From LOJBAN%CUVMB.bitnet@YaleVM.YCC.YALE.EDU Sat Mar 6 22:51:50 2010 Received: from YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU by MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Sun, 23 May 1993 15:02:02 -0400 Received: from CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU by YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 4316; Sun, 23 May 93 15:01:16 EDT Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU by CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Mailer R2.07) with BSMTP id 5663; Sun, 23 May 93 15:02:25 EDT Date: Sun, 23 May 1993 14:59:27 EDT Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: Re: self-segregating morphemes X-To: conlang@diku.dk X-Cc: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: Erik Rauch Status: O X-Status: X-From-Space-Date: Sun May 23 10:59:27 1993 X-From-Space-Address: @YaleVM.YCC.YALE.EDU:LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET Message-ID: The problem with Frank Schulz's suggestion is that you would either have to greatly expand the selection of permissible initial consonant clusters, or you would only have something like 240 gismu with combining forms. Part of the reason for 'all that complexity' is the requirement that ALL gosmu have combining forms, not just some of them, and that the gismu/rafsi list have some (if not a lot) expansibility, so that new gismu can be added when new concpets arise. On this subject, though. I was thinking last night, and I realized that there is another system that has two-level segregation, and which people seem to learn without too much trouble: the chemical elements and their symbols. You effectively have some 100 'gismu', the full element names, and their atomic symbols, as rafsi. People studying chemistry have to learn both to effectively learn material. While the numbers are smaller, I do not recall any particular difficulty in learning atomic symbols as I needed them, and thus being able to identify the components of a chemical compound (a 'lujvo'), even though several of the symbols are not even mnemonic. What happens, and I think it happens with Lojban as well, is that you learn a few of them because they occur all of the time. Then as you see most compouns, you know where to look up what you don't know, but you ususally know at least part of the compound (and sometimes, just as in language text, context can tell you what a symbol means). Even though I have studied no chemistry for some 20 years, i still recall most of the chemical elements, and probably could recognize 80% of the chemical symbols, and recall at least 50%, yet we only run into a few of the symbols in 'everyday life'. I presume that most chemists, or chemistry students (i.e. comparable to people who are serious about learning Lojban) get close to 100% long before they understand a fraction of the syntax (things like valences and whatever) that controls what formulaes are plausible and/or likely (though I seem to recall that we could learn to make good guesses in that area too by the end of 1st year high school chem). Whether this means Lojban's sytem is learnable, i can't say. I know I have had no particular trouble, though I am not good at languages (my Russian vocabulary is growing much slower than my Lojban vocabulary did, and I use Russian far more often). lojbab