Another thread addresses the Englishness of the words. My question is different and a lot more convoluted: I hope I can make it plain and simple.
I. There are straightforward nouns of action and agency with roots in English verbs: procrastinator, loafer, snoozer. And other nouns that arise from augmented (let's say) forms of the verb. 'Commentator' is one such word: there's no verb 'commentate.' 1
'Orientation' meaning 'guidance' or 'adjustment' ("student-orientation week") is another, though hugely more vexed because there actually is a verb 'orientate' meaning to face eastward (both transitively and intrans). But I convolute.
II. Not long ago, we had a thread about meter and foot in prose: iambic, trochaic, and who knows what else that I've forgotten since college. Arguably, as speakers and writers, we seem unconsciously to choose the iambic (say) over boring spondaic. As listeners, we perhaps naturally find the iambic most pleasant and (umm...) euphonious.
III. Finally, the question. Let's suppose that we do in truth prefer rhythm that we can grab, that we can lean on and stand on.
Do we then invent and manufacture made-up verbs just so as to give us corresponding made-up nouns that feel better to speak and write? That sound better to our ears? 'Commentator' sounds a lot better than 'commenter'. 'Orientator' is somehow easier to say than 'orienter'.
Not to go all Chomskian on y'all, but is there an impulsive, inborn, irresistible way to speak?
A natural way of locution? 2
1 Not by our lights, anyway. Right? Right?
2 Or am I merely dredging up fragments of Aristotle from dim recall?