🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <memo.851489@cix.compulink.co.uk>, petex@cix (Peter Christian) writes:
>In-Reply-To: <1993Jan8.002157.20841@leland.Stanford.EDU> alderson@cisco.com (Rich Alderson)

>> regular:  Predictable by historical or comparative expectation.
>
>I'm not querying the definition, but some people might be a bit baffled by the
>use of the word `predictable' refering to something in the past, where
>prediction in the normal sense doesn't apply. Perhaps you could add an extra
>gloss, something along the lines of:
>
>   `occurring (generally!) without exception in identical
>   circumstances'

In private e-mail, which I include with his permission, Leo Connolly had this
to say:

>Date: 8 Jan 93 08:35:00 CST
>From: "CONNOLLY LEO A" <CONNOLLY@memstvx1.memst.edu>
>Subject: Re: Definitions of terms that have bothered Mark Hubey
>To: "alderson" <alderson@cisco.com>
>
>I like your post very much, but I think this item is misleading because
>it's incomplete:
>
>>regular:  Predictable by historical or comparative expectation.
>
>No one could say that the Junggrammatiker thought sound change was rule-
>governed in exactly the same way we do.  Nevertheless, their whole terminology
>suggests that they believed *something* of the sort.  German _regelmaessig_
>'regular' literally, and obviously, means 'according to the rule(s)' (_Regel_
>'rule', _Mass_ 'measure', _gemaess_ 'in accordance with').  Further, they
>established "sound laws" and postulated that they operated without exception
>("die Ausnahmslosigkeit der Lautgesetze").  So I'd suggest a definition:
>"apparently produced by the processes postulated to account for the same
>development in other words".  Still, for your purposes, that's probably too
>much, which is why I'm not posting this.  (Do so yourself if you like.)
					   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I would like to thank both of you for your additions and clarifications.
Perhaps we can yet define this field so that non-practitioners can understand
what we do, and why.
-- 
Rich Alderson   'I wish life was not so short,' he thought.  'Languages take
                such a time, and so do all the things one wants to know about.'
                                                        --J. R. R. Tolkien,
alderson@leland.stanford.edu                              _The Lost Road_