[ExI] Language Changing Before Our Very Eyes

[Damien Broderick]

> >> One connotation of "near" has nothing whatsoever to do with space-time, as
> >> in:
> >>
> >> "He received a B+ on his English exam, which was near to an A."

Of course it has, in a very direct sense--their proximity is in value 
space, in alphabet sequence, etc. All right, that kind of "nearness" 
is not a spacetime measure, but that's what underwrites the metaphor. 
A near-A is a B, not an A; a near-miss IS a miss.

But this is looking at the wrong level. Obviously the idiom is 
instantly understood (unlike "sanction" which means both "allow X" 
and "punish for doing X"...). Seek thee the X-bar analysis, that's 
what I say--what the Chomskyans used to call the deep structure.