The only thing you haven’t addressed is why there doesn’t seem to be an implied {w} in the {o} sound in all the recordings of Okrand pronouncing words like {Qo’noS}, or any other word that includes {o},

I did address it. I speculated that only words that actually end in o use a diphthong. That excludes words like Qo'noS.

You brought up the example of {gho-} as a syllable that doesn’t follow the {o} with a consonant,

No, I brought up the word gho as an example of a word that ends in o. If it's actually about ending words with o, then the prefix gho- will never qualify for a diphthong, because it never ends a word.

So, no, you didn’t explicitly say that Okrand’s verbal description applied to only {gho-}. You said that maybe it only applies to syllables ending in {o}, and the only example that I know of is {gho-}, so that does logically follow that he’d be giving that description of how {o} is pronounced in {gho-}, while not giving an accurate description of the {o} sound in any other syllable in the vocabulary.

I am not responsible for your inability to think of other syllables ending in o. I can assure you that I had several of those other words in mind too. I just picked one to make an example.

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SuStel
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