Re: Speaker Relative Adjectives

On Mon, 15 Feb 1999, vardi wrote:

> Perhaps the conculture, or conpoliticalscenario, might be a kind of
> cultural relativism gone crazy? Then people might indeed need a word for
> "blue, relative to my perception, but without implying that I'm
> establishing some norms for what blue is for someone else."
>
> Or there again perhaps not.
Ever read hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy?  "IF I were qualified to make
a statement in regards to weather, and if my perceptions were accurate, I
might assume, in the face of the evidence available, that it seemed to be
raining, but then again, I could be wrong."  ;)

I'd bet a language with such relative adjectives would have a *pile* of
subjective cases.  I wouldn't know what you'd call them, though.

> I'd reinforce Jim's comments (in the clipped bit)about the problems with
> the extreme nature of children's perceptions. My 3 year-old son often
> says that
> some 7 or 8year old child is "very big, isn't he?" Young children's
> capacity
> to express shades of meaning in temporal, physical or other areas is
> limited ("I've never had ice-cream," he'll say to me, meaning that he
> hasn't had any since he stuffed himself sick on it just the day
> before).
A language for a people whose mental maturity never excedes age ten by
our standards?

Seems impractical, but hey, nothing wrong with impractical, is there?
It's *conlanging*, after all.

--Patrick