> [Original Message] > From: Michael Everson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > At 13:08 -0400 2004-05-02, Ernest Cline wrote: > > >As long as you are doing a revision. One thing that would make > >someone like me who knows very little about the glyphs themselves > >happier with the proposal would be if there would be some > >explanation with examples of why the proposed pruning of the > >Hebrew branch from the Phoenician root is being made along > >the lines envisioned in the proposal, > > Reasonable glyph analysis based on the work of other script experts, > mostly. "What looks Phoenician?" Informs this pretty much, here, in > N2311, and in most histories of writing. Mark Shoulson and I may get > a chance to look at a revision of N2311 (which has been available for > comment for three years).
I'll make that near the top of my to read list then. > >and not for example some other proposal that would say, encode Punic > >as the branch as treat the square Hebrew script as the rightful > >continuation of the original Phoenician script. > > Samaritan would be the most direct continuation of the original Phoenician. Well then, why doesn't the proposal for Phoenician reflect that? > >The proposal states baldly: > > > >The historical cut that has been made here considers the line from > >Phoenician to Punic to represent a single continuous branch of > >script evolution. > > I think Rick McGowan wrote that sentence in UTR#3. There is a > continuous line from Phoenician to Punic; there are also some other > branches off that line which it seems sensible to unify with > Phoenician. > > >without giving any reason why this cut is to be preferred over other > >potential cuts. > > When lumping, like goes with like. We lump using our intelligence and > common sense. :-) The only problem with common sense is that it isn't very common, and sometimes it isn't very sensible. :) In my life, one central lesson I have learned the hard way is to never assume that someone else will grasp what you consider obvious. > Do you really think it necessary that the proposal be a thesis > reprising a hundred years of script analysis? I don't think a thesis would be required, but at the very least a few pointers such as those that you gave in this reply to the basis used for your determination. I haven't had a chance to go back and look at those pointers yet, so I can't say if they answer the questions I have, but from your description of them it sounds as if they would.
