  extinct, having been replaced by eight new species (a14 to m14); and (I)
  will have been replaced by six (n14 to z14) new species."  (p. 122)

Species (A) and (I) are in this case not genuinely extinct, but rather
pseudoextinct; that is, there is nothing around today that looks like (A),
but there are descendants of (A).  (Species (A) is thus like Latin.)  Darwin
contrasts this sort of extinction with that of some of the other species at
the bottom of his diagram, such as (E), which are "extinct, and have left no
descendants."  (p. 123)

Greg also says that it is often neither important nor practical for
paleontologists to determine whether a particular lineage has undergone
extinction or pseudoextinction.  I certainly agree about the practical part
(it may be an exccedingly difficult or impossible question to answer), but
depending upon what one wants to do with the information it may be very
important to distinguish between genuine and pseudoextinction.  There is a
large genre of literature in paleontology, most of it from the last 20 years
or so, that attempts to tablulate the number of species, genera, or families
from different geological periods, and to use these data to say something
about rates of extinction and origination of taxa.  The data on which these
studies are based almost certainly contaminated with pseudoextinctions, and so
their results must be regarded critically.  One valuable paper that challenged
these studies on this ground is:

  Smith, Andrew B., & Colin Patterson.  1988.  The influence of taxonomic
  method on the perception of patterns of evolution.  Evolutionary Biology,
  23:127-216.

Smith and Patterson suggest that as many as one third of the extinction events
recorded in paleobiological compilations, and used in statistical calculations
of rates of extinction, are in fact pseudoextinctions.  It's as though the
historical linguists had tens or hundreds of thousands of languages to study,
and they wanted to figure out how frequently languages "die out", but had
listed both Latin and Tasmanian as having "died out", when in fact one of them
(Latin) not only didn't die out, but flourished and diversified.

To bring the issue of pseudoextinction home, and also the contrast between
morphologically vs. genealogically defined taxa, one has only to consider
dinosaurs, the archetypal "extinct" taxon.  In point of fact, of course,
the pseudoextinct Dinosauria are alive and well; we just call them birds.

Bob O'Hara, Darwin-L list owner

Robert J. O'Hara (darwin@iris.uncg.edu)
Center for Critical Inquiry and Department of Biology
100 Foust Building, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Greensboro, North Carolina 27412 U.S.A.

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:28>From GA3704@SIUCVMB.SIU.EDU  Thu Dec  9 11:57:14 1993

Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 10:55:10 CST
From: "Margaret E. Winters" <GA3704@SIUCVMB.SIU.EDU>
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: extinction

Diane Nelson asks nice questions in her posting.  As far as the
Latin kind of extinction, the line is extremely fuzzy from the
point of view of historical linguistics.  There is a moderate
literature on the Romance languages specifically, with various
opinions as to when Latin "died".  I recommend anything by
Roger Wright to begin with. Questions of orthography and
interpretation of texts enter crucially into this question,
and Wright sets forth the issues and his responses elegantly.

Apropos of the fact that Ms. Nelson is at Edinburgh, I will be
there in the linguistics department as a postdoc for the spring,
starting in January, and have been meaning to ask if anyone
on the list is there.  I now have one answer and am curious
to know if there are others.

           Best,
           Margaret Winters
           <ga3704@siucvmb.siu.edu>

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:29>From delancey@darkwing.uoregon.edu  Thu Dec  9 12:06:11 1993

Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 09:53:02 -0800 (PST)
From: Scott C DeLancey <delancey@darkwing.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: extinction and speciation
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

On Wed, 8 Dec 1993, Tom Cravens wrote:

> One of the major distinctions between evolutionary biology
> and historical linguistics appears to be that in the latter field, most
> people would shy away from notions of teleology of purpose (and even of
> function).

Remember that linguistics lacks any correlate to the notion of fitness
in biological evolution.  We can characterize the function of some
syntactic developments, but not in terms that suggest why one
construction should be selected for over another.  (For phonological
change we can't even do that).  There are some teleological explanations
that are sometimes proferred for certain kinds of change--e.g. it
may be claimed that English developed fixed word order in order to
clarify subject and object relations that were obscured when case
marking, which used to indicate subject and object, was lost.  But
in many (at least) cases this kind of argument turns out to be
empirically untenable.

>"Drift" -- which is so vague as to not be employed as more
> than a cover term in my experience -- does indeed refer to the strong
> current, or momentum, but while it has its internal motivations, it does
> not have a goal. In the extreme reading, then, the vast majority of
> linguistic changes are random and non-directed.

This is really true only of phonological change, and conceivably even
there only because we don't understand phonology well enough to see
what's going on.  We're closer to being able to provide motivated
explanations for syntactic change, in the general line of certain
constructions being found useful for certain functions, and over time
adapting their form to these new functions.  Again, though, there is
only a very weak sense of "fitness" that can be invoked here, and at
its best the story still doesn't come out looking like the elegant
tales of adaptation that evolutionists can tell.

> And--a crucial difference vis-a`-vis biology I would think--the change
> doesn't stick unless the community accepts it (see James Milroy's new book,
> Language variation and change).

Here is where we might go looking for an analogue to fitness.  The fly
in the linguistic ointment (as I think you are suggesting here) is the
sociological dimension, that communities may accept changes for
social reasons (prestige of the originators, perceived need to
distinguish one community or social group from another, etc.) that
have nothing to do with the structural nature or effects of the
change.  I can't imagine what a biological analogue of this could
be.

Scott DeLancey			delancey@darkwing.uoregon.edu
Department of Linguistics
University of Oregon
Eugene, OR 97403, USA

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:30>From junger@samsara.law.cwru.edu  Thu Dec  9 13:40:32 1993

From: junger@samsara.law.cwru.edu (Peter D. Junger)
Reply-To: junger@samsara.law.cwru.edu
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Re: Re: extinction and speciation

In message <Pine.3.87.9312090902.A2542-0100000@darkwing.uoregon.edu>
Scott DeLancey wrote:

>> And--a crucial difference vis-a`-vis biology I would think--the change
>> doesn't stick unless the community accepts it (see James Milroy's new book,
>> Language variation and change).
>
>Here is where we might go looking for an analogue to fitness.  The fly
>in the linguistic ointment (as I think you are suggesting here) is the
>sociological dimension, that communities may accept changes for
>social reasons (prestige of the originators, perceived need to
>distinguish one community or social group from another, etc.) that
>have nothing to do with the structural nature or effects of the
>change.  I can't imagine what a biological analogue of this could
>be.

How about sexual selection?

