Yes, active and passive are hardly different at all, being merely a means of
reversing topicality of subject and object.
While I know what "YMMV" means literally, I don't know what you (or anyone
else) mean by it. I suspect something like "This is subjective, and may not
be the same (or may be completely different) for you".

stevo

On Sun, Aug 14, 2011 at 12:19 AM, Padraic Brown <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> --- On Sat, 8/13/11, MorphemeAddict <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > From: MorphemeAddict <[log in to unmask]>
> > Subject: Re: [CONLANG] New a priori conlang parts of speech
> > To: [log in to unmask]
> > Date: Saturday, August 13, 2011, 12:32 PM
>  > On Sat, Aug 13, 2011 at 8:14 AM,
> > Padraic Brown <[log in to unmask]>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > --- On Fri, 8/12/11, Scott Hlad <[log in to unmask]>
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > > Hi Alex and thanks for your queries.
> > > >
> > > > Passive voice:
> > > > I have envisioned a separate class of pronoun
> > (I've not
> > > > imagined it to be a
> > > > case - hadn't thought in those terms)
> > > >
> > > > English employs the preposition "by" to make the
> > passive
> > > > voice. Rather than
> > > > introduce a preposition into the sentence, I have
> > simply
> > > > made a separate
> > > > pronoun for the same function. I have not coined
> > any words
> > > > yet so
> > >
> > > I like this much! It makes sense for two such distinct
> > semantic realms to
> > > be governed by different kinds of pronouns. Will be
> > interesting to see
> > > how this turns out!
> > >
> >
> > "Such distinct semantic realms"? The topicality of the
> > subject and object
> > are reversed. That doesn't seem like a big deal to me.
>
> I mean active versus passive in verbs.  YMMV.
>
> > > By dropping the subject pronoun, we're no longer sure
> > who went to the deli
> > > and neither are we sure if the verb is active or
> > middle. If "I" went to
> > > the deli, "get" would be an active verb and "him"
> > would simply be the
> > > indirect object of the verb. If "He" went to the deli,
> > then "get" would
> > > be a middle verb and "him" would simply refer back to
> > the agent.
> >
> > Technically not, I think. "him" as object would imply a
> > different 3rd person
> > subject; "himself" would be needed to refer back to the
> > agent.
>
> For me, "him" can refer either to the same or a different agent. Seems
> our lects differ on this particular.
>
> > stevo
>
> Padraic
>

Yes, by "technically", I meant prescriptive (rather than descriptive) and
standard dialect.

stevo