From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!west.West.Sun.COM!smaug.West.Sun.COM!dab Thu Oct  8 10:11:20 EDT 1992
Article 7125 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: dab@ism.isc.com (Dave Butterfield)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Brain and Mind (was: Logic and God)
Date: 5 Oct 1992 23:24:32 GMT
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References: <1992Sep28.164828.2122@meteor.wisc.edu> <1992Sep30.205233.662@hilbert.cyprs.rain.com> <1992Oct5.174528.20148@usl.edu>
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mhf4421@usl.edu (Flynn Matthew H) writes:
>Derrida and De Sausare (sp.?) argue rather convincingly that language is
>arbitrary, and there is no real reason why any particular word, letter, or    
>phoneme need mean what we accept it to mean.

The origin of the word "mama" (and its close relatives in other languages)
appears to contradict that statement.  "Ma" is one of the easiest syllables
to utter, and is one of the first spoken by infants.  The first entity that
an infant wants to refer to is his mother.  The association of that word to
that concept was not arbitrary.  Reference the OED for more detail.

Dave
-- 
                     Vote for *anybody* but Quayle!