Peter D. Junger

Case Western Reserve University Law School, Cleveland, OH
Internet:  JUNGER@SAMSARA.LAW.CWRU.Edu -- Bitnet:  JUNGER@CWRU

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:31>From GGALE@VAX1.UMKC.EDU  Thu Dec  9 17:24:53 1993

Date: Thu, 09 Dec 1993 17:28:00 -0600 (CST)
From: GGALE@VAX1.UMKC.EDU
Subject: Re: DARWIN-L digest 88
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

A silly question came to my mind after reading Nelson's interesting question,
and its equally interesting responses. Couldn't a language, whether extinct
or pseudoextinct, be brought back to life? [sort of a linguistic 'Jurassic
Park' maybe?] Take Latin, for example. Surely enough 'fossils' and other
specimens of Latin exist that a rich linguistic context could be supplied to
any community that desired--for whatever reason--to raise its upcoming
progeny as native speakers of Latin? Wouldn't that count? I mean, I suppose
we could dig far enough to find some technicalities to rule it out a Real
Latin; but it seems to me that maybe this might be a case of bringing
something back from the Dead.
Puzzled in KC
George

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:32>From bsinger@eniac.seas.upenn.edu  Thu Dec  9 17:55:27 1993

From: bsinger@eniac.seas.upenn.edu (Bayla Singer)
Subject: Lazarus Languages
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 18:58:21 EST

George Gale asks about bringing 'dead' languages 'back to life'.  There
are two senses in which this is done, to my knowledge: the first is a
reconstruction, a la the inferences used in developing
'proto-indo-european' (PIE); the second an adoption of a 'dead' or
liturgical language as the living language of a particular group of
people, as has been done with Hebrew in Israel.  In the second case, of
course, one must 'invent' or adopt new words to signify things which
didn't exist when the laguage was previously current.

Someone please add to my knowledge.

--bayla

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:33>From idavidso@metz.une.edu.au  Thu Dec  9 17:55:30 1993

Date: Fri, 10 Dec 1993 10:58:16 +0700
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
From: idavidso@metz.une.edu.au (Iain Davidson)
Subject: Re: DARWIN-L digest 88

>A silly question came to my mind after reading Nelson's interesting question,
>and its equally interesting responses. Couldn't a language, whether extinct
>or pseudoextinct, be brought back to life? [sort of a linguistic 'Jurassic
>Park' maybe?] Take Latin, for example. Surely enough 'fossils' and other
>specimens of Latin exist that a rich linguistic context could be supplied to
>any community that desired--for whatever reason--to raise its upcoming
>progeny as native speakers of Latin? Wouldn't that count? I mean, I suppose
>we could dig far enough to find some technicalities to rule it out a Real
>Latin; but it seems to me that maybe this might be a case of bringing
>something back from the Dead.

Hebrew, Gaelic?

Iain Davidson
Archaeology and Palaeoanthropology
University of New England
Armidale NSW 2351
AUSTRALIA
Tel (067) 732 441
Fax (International) +61 67 73 25 26
    (Domestic) 067 73 25 26

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:34>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Thu Dec  9 18:14:12 1993

Date: Thu, 09 Dec 1993 19:20:38 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: Subscriber list and November message log available
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

Margaret Winters wondered whether there are any Darwin-L members from
Edinburgh, and this prompts me to say that anyone who wishes to can retrieve
the complete list of Darwin-L subscribers by sending the one-line message:

   REVIEW DARWIN-L

to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.  The message you will recieve in return
will show the names and e-mail addresses of all subscribers, now over 500,
and in clever mainframe fashion it will be sorted alphabetically by e-mail
address spelled backwards (I'm not making this up).  Thus all the Canadian
subscribers, whose e-mail addresses end in .ca, appear first, and the New
Zealand subscribers, with addresses ending in .nz, appear last, with everyone
else in between.

Another announcement: an edited copy of the November message log is now
available for retrieval; just sent the message:

   GET DARWIN-L 9311

to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.  A complete index to the files available in
the list archives appears below.  Any one of these files can be retrieved in
the same manner, by sending the message in the form GET DARWIN-L <filename>
to the listserv address.

Archive: darwin-l (path: darwin-l) -- Files:
  biblio.clades (1 part, 4532 bytes) -- Basic phylogenetics bibliography
  biblio.general (1 part, 5962 bytes) -- Short historical sciences bibliography
  biblio.toulmin (1 part, 24311 bytes) -- Stephen Toulmin bibliography
  biblio.trees (1 part, 24153 bytes) -- Trees of history bibliography
  bmcr.report (1 part, 22393 bytes) -- BMCR 3.3.27 Textual Criticism Challenge
  9309 (1 part, 618939 bytes) -- DARWIN-L Message Log #1 -- September 1993
  9310 (1 part, 363615 bytes) -- DARWIN-L Message Log #2 -- October 1993
  9311 (1 part, 191870 bytes) -- DARWIN-L Message Log #3 -- November 1993

Bob O'Hara, Darwin-L list owner

Robert J. O'Hara (darwin@iris.uncg.edu)
Center for Critical Inquiry and Department of Biology
100 Foust Building, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Greensboro, North Carolina 27412 U.S.A.

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:35>From delancey@darkwing.uoregon.edu  Thu Dec  9 18:42:44 1993

Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 16:32:46 -0800 (PST)
From: Scott C DeLancey <delancey@darkwing.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: DARWIN-L digest 88
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

On Thu, 9 Dec 1993 GGALE@VAX1.UMKC.EDU wrote:

> A silly question came to my mind after reading Nelson's interesting question,
> and its equally interesting responses. Couldn't a language, whether extinct
> or pseudoextinct, be brought back to life? [sort of a linguistic 'Jurassic
> Park' maybe?] Take Latin, for example. Surely enough 'fossils' and other
> specimens of Latin exist that a rich linguistic context could be supplied to
> any community that desired--for whatever reason--to raise its upcoming
> progeny as native speakers of Latin? Wouldn't that count? I mean, I suppose
> we could dig far enough to find some technicalities to rule it out a Real
> Latin; but it seems to me that maybe this might be a case of bringing
> something back from the Dead.

The standard example of this is Hebrew in Israel; somebody else mentioned
Irish Gaelic, but that's not as clear an example because a) it wasn't
entirely dead yet, and b) the revival isn't all that successful--it isn't
the case that children are now again acquiring it as a first language.
Nearly everyone in Ireland still learns English as their first language
and Irish in school (if at all).  Various Native communities in North
America are currently interested in this idea, but I don't think the
prognosis there is very good.
   There's still a question of exactly how parallel this is to
something like the Jurassic Park scenario.  There are differences
(it's somewhat controversial how much and what kind) between
children's first language acquisition and adults' second language
acquisition.  There's reason to think (again somewhat controversial)
that the mental representation of the learned language is different
under these circumstances.  Then, to take a thought experiment,
if we were to "revivify", say, Spanish, in a non-Spanish speaking
community, it's not at all clear what kinds of differences might
obtain between that Spanish and Spanish spoken in populations to
which it had been transmitted normally.
   Possibly a better analogy than the JP scenario for something
like this hypothetical revivification of Latin would be genetic
simulation, i.e. reverse engineering genetic material to try and
approximate a species based on knowledge of the phenotype.

