Murray Gell-Mann and the Evolution of Human Languages - The Burden of Proof

Explore the evolution of human languages and the concept of "burden of proof" in historical linguistics through this thought-provoking lecture by George Starostin. Delve into Murray Gell-Mann's contributions to the "Evolution of Human Languages" project and his challenge to conventional linguistic theories. Examine the validity of long-range language relationships, such as Altaic, Nostratic, and Dene-Caucasian, and consider alternative explanations for similarities between language families. Discover how the project aims to replace the binary approach to language relationships with a more nuanced probability scale. Gain insights into recurrent patterns of change, proof of common ancestry, and the evaluation of superfamily hypotheses. Analyze the quality of evidence in etymological dictionaries and explore stability models through a simple example.