lojban zasni

["Steven M. Belknap" <sbelknap@UIC.EDU>]

>>Change is the one invariant of natlangs.
>
>True.
>
>>We must think carefully about how change is to be managed for lojban.
>
>The absence of effective managed change is a corollary invariant of
>natlangs.
>
>I am unconvinced that change needs to be (or can be) "managed" - i.e.
>imposed from the top - once we have a large community of users.
>

Successful management is only rarely imposed from the top. See my comments
about leadership style.


>>Lojbab has recognized the problem with leadership which occurred with
>>Loglan.  It is to his credit that he wishes to provide better leadership
>>for lojban.  But abdication of leadership after initial strong
>>leadership is a mistake.
>
>Who said anything about abdication of leadership?  It will take strong
>and stubborn leadership to say "no" to all change proposals for 5 years.
>And rest assured that if I get to actually use the language, that I will
>be leading with the best of the rest through my actual usage.  Because
>that is how natural languages are "led".
>

I'm sure saying "no" to everything will be hard. Such an approach would not
constitute leadership. What will you do if someone comes up with a problem
of the magnitude of the negation issue?

>>The de facto result of this will be that those changes which lojbab
>>believes ought to be included in the language at baseline will be
>>immortalized, and the (possibly valuable) inclusion of others will be
>>impeded.
>
>We are essentially already past the point where inclusion of changes
>that substantially change the language can be made.  Indeed LONG past
>the point.  We have had a grammar baseline in effect for 3 years now.
>The first one failed and we rebaselined a year later.  That baseline has
>held, with a minimal number of changes making it past the gauntlet since
>then.  I contend that the time for debating changes that have
>substantial impact on the language are past, and that we need to finish
>documenting what we have and start using it.  I have obviously NOT been
>successful at getting the most vocal participants on this list to agree
>with my policy, and language is essentially democratic.

Your failure to get the most vocal participants to agree with your policy
is pretty good evidence that your policy is flawed, or at least incomplete.

I am suggesting a way out of your dilemma. Lump all the proposals you wish
to defer under the category "to be considered at a later date by the lojban
academy." Jorge's X1 - X5 proposals were rejected outright, when it appears
to me that at least two of them had some merit. (The others may also have
merit, but I don't understand the issues) I am suggesting that such
proposals be considered for inclusion in the baseline. If the changes are
too hard, or if there is fear of uncertain consequences, defer them till a
later version of the language. Don't reject possibly meritorious proposals
altogether. You are confusing your roles of book editor and lojban
community leader.

>
>>Leadership styles run the gamut from rigid and autocratic to constantly
>>shifting and anarchic.  There are successful examples of leadership all
>>along this spectrum; some endeavors require more heirarchy, others
>>require near chaos to work effectively.  The key point here is that the
>>nature of the endeavor has a lot to do with whether a given leadership
>>style will be successful.  Thus a person designated as a leader must
>>carefully consider how he will establish a style which will make success
>>possible.  If a leader fails to tailor his leadership style to the
>>endeavor, then the success of the endeavor will be imperiled.
>
>I would contend that I did this 8 years ago, and we have a language now
>because I *DID* establish a leadership style appropriate to the effort.
>

Agreed. And I, for one, am grateful for your efforts. I am encouraging you
to consider a change in leadership style after baselining. Perhaps I do not
adequately understand your plans for leadership after baselining.

>>It is useful to consider three common leadership styles:  participative
>>leadership, consultative leadership, or collaborative leadership.
>
>All 3 are used within the Lojban community.
>
>>In collaborative leadership, the leader is first among equals,
>>decision-making is by consensus among the members of the team.  The
>>collaborative leadership style seems most appropriate to manage
>>post-baselining change.
>
>And who decides who is a member of the team?

You do. Pick your team.

>Specifically, what about
>the majority of the community that is not on Lojban List?

I am unaware of any North Koreans, Cubans, or New Zealand Maoris who are
interested in lojban. All these people are living in places where computers
are easily available. Encourage these folks to get an america online or
compuserve account or make some other slipshod arrangement. If they are
genuinely interested in lojban, perhaps they will get online. Maybe they do
not understand how easy it is to participate in online discussion groups.

