'mouth noises' bad? [was: Re: YAPT]

Gary Shannon wrote:
> More evidence for my contention that the exact nature
> of mouth noises is probably the least important aspect
> of language. Just listen to a four way conversation
> between people from Syndey, Bombay, Boston and South
> Carolina and you'll notice that they all understand
> each other just fine even though they have practically
> no mouth noises in common.
The list has discussed this claim before, and I don't think
those of us (like me) who disagreed with the claim ever got
a sensible and objective answer for why this should be so.
I mean, one could just as well argue that in a language like
German case is entirely superfluous, since word order is
(normally) pretty predictable, or that word order in a
language like Dyirbal is superfluous, since all the NPs have
explicit case-marking telling you who did what to whom.

It's one thing to say "I dislike this facet of grammar-creation
more than some other", since that's a matter of aesthetics, and
beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  It's very different thing
to say "My dislike of this facet of grammar-creation has objective
grounds for being so".

 =========================================================================
Thomas Wier	       "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago   half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street     Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637

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