In a message dated 5/22/2011 9:53:08 AM Pacific Daylight Time, lists@caseybrown.org writes:
Indeed, it doesn't mean that necessarily. However, your analogy doesn't apply in this situation and Nikola was right. Many of the Chinese languages share a common writing system and only differ in the way the language is spoken.
You're missing my point. All the Latin languages "share a common writing system" and "only differ in the way the language is spoken".
Address the point that the "words" within the system have the same semantic *meaning* and are formed with the same syntactic rules.
If Bo Dow Kah means "your dog is dead" in one language or dialect, but Bo Dow Kah means "your mother is pretty" in another, than the fact that the spelling is the same, has no relevance to the issue at hand.