>
>>>From Jorge's and lojbabs discussion on change:
>>>>This is a matter of public relations.
>>>
>>>And one that JCB managed horribly, and which we will manage horribly as well
>>>if we cannot present the image of standing very firm against change.
>>
>>I strongly disagree.  Standing firm against change is not the right
>>lesson to learn from the JCB-Loglan experience.
>
>I dare say that you were not involved in the JCB-Loglan experience and
>do not know what effect constant change had on the community.

I respectfully disagree. I believe my interest in Loglan predates your own,
dating back to 1971, when I came across the 1960 Scientific American
article. I am less familiar with the details of the Loglan-lojban schism
than you are, and was not an active participant in the birth of lojban, but
I have corresponded with JCB over the years, I did learn the basic Loglan
grammer and a significant number of Loglan words years before Nora wrote
Logflash. I still have copies of the microfilmed dictionaries and early
versions of Loglan texts on my shelves. I was keenly disappointed when I
found that all the words were redone for lojban, although I understand the
(copyright-related) reasons for doing this. I understand the problem with
conlang change all too well. Do you understand the problem with not-change?

>
>>Rather, matching the leadership style to the project at hand is the
>>right lesson.  JCB failed to choose the most effective leadership style
>>for Loglan;
>
>It is true that JCB chose an inappropriate leadership model (though then
>again, it might have been the appropriate one for the first 20 years -
>it just became inappropriate once he opened the language to the
>community.

Hmmm. Anyone see a parallel here?

>
>>Lojbab now proposes a different, but equally ill-advised leadership
>>style, that is, initial participative leadership followed by the absence
>>of leadership.  This is not a good idea.
>
>And I say that you are failing to understand my intent.

Probably. I often fail to understand my own intent! So what is your intent?

>>If there is a broad consensus for formal recognition and inclusion of
>>the various "slang" extensions and changes which have entered the
>>language, then the implications of these extensions and changes should
>>be carefully worked out, and then a "lojban language academy" consisting
>>of interested experts should deliberate.  If there is consensus on a
>>point, it should be adopted; if not, then the change should be deferred
>>until the *next* constitutional language convention.  The genius of
>>documents like the US Constitution is that they have a built in
>>apparatus for amending the document.
>
>The other genius is that they made the process difficult enough that
>such change seldom occurs.  They also had the good luck to have the
>document become sacred enough that changing it lightly is considered
>sacrilege.
>

I did not choose my example of the U.S. Constitution unwittingly!

>Your description of the way things "should be" is precisely the way they
>are now - periodic consideration of change proposals by a group of
>deliberating experts - the periodicity in this case dependent on our
>time and outside activities - which will continue to be the case until
>Lojban can support full time workers (not in my lifetime!).  So you are
>arguing for continuing the status quo.
>

No, it is not the way things are now. There is no formal mechanism now. I
am proposing a formal mechanism. This is the crux of the matter.

>It isn't working.  Too many changes get proposed; there is too much
>indecisive deliberation, and too many changes are slipping by as "well,
>I can't see anything wrong with it, and it is only an extension to the
>language, and person X who has contributed mightily to the effort is
>fighting hard for it".

Understood. That is what the lojban academy is for. For language-killing
problems the academy will jump into the breach and fix the problem. For
lesser problems, prudent delay, due consideration, and a more leisurely
approach will be taken. Baseline the language, defer all the nonessential
improvements to a later release and be done with it. Stop engaging in
pointless discussions with Jorge and others about what ought to be included
in the baseline and what ought not. Obviously absurd suggested changes can
be rejected now. Brilliant suggestions which correct some newly discovered
fatal flaw will be adopted forthwith. Those with some lesser merit can be
discussed at leisure, final determination deferred until the lojban academy
has a clear sense of how to proceed.

>
>Now take a proposal that is more controversial that Jorge's "simple
>extensions" like your fuzzy proposals.
>
>>A. No formal lojban revisions.  If this is true, I will lose interest in
>>lojban, and probably not spend much more effort on learning or speaking
>>it.  (Unless I can convince myself that there is some other slick method
>>of doing the same thing that doesn't take 15 syllables)
>
>We have Peter and you who have called each other names, and an enormous
>volume of technical discussion.  And I feel that after it all, I have
>ABSOLUTELY NO useful information on which to base a decision.  We have
>And's proposal for "xoi", never written up formally so I don't even know
>which one it it is, and your agreement that it would satisfy you.

