Re:Blue–Green Distinction in Language
by thaumasiotes on Thursday January 23, 2020 @06:44AM
(#22126758)
> it has... verb modifiers!
> For example: use = to cause to work. Repair = to cause to be good. Understand = to cause to hear.
> Wow, am I telling you that verbs convey and encode causality in these languages? Yup, that's right.
This isn't really a feature of modern English, but it certainly isn't something exotic. It was a feature of earlier English, and the effects of that are still obvious today.
For example: raise = cause to rise. Fell = cause to fall. Lay = cause to lie. Drench = cause to drink.
(Causative verbs are alive and well in modern English, but they are more likely to be zero-derived than to use a separate overt grammatical form.)
> For example: use = to cause to work. Repair = to cause to be good. Understand = to cause to hear.
> Wow, am I telling you that verbs convey and encode causality in these languages? Yup, that's right.
This isn't really a feature of modern English, but it certainly isn't something exotic. It was a feature of earlier English, and the effects of that are still obvious today.
For example: raise = cause to rise. Fell = cause to fall. Lay = cause to lie. Drench = cause to drink.
(Causative verbs are alive and well in modern English, but they are more likely to be zero-derived than to use a separate overt grammatical form.)