Re: Who were the Aryans?

In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, coyotes
morgan mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:

> all languages are presumed of the same complexity

i have been interested in linguistics from a layman's point of view for
a long time, and I have never quite figured out what kind of statement 
this is.  I think it could be:

A) an axiom (we start out by assuming this; if we don't, then we aren't
really doing linguistics)

B) a "forget about it" rule (we can't decide, so we aren't going to
wear ourselves out on this silly question)

C) a point of etiquette (we have had it up to *HERE* with people
starting fights over 'MY language is more complicated than YOUR
language!')

D) an empirical observation (yes, we can measure the complexity of a
language, and when we do... lo and behold, English, Latin, Sanskrit,
Mandaring Chinese, and various native Australian languages all come out
within about 15% of one another on our complexity scale).

-------------------
I'd check the box next to (C).

> though different languages put the complexity in different places
> modern english has a simple morphology but complex syntax
> old english was the other way around

-- 
Chris Henrich
You can always delay short-term thinking, but you can never delay long-term
thinking.
--Alan Cooper