...remembering that human beings cannot produce 20,000 unique sounds, even if you were to include belching and hawking great globs of phlegm {which I think counts in Chinese}, the linguistic powers that be--whoever they are--threw in tones, possibly to ensure that no foreigner over the ages of thirty would have any chance whatsoever of understanding that Chinese language.
( J. Maarten Troost )
[ Lost on Planet China: The ]
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