Lol, thats right. And the book is not the reserach institute. Tell me something else I don't know. The map is not the terrain - that does not imply the map is innacurate as a map.
no, you're missing the point. go tilt at wind mills some more if you like. but wikipedia ≠ research. wikipedia is an encyclopedia. that a little different than a map. a map, in this analogy might be a textbook, and wikipedia would be the children's color book. and you're challenging, of all people, the cartographer of the map with it. "but, look," you say, "this bit's clearly blue and scribbled on. i don't see that on your map!"
what's even funnier, is that you're challenging the cartographer on something that's not even part of his map. out of the boundaries.
Yes, becuase the answer was inadequate.
now, i know the wording of the op was a little confusing. but this is was an offshoot of another thread between crashfrog and i and brenna, where he insisted that words have gender, even though they have no sex, and so applying gender based on social roles to other things without sex was ok. the response of the prof destroyed that point. the gender of nouns is not commenting on their role in society in the slightest. and that was all we needed to know.
so no, actually, the answer of the prof was totally sufficent. the "origin of gender in languages" appears to be that they borrow it from their earlier source languages, and not that they make them up to suit their specific society. that's all we were looking for.
so the fact that latin got its genders from indo-european languages is only supplimentary to this, and only further proves the point.
And you are confirming my charge: you privilege the status of the institution rather than the accuracy of the information.
except that the information was not inaccurate. hey, sure, maybe it's missing the fact that latin got its genders from its indo-european roots.
actually, wait on second though -- no it's not. let's read it again shall we?
quote:
But there just isn't a really satisfying answer beyond the fact that it's a matter of historical inheritance from Latin. In remote linguistic history, before Latin existed, and in its ancestor language, there was a semantically-based distinction between animate and inanimate (or 'neuter').
hmm. did we miss that part the first few times? so now tell me again, where is his reply inaccurate? can you point out something he forgot? or got wrong? there's even a bit about which genders where associated with what, and then HOW that transfered to modern romance languages. does wikipedia have that observation? it mentions them, but does it outline their history and integration in modern languages?
tell me, where is the reply inaccurate?
Ha ha. Yes, and so what happens if you enter something that is contrary to the state of the art? Why someone who IS familiar with the state of art will correct it.
presumably. want to run a test?
also, as schraf pointed out, from wikipedia's entry on ITSELF,
quote:
Wikipedia has been criticized for a perceived lack of reliability, comprehensiveness, and authority. It is considered to have no or limited utility as a reference work among many librarians, academics, and the editors of more formally written encyclopedias.
quote:
...By its open nature, vandalism and inaccuracy are problems in Wikipedia.
I'm afraid I did'nt see any such article, I presume you created one - the link was empty when I hit it. But yes, that does demonstrate that the low standard you ASSUMED because you did not have a prestigious institution or reseracher associated with it was hasty.
yes, well, as it turns out, they have an automatic filter that looks for things like name-calling, profanity, and pointlessly short entries. shall we try editting some real-sounding misinformation into a legitimate article, and actually TEST the standards according to the debate we're having?
By all means. After all, the information was correct, was it not?
yes, but you have failed to substantiate these "virtue[s] of a common open resource." evidence please.
Funny how you seem less than hasty to dispute that point. Also telling that once again you refer back to a prior discussion about French that did not appear here.
i dunno, that stuff in the opening post about latin, french, and romance languages should have been a hint. although, i agree. it was poorly introduced.
the point is that you arrogantly decided to take on the expert opinion of an oxford professor of french, about the source of gender in the language he studies, claiming he'd fogotten a point he hadn't, and citing a hardly reputable source that didn't disagree with him.
what was your point, exactly? and DO you do this just to be annoying?
also, answer schraf's post while you're at it.
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