Received: from mail-ie0-f191.google.com ([209.85.223.191]:34562) by stodi.digitalkingdom.org with esmtps (TLSv1:RC4-SHA:128) (Exim 4.80.1) (envelope-from ) id 1XPHXN-00087J-5x for lojban-list-archive@lojban.org; Wed, 03 Sep 2014 13:52:18 -0700 Received: by mail-ie0-f191.google.com with SMTP id rp18sf1990974iec.28 for ; Wed, 03 Sep 2014 13:52:10 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=googlegroups.com; s=20120806; h=references:message-id:date:from:reply-to:subject:to:in-reply-to :mime-version:x-original-sender:x-original-authentication-results :precedence:mailing-list:list-id:list-post:list-help:list-archive :sender:list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type; bh=PgebvvqZET+fsPWmZAMmkWyk0S0ERrgD7ZZWpSDSENc=; b=sMKDF0wqd1j7/PJs7frpedpaXRC7SAhY2gP9Fol50RoS0OCckQVmbakkVUrgdNpWd5 MmL53AkgjUP6AFp+7jsL48/gf9t57tWTydTx2F+eJ8Gmx2asq3eD9l4gMAZx12mNDDFL BK5tDkXUa9HI+ApJCmv0RwG4tEKpf/cbOijecN0rpP7Wdz/TzlVko8EtIhzbdXlZpCON RCVGBkyBUCDM818n3b1uglE9AZn97IV4qHDvG8HNVF18weg3Ro3O6HBOFO05byNTLlGS foP9t9MFScgLKxf9BGx2luuclsQkGCloOvVnZtk9TWjsil3hlxBtWihSXjG+iHMwcXBz CwRw== X-Received: by 10.140.19.213 with SMTP id 79mr2126qgh.5.1409777530929; Wed, 03 Sep 2014 13:52:10 -0700 (PDT) X-BeenThere: lojban@googlegroups.com Received: by 10.140.108.230 with SMTP id j93ls11560qgf.31.gmail; Wed, 03 Sep 2014 13:52:10 -0700 (PDT) X-Received: by 10.236.230.106 with SMTP id i100mr52368yhq.27.1409777530413; Wed, 03 Sep 2014 13:52:10 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nm13-vm5.access.bullet.mail.gq1.yahoo.com (nm13-vm5.access.bullet.mail.gq1.yahoo.com. [216.39.63.131]) by gmr-mx.google.com with ESMTPS id bb4si1065903pdb.1.2014.09.03.13.52.10 for (version=TLSv1 cipher=RC4-SHA bits=128/128); Wed, 03 Sep 2014 13:52:10 -0700 (PDT) Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of kali9putra@yahoo.com designates 216.39.63.131 as permitted sender) client-ip=216.39.63.131; Received: from [216.39.60.176] by nm13.access.bullet.mail.gq1.yahoo.com with NNFMP; 03 Sep 2014 20:52:10 -0000 Received: from [216.39.60.245] by tm12.access.bullet.mail.gq1.yahoo.com with NNFMP; 03 Sep 2014 20:52:09 -0000 Received: from [127.0.0.1] by omp1016.access.mail.gq1.yahoo.com with NNFMP; 03 Sep 2014 20:52:09 -0000 X-Yahoo-Newman-Property: ymail-3 X-Yahoo-Newman-Id: 896979.78873.bm@omp1016.access.mail.gq1.yahoo.com Received: (qmail 91814 invoked by uid 60001); 3 Sep 2014 20:52:09 -0000 X-YMail-OSG: XSu1A78VM1nCmamA.g49IEqqalP1ZBMOB2OjVd8yHp4fBE2 1EA9YG9BoHpbtk7QMktZKyjOCLMc3HSeLM5FFkJOf_P_kUHG8IMdPiJILgsK RZ7_3IIGiQX9Lh20CCoAbmNGn_6DF4XhGOsW4k4Zh8Soa4oKNj6yvQ9HNqD9 smBkvt01i2TpF1hC4b9gzxMsMGilaMRkHeuLAw.qP1DXr5vx2cTuz82QVY_C UpSR6yfx0_5r8k68so.2GTfzC1ARq8UTrGVY_K66H8YNHeKHLJH2SAA1Jfdo wP9FnEBv3QVE_wNuCAFalv1G1ofYgAF2wLwnDAoSiRVwVxoswmTEn5q.ors2 .3IUTUZvHtuZX1yQkIxA5h_9ykgAZRRmLmKbIfrIoOiUBd4FJc6mmKbYDLpW dQOYTyPz_1uRttqoZBfA2kjV0zMq.MyeHuNkmsbmnLFJaF4o0HpoSK0XGQt1 jUZIzgccSsmeWYxz43FTfInMc3ZDZtr84gUHCmozZt3g6n4Mx8.T.W7H_Z7d xPwmHOkuIdKmYAHBu.nhhqL8yYnJvRXgEm1JsPwR7fReAqfghkDtWYC3Bb_H w06gp04HUJSg0mXujmmwbdWFEmrvfpYxETpzerN8mOQq130Xd_YpWBXGkxbA 3y1DaqDp9jdgpKnDhWf2dmDEXjxopHBESCfSKGFYdac5kB9L9tsmitNB9u0T 6weKsjeJ2LfmsIwl26qsECRkW5862f6sLmjBbbacgelA- Received: from [99.92.109.82] by web181101.mail.ne1.yahoo.com via HTTP; Wed, 03 Sep 2014 13:52:09 PDT X-Rocket-MIMEInfo: 002.001,ImxpdmluZyIsIGkuZS4sIGJlaW5nIHJlYXNvbmFibHkgd2VsbC1kb2N1bWVudGVkIGFuZCBoYXZpbmcgYSBjb21tdW5pdHkgb2YgcmVhc29uYWJseSBjb21wZXRlbnQgdXNlcnMsIG1heSBiZSBhbiBvdmVybHkgbmFycm93IGNsYXNzLCBkZXBlbmRpbmcgb24geW91ciBhaW1zLiBQZW9wbGUgc2VyaW91c2x5IGxvb2tpbmcgZm9yIHdoYXQgTG9qYmFuIHB1cnBvcnRzIHRvIG9mZmVyIG1pZ2h0IGJlIHdpbGxpbmcgdG8gdG8gbG9vayBmb3Igc29tZXRoaW5nIHdpdGggYSBnb29kIHN0YXJ0IG9uIGEgZGVzY3JpcHQBMAEBAQE- X-Mailer: YahooMailWebService/0.8.203.696 References: <5eccb6c5-6904-4b30-a49c-455e9bb1d32a@googlegroups.com> <5406CBB8.20305@gmail.com> <1409759095.40258.YahooMailNeo@web181102.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <1409777529.63686.YahooMailNeo@web181101.