Re: Degrees of adjectives

Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> wrote:
>> On an etymological level, the "opposite" of |comparative| would
>> be *|separative|--"compare" being literally to bring together [such
>> as for the purpose of comparison],
>
> Yes, but with "Z is less adj than X" Z and X are still being brought
> together for comparison. There's no separation.
Actually, I thought about that, and [in a different sense, you could
say] Z is being held farther away from the standard of "adj" than
X is (that is, instead of considering X and Z compared to each other,
considering them compared to the standard of "adj"ness).  But that
is of course an unusual way of looking at it. :p

>> and of |superlative|, *|sublative|,
>> but that's perhaps a little silly.
>
> the main problem with 'sublative' is that those who know any Latin will
> know that _sublatum_ is the supine of _sufferre_ "to suffer" which is the
> wrong meaning.
Sublative is still used as a case name, I think. "Suffer" may be the
predominant meaning but isn't the literal meaning of _suffere_.

	*Muke!
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