The Joseph Greenberg problem: combinatorics and comparative linguistics

DOI10.1080/0025570X.2018.1444897MaRDI QIDQ4622971zbMATH OpenOpenAlexWikidataFDO

Authors Alexander Yong

Publication date 18 February 2019

Published in Mathematics Magazine (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/1309.5883

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Exact enumeration problems, generating functions (05A15) Bell and Stirling numbers (11B73) Linguistics (91F20)

Abstract: We correct a 1957 combinatorial enumeration by the linguist J. Greenberg. The desired count, the Bell number B(25), supported using his Mass Comparison method for language classification. In 1987, he used this method to classify indigenous languages of the Americas into three families. Actually, the same combinatorics provides a back-of-the-envelope estimate for the number of families. This suggests that alternative classifications with over a hundred families possess the right order of magnitude.

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Cites work

• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 3598475 (Why is no real title available?)
• Critique of Hirsch's citation index: a combinatorial Fermi problem
• Minimum Periods, Modulo p, of First-Order Bell Exponential Integers
• Theory of equivalence relations

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