"Severian" <severian@chlamydia-is-not-a-flower.com> wrote in message
news:f4o5105mejcq4gv3fuq83t03pel54a0g2f@4ax.com...
> On Sat, 24 Jan 2004 20:54:12 +0000 (UTC), "Uncle Davey"
> <noway@jose.com> wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> > >> And that this because the Tower would have been unacceptably tall?
> >> >
> >> >'reach the sky' is more than just a physical reaching.
>
> >> So it's not a literal meaning. Interesting dodge.
>
> >I said it was more than a physical meaning.
>
> >I didn't say the literal meaning was not part of the meaning, it usually
is.
>
> So "literal" means whatever you want it to mean? "Reach the sky" means
> "reach the sky" except when it doesn't.
You tell me where the sky starts in your opinion, and I'll tell you whether
it might have reached it or not.
>
> Well maybe, "On the third day" doesn't always literally mean "on the
> third day," either. Your meaning of "literal" is a brush whose width
> changes based on *your* prejudices.
"Day" does have a literal temporal meaning, but "sky" doesn't have a literal
physical meaning.
>
> >> >> How tall would the Tower of Babel have been if it had been
completed?
> >> >> (Note: I recommend you use the archaeological record to justify your
> >> >> answer.)
> >> >
> >> >This is a mere irrelevance. Kindly posit a common ancestor of Indo
> >European
> >> >and Finno-Ugric.
> >>
> >> That's even more irrelevant. The evolution of language is unrelated,
> >> except by analogy, to the theory of evolution.
> >>
> >
> >Interesting dodge and how convenient.
>
> How convenient that I not conflate two different ideas from two
> different areas of study?
The area of study is how we got here.
All other divisions are artificial. You can divide the school syllabus how
you like.
>
> >In other words you agee that language could not have evolved.
>
> Of course language evolved -- evolution means change. My point was
> that biological evolution is a fact, the "theory of evolution" is a
> biological theory explaining evolution, and your attempt to discredit
> it by positing that all languages didn't come from some proto-language
> is simply an obfuscation. The _biological_ "theory of evolution" is
> unrelated to, and independent of, the origin and change of language.
>
These are the words of someone who is as good as admittiong there is no
common ancestry between the language families, but isn't willing to concede
to the biblical reason of why that is?
> >So how exactly do we get from monkeys to man, run that by me again?
>
> By breeding, mutating, living and dying, through millions of
> generations.
>
> - Sev
>
If that were so, we would not be speaking to each other now.
Uncle Davey
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