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  • From: Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>
  • To: JCR128 AT student.anglia.ac.uk
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Isaac Fried's Theory (was Karl's lexicon)
  • Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2007 00:03:39 -0400

James,

You say "Grammar is induced by [a?] process of generalisation". OK. But what is being generalized? There is obviously a transmitted grammatical system [we need define grammar, but this is not for now] with some irregularities that are being instinctively, yet "erroneously", rectified by the young or the naive [or the well intentioned]. There is a darn annoying extra s in 'he stands'. Does this 's' mean anything, or is it just a dead appendix? If so why is it not removed by the wise men of England? I used to remove it in English class in school but the teacher became annoyed with me.
What is the point you are trying to make here? English is not Hebrew. English does not have a root system anymore, and its vowels are just empty sounds. Could you explain to me, by the way, what is the independent meaning of -ed in goed? Is this just a random syllable formed out of thin air and stuck there to indicate past action? I have said it earlier, I will say it again, I am not interested in English nor in Eskimo, only in Hebrew.
I am really put off by this techno-talk of hardweired brains. The human mind is not the motherboard of a digital computer. We have feelings and are inventive. What is, pray, "the mechanisms of our cognitive system"? is this just common linguistic bombast for 'intelligence'? You say further "Shamarnu has very little meaning on its own but in a real phonetic string becomes far more meaningful". Sorry, but I do not understand this. Is "phonetic string" the same bombast for 'sentence'?
You go on to say "Any one hearing such a statement [namely SHAMARNU] would immediately wonder 'Who is the we?' and 'What did they guard?' Right! This proves that SHAMARNU is meaningful since it engenders meaningful questions. SHAMARNU consists of two words that came together SHAMAR and NU. Moreover, I see NU itself as consisting of the two words N-U, with N indication existence, and U something that is noisy, like me.
You end by saying "Such is, after all, merely convention". True. But convention is set by people.
The issues before us are very simple and very well defined, and unique to Hebrew [or her Semitic sisters]. Hebrew is built up of roots---some 3500 of them. Each root consists [normally] of a cluster of three consonants, and is endowed with a meaning. Say the root GDL, which means 'large'. I know that meaning is vague and controversial. There are some 22 marked consonants in Hebrew, which can be arranged into seven groups. One group, for example, being B, V, W, P, F. The question now is this Is the root random or systematic? I hold to the opinion that the root is systematic with each contributing consonant being by itself a meaningful single-consonant root. Next, to the skeletal root Hebrew adds vowels to create pronounceable [pronounce- able] words. The question now is this Are the vowels empty sounds or are they semantically meaningful? I hold to the opinion that the A sound is just a phonetic ligature, but that the sounds U-O and I-E are identity markers. For instance, $AMUR, 'guarded', from the root $MR, is $AM-U-R with U referring to the thing, HU, being guarded.
Luckily our root system is transmitted to us from biblical times nearly intact, otherwise the linguistic barbarians would have ruined it.

Isaac Fried, Boston University





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