Hallo!

On Sat, 24 Jul 2010 18:07:45 +0100, R A Brown wrote:

>  [...]
>  IME if a language has no obvious affinities, it will
>  inevitably be claimed to have a Caucasian connexion    :)

Especially if it is spoken anywhere in or near Europe.  There is
a popular long-range relationship hypothesis, "Vasco-Caucasian",
which rolls Basque, "North Caucasian" (actually two utterly different
families not yet shown to be related to each other), Burushaski and
sometimes Etruscan into a single family - which is then combined with
Sino-Tibetan, Yeniseian and Na-Dene into "Dene-Caucasian".  There is
really no evidence for that (except that Yeniseian may actually be
related to Na-Dene), other than the languages in question being not
"Nostratic" - another dubious entity.

Some even say that language XY was related to "Caucasian", ignoring
that the latter are *three* families, not one.

>  >  [Christophe]
>  >  It's just as useless to try and fit it in a family it doesn't fit in, or to
>  >  create language families out of thin air just in order to remove an isolate
>  >  status.
>
>  Absolutely. Where does it get you to say that Basque is the
>  only known example of the Vascan family (especially as Vasc-
>  and Basque are of the same origin)? Or that Etruscan and
>  possibly Lemnian are the only attested members of the
>  Tyrrhenian family?
>
>  As for fitting them into some other family on the flimsiest
>  of 'evidence' just to save them from being called isolates -
>  that is even worse - it's downright misleading.

Indeed.  A false, misleading classification is worse than a
classification of an entity as "unknown" or "sui generis".

Such things, BTW, happen in other fields of discourse, too.
I am currently involved in a debate about the classification
of a particular rock band which is in my opinion misleading
in a German music forum.

>  >
>  >>  It has got to have some relatives whether we will ever know them or not.
>  >
>  >  Of course! "Isolate" has never meant: "doesn't have any relatives". It
>  >  means: "as far as we *can* know *at this moment*, it doesn't have any
>  >  *known* relatives that are of an established language family". It's not an
>  >  end point, it's a temporary classification for languages for which we just
>  >  lack the data needed to establish genetic relationships.
>
>  Exactly!! _isolate_ may not have been the best label to use
>  for this meaning, but it's been established for a long time
>  now.

Some scholars use the term "unclassified language", which is IMHO
better because it says exactly what such a language is: a language
which has not yet been successfully classified as belonging to any
known family.  But "isolate" is more common.

>  [...]
>  >  But classifying a language as isolate is not "assuming there aren't any"
>  >  relatives! It's just a label to point out or lack of knowledge, nothing
>  >  else. And it certainly hasn't stopped anyone trying to establish a
>  >  relationship between Basque and about every other language in the world!
>
>  It certainly has not. I can testify that there are those who
>  vociferously and fanatically claim to have established the
>  identity of Etruscan.
>
>  >  When a language is classified as an isolate, linguists don't just sit on
>  >  their laurels and smile on a job well done! On the contrary, they redouble
>  >  their efforts to find genetic proofs of relationship with other languages!
>  >  But sometimes, the data is just missing, and we have no way to reconstruct
>  >  it. So the status of isolate lingers. But that doesn't mean anyone is
>  >  satisfied by it.
>
>  Absolutely.  I cannot think of one single isolate for which
>  no one has tried to establish relationships. I've never come
>  across anyone who:
>  - either assumes an isolate came into being ex_nihilo
>  without any relationship to any other language;
>  - or is not curious to find out what relationships the
>  isolate may have.

Curiosity is what drives science.  Someone who is not curious to find
out what is not yet known should not seek a career in science.  Also,
curiosity is human nature.  A person lacking curiosity probably has a
mental health problem ;)

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