Re: I came in late.

Nik Taylor wrote:

> Boudewijn Rempt wrote:
> > I've been looking around for information, but I couldn't find anything
> > directly relating to this. Somewhere in the attics of my mind hovers a
> > quote about some C19 Englishman who dismissed 'primitive' languages for
> > not having comparatives, but that's all.
>
> Well, I suspect that those "primitive" languages simply didn't have a
> morphological comparative.  I've read that, for instance, Quechua uses a
> verb meaning something like "to surpass" to indicate comparative.  I
> don't know how it's used, my source didn't explain it.  I think it's
> something like "he is old surpassing me" for "He is older than me".  I
> don't see how a language could have NO way of indicating more and less
> of a quality.
Oh, you'd be surprised.  Afterall, there are languages in Paupua New Guinea
which have only two colors, basicly meaning "light" and "dark".  The idea
is not that a language *can't* not indicate a given meaning, but that the
*probability* is that it can.

===========================================
Tom Wier <artabanos@...>
AIM: Deuterotom ICQ: 4315704
<http://www.angelfire.com/tx/eclectorium/>
"Cogito ergo sum, sed credo ergo ero."

"Things just ain't the way they used to was."
     - a man on the subway
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