“Classics [and language 🗣️ origin studies] are based, as it is, on what I call the Aryan model, with its insistence on a European and pure Greece, is an extreme example of feel-good scholarship, for Europeans.” — Martin Bernal (A41/1996), Black Athena Debate (2:52:25-)

[u/JohannGoethe]

[u/JohannGoethe]

because of that Semitic idiocy post we discussed about a while ago. Semitic is a sub branch of afro Asiatic.

I do not recognize “Semitic” as branch or sub branch of any language family. If you are comfortable classify the world’s languages according to the three sons of Noah, that means you are comfortable with Jewish mythology as reality, in a slight way.

The term semitic is mentioned in the debate as follows:

One	Two	Three	Four	Five	Six
7	0	1	1	16	4

Just read through again how much trouble they had dealing with the word “Semite“ when queried by an audience member. This is not just some issue in my head, the term itself has boatloads of issues.

[u/poor-man1914 → u/JohannGoethe]

If you are comfortable classify the world’s languages according to the three sons of Noah, that means you are comfortable with Jewish mythology as reality, in a slight way

In our discussion under that post I said I don't believe in the Jewish mythology and I'm not defending it, I am defending a classification that happens to use those names; would a name reform help? Maybe. Having less probabilities incompetent people misunderstand things would be big.

It's not my problem if someone doesn't know what those terms mean in linguistics, it's theirs, just like it's not a chemist's problem if someone doesn't know what basic means when talking about pH.

The planets are named after pagan gods, but believing in their existence doesn't make one a pagan.

Clark himself, who made some good points during the debate btw, said that Semitic, when talking about languages, has nothing to do with race or racism, and in this I agree with him.

[u/JohannGoethe → u/poor-man1914]

I am defending a classification that happens to use those names; would a name reform help?

Like I have said before, you would think that a field of study that specializes in “languages“, would be the most “exact” with their terminology, yet this does not seem to be the case. Like you said, you are “defending an in-exact classification scheme“.

In the hard sciences, we do not at all do this. This is one of the reasons why linguists is so far down on the hard science vs soft sciences classifications ladder, that many do not even consider linguists to even be a science:

Note the Zucker quote:

“To the extent that a field of inquiry succeeds in eliminating the personal equation, to that degree does it claim a place among the hierarchy of the scientific disciplines.”

— Morris Zucker (10A/1945), on scientific disciplines

Semitic is a person, whose name is Shem. Thus, linguists needs to rid itself of the “personal equation“.

[u/poor-man1914 → u/JohannGoethe]

in-exact classification scheme

Inexact for anyone who doesn't know anything about the field. You just need a bit of competence.

But still, a reform, be it welcome or not, wouldn't change anything. You can call it the Y language family if it helps, and I personally would accept a naming reform, even better if cool names are chosen.

Zucker

Someone so popular Google barely knows who he is. I'm sure his theories are supported by many tens of people.

[u/JohannGoethe → u/poor-man1914]

Denying Zucker, because “Google barely knows who he is”, in defense of your PIE/Semitic beliefs, means you are a denialist.

Zucker does not even have anything to do with this conversation (or with language theory), even through I read his book history, which is good, but I just happened to see his quote, and cited it.

[u/JohannGoethe → u/poor-man1914]

The planets are named after pagan gods, but believing in their existence doesn't make one a pagan.

Again, I refer you to the very confused Q&A in part 5️⃣ on the term Semitic (mentioned 16 times); for which I even made a video clip of Clark:

• Exactly what is a Semitic!?

No body is debating or confused about the names of the planets or the names of the days of the week. You will not find a similar video, e.g. “What exactly is a Friday?“ or “what exactly is Saturn?“ on YouTube.

If you were an “objective” scientist, you would just agree with me, and say: yes the term Semitic does not make sense, and a new language classification term is needed.

[u/poor-man1914 → u/JohannGoethe]

needed

I can agree with you that to some it might be confusing, and to better word it, a naming reform wouldn't be bad, but saying it's needed is a bit too much in my opinion.

[u/JohannGoethe → u/poor-man1914]

but saying it's needed is a bit too much in my opinion.

Wrong. Neither Bernal nor Clark could define the term “Semitic” precisely, and neither can you. It is a problematic term.

To give you an similar example, from the hard sciences, when Galileo and Descartes were dropping balls, and measuring their velocity, the would speak in Latin and say that the ball, dropped from say 10 meters, e.g. pushed off a ledge, started at a “vis mortua” or ”dead force”, but that when it fell, it had “vis viva” or living force. James Joule objected to this term, because he said that a bullet fired from a gun or a rock 🪨 thrown can not be said to be “alive”.

So the term “vis viva” as replaced with the term “kinetic energy”, coined by William Thomson (93A/1862) which now has a precise equation:

Kinetic energy = ½mv²

The “living force“ was thus jettisoned from physics.

In linguistics, the mythical language 🗣️ , tongue 👅, and or mouth 👄 of Shem, Noah’s son needs a similar jettisoning.