Re: Conlangs: Languages or "Art"

[cbmvax!uunet!PRC.Unisys.COM!dave]

>What is a "real" language, and why is it impossible to invent one?  Why
>is a language without a community to develop it not a language?

"When I use a word," said Humpty Dumpty, "It means exactly what I
intend it to mean--nothing more, nothing less.  It's merely a question
of who is to be master, that's all."     (Paraphrased from memory)

Since Lojbab is devoting a significant fraction of his life to
developing a new language, it is certainly worth considerable thought
as to how the new language fits into the scheme of things.  However, I
am much less convinced that it is worth agonizing over whether the
English word "language" has the right coverage to include Lojban.

>  Linguists do not accept as a 'language' worth study anything that does
>  not have a speech community, and are generally interested in the features
>  common to the community, as opposed to individual idiosyncrasies.

Well, now, that just shows which tiny portion of the world linguists
are interested in, doesn't it?  IMHO this narrow-mindedness
unnecessarily limits the extent to which linguists are likely to
advance our knowledge of language.  In Piet Hein's words:

	Our choicest plans
	  have fallen through,
	Our airest castles
	  tumbled over,
	Because of lines
	  we neatly drew,
	And later neatly
	  stumbled over.

> A conlang invented by a single person inherently must be arbitrary in
> assigning meanings.

Whereas the correspondence of words to meanings in a natural language
is not arbitrary?  Aw, c'mon...acceptance and usage by a large number
of people may render the correspondence of words to meanings more
"comfortable," but it does not make it any less arbitrary.

> To which we add one definition of "code":
> 
> A system of symbols used in information processing in which letter, figures,
> etc. are arbitrarily given certain meanings.
> 
>   Comparing this definition with 2. (and by implication 3.), an invented or
>   arbitrary system of communication is a code, rather than a language.  The
>   distinction of 2. is that meaning is attributed, not assigned.

Insofar as I understand your distinction between "language" and "code"
(and I admit I don't understand it very well), Fortran, BASIC, Pascal,
Lisp, and the like are computer codes, not computer languages?  We
should speak of "the code of mathematics"?  Esperanto is a code, not a
language?  Sorry--you can make this distinction in the Lojban
vocabulary, if you like, but (aside from a few linguists) that is not
the way the words are used in English.

Later you say

> The most form of this position requires that a language have speaker and
> listener 'thinking in the language', rather than translating everything
> to English, in order for it to cease being a code.

This is rather more in line with the way the terms are used in
English, and moreover it has the advantage of making a clearer
distinction between the two.  It is, however, orthogonal to your other
claim that a thing can only be called a language if it is in use by a
large community.

> This emphasis is our only real hope of making a conlang into a real
> language inside of a generation.

I hope you have specific, quantifiable goals as well as muzzy ones.

Sorry if this response is a little on the testy side.  I find it very
irritating when people attach undue significance to arguments over the
precise meaning of imprecise words, instead of concerning themselves
with the real issues.  Unfortunately, the only cure I know of for this
particular debility is a dose of General Semantics, which Lojbab
rejects.

Lojbab (and others): if the basis for your rejection is an encounter
with Korzybski's "code," I can hardly blame you--but please consider
the "language" that others have made of it.  Original sources are not
always the best.  One of my favorite books about General Semantics is
"People in Quandries" by Wendell Johnson, though this has probably
been out of print for decades, and you'd be fortunate indeed to find a
copy; I don't know what might be currently available.

[BTW, I do not in any sense consider myself an evangelist for General
Semantics.  Note that I haven't even read a book on the subject in
years.  However, if the tool works, use it.  I don't go to the extreme
of insisting that General Semantics be incorporated into Lojban, but I
do feel that the language developers should be a little more cognizant
of it.]

> But it is rarely grammatical either because he takes 'poetic license'
> or else just doesn't know the grammar for the construct he wishes to
> use.

At least he's made some attempt.  It does not seem to me to be in the
best interests of Lojban to dump on people who make mistakes, even if
you feel they are being willfully stupid.  I wish Lojban the
best--really--so please consider that remarks like this, regardless of
how justified they may be, do not entice people into giving the
language a try.

	-- Really much more supportive than I sometimes sound,
		David Matuszek

As another aside, I assume "conlang" is a portmanteau for "constructed
language"?