Re: Sapir-WhorFreakiness

John Cowan said:
> Mark P. Line scripsit:
>
>> Actually, Piraha is much freakier than the article in _Science_ lets on.
>> Also, there may be a reason for much of the freakiness in Piraha that
>> has
>> nothing to do with Sapir-Whorf relativity:
>
> This is beyond freaky.  I strongly suspect that the Pirahã have
> some kind of inbred genetic defect: maybe not SLI but something like it.
Although I'm as ready to beat up on notions of "Universal Grammar" as
anybody, I think the Piraha case goes quite a ways beyond anything I'd
ever be prepared to expect in a natlang, even if it is an isolate. All the
other isolates I've looked at fall well within the evolutionary space I
can imagine for human languages. Piraha falls outside that space in a
number of ways (lack of embedding is the worst, for me). So I'm prepared
to consider very unusual conditions that make this language such an
outlier.

A genetic defect is one possibility, I suppose. Perhaps something very odd
happened during the evolution of this language. (I dunno, pidginization
followed by stunted creolization, with lexifiers and substrates all lost
in the meantime. Or something. *shrug*)

Alternatively, maybe there is an additional cultural constraint that
cannot, due to its nature, be discovered by outsiders: "Don't talk
straight with outsiders."

1. Use simple sentences with simple grammar. You know how dense these
outsiders are.

2. Never mention color. Remember what happened to our neighbors the
Ungabunga when they explained colors to that American who was visiting
their village? They'll never see the end of him now.

3. Don't teach the outsiders to count, and don't commit to anything that
you've counted. Nobody needs to stick their nose into our bookkeeping.

4. Don't try to explain our family relations to them. They'll only get
confused. They're like children, never forget. Just give them some beer
and they'll go away eventually.

5. Don't tell them any of our important stories. They won't believe them
anyway, so what's the point? And anyway, our stories are none of their
business either. Just tell them, "I don't know any important stories".
They'll believe that for sure. If they don't, just tell them something
about your parents or grandparents -- that always cheers them up. Don't
tell them how the world was created or anything. They don't need to know
about that.

6. Whatever you do, don't let the outsiders know you're limiting the way
you talk with them. It only makes them mad and then we'll *NEVER* get rid
of them.


-- Mark

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