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> Date: Wed, 3 Sep 2014 13:52:09 -0700 From: "'John E Clifford' via lojban" Reply-To: lojban@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: criticism of lojban needed To: "lojban@googlegroups.com" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Original-Sender: kali9putra@yahoo.com X-Original-Authentication-Results: gmr-mx.google.com; spf=pass (google.com: domain of kali9putra@yahoo.com designates 216.39.63.131 as permitted sender) smtp.mail=kali9putra@yahoo.com; dkim=pass header.i=@yahoo.com; dmarc=pass (p=REJECT dis=NONE) header.from=yahoo.com Precedence: list Mailing-list: list lojban@googlegroups.com; contact lojban+owners@googlegroups.com List-ID: X-Google-Group-Id: 1004133512417 List-Post: , List-Help: , List-Archive: , List-Unsubscribe: , X-Original-From: John E Clifford Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="1013620071-498871275-1409777529=:63686" X-Spam-Score: -1.9 (-) X-Spam_score: -1.9 X-Spam_score_int: -18 X-Spam_bar: - --1013620071-498871275-1409777529=:63686 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable "living", i.e., being reasonably well-documented and having a community of = reasonably competent users, may be an overly narrow class, depending on you= r aims. People seriously looking for what Lojban purports to offer might be= willing to to look for something with a good start on a description and a = very small active group and then build on that (cf. Esperanto in the face = of Volapuk). The alternatives at the moment are to stick with Lojban in th= e face of its promise not to change and so to remain deeply flawed or to st= art from scratch or close to it, though with a the data from LoCCan and its= offshoots -- and probably others -- to build on. Is there no less well-kn= own conlang that has not yet developed a clearly wrong turn but is develope= d enough -- and open enough -- to form a reasonable platform for developmen= t? I don't know the present field well enough to have an answer to that. = Those I do know (all less than thoroughly) have nice points and apparent (to me) deep flaws, but are not yet so fixed that correction is i= mpossible. But, on the other hand, I am not inclined (nor able) to wait an= other 60 years for the sort of language envisioned to come along and the re= cord shows that getting the sort of grunt work that creating such a languag= e will require makes the 60 years from a rough start seem optimistic. So, o= n a third hand, perhaps getting Lojban to change even before it has a compl= ete record of how bad it is is the best option -- though not a very promisi= ng one in the present climate. On Wednesday, September 3, 2014 1:18 PM, And Rosta wr= ote: =20 This is an important point. If you restrict the set of candidate languages = only to living ones (i.e. with speaker community), then despite its many fa= ults Lojban is patently the best choice if you want what you aptly term "mo= noparsing". More generally, most of the PR claims for Lojban are valid if and only if t= he set of candidate languages is restricted to living languages. (Which res= triction is not unreasonable.) --And. =20 On 3 Sep 2014 16:44, "'John E Clifford' via lojban" wrote: Yup! If your goal isn't monoparsing, you have no reason to be interested i= n Lojban/Loglan. If your goal is monoparsing, Lojan/Loglan may be the only= living option but its success is not proven and, even if it were, it does = just about everything in the worst possible way. > > >Let's see how that line of objections, rather than ones to the cosmetics, = can be met and turned into a positive discussion of Lojban. > > > >On Wednesday, September 3, 2014 3:04 AM, And Rosta w= rote: >=20 > > >On Monday, September 1, 2014 4:07:03 AM UTC-4, la gleki wrote: >> the wikipedia article about lojban might need a short list of >> criticism of lojban with links (e.g. to posts in this mailing list). >> Balanced criticism actually makes languages more popular, so it's >> advisable to make such a list. > >Lojban's greatest success is this: > >1. The founders of Lojban set themselves the absolutely overriding goal of= creating a version of Loglan that is stable and has a community of users. = This goal was achieved. > >My main criticisms of Loglan/Lojban are: > >2. Even if being a Whorfian experiment -- as Loglan not very credibly purp= orted to be -- were of academic interest, the experiment design was so poor= as to render it an utter failure as an experiment. > >3. Even relative to the compartively