Right. <xoi> is now slang. I think it could easily be made an official
selmaho, but someone with a better grasp of the language than I needs to
think about Guttman scales, fuzzy logic and <xoi>, and make a formal
proposal. I am a long way away from being competent to do this.

>WHERE
>IS THE USAGE?!!!  A couple of examples of how it might be used is NOT
>"usage" - there is no context, and no sign that anyone looked at
>alternate methods to communicate the same ideas.  You have made a
>nebulous implication that without "xoi" what you want to say might take
>15 syllables, and that therefore you would lose interest in the project.

No. I have not said this.

>Can you provide me ANY evidence that the Zipfean demand to use the
>construct JUSTIFIES being able to say it in less than 15 syllables,
>should it really take that many?  And what am I to make of such implied
>threats:  make the change that I want or otherwise satify me, or else I
>will likely leave.

I did not say this. You are misrepresenting my position. I agreed to accept
deferrment of the decision regarding fuzzy logic and <xoi> for now, if that
is what you decide. What you call a "threat" is my statement that I will
loose interest in lojban if there is not a formal mechanism to deal with
evolution of the language. That is because I consider the lack of such a
formal mechanism to be a fatal management error which will doom the lojban
enterprise.

>>I will of course be disappointed that <xoi> is not
>>in the language, but I will redouble my efforts to learn the language
>>with the hope that through better understanding and rational discussion
>>I will persuade the members of the language academy to adopt mechanisms
>>for handling fuzziness, guttman scales, etc.
>
>Would you accept a formal revision procedure if it REJECTED making any
>changes relating to fuzzy logic because you were UNABLE to convince
>people?

Yes.

>How about if the academy refused to even consider your
>proposals and allow you to "try to persuade" because there are 20 or 200
>other proposals on the table, and discussion of the changes alone would
>take another 5 years if done at the cvolume and intensity we have seen
>on this list.

That would be a lesser non-fatal degree of poor management.

>
>
>>>>None of the changes that occured
>>>>or were seriously proposed in the last three years (which is the time I've
>>>>known Lojban for) has or would have had much effect on Lojban as used.
>>>
>>>If they have no effect on Lojban as used, then they are unnecessary.
>>
>>False dichotomy. Jorge said "none...had much effect" not "they had no effect"
>
>The question is whether they were IMPORTANT - important enough to effect
>or prevent the success of the language.  That is the standard we need to
>be setting to have language stability.

Apparently Jorge felt his changes were important. I consider the fuzzy
logic issue to be important. I consider the Guttman scales issue to be
important. If you wish to defer these, fine. But if you reject them
outright, I suspect you are tailoring your decisions to fit your
preordained conception of how lojban ought best be managed.

>
>>My amended recommendations for managing change after the baseline:
>>
>>1. Add a formal version number to the name of lojban
>><la papinomoi lojban> or <la pasosoxajoi lojban>
>>
>>"lojban 1.0 or lojban 1996"
>>
>>After a five year initial period, if there is a broad and deep consensus
>>about changes to be made,
>
>I guarantee that there WON'T be.  There are people even now who vote
>"no" on all changes as a matter of principle.

I think you will be surprised to find that there *will* be some matters for
which consensus as to change will obtain.

>
>>where the academy of right-thinking lojbi will eventually give the
>>stamp of approval to the new version.
>
>whereupon the language promptly collapses and dies in schism because
>most of those who did not participate in the debate see no reason for
>changing, and feel put upon by calls for them to relearn what they have
>put months and years of work into.


Oh, please. Do you think adding <xoi> to the language, (if that is what the
lojban academy decides) would schism the language?. Many people I know
*never* use the subjunctive tense. I understand them just fine. Those who
don't like the new constructs won't use them. Changing something like the
meaning of ti, ta, and tu is a different kettle of fish. I doubt that the
academy would approve such a change.

