Thank you. I made a point of saying "similar" because they are... in my subjective opinion.


Indeed, and the there have always been notions where people selectively choose a handful of features they find important simply because they support a theory they would like to be true -- eg. the Gaels being a lost tribe of Israel because of prepositional pronouns and the presence of a definite article without an indefinite one.
I'm aware of this, and I'm not presenting my preferred theory as an objective "truth".


I feel I went to reasonable lengths to make it clear that I wasn't taking it as gospel, and not to present it as something that should be believed. The factual part was that I'd seen a claim. (A claim that I had previously presumed true, and it was looking for it today that made me stop to think about my own preconceptions.)

Fair enough. One of my beefs about the internet these days is that people seem to forget that you can't have your preconceptions challenge without talking about them...

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A language belongs to its native speakers, and when you speak it, you are a guest in their homes.
If you are not a good guest, you have no right to complain about receiving poor hospitality.

Tum hamesha ye samasyaen kyon paida karate rahate hai!

Yes, indeed. Some very strange notions have gone around. That particular theory, of course, was based on the story of the Milesians in Lebor Gabála Érenn, which was taken to be a more or less historical account even by serious scholars for quite a while. Naturally then, if this is already being treated as somewhat plausible historical account, and then linguistic commonalities are identified between Hebrew and Irish, this may reinforce a bias towards this account, as you suggest. It is, of course, very much treated like a fictitious fabrication rather than a historical account by modern scholars, and without that context the similarities between Hebrew and Irish are shown up for what they really are; an interesting coincidence, but not symptomatic of particularly close philological ties or particularly recent divergence.



Yes, based on what you highlight, you certainly weren't dogmatic or anything. It did seem a little like you were leaning towards one side more so than the other, but of course, you're perfectly entitled to do so if you please.



I suspect some people don't like to challenge their own perceptions. Cognitive dissonance and all that.

Why "suspect"...? It's a pretty self-evident truth -- that's why I was focusing on the other parties in the conversation.
Having the patience to explain why something is a misconception is getting rarer -- instead there's an attitude (often an explicit one) of "you're wrong, and I cannot correct you, so I must shout at you and insult you so that other people will know that if they believe what you say, then they too will be subject to verbal abuse and ridicule."

_________________
A language belongs to its native speakers, and when you speak it, you are a guest in their homes.
If you are not a good guest, you have no right to complain about receiving poor hospitality.

If only you had been subjected to verbal abuse and ridicule, you might have a point. I'm a great supporter of free speech, completely untrammelled, but a couple of threads here appear to have little high-quality information or views. I'm the first one to say you are ENTITLED to poorly-argued views. I would die in the ditch to defend your right to that.

I have been subject to verbal abuse and ridicule. Loads of times. On the internet.

_________________
A language belongs to its native speakers, and when you speak it, you are a guest in their homes.
If you are not a good guest, you have no right to complain about receiving poor hospitality.

Ó, Dia linn! Nách mór an dochar a dheineann san duit!

And your point is, caller..?

_________________
A language belongs to its native speakers, and when you speak it, you are a guest in their homes.
If you are not a good guest, you have no right to complain about receiving poor hospitality.

On the earlier subject of Irish's similarities to other languages. I have learned some languages from around the world, and I noticed a few interesting similarities between Gaelic and Pacific languages. Probably a coincidence, but it is interesting as I haven't noticed such similarities in other languages.

Such as the subject being introduced first before commenting on it further, and a pronoun proceeds. Such as ak raan mā ko raar kañaltok (I think that is right), lit. the frigate birds on top of the breadfruit tree they gathered around.
In the vocative case in Marshallese, "a" proceeds nouns (in Hawaiian, it is "e"). In certain sentences the word order is "Is (adjective) the (noun)" as in Irish. A very small detail is that "e" (pronounced ay) is used as the masculine and feminine pronoun.
With me, with you, etc is all one word as liom leat etc, ippād = with us, ad = our. Also, there isn't any set verb "have," it is expressed differently as in Irish.

Inne is a roughly shared word in Gaelic and Marshallese for yesterday. Lā means day in Hawaiian, and nā is used as a plural article.
Duolingo sentence: pūlehu ka tūtū kāne i ka 'ulu - word order is literally "broils the grandfather the breadfruit" similar to Irish.

Just in case you're interested, recording of Marshallese: https://mistories.org/sound/Mwekto-audio.mp3 text: https://mistories.org/life-Mwekto-text.php

Also, in Scandanavian languages, "this year" is expressed i år, (pronounced ee oor) lit. in year, as Irish i mbliadhna. I have also seen some other potential remnants of Norse influence on Irish in the past but can't remember them now.

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I recommend to learn Irish pronunciation on doegen.ie
Scottish Gaelic pronunciation on tobarandualchais.co.uk

In English the vocative was "o" before the noun until relatively recently. "O" or "u" in Italic languages, and though many have lost it, it's still active in some and does reappear in others where there's a particular desire to draw attention. There aren't all that many vowels to choose from in any given language...

Which certain sentences? There's a clear pattern in Irish that it only happens with copular clauses. There's a good chance that it's a hold-over from a time when more cases were explicitly marked and word order was freer. A change of sentence order from default VSO would have indicated a change of focus, and the copular could have stuck with the non-standard because of the pragmatic relationship between elements of the sentence.

Not particularly surprising in a polysynthetic language. More surprising in the Celtic languages because they're not really polysynthetic.

_________________
A language belongs to its native speakers, and when you speak it, you are a guest in their homes.
If you are not a good guest, you have no right to complain about receiving poor hospitality.