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From: iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski)
Subject: Re: Esperanto (was: Languages in the EC)
Message-ID: <D4I2vq.9oF@cogsci.ed.ac.uk>
Organization: Centre for Cognitive Science, Edinburgh, UK
References: <3hbcl6$qhl@blackrabbit.cs.uoregon.edu> <D403LK.8r8@news.cis.umn.edu> <D4DEC8.G4I@spss.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 1995 10:38:12 GMT
Lines: 118

In article <D4DEC8.G4I@spss.com> markrose@spss.com (Mark Rosenfelder) writes:

[excellent introduction deleted]

>In article <D403LK.8r8@news.cis.umn.edu>, Nick Rezmerski  <rezm0001@gold.tc.umn.edu> wrote:
>>Although I'm not a EU citizen, I think it's important to pick a
>>language that people can all learn to speak equally well.  
>
>This is called "stacking the deck".  Esperanto is certainly easy to learn;
>naturally an Esperantist will push ease of learning as the chief criterion
>for an interlanguage.  Esperanto has very few speakers; naturally an
>Esperantist will pooh-pooh the advantages (number of speakers, number of
>teachers, rich lexicon, rich culture) of any widely spoken language.

That's precisely why so many interlanguages have been proposed, are
being proposed and will be proposed in the future, without a single
one being universally accepted:  There are too many criteria for an
interlanguage, and many of them contradict one another.  There will
always be those who will find that Esperanto, or any other project,
doesn't match what they consider to be the chief criteria.

Let's see how stacking the deck works.  I'm sure that no one in his
right mind would state that ambiguity is a desirable feature in an
interlanguage.  Now, ambiguity comes in several different kinds,
some of which are harder to avoid than others.  Even Lojban permits
semantic ambiguity, or more precisely semantic vagueness, but it
differs from most other projects in that it has an unambiguous syntax.
Then there's Vorlin, which doesn't have that, but has (or had last
I checked) an unambiguous morphology: its words are parsed in a unique
way, even though its sentences aren't.  So the fact that Esperanto has
words which can be divided into morphemes into more than one way, as
in the recently posted puns,

  Q: Kial la Kembrighaj studentoj estas bovoj?
  A: Char ili remachas!

  Q: Kial la virinoj estas stultaj?
  A: Char ili havas menstruojn!

should be considered a serious flaw.  Yet it is not seen as such when
it is pointed out as an answer to the question `Where are the jokes?'

The existence of a culture, including original literature, is also a
thorny question.  If a language has that kind of thing behind it, then
a certain degree of familiarity with it is a necessary requirement for
fluency in the language.  If someone says `Le pauvre homme!', a French
speaker should know where that line comes from.  If an interlanguage
is required to be easy for everyone, then maybe it is better for it
not to develop any original literature.  But then people will ask:
`Where are the Molie`res?'

>>Part of the advantage of Esperanto is that there is an established
>>community of speakers who use it not out of necessity, but because
>>they WANT to establish international relationships, and are therefore
>>willing to take a step to meet others halfway, by learning Esperanto.
>
>And here's where we get into the insults.  People who learn Esperanto are
>altruistic internationalists; while all you people who've learned English
>are just a bunch of greedheads.  
>
>The statement itself is dubious enough (I do hope Ivan Derzhanski
>comments on the suggestion that he learned English out of a desire
>for American dollars); but that's not the point.

I didn't even know that American dollars existed when I started
learning English.  I didn't know that pounds sterling existed either.
Neither were mentioned in Kipling's _Just So Stories_, the first book
in English that I remember reading.  I didn't read it out of any dire
necessity, mind you, but I enjoyed every line.

And I've never thought of English as belonging to any nation.

>>Why are people so afraid of trying it?  It's not difficult; it's fun!
>>You can always give it up and try something else later if you want.  [...]
>
>And the final religious appeal: you'd stop criticizing us if only you'd
>come join us.  Join us... join us...
>
>What Mr. Rezmerski forgets is that religions have apostates, too.  
>I and others who've criticized Esperanto here-- I hope Scott Horne doesn't
>mind if I mention his name-- *have* taken the time to learn Esperanto.

I've spoken it on one occasion.  Someone who thought I was an
Esperantist 'phoned me and started talking in Esperanto, so I
followed suit (one of my principles is to let the other side
choose the language whenever I can).  It didn't kill me, but
it didn't give me any warm fuzzy feeling either.

I can't be counted with you and Scott, though, because I haven't
spent a single hour learning Esperanto.  I was just using the unfair
advantage that it gave me, as a speaker of 4 Romance, 3.5 Slavic and
3 Germanic languages.

>And though yes, it was fun, I've gotten a lot more fun out of 
>French, Spanish, and Portuguese.

I'm interested in both natural and constructed languages, and I find
that they provide different kinds of satisfaction.  The features of
Esperanto that I find attractive (yes, there are some) are precisely
the ones in which it differs most from its source languages.  I think,
for example, that the use of any derivational suffix as a root was a
brilliant idea.  Now that's not how Latin works, and that's excellent.

This takes us back to the problem of reconciling conflicting criteria.
French is charming because it is idiosyncratic; Klingon is attractive
because it is exotic.  Esperanto's _a priori_ grammar prevents it from
being fun in the way French is, whilst its _a posteriori_ vocabulary
and Latin-like syllable structure prevent it from claiming the points
Klingon can claim.

That's just in my eyes, of course.  I'm not saying that I expect
everyone else to share my motivations, but I'm sure I'm not alone
in having them.
-- 
`I'm sendin a flood tae pit an end tae it aw.  But dinny worry yersel, Noah.'
Ivan A Derzhanski (iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk)    (J Stuart, _Auld Testament Tales_)
* Centre for Cognitive Science,  2 Buccleuch Place,   Edinburgh EH8 9LW,  UK
* Cowan House E113, Pollock Halls, 18 Holyrood Pk Rd, Edinburgh EH16 5BD, UK