>
>Remember that Esperanto survived largely because after 7 years or so,
>they had just such a revision proposed and deliberated and voted upon.
>The vote of the community rejected the new version (I personally believe
>Zamenhof set up the proposal to be self-defeating by including enough
>change that most people found something to object to).


False analogy. The changes proposed to Esperanto were massive. Didn't this
result in a new language, which eventually died? Also, lojban claims to be
a "Loglan" If serious flaws are found, it is imperative that they be fixed,
otherwise, lojban will be demonstrably *not* a lojban. Esperanto and lojban
are different.

>
>So what happens if the right-thinking lojbo say "no"?
>

So then the experimental constructs remain slang, or die out.

>>2. As part of the new version release, assure that there is a
>>well-defined, nonambiguous translation algorithm from la papinomoi
>>lojban -> la papipamoi lojban (or whatever).  Thus all well-formed
>>extant texts can be translated.
>
>What if there isn't and cannot be, because of the nature of the changes?
>(For example, a simple realignment of "lo" based on the discussions of
>the last year or so would alone make this impossible - there IS no
>algorithmic way to decide which gadri is to be used if the semantics
>change.


I doubt the academy would approve such a change. There would have to be an
awfully good reason. Preservation of semantics and grammer would be a high
priority. This illustrates the cleverness of Jorge's suggestion. If all
deliberations were carried out in lojban, only those with a great deal
invested in the language would be making change suggestions.


>
>3. Agree to a standard notation for lojban version specification; for
>example, at the beginning of an utterance, the version of lojban to be
>used could be specified.
>
>In short, FORCE schism, since such a notation presumes that ther weill
>be people who will NOT use the current standard version.

No. This notation would acknowledge the existence of pre-revision extant
texts. The authority of the academy over speakers is nil. If speakers
refuse to adopt the proposed changes, then eventually a rational academy
will have to acknowledge failure of their attempts at revision and withdraw
them. I suspect most such changes will be at the edges of the language and
will not affect most speakers, so they wont mind much.

>>4. Emphasize that there will be considerable tolerance to experimental
>>additions/changes to lojban among the lojban community.  But these will
>>be uncertified "slang" usages until & unless a broad and deep consensus
>>builds as to incorporation of the "slang" into the latest release of
>>lojban.  Such changes will then be considered at the next meeting of the
>>lojban academy
>
>Status quo, except that we have no formal "Academy".  We do have a
>voting membership that could establish one if it wanted to (which I am
>sure it doesn't).

We don't know if this is the status quo since there is relatively little
discussion in lojban; my point here is to encourage rather than discourage
slang, while at the same time distinguishing slang from proper lojban.

>
>>5. Maintain a list of recognized problems in lojban.  As solutions
>>appear, propose them for inclusion in the next version of lojban.
>>Maintain a specification of "proposed, but still under consideration"
>>changes/additions/extensions as part of the formal definition of the
>>language.
>
>You would be surprised at how large that list is.  Last January, I made
>a list based primarily on the le/lo/any discussions of a couple of dozen
>"issues" and "problems" nestled in that discussion.  AFAIK, all are
>unresolved.  Indeed.  EVERY discussion of the last year that has posed a
>"problem" is unresolved, since my "due consideration of proposals" is
>stagnated back at 2 September 1994 which is where my old mail backlog
>rests.  And I have a couple dozen issues unresolved even from before
>that time, though Cowan considers all to be resolved and/or unimportant.

Aren't you providing support for establishment of a lojban academy with
these points?

>
>I think you MASSIVELY underestimate the number of issues that will have
>to be considered at the time the 5 year baseline concludes.  If we have
>ANY requirement to formally consider proposals, then unless we make the
>strictures on making a proposal quite onerous, there will be no end to
>the deliberations.  Indeed, I suspect that the campaign for the next 5
>year baseline change set will start the day the previous one concludes.
>

Undoubtedly. Why is this a problem? Slang usage will still be possible.

>>>And as John just mentioned
>>>to be today, the problem in writing these thinsg is not the writing itself,
>>>but in deciding what to write about.  That last year's discussion of lo/le
>>>and family will have ENORMOUS impact on what he evenutally writes on the
>>>logic paper, i am sure.
>>
>>Perhaps John and lojbab are trying to do too much for the baseline. If we
>>build in a mechanism for eventual revision, then it will be easier for them
>>to get the first version done, as they will be less concerned about making
>>everything optimal.
>
>If it is not documented, it is not formally part of the language.  As
>simple as that.  People will be learning from what we write.

