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From: rte@elmo.lz.att.com (Ralph T. Edwards)
Subject: Re: anti-Esperanto
Message-ID: <rte-1910951107530001@mac-118.lz.att.com>
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Date: Thu, 19 Oct 1995 16:07:53 GMT
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In article <elnaDGnn0E.6u3@netcom.com>, elna@netcom.com (Esperanto League
N America) Miko Sloper wrote:

> rte@elmo.lz.att.com (Ralph T. Edwards) writes in a recent posting
(reference <rte-1310951429000001@mac-118.lz.att.com>):
> >
> >Is there any way the Esperantists can be encouraged to keep their
> >bimonthly spam wars out of sci.lang?  Science studies natural phenomena,
> >not parlor games and hobbies.
> >
> You will perhaps notice the cause of these offensive flamefests is in
> the anti-Esperanto camp. Obviously unscientific assertions based on
> a priori judgements of realworld phenomena *ought* to be challenged and
> corrected.

When do you plan to start?  What scientific issues of interest to linguists
do you plan to post?  What issues of scientific interest did you include in
the original post?  What scientific issue did you include in this post?

Why did you post a followup to a nonscientific posting in a newsgroup other 
than the one in which it was posted?  I deleted sci.lang
from the list of newsgroups, why did you restore it?
...
> "Science studies natural phenomena" says RTE. If this includes discussions
> of language as natural phenomena, then planned languages are also fair game.

Say what?  Planned = natural?  You need a new dictionary.
The original article argued for Esperanto as the language of the EU.
Explain why this is a scientific issue rather than a political issue.
(But for heaven's sake be brief.)

> Is engineering a part of science? 

No, it uses scientific results and sometimes methods, but is not science.

> Esperanto is neither a parlor game nor a hobby. Perhaps RTE should keep a
> better grip on his "facts" or bring his insults to another group, as
> suggested above.  
> 

This is not an issue of fact.  It is a matter of opinion.  You appear not
to know the difference.  It is not an insult, it is my opinion, which I
DID 
post in another newsgroup.  Why did you drag it back here?  What science do 
you have to offer?

Proselytizing for a constucted language is not science.

Now if you were to describe how pronunciation had changed since esp started
(other than by regulation) this could be science.  Arguing for esp is not
science.

-- 
R.T.Edwards rte@elmo.att.com 908 576-3031
