comparative method alexis manaster ramer asks claim relatedness subgrouping established based systematic morphological relationships sort likely observed paradigms declensions familiar claim much weaker form morphological comparisons reliable phonological ones basis establishing linguistic relationships subgroups basis example robert hetzron 1976 proposed rigorous internal subgrouping semitic languages based affixes verb paradigms hetzron proposal hebrew arabic aramaic constitute central semitic group believe correct supported much evidence hetzron adduces much morphological morphosyntactic e g innovation novel negative markers etc may reading much claims morphological priority establishing subgrouping always interpreted reaction difficulty distinguishing convergent shared phonological development principled basis difficult determine whether particular recurrent sound change language group represents shared innovation rather convergent development might pragmatically safer rely morphological innovation thus case semitic languages changes p f g jh junk would treated shared innovation lead subgroups inconsistent deduced means hand unusual changes like change proto semitic glottalic consonants pharyngealized consonants much likely represent shared innovation given typological rarity pharyngealized consonants regard fritz newmeyer questions comparative syntactic reconstruction nt know systematic published counters jeffers others claims principle impossible however think good case made overly pessimistic assessment problem course appropriate context compare phonemes words morphemes morphemes paradigms clear context might word orders presumably discourse context plays role would imagine languages family shared unusual word order vis vis dominant types whatever might counterfactuals might want attribute order latest shared ancestor pragmatically speaking lot easier find information morphological context particular phonemes find reliable information larger context sentence construction types nonetheless least inchoately perhaps inchoateness jeffers objects notion syntactic reconstruction surely behind claims proto indo european sov proto semitic svo like two principles genetic reconstruction lingua 38 89104 alice faber faber haskins yale edu