Agreed.

>Any usage
>that is not covered will not be widely promulgated throughout the
>community, and hence will never get used.

Suspect this is not true. I'll be using <xoi> for example. And I'm not too
happy about the existence of a "present" tense. I probably won't use it,
using "near future", "near past" and "interval extending from near past to
near future" instead. So it goes.

>The problem JCB faced with his continuous change philosophy was just
>that - there was NO ONE, JCB included, who had a current document that
>incorporated all of the changes.

Reminds me of the French preparing for world war two. You are fighting old
battles. The Maginot line wasn't very effective in a Blitzkreig.

>
>>>>> John and I have found, and presume that others find it as well, that the
>>>>> image of instability affects those of us working on learning or using the
>>>>> language FAR MORE than the changes themselves.
>>>>
>>>>Then let's change that image. You should not react so violently to changes
>>>>that have no effect whatsoever on learning
>>
>>Agreed. Change in and of itself shouldn't be absolutely forbidden. However,
>>once baselined, changes in the formal definition of the language should be
>>*hard* to make. They should not be *impossible* to make!
>
>How hard is hard?  Or how impossible is impossible?  I think it is safe
>to say that Lojban changes will be imposable by a group of like-minded
>leaders on the community with at least as much ease as the Constitution
>is amended today - at least at first.

Fine by me.

>
>>Lojbab's proposal of letting the users of the language develop their own
>>slangs is fine, but we still need a way of specifying what "standard"
>>lojban is.
>
>Every person that writes a parser or other tool for the language will be
>specifying their own "standard".  Because LLG is NOT retaining
>intellectual property control on the language, we cannot and will not
>stop people from promulgating such "standards".  If any of them finds a
>market either in terms of an economically remunerative application, or
>in terms of acceptance by the community, their version will BECOME the
>new standard, and all the academies in the world will not stop this.
>
>I thus envision that standardization of Lojban will have the fate of,
>for example, the C computer language, where all of the community pays
>obeisance back to Kernigan and Ritchey as the original standard of the
>language, but the "real" standard is the current compiler
>implementations promulgated by Borland and Microsoft in the PC world and
>by whatever groups are promulgating Unix versions.
>
>I also note that the K&R language standard has survived something like
>25 years and an enormous explosion in usage.

I've written Lisp & Pascal interpreters. There are standards and there are
"gray edges" to the standards. ANSI standards are helpful, even if widely
criticized.
>
>>Lojban is not a natural language, and I believe we loose something by
>>allowing it to turn into one if we don't have some kind of standards
>>mechanism.  The French and Brazilian Portuguese academies provide use
>>with an opportunity to learn from the experience of others.  There is a
>>reason why such language academies exist.
>
>They exist to provide a force for tradition.  They also have some legal
>clout.  LLG has no legal clout, and if we need a force for tradition to
>preserve language stability, then the effort is hopeless.
>
>English has NO academy, and yet has the widest international spread of
>any natlang (even if you argue total numbers of speakers).  There is a
>reason why no such academy exists.

English does have dictionaries, textbooks, grammers, manuals of style etc.
I believe that e.b. white's little book has considerable influence over
written english. There are formal mechanisms for regulation of english,
sans academy.
>
>>I think lojbab should be the president of the convention, and that the
>>academy should consist of (maximum) 15-20 people.
>
>This will be decided by the LLG membership, probably at a Logfest 5
>years down the pike.  The LLG membership is almost at that 15-20 person
>count right now.
>
>There is no guarantee that I will be alive in 5 years or that I will
>WANT to be leading such a convention.  (It is safe to say that if I am
>leading such a convention that it will be VERY conservative.)
>


A point in your favor, I would say.


la stivn


Steven M. Belknap, M.D.
Assistant Professor of Clinical Pharmacology and Medicine
University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria

email: sbelknap@uic.edu
Voice: 309/671-3403
Fax:   309/671-8413