Sally wrote :
On Sat, 24 Oct 1998, Mathias M. Lassailly wrote:
>
> > 'experience' is the state were you are at a certain stage of a process.
> > It's like you step outside time. You don't refer to the different stages
> > of process in time (aspective vision), but to the state in comparison to
> > other states (unaspective vision). People in active systems find it
> > difficult to stop referring to process in a phrase. So they go way round
> > and think : what does embody a state outside time ? A 'noun'. So they
> > use the noun as an adjective (as Latins did : 'bonus' = 'the good one' >
> > 'good' as an adjective)
>
> I'm having a hard time understanding how this illustrates an active
> system. Is Latin an active language simply because it uses substantive
> adjectives? German was doing this way back when, and we do it still, only
> in the plural. The poor. How does this prove activeness?
>
I didn't write that deriving epithete adjectives from substantive is an evidence for activeness.
>
> or as part of a compound locution with a verb of
> > state : 'to be good'. The 'dative-experiencer' case discussed a few
> > posts earlier is a way to make one agent refer to state ('experience')
> > while the predicate still refers to process.
>
> You mean the other way around? Me thynketh thaet soth is... "that seems
> to me to be true." The predicate is the state "being true" and the verb
> and dative "subject" is the process. Except that you identify state with
> experience. This is not clear, or I am really misunderstanding you.
nominative system :
adj = true > to-be-true = state verb > it-nom to-be-true
ergative system :
state = to-be-true > it-abs to-be-true
> But it's very difficult for
> > people speaking nom/acc or split ergative systems to figure that out.
>
> If I knew what you were expressing I could figure it out.
>
I'm doing my best. I didn't mean to e offensive. Don't be angry at me, I'm always
doing my best :-)
> > Pure ergative and age/pat systems have no trouble referring to
> > 'experience' because absolutive case precisely originately refers to
> > states like 'to-be-cut', and so do either agent or patient depending on
> > the predicate they refer to.
>
> Unclear.
>
English : intransitive nominative (=state verb) : I-nom (can) see > transitive
nominative : I-nom see (it)
Ergative : to-be-seen (= state) > me-erg it-abs to-be-seen = I see it, or rather :
me-unerg it-abs to-be-seen = I see.
Split ergative : appear (=state) > me-abs appear = I appear; me-erg/nom it-acc appear = I see it.
I used 'appear' with split ergative, not 'to-be-seen' to show that this root
equates the passive state 'to-be-seen' in spliterg and nom/acc systems. Compare
with :
Split ergative : to-be-seen (=state) > me-abs to-be-seen = I appear;
me-erg/nom it-acc to-be-seen = I show it.
To understand that you must step out of process (but not out of progression) and
consider each (progressive) stage of process as a different state viewed from
each possible agent thereto : that's unaspectiveness.
> >
> > Mathias
>
> So is it utterly off the mark to identify my "volitional/non-volitional"
> case system in Teonaht (which I see as different forms of nominative) with
> active systems?
>
Nothing is 'off the mark' to us conlangers. Maybe because I'm no linguist I enjoy
transgressing marks all the time with conlangs. Mine are unaspective so I need
tons of cases and aspectivers and connectives but I love it. So why not
volition outside unergative case of ergative languages and antipassive voice of
nom/acc languages ? I just try to show you that your volitional system (I call
it volitive in my languages) is another way of making active verbs from
unspective states, which is very normal since we all (fortunately) have in
brain concepts outside time (substantive), time inside concepts (aspective :
'verbs'), time inside time (progression), etc. Don't take it awrong :-)
> T. has a whole host of ni (non-volitional intransitive) verbs that are
> made from states (actually adjectives--or which furnish adjectives): "to
> be present," "to be blue," "to be dead," "to be wounded," etc.
>
> For some reason, I am still casting about for a notch to fit this into.
> I'd like to know of natlangs that do what T. does. i.e., maintain a basic
> nominative/accusative structure and still make distinctions between
> volition and non volition.
>
I can't help : no natlangs I know do. My language does but it's not a nom/acc
language. Slavic have a different verb for transitive (faculty and
intransitive), Japanese has an antipassive system :
mieru = to be apparent > miru = to see > miseru = to make it apparent (=to show) >
misaseru > to make someone see. But nothing to tell 'I see' from 'I look at'
with the same root.
> Maybe I SHOULD develop a dative form of the possessive.
>
> Sally
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> Sally Caves
> scaves@frontiernet.net
>
http://www.frontiernet.net/~scaves/teonaht.html
>
> Rin euab ouarjo vopy vytssema tohda uo zef:
> ar al aippara brottwav; ad kemban aril yllefo
> brotwav fenom; vybbrysan brotwav an; he ad
> edirmerem brotwav kronom.
>
> "A cat and a man are not all that different.
> Both are on my bed; both lay their head on their
> arm; both have mustaches; both purr when they
> sleep."
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>
>