Scott DeLancey       delancey@darwking.uoregon.edu
Department of Linguistics
University of Oregon
Eugene, OR 97403

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:36>From PICARD@Vax2.Concordia.CA  Thu Dec  9 19:14:02 1993

Date: Thu, 09 Dec 1993 19:09:06 -0500 (EST)
From: MARC PICARD <PICARD@Vax2.Concordia.CA>
Subject: Re: DARWIN-L digest 88
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

George Gale asks: "Couldn't a language, whether extinct
or pseudoextinct, be brought back to life?" It can, and it has, and its name
is Hebrew.
Marc

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:37>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Thu Dec  9 19:31:36 1993

Date: Thu, 09 Dec 1993 20:38:05 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: December 9 -- Today in the Historical Sciences
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

DECEMBER 9 -- TODAY IN THE HISTORICAL SCIENCES

1652: AUGUSTUS QUIRINUS BACHMANN, also known as RIVINUS, is born at Leipzig,
Germany.  After medical study Leipzig and Helmstedt, Rivinus will settle in
Leipzig to practice medicine and lecture at the University of Leipzig.  He
will be best remembered for his work in botanical systematics, and in his
_Introductio Generalis in Rem Herbariam_ (1690) he will anticipate many
features of the later work of Tournefort and Linnaeus.

1667: WILLIAM WHISTON is born at Norton, England.  Whiston will study
mathematics at Cambridge University and will work as an assistant to Isaac
Newton, eventually succeeding Newton as Lucasian Professor.  The two will
become estranged over a dispute about Biblical chronology, and Whiston will
eventually take up residence in London after being expelled from Cambridge.
In his principal work, _A New Theory of the Earth, From its Original, to the
Consummation of all Things_ (London, 1696), Whiston will attempt to reconcile
astronomy with the Biblical account of creation, and will propose that the
Noachian flood was caused by a comet which struck the Earth, driving it from
its original circular orbit and releasing great volumes of subterranean water:
"not the vast Universe, but the Earth alone, with its dependencies, are the
proper subject of the Six Days Creation: And...the Mosaick History is not a
Nice, Exact and Philosophick account of the several steps and operations of
the whole; but such an Historical Relation of each Mutation of the Chaos, each
successive day, as the Journal of a Person on the Face of the Earth all that
while would naturally have contained."

Today in the Historical Sciences is a feature of Darwin-L, an international
discussion group on the history and theory of the historical sciences.  For
information send the message INFO DARWIN-L to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:38>From peter@usenix.org  Thu Dec  9 19:59:24 1993

Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 18:02:39 PST
From: peter@usenix.org (Peter H. Salus)
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Re:  Lazarus Languages

Cornish has been brought back from the
grave, as was Hebrew.

Peter

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:39>From PICARD@Vax2.Concordia.CA  Thu Dec  9 20:14:59 1993

Date: Thu, 09 Dec 1993 21:14:35 -0500 (EST)
From: MARC PICARD <PICARD@Vax2.Concordia.CA>
Subject: Re: DARWIN-L digest 88
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

   In reply to George Gale's question about bringing dead languages back
to life, Iain Davidson replies: "Hebrew, Gaelic?"
   I don't think Irish or Scottish Gaelic qualify as dead languages since
they still have tens of thousands of speakers according to Barbara Grimes'
EHNOLOGUE: LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD.

Marc Picard

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:40>From c.lavastida1@genie.geis.com  Thu Dec  9 20:35:47 1993

From: c.lavastida1@genie.geis.com
Date: Fri, 10 Dec 93 01:50:00 BST
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Re: Re: extinction and speciat

How about sexual selection?
 ---------
 May this not be a good time to ask for a critique of Barbara Cronin and her
work on this subject?
 As a practicing systems analyst, a number of issues peculiar to
"systematics" seem to come forth from the discussion on "drift":
 1. What is the consequence of tropism on its way from the biological
sciences to the historical sciences, and how does that relate to,
 2. Imabalances, a well measurable term in the hard sciences, tyhe
differential calculus could be say to use the ambiguity of the word as its
teleology.
 3. Spanish is decadent Latin? Whatever happened to Septimania, ..not off
Puerto Rico, ...if you get my drift..
 Carlos.
 C.LAVASTIDA1@genie.feis.com
 0700SYSTEMS

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:41>From CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu  Thu Dec  9 22:17:53 1993

Date: Thu, 09 Dec 93 22:20 CDT
From: Tom Cravens <CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu>
Subject: Re: extinction and speciat
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

Lest there be any misunderstanding, there has been no claim put forward
here that linguistic change is decay. It's merely change. Spanish,
Portuguese, French, Italian, etc. aren't decadent Latin; they're varieties
of modern Latin.

Tom Cravens
cravens@macc.wisc.edu
cravens@wiscmacc.bitnet

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:42>From gew400@coombs.anu.edu.au  Thu Dec  9 23:38:37 1993

Date: Fri, 10 Dec 1993 16:47:36 +1000
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
From: gew400@coombs.anu.edu.au
Subject: Classical Sanskrit

I am a recent member of Darwin-L. I have been reading the contributions on
extinctions etcetra of languages. I would very much like to read something
on Classical Sanskrit and its relation to Vedic Sanskrit.

Gehan Wijeyewardene
Anthropology, Research School of Pacific Studies
The Australian National University
Canberra ACT 0200
Australia

e-mail gew400@coombs.anu.edu.au

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:43>From coon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU  Fri Dec 10 07:23:37 1993

Date: Fri, 10 Dec 1993 08:26:59 EST
From: coon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Re: DARWIN-L digest 88

As to whether a language could be brought back to life, the answer is
an easy one, yes.  IMHO, the best example is Hebrew in modern Israel.
************************************************
Roger (Brad) Coon            "Better to have one
COON@IPFWCVAX.BITNET          freedom too many,
COON@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU    than to have one
                              too few."

Politically incorrect and proud of it.
Niquimictitoc inana Bambi.
************************************************

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:44>From c.lavastida1@genie.geis.com  Fri Dec 10 09:09:52 1993

From: c.lavastida1@genie.geis.com
Date: Fri, 10 Dec 93 14:49:00 BST
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Re: extinction and speciat

here that linguistic change is decay. It's merely change. Spanish,
 Portuguese, French, Italian, etc. aren't decadent Latin; they're varieties
 of modern Latin.
 --------------
 My interest was in the influence of portuguese-gallician and provencal-
catalan on castillian (the closest to Latin of either). I think it must be
specially relevant, since the former languages, while outside of the Muslim
area of direct conquest, are both older and contain less muslim words than
castillian. I would imagine that Andalusian castillian pronunciations and
drift reflect the arab influence most closely.
 Carlos.
 C.LAVASTIDA1@GENIE.GEIS.COM
 0700SYSTEMS
 PS. The comment on decadence was not on the definition of change but the
description of an imbalance.

