The neo-grammarian hypothesis implies that sound-change is unaffected by semantic features and concerns merely the habits of articulating speech-sounds. If residual forms are characterized by some semantic feature, then their deviation must be due not to sound-change, but to some other factor of linguistic change - to some factor which is connected with meanings.
- Bloomfield (1935), a pag.363

The neo-grammarians define sound-change as a purely phonetic process; it affects a phoneme or a type of phonemes either universally or under certain strictly phonetic conditions, and is neither favored nor impeded by the semantic character of the forms which happen to contain the phoneme.
- Bloomfield (1935), a pag.364