simple task of creating a logical lan= guage, Lojban does an exceptionally poor job. There are no formal rules tha= t map a sentence's phonological form to its logical form, and to a large bu= t very slowly diminishing extent there are no informal rules that do that e= ither. There are ways to unambiguously encode logical forms in Lojban sentences, but these are clunky, verbose and unerg= onomic (and therefore largely unused); and anybody giving the problem twent= y minutes' thought could have come up with a better design than Lojban's. > >4. The morphosyntax of Lojban is full of unnecessary baroque complexity --= the proliferations of allomorphy, word-classes, constructions, function wo= rds could also be very drastically simplified. > >5. Goal (1) is not a very interesting goal: having a stable language with = a community of users is interesting only if the language itself is worthy o= f being a stable language with a community of users. Criticisms (2) and, in= my view, particularly (3) and (4) mean the language itself isn't worthy of= being a stable language with a community of users. That is, there are no r= easons why it is a Good Thing to learn and use Lojban; any attempt to persu= ade people otherwise would in my view by deluded or dishonest. (A "Good Thing" is something more than just = "whatever floats your boat".) > >I've written at length about (3) and (4) elsewhere, on Lojban and Conlang = lists. > >--And. > > >--=20 >You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups = "lojban" group. >To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an = email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com. >To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com. >Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban. >For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > --=20 >You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups = "lojban" group. >To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an = email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com. >To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com. >Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban. >For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > --=20 You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "= lojban" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an e= mail to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. --=20 You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "= lojban" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an e= mail to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. --1013620071-498871275-1409777529=:63686 Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
"living", i.e., being reasonably well-documented a= nd having a community of reasonably competent users, may be an overly narro= w class, depending on your aims. People seriously looking for what Lojban p= urports to offer might be willing to to look for something with a good star= t on a description and a very small active group and then build on that (cf= .  Esperanto in the face of Volapuk).  The alternatives at the mo= ment are to stick with Lojban in the face of its promise not to change and = so to remain deeply flawed or to start from scratch or close to it, though = with a the data from LoCCan and its offshoots -- and probably others -- to = build on.  Is there no less well-known conlang that has not yet develo= ped a clearly wrong turn but is developed enough -- and open enough -- to form a reasonable platform for development?  I don't know the pres= ent field well enough to have an answer to that.  Those I do know (all= less than thoroughly) have nice points and apparent (to me) deep flaws, bu= t are not yet so fixed that correction is impossible.  But, on the oth= er hand, I am not inclined (nor able) to wait another 60 years for the sort= of language envisioned to come along and the record shows that getting the= sort of grunt work that creating such a language will require makes the 60= years from a rough start seem optimistic. So, on a third hand, perhaps get= ting Lojban to change even before it has a complete record of how bad it is= is the best option -- though not a very promising one in the present clima= te.