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:45>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Fri Dec 10 15:05:29 1993

Date: Fri, 10 Dec 1993 16:11:47 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: December 10 -- Today in the Historical Sciences
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

DECEMBER 10 -- TODAY IN THE HISTORICAL SCIENCES

1911: JOSEPH DALTON HOOKER dies at Sunningdale, England.  Hooker was the
leading systematic botanist and phytogeographer of his day, and had overseen
with Charles Lyell the first publication of the evolutionary theories of
Darwin and Wallace.  His extensive travel in the southern hemisphere and in
Asia led to the publication of _Flora Antarctica_ (1844-1847) and _Flora
Indica_ (1855), among many other works.  Hooker became consistent advocate
of evolution following the publication of the _Origin of Species_ in 1859,
and succeeded his father, William Jackson Hooker, as director of the Royal
Botanic Gardens at Kew in 1865.

Today in the Historical Sciences is a feature of Darwin-L, an international
discussion group on the history and theory of the historical sciences.  For
information send the message INFO DARWIN-L to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:46>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Sun Dec 12 00:06:26 1993

Date: Sun, 12 Dec 1993 01:12:58 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: December 12 -- Today in the Historical Sciences
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

DECEMBER 12 -- TODAY IN THE HISTORICAL SCIENCES

1731: ERASMUS DARWIN born at Elston Hall, near Nottingham, England.  Following
study at St. John's College, Cambridge, Darwin will establish a medical
practice at Nottingham, and then at Lichfield.  His long poem, _The Botanic
Garden_ (1789-1791), will meet with limited success, but his more substantial
_Zoonomia_ (1794-1796) will become famous for its adumbration of his grandson
Charles's later work in evolution: "Would it be too bold to imagine, that all
warm-blooded animals have arisen from one living filament...with the power of
acquiring new parts, attended with new propensities, directed by irritations,
sensations, volitions, and associations; and thus possessing the faculty of
continuing to improve by its own inherent activity, and of delivering down
those improvements to its posterity, world without end!"

Today in the Historical Sciences is a feature of Darwin-L, an international
discussion group on the history and theory of the historical sciences.  For
information send the message INFO DARWIN-L to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:47>From gpassey@eis.calstate.edu  Sun Dec 12 16:30:36 1993

Date: Sun, 12 Dec 1993 14:34:18 -0800 (PST)
From: Gary g Passey <gpassey@eis.calstate.edu>
Subject: Introduction
To: darwin list <darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu>

Being a new member to the list, I understand an introduction is in order:
By way of introduction, I am a 28 year veteran of teaching biology and
earth sciences in the San Francisco Bay Area California public schools.
As a high school biology teacher, I am always on the lookout for new ways
to get the concept of evolution across to my students. (more and more of
whom come with a definite "fundamentalist" background)  In the couple of
days I have been on-line with this list, I have enjoyed the parallels
between biology and language.  I look forward to some interesting
conversation.  Gary

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:48>From simon@ling.edinburgh.ac.uk  Mon Dec 13 12:12:36 1993

Date: Mon, 13 Dec 93 17:58:53 GMT
From: Simon Kirby <simon@ling.edinburgh.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: `fitness' in linguistics
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organisation: Department of Linguistics, Edinburgh.

I am a recent subscriber to Darwin and have been fascinated by the
discussion following Diane's comment on extinction. Before I make a couple
of comments on the notion of `fitness' in linguistics I should say that
I am a PhD student in Linguistics currently working on explanations for
language universals and markedness. To this end I have been experimenting
with some (not very formal) computer simulations of selection-type models
of change.

On 9 Dec, Scott DeLancey wrote:

> Remember that linguistics lacks any correlate to the notion of fitness
> in biological evolution.  We can characterize the function of some
> syntactic developments, but not in terms that suggest why one
> construction should be selected for over another.

Jack Hawkins' recent work on a performance explanation for word order
universals seems to be based on some notion of fitness (though he does
not couch it in these terms himself). He claims that the effort of
processing an utterance may be predicted in part from the order of
constituents within the utterance.

Hawkins gives a simple metric derived from models of human processing
that can be used to predict the relative complexity of processing
various word orders. There is evidence that the basic word orders of
the world's languages tend to be the ones that are the least complex
to process by this metric.

Could this metric be counted as a `measure of fitness'? The kind of
scenario I envisage is one in which synchronic variants, varying only
with respect to word order, co-exist in some speech community. In some
sense these variants `compete' in that their survival diachronically
relies on them being uttered, understood and, ultimately, acquired.
This survival, then, is related to the processing effort that one
variant exacts relative to the other.

Simon Kirby --- Department of Linguistics, Edinburgh University

simon@ling.ed.ac.uk

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:49>From CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu  Mon Dec 13 20:46:26 1993

Date: Mon, 13 Dec 93 20:48 CDT
From: Tom Cravens <CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu>
Subject: Re: `fitness' in linguistics
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

The 'measure of fitness' view of linguistic change is intuitively appealing,
and examples which seem to evidence it can be found easily. But counter-
examples can be found easily, as well, if survival of the fittest here
means survival of the simplest. In morphological patterning, for example,
the more regular (i.e. simple) verbs are, the easier they are to learn,
presumably: walk-walk-walked (productive) or sing-sang-sung (not productive,
but symmetrical). But what to make of go-went-gone? In acquisition, children
regularize to go-goed-goed. Nice and simple, more fit than go-went-gone, but
it doesn't stick. Also: am-is-are/was/been. It can be argued that frequency
can account for maintenance of the complexities, but that begs the question,
doesn't it? Especially in the case of go-went, where what he have historically
is a blend of two verbs, go and wend.

A nice Italian example is the infinitive _bere_ 'drink',
the result of phonological erosion of earlier _bevere_. Forms other than
the infinitive retain the -v- (bevo 'I drink', bevvi 'I drank', bevuto [past
participle], etc.). Again, children regularize the infinitive, e.g. "Mamma,
voglio bevere" 'Mom, I want to drink'. The odd infinitive is the only form
standing in the way of a nicely regular matrix of verb forms, yet it resists
reanalysis. And it's the only one which has undergone drastic phonological
restructuring.

I'm not trying to douse the fire of fitness in linguistic change; I'm
just wondering how these (and many other) examples can be handled.

