Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>]

Peter:

It was in logic that I first heard the argument that it is a 
fallacy to assume that a lack of evidence merely means 
that we lack evidence of something that exists. Rather we 
must leave open the possibility that a lack of evidence is 
evidence of lack, that that something does not exist. In the 
latter case, lack of evidence is a positive (of a negation) 
not a negative (don't have the data).

When there is positive evidence from within a language 
contrasted to positive evidence from a cognate language, 
I claim that internal evidence trumps cognate language 
evidence all the time.

In the case of XRM, I see positive evidence that one basic 
meaning fits all uses, therefore there is no evidence for 
more than one root and none needed, therefore the lack 
of evidence is evidence of lack, i.e. that there was no more 
than one root used in Biblical Hebrew.

Karl W. Randolph.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Kirk" <peterkirk AT qaya.org>
> 
> On 31/10/2005 15:29, Karl Randolph wrote:
> 
> > ...
> >
> > There are times when absence of evidence is a lack, i.e. that a 
> > certain phenomenon existed but that we have yet to find evidence 
> > for it, and other times when it is evidence of lack, i.e. that 
> > the looked for phenomenon was never there in the first place. 
> > This is one of the cases IMO of the latter.
> >
> >
> >
> But surely direct evidence of a phenomenon must always trump any 
> argument from lack of evidence!
> 
> But as you say, it seems that we are unlikely to reach any 
> resolution of such matters as long as you refuse to accept the 
> usual rules of logic concerning evidence.
> 
> -- Peter Kirk
> peter AT qaya.org (personal)
> peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
> http://www.qaya.org/


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