On Wednesday, September 3, 2= 014 1:18 PM, And Rosta <and.rosta@gmail.com> wrote:

<= div dir=3D"ltr">This is an important point. If you restrict the set of cand= idate languages only to living ones (i.e. with speaker community), then des= pite its many faults Lojban is patently the best choice if you want what yo= u aptly term "monoparsing".
More generally, most of the PR claims for Lojban are valid= if and only if the set of candidate languages is restricted to living lang= uages. (Which restriction is not unreasonable.)
--And.  
On 3 Sep 2014 16:44, "'John E Clifford'= via lojban" <lojban@googlegroups.com> wrote:
Yup!  If your goal i= sn't monoparsing, you have no reason to be interested in Lojban/Loglan. &nb= sp;If your goal is monoparsing, Lojan/Loglan may be the only living option = but its success is not proven and, even if it were, it does just about ever= ything in the worst possible way.

Let's see how that line of objections, rather than ones to the cosmet= ics, can be met and turned into a positive discussion of Lojban.

On Wednesday, September 3, 2014 3:04 AM, And Rosta <and.rosta@gmail.com&g= t; wrote:


On Monday, Sep= tember 1, 2014 4:07:03 AM UTC-4, la gleki wrote:
> the= wikipedia article about lojban might need a short list of
> criticism of lojban with links (e.g. to posts in this mailing list).=
> Balanced criticism actually makes languages more popular, so it's
> advisable to make such a list.

Lojban's greatest success is th= is:

1. The founders of Lojban set them= selves the absolutely overriding goal of creating a version of Loglan that = is stable and has a community of users. This goal was achieved.

My main criticisms of Loglan/Lojban are:

2. Even if being a Whorfian experiment -- as Loglan n= ot very credibly purported to be -- were of academic interest, the experime= nt design was so poor as to render it an utter failure as an experiment.
3. Even relative to the compartively simple task of crea= ting a logical language, Lojban does an exceptionally poor job. There are n= o formal rules that map a sentence's phonological form to its logical form,= and to a large but very slowly diminishing extent there are no informal ru= les that do that either. There are ways to unambiguously encode logical forms in Lojban sentences, but these are clunky, verbose and unerg= onomic (and therefore largely unused); and anybody giving the problem twent= y minutes' thought could have come up with a better design than Lojban's.
4. The morphosyntax of Lojban is full of unnecessary bar= oque complexity -- the proliferations of allomorphy, word-classes, construc= tions, function words could also be very drastically simplified.

5. Goal (1) is not a very interesting goal: having a sta= ble language with a community of users is interesting only if the language = itself is worthy of being a stable language with a community of users. Crit= icisms (2) and, in my view, particularly (3) and (4) mean the language itse= lf isn't worthy of being a stable language with a community of users. That = is, there are no reasons why it is a Good Thing to learn and use Lojban; an= y attempt to persuade people otherwise would in my view by deluded or dishonest. (A "Good Thing" is something more than just = "whatever floats your boat".)

I've wri= tten at length about (3) and (4) elsewhere, on Lojban and Conlang lists.
--And.


--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the = Google Groups "lojban" group.
To unsubscribe from this gr= oup and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to lojban+unsubscribe@go= oglegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com.
Vis= it this group at http://groups.google.com/group/l= ojban.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/opto= ut.


<= /div>
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "= lojban" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an e= mail to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group= /lojban.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/o= ptout.
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "= lojban" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an e= mail to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group= /lojban.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/o= ptout.


--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups &= quot;lojban" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an e= mail to lojban+unsub= scribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at http:= //groups.google.com/group/lojban.
For more options, visit http= s://groups.google.com/d/optout.
--1013620071-498871275-1409777529=:63686--