Tom Cravens
cravens@macc.wisc.edu
cravens@wiscmacc.bitnet

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:50>From mufw@midway.uchicago.edu  Tue Dec 14 10:02:38 1993

Date: Tue, 14 Dec 93 10:02:42 CST
From: "salikoko mufwene" <mufw@midway.uchicago.edu>
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: RE: DARWIN-L digest 92

>> Remember that linguistics lacks any correlate to the notion of fitness
>> in biological evolution.  We can characterize the function of some
>> syntactic developments, but not in terms that suggest why one
>> construction should be selected for over another.

  As I understand from reading population genetics as layman, fitness in
biology/population genetics makes no sense without reference to ecology.
What prevails in one particular ecological setting may not in another. It
seems to me that in linguistics things work more or less the same way, the
main challenge being that of characterizing the ecology of linguistic change
adequately enough to account for the setting-based fitness of forms and
constructions. Ecological factors bearing on selection vary, including
simplicity, transparency, uniformity, frequency, perceptual salience, and a
host of others (known and unknown). They do not all obtain in every case.
Those that obtain may converge, thereby eliminating or reducing variation.
But they may also conflict with each other, thus preserving variation.

>Jack Hawkins' recent work on a performance explanation for word order
>universals seems to be based on some notion of fitness (though he does
>not couch it in these terms himself). He claims that the effort of
>processing an utterance may be predicted in part from the order of
>constituents within the utterance.

  "in part" is very critical in this answer. There are several relevant
factors and it is not so simple to determine which ones carry the most
weight.

>Hawkins gives a simple metric derived from models of human processing
>that can be used to predict the relative complexity of processing
>various word orders. There is evidence that the basic word orders of
>the world's languages tend to be the ones that are the least complex
>to process by this metric.

  I am very curious how, the force of habits ruled out, one may determine
which constituent order is easier to process than another. Taking, for
instance Subject-Verb-Object vs. Subject-Object-Verb, why should one be
simpler than the other? This is not a charitable interpretation of the
above comment, but it has been suggested in the literature. What I should
ask is what is meant by "basic word orders of the world's languages?"
Salikoko S. Mufwene
Linguistics, U. of Chicago
s-mufwene@uchicago.edu
312-702-8531

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:51>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Tue Dec 14 10:15:51 1993

Date: Tue, 14 Dec 1993 11:22:24 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: New list on ancient languages
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

I just came across this announcement of a new list on ancient languages,
and thought it might be of interest to some of the members of Darwin-L.

Bob O'Hara
darwin@iris.uncg.edu

------------------- begin forwarded announcement -------------------

CAAL - NEW E-MAIL LIST

We take the liberty to inform you that a new discussion group on Computers
and Ancient Languages (CAAL) has been formed. It is oriented mainly on the
languages of the Ancient Near East (Indo-European, Semitic and other).
The main interests of the list are:

1. Computer databases of ancient Indo-European, Afro-Asiatic
(Hamito-Semitic) and other languages.

2. Graphic databases of texts of ancient, esp. Near Eastern languages,

3. The use of hypertexts for the texts and secondary sources,
esp. on Ancient Near East.

4. Linguistic and philological analysis of ancient languages based

5. OCR systems and ancient languages.

6. Problems of encoding of the texts of ancient languages,
exchange of information on software applications

7. Exchange of further linguistic information on ancient languages.

In case you are interested in such a list, please, contact
the list management.

        List management
        (caal-owner@ff.cuni.cz):

        Furat Rahman
        Petr Vavrousek
        Petr Zemanek

-------------------- end forwarded announcement --------------------

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:52>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Tue Dec 14 12:46:51 1993

Date: Tue, 14 Dec 1993 13:53:20 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: December 14 -- Today in the Historical Sciences
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

DECEMBER 14 -- TODAY IN THE HISTORICAL SCIENCES

1873: JEAN LOUIS RODOLPHE AGASSIZ dies at Cambridge, Massachusetts.  As a
young naturalist in Swizerland, France, and Germany, Agassiz did foundational
work in paleontology and historical geology, and in his _Etudes sur les
glaciers_ (Neuchatel, 1840) he presented the first comprehensive theory of
the Ice Age.  Following his emigration to the United States he established
the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University in 1859, and later
contributed to the founding of the United States National Academy of Sciences.
The poet James Russell Lowell will hear of Agassiz's death while travelling
in Italy, and will eulogize him in the _Atlantic Monthly_:

         ...with vague, mechanic eyes,
    I scanned the festering news we half despise...
    When suddenly,

    As happens if the brain, from overweight
    Of blood, infect the eye,
    Three tiny words grew lurid as I read,
    and reeled commingling: Agassiz is dead!

           ...the wise of old
    Welcome and own him of their peaceful fold...
    And Cuvier clasps once more his long lost son.

    We have not lost him all; he is not gone
    To the dumb herd of them that wholly die;
    The beauty of his better self lives on
    In minds he touched with fire, in many an eye
    He trained to Truth's exact severity;
    He was a Teacher: why be grieved for him
    Whose living word still stimulates the air?
    In endless file shall loving scholars come
    The glow of his transmitted touch to share.

Today in the Historical Sciences is a feature of Darwin-L, an international
discussion group on the history and theory of the historical sciences.  For
information send the message INFO DARWIN-L to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu.

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:53>From coon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU  Tue Dec 14 14:55:48 1993

Date: Tue, 14 Dec 1993 15:59:11 EST
From: coon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: RE: December 14 -- Today in the Historical Sciences

This is the kind of stuff that great lists are made of.
************************************************
Roger (Brad) Coon            "Better to have one
COON@IPFWCVAX.BITNET          freedom too many,
COON@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU    than to have one
                              too few."

Politically incorrect and proud of it.
Niquimictitoc inana Bambi.
************************************************

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:54>From GA3704@SIUCVMB.SIU.EDU  Tue Dec 14 22:16:48 1993

Date: Tue, 14 Dec 93 22:01:29 CST
From: "Margaret E. Winters" <GA3704@SIUCVMB.SIU.EDU>
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Precursors

The "Today in the Historical Sciences" of 12/12 with its quote
before the fact (almost) predicting evolution theory (Darwin's
grandfather?? - I'm tired and I didn't keep it) reminded me of
a long quote by Sir William Jones in an address he made to the
Asiatic Society of India in 1786 which prefigures the reconstruction
of Proto Indo-European.  With apologies to the historical linguists
on the list who probably can recite it by heart, it is worth
quoting:

The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful
structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the
Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both
of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs
and in the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced
by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine
them all three, without believing them to have sprung from some
common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists: there is a
similar reason, though not quite so forcible, for supposing that
both the Gothick and the Celtick, though blended with a very
different idiom, had the same origin with the Sanscrit; and the
old Persian might be added to the same family, if this were
the place for discussing any question concerning the antiquities
of Persia.

