The fucked up percentages are part of the joke - claims about some attested language being the mother of all others are full of equally flawed reasoning, except the authors genuinely believe on them. Same deal with claims of English being “mostly French”; they’re as silly as saying “a tuxedo cat is 99% spotted cow, 1% orange cat”.
That’s not how percentages work.
Also, the mother oft all languages is the silent starring into the fire.
The fucked up percentages are part of the joke - claims about some attested language being the mother of all others are full of equally flawed reasoning, except the authors genuinely believe on them. Same deal with claims of English being “mostly French”; they’re as silly as saying “a tuxedo cat is 99% spotted cow, 1% orange cat”.