There is a statue to Sir William in St. Paul's Cathedral in London,
not for his contributions to historical linguistics, but for
his high position in the British Civil Service in India,
if I remember correctly, in the Bengali Province where he
founded the Asiatic Society.  The statue, most unfortunately,
has him in a Roman toga - I show a photograph of it to my
historical linguistics students each fall, and almost undermine
as a result, any respect they have for the field almost before
they begin.  But how can I resist?
            Margaret Winters

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:55>From peter@usenix.org  Wed Dec 15 07:50:32 1993

Date: Wed, 15 Dec 93 05:53:42 PST
From: peter@usenix.org (Peter H. Salus)
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Re:  Precursors

Sir William Jones was justice in the High Court of Bengal [Calcutta]
for the last decade of his life.  He is clad in a toga to denote his
judicial status.  He clasps in his hand a copy of his last work,
the translation of the Statutes of Manu.  Jones played a vital role
in bringing the culture of India and the East to Europe.  While
linguists think of the Ninth Anniversary Discourse as important,
his translations of Sanskrit, Persian and Arabic literary and
legal works had profound influence on such diverse folk as Goethe,
Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Shelley, Emerson, and FitzGerald.

OUP has recently published a one-volume anthology of Jones'
work, ed. by SS Pachori of the U. of North Florida.  (Sir William
Jones: A Reader)

Peter

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:56>From J_LIMBER@UNHH.UNH.EDU  Wed Dec 15 08:49:58 1993

Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1993 9:52:38 -0500 (EST)
From: J_LIMBER@UNHH.UNH.EDU (JOHN LIMBER)
Subject: Re:  Precursors
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

Precursors to precursors to...
While not to deny the merits of William Jones, the idea of a protolanguage has
been around a long time--perhaps since the collapse of Babel?  Leibniz, for
example, took it seriously as an empirical question deserving systematic
attention.

Leibniz to Ludolf, September 5, 1691 ..Of course, if the first change of
language brings forth other dialects among neighboring tribes, the the second
and third changes will result in another language.  Nor would I disagree very
much with those who, learned in the ancient languages of the world, believe
that many languages have developed from the same source.  But as far as
Chinese, the American Indian, and the African languges are concerned (languages
which , might I say, I do not command), they differ from ours, completely in
vocabulary, thought not necessarily in structure...p.22

Leibniz to Ludolf, April 17, 1692..And it would be most advisable to have the
Lord's Prayer expressed in each language, so that we might have common measure
of comparision.  I ask you to concentrate your attention upon Asia and other
places in that part of the world...."

Leibniz on gradualism and protolanguage (letter to Sparfvenfeldt, 12/6/1695):
"Actually, it is a source of amazement to me that neighboring people often have
such different languages; as for example the Germans and the Slavs.  Perhaps
the ancient people who may have been between the two, and who would have
provided a more perceptible transition from one language to another, have been
exterminated. p.63)

Waterman, J. T. (1978). Leibniz and Ludolf on Things Linguistic: Excerpts from
Their Correspondence . Berkelely: University of California Press.

John Limber, psychology, University of New Hampshire, Durham NH 03824 USA

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:57>From peter@usenix.org  Wed Dec 15 09:20:07 1993

Date: Wed, 15 Dec 93 07:23:17 PST
From: peter@usenix.org (Peter H. Salus)
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Subject: Re:  Precursors

John,

Your citations from Leibniz are precisely why Jones'
utterance was so remarkable: having the Lord's Prayer in
each language" and "differ in vocabulary, though not necessarily in
structure," and "ancient people who may have been
between the two," do not reflect a common ancestor which
no longer exists.  Nor do vague generalizations about
Chinese, Amerindian, and African (by which, incidentally,
Leibniz must have meant super-Saharan, ie Arabic and Berber)
have much to do with specific statements about Sanskrit,
Greek and Latin inflections, the "Gothick" (by which
Jones meant Germanic), and the Celtic.

Peter H. Salus

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:58>From KIMLER@social.chass.ncsu.edu  Wed Dec 15 13:44:53 1993

From: KIMLER@social.chass.ncsu.edu
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1993 14:49:07 EST5EDT
Subject: Re: fitness in linguistics

How nice to see the reminder from Salikoko Mufwene that genetic
fitness "makes no sense without reference to ecology."  As with all
the comparisons of cultural change to biological evolutionary change,
the difficulties for the metaphor lie in finding the proper
equivalents.  Although they need an "ecological setting" for the
idea of fitness to make sense, I am not quite certain what linguists
want the "ecological setting" for linguistic fitness to mean.  Is it
the world of meaning, or a set of constraints in the body's
sound-producing apparatus, or a search for inherent universalisms in
the structure and function of the brain's linguistic capacity?  All
of this?

The methodological question to ask of all "cultural evolution"
comparisons [refer to DARWIN-L discussions on cultural evolution, a
few months back] is why one is interested in explanations that are
"genetic" (universal rules from shared structures) rather than
"ecological" (contingent circumstances and history).  Are there
enough universal patterns of linguistic change to find something
"below" historical circumstance and cultural choices?

William Kimler
History, North Carolina State University
kimler@ncsu.edu

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:59>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Wed Dec 15 16:50:34 1993

Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1993 17:56:52 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: Conference on historiography of history of science (fwd from HPSST-L)
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

Announcement of a meta-historical conference
that might be of interest to some Darwin-L members.

Bob O'Hara
darwin@iris.uncg.edu

----- begin forwarded message -----------------------------------

First circular:  Nordic Workshop:

THE HISTORIOGRAPHY OF CONTEMPORARY HISTORY OF SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY
AND MEDICINE

Goeteborg University, Sweden, 16 - 17 September, 1994

The historical study of contemporary history of science,
technology and medicine is a rapidly expanding and highly
cross-disciplinary area that engages scholars in fields such as
history and technology of science, history of medicine, sociology
of science, science and technology studies, and philosophy of
science.  Contemporary history also attracts science journalists,
and has the attention of practicing scientists, technologists and
medical scientists.
 The aim of the workshop is to address a number of
historiographical problems that are rarely, or only marginally,
confronted by historians of earlier periods in the history of
science, technology, and medicine, such as:

- is there a qualitative difference between scientists' history
and historians' history?
- does the lack of historical distance prohibit traditional
historical scholarship?
- does the technical complexity of recent science and technology
prevent historians and sociologists of science from doing their
job?
- does the increasing specialization of scientific work prevent
scientists from engaging in historical overviews?
- can oral history and interviews contribute anything
significantly beyond the written sources?
- does the immense volume of published literature make the
historian dependent on electronic databases for reviewing recent
science and technology?
- how do the new information- and communication technologies
effect the access of historical sources?
- is there a place for scientific biography in the history of Big
Science and technology as an increasingly collective enterprise?
- can science journalism contribute to the history of
contemporary science, technology and medicine?

The workshop takes place 16-17 September 1994 in the Humanities
Building, Goeteborg University, Goeteborg, Sweden.  The number of
participants is limited to 30.  A publication with selected
papers is planned.
 The Swedish Council for Planning and Coordination of Research
provides a small grant for the workshop.  A limited number of
stipends for travel and accomodation are available for those who
cannot obtain other funds.
 Inquiries and preliminary applications, including suggestions
for 30 minute papers (.5 page abstract), shall be sent before
February 15, 1994 to: Thomas Soederqvist, Dept of Life Sciences,
Roskilde University, P.O. Box 260, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark
***  Fax: INT + 45 46757401  ***  E-mail: thomass@mmf.ruc.dk
Please indicate if you are in need of a stipend.  A second
announcement, including preliminary program, travel and hotel
information, etc. will be distributed to the participants in late
March.

Thomas Soederqvist
Department of Theory of Science
Goeteborg University

_______________________________________________________________________________

<4:60>From CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu  Wed Dec 15 22:51:07 1993

Date: Wed, 15 Dec 93 22:53 CDT
From: Tom Cravens <CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu>
Subject: Re: fitness in linguistics
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

William Kimler asks

Are there enough universal patterns of linguistic change to find
something "below" historical circumstances and cultural choices?

If 'historical circumstances' refers to matters external to language,
the answer is most definitely yes. Basic to even the most socially
responsible historical linguistic research is the knowledge that there
are a number of universals and a number of pseudo-universals controlling
many aspects of language change. A universal would be that /n/ before
/p/ will be pronounced [m] (thus 'iMpossible' vs 'iNelegant'). A pseudo-
universal might be that consonants between vowels tend to weaken, rather
than strengthen, or that analytic constructions such as multi-word verbs
(Lat. CANTARE HABEO) tend to become synthetic, i.e. root plus morphemes
(It. cantero` 'I will/shall sing').

The metaphor of ecology is of interest here, I think, if we distinguish
between the ecology of the linguistic system(s) and the ecology of the
society in which the language is employed. The first determines the
types of mutations which are churned out constantly, the second (in very
vaguely characterizable terms) determines which of the mutations actually
will be incorporated permanently in the language in question. The first is
approachable, with lots of thorns and controversial theories. Research
on the social parameters of change suggests that acceptance is socially,
not linguistically, motivated.

Is this along the lines you meant, William?

Tom Cravens
University of Wisconsin-Madison
cravens@macc.wisc.edu
cravens@wiscmacc.bitnet

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<4:61>From KIMLER@social.chass.ncsu.edu  Thu Dec 16 14:22:37 1993

From: KIMLER@social.chass.ncsu.edu
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1993 15:27:24 EST5EDT
Subject: Re: fitness

In response to my question about the "ecological setting" for
linguistic change, Tom Cravens writes:

   The metaphor of ecology is of interest here, I think, if we
   distinguish between the ecology of the linguistic system(s) and
   the ecology of the society in which the language is employed.
   The first determines the types of mutations which are churned
   out constantly, the second (in very vaguely characterizable
   terms) determines which of the mutations actually will be
   incorporated permanently in the language in question. The first
   is approachable, with lots of thorns and controversial theories.
   Research on the social parameters of change suggests that
   acceptance is socially, not linguistically, motivated.

This is exactly the issue I had in mind, and the sort of clean
thinking about universal "generators" versus universal "valuators"
that all biology-to-culture theories need.  Thanks to the linguists
for some great examples of finding universals, with a topic usually
left out of sociobiology discussions, despite the obviously huge
importance of language for culture.

As a historian, it's also reassuring to see the recognition of
historically-located "social parameters."  Might we more simply call
that independent and unique "choices", or are there universals at
that level, too?  Quests for universal historical "rules" are old-
fashioned among historians, but what about their appeal for the
historical sciences?

William Kimler
History, North Carolina State University
kimler@ncsu.edu

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<4:62>From CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu  Thu Dec 16 16:58:13 1993

Date: Thu, 16 Dec 93 17:00 CDT
From: Tom Cravens <CRAVENS@macc.wisc.edu>
Subject: Re: fitness
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

A clarification.

I should, perhaps, clarify what I meant by "social parameters" of
language change. I was referring not to the change itself, or the
gamut of possible alternatives from which a successful change is
selected, but the conjunct of social features (gender, socio-economic
status, etc.) which define who accepts and/or promulgates a given
change. (Those interested in language change might want to take a
look at Jean Aitchison. 1991. _Language change: Progress or decay?_.
Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0 521 42283 3 paperback. The writing
is crystal clear [not always guaranteed in linguistics!], and she does
an extraordinary job of summarizing and illustrating up-to-date thinking.)

Also, it may not have been clear from my cursory note that the
"generators" and the generated within the linguistic system as well
as ultimate selection/acceptance as change ("valuation?") are viewed
by at least some linguists as legitimate historical nuts for cracking,
but the first gets much more attention.

The system-internal changes are easier to deal with (which does not mean
easy to deal with), and they also hold promise as indications of how
linguistic systems work, so that's what most historical linguists
investigate. Social acceptance is definitely of interest in a full
description of linguistic change, but it's 1) not easy to deal with
(and all but impossible when examining past stages); 2) extra-systemic,
thus not attractive to those whose brief is confined to language-as-
system.

This is my reading of things. It could, no doubt, stand some correction
by the other linguists on the list!

Tom Cravens
cravens@macc.wisc.edu
cravens@wismacc.bitnet

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<4:63>From WILLS@macc.wisc.edu  Thu Dec 16 17:03:09 1993

Date: Thu, 16 Dec 93 17:05 CDT
From: Jeffrey Wills <WILLS@macc.wisc.edu>
Subject: universals
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

	Tom Cravens' distinction between "universals" and "pseudo-universals"
leads me to ask what may seem an elementary question, but what exactly do we
mean by "universals" these days? Although there is certainly a plentiful
literature on linguistic universals (e.g. B. Comrie), I have the feeling that
some writers mean Tom's "universal" (really truly all the time) and others mean
"pseudo-universal" (very frequent, commonplace). Is this sort of confusion
"universal" among the historical sciences?  Is there a terminology in use which
someone might recommend?
	Jeffrey Wills
	wills@macc.wisc.edu

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<4:64>From WILLS@macc.wisc.edu  Thu Dec 16 17:32:56 1993

Date: Thu, 16 Dec 93 17:35 CDT
From: Jeffrey Wills <WILLS@macc.wisc.edu>
Subject: Scientifc American
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

	As an Indo-Europeanist, I am disappointed to see Colin Renfrew again
given space by _Scientific American_ (Jan. 1994) for his controversial views on
the spread of language when other opinions could have been solicited.
	Renfrew, a distinguished Cambridge archaeologist who has always been
interested in models and the big picture, claims that evidence from
anthropology, genetics, and ecology give support to the "lumpers" in the
debates about the origins and spread of language. He mentions repeatedly that
the majority of linguists are not sold on his views (or the work of Greenberg,
Ruhlen, etc.), but he is undeterred. For those of us who think there is little
or no linguistic evidence relevant to populations before c. 5000 BCE, what are
we to do? We can't refute non-testable hypotheses. Any advice?
	Would others on the list care to evaluate Renfrew's article from their
own areas of expertise? I apologize for not summarizing the article in more
detail but I think that would come better from someone sympathetic to it.

	Jeffrey Wills
	wills@macc.wisc.edu

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<4:65>From DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu  Thu Dec 16 21:30:07 1993

Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1993 22:36:38 -0400 (EDT)
From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu
Subject: KLEIO software for historians (fwd from HUMANIST)
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Organization: University of NC at Greensboro

I came across this announcement of a new software package for historians
on the HUMANIST list, and thought it might be of interest to some Darwin-L
members.  I don't exactly understand what it does myself, but perhaps
someone here will try it out and enlighten the rest of us.

Bob O'Hara
darwin@iris.uncg.edu

----- begin forwarded message ------------------------------------

Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 7, No. 0346. Thursday, 16 Dec 1993.

Date: Thu, 16 Dec 93 16:48:22 GMT
From: Donald A Spaeth <GKHA13@CMS.GLASGOW.AC.UK>
Subject: Announcing the release of the English version of Kleio

I have been asked to post the enclosed announcement by Dr Peter Denley
of Queen Mary and Westfield College (London), email: p.r.denley@qmw.ac.uk

Donald Spaeth
Computers in Teaching Initiative Centre for History
ctich@glasgow.ac.uk


   ---------------------------------------------------

   K   K   L        EEEE   I     W W W
   K  K    L        E      I    W  W  W
   K K     L        E      I    W  W  W
   KK      LL       EEE    I    W  W  W
   K K     L  L     E      I    W  W  W
   K  K    L   L    E      I    W  W  W
   K   K   L    L   EEEE   I   WWWW WWWW

   ---------------------------------------------------

   Version 5.1.1; The English Version of KLEIO

   ---------------------------------------------------

The pioneering software system KLEIO, developed by Dr
Manfred Thaller of the Max-Planck-Institut at Goettingen, has
revolutionised historical computing in the German-speaking
world. Starting with the principle of "source-oriented data
processing", KLEIO provides historians with a range of
sophisticated, discipline-specific tools which enable them to
preserve the integrity of their source material while handling
that material in a wide variety of ways. To this end, KLEIO
offers powerful text handling facilities, routines for dealing with
varieties of historical dating systems and interlocking currency
systems, hierarchical and non-hierarchical relationships, record-
matching algorithms, fuzzy and context-sensitive data handling,
mapping, image retrieval and information exchange routines.
The approach has been accurately defined as that of the
"historical workstation".

The English version of KLEIO is now released, allowing a wider
community of historians access to the software at last. This
version consists of a substantial revision of the software itself,
and a completely new tutorial written English historical practice
data sets. The tutorial has been tested on classes of students
during 1993, but is equally suitable for individual work.

Version 5.1.1 of KLEIO is suitable for PCs of 386 specification or
above. The release also includes StanFEP, the Standard Format
Exchange Program also developed by the KLEIO team. A "high-
tech" version of KLEIO incorporating the features of this version
as well as KLEIO's Image Analysis System (KLEIO IAS) is also
available, at present only for UNIX systems.

The English Version of KLEIO has been made possible by the
support of The British Academy: The Royal Historical Society:
The Max-Planck-Institut fuer Geschichte, Goettingen: The
Committee for Advanced Studies, University of Southampton:
The Arts Faculty, Queen Mary & Westfield College, University
of London.


     How to Order KLEIO
     ------------------

Version 5.1.1 of KLEIO comes as a package consisting of the
following:

  *  a software disk (3.5")

  *  a tutorial disk (3.5")

  *  the reference manual (Manfred Thaller, KLEIO. A
     Database System)

  *  the tutorial volume (Matthew Woollard & Peter Denley,
     Source-Oriented Data Processing for Historians: a Tutorial
     for KLEIO)

  *  the KLEIO IAS manual (Gerhard Jaritz, Images. A Primer
     of Computer-Supported Analysis with KLEIO IAS),
     supplied as a taster for the image analysis system
     (currently available for Unix systems only)

Version 5.1.1 incorporates both the German and the English
versions of KLEIO: you are asked at installation which version
you wish to use.

Purchase of the package entitles you to multiple use; the only
restriction is that you may not sell KLEIO to third parties.
Further copies of the individual volumes are available as books
in the Halbgraue Reihe zur historischen Fachinformatik, for which
a price list and order form are attached.

English KLEIO users are also entitled to the services of the
KLEIO Support Team, which will answer questions and help to
resolve any problems encountered. Users will receive
information about updates and enhancements to the software.


Cost and method of payment
--------------------------

The cost of the package is L30 excluding postage and packing.
The amount to be added for postage and packing is L4.50 for
orders from within the United Kingdom and L6.50 for orders
from outside the United Kingdom. Payment must be by cheque,
made out to "Queen Mary & Westfield College", and must reach
the suppliers in sterling, free of bank or international exchange
charges. Invoices and receipts can be supplied on request.

Orders should be sent to:

  KLEIO Support Team, Humanities Computing Centre,
  Queen Mary & Westfield College, University of
  London, Mile End Road, London E1 4NS, United
  Kingdom: fax. +44 81 980 8400: email
  kleio@qmw.ac.uk

from whom information about the image analysis system,
KLEIO IAS, can also be obtained.


     KLEIO: Order Form
     -----------------

I wish to order KLEIO Version 5.1.1.

Name   ...................................................
Address  ...................................................
     ...................................................
     ...................................................
     ...................................................
     ...................................................
Signature  ...................................................

I enclose a cheque for:

     KLEIO 5.1.1            L30

     Postage & packing
     (L4.50 within UK, L6.50 outside UK) ......

            TOTAL      ......


Payment must be by cheque, made out to "Queen
Mary & Westfield College", and must reach the
suppliers in sterling, free of bank or international
exchange charges.

Invoices and receipts can be supplied on request.

Orders should be sent to:

     KLEIO Support Team
     Humanities Computing Centre
     Queen Mary & Westfield College
     University of London
     Mile End Road
     London E1 4NS
     United Kingdom

     fax. +44 81 980 8400
     email kleio@qmw.ac.uk

----- end forwarded message --------------------------------------

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Darwin-L Message Log 4: 26-65 -- December 1993          End