Message-Id: <199602061042.MAA08557@xiron.pc.helsinki.fi>
Date:         Tue, 6 Feb 1996 05:41:13 -0500
Reply-To: Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
Sender: Lojban list <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
From: Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
Subject:      Re: CLD
To: Veijo Vilva <veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI>
Content-Length: 6688
Lines: 125

>> The number of people who are discussing change proposals because they
>> want the language to change further are fewer than a half dozen.
>
>You are still representing only the majority view.

Yes - in the event there are two diametrically opposing views, I cannot hope
to represent both, so I better take the majoritarian one without good reason
otherwise.

>> Meanwhile, others tend to shut up and bow out just vbecause the debate
>> is this hypertechnical change proposal related stuff.
>
>It is untrue that there is much debate related to change proposals.
>The hypertechnicality doubtless puts people off, but anyone deterred by
>hypertechnicality would probably be happier with Glosa anyway.

I consider that the enter hypertechnical discussion is about "change proposals"
but that some are changes tothe semantics as opposed to the baseline stuff.
But it does affect the refgrammar which has had to delve into semantics to
some extent.

It is important to meand most that Lojban be learnable by someone without
advanced coursework in logic.  If a significant construct - one that will
appear often in text- cannot be communciative wiothout such coursework
than the idea of speakable logic in a natural language is a dead issue
- it will just be speakable logic in an unnatural jargon.  I will sacrifice
that goal in favor of other Lojban goals, if need be, especially since from
what pc has said, JCB actually sacrificed the goal long ago, at least in
anything resembling a pure, speakable logic.

>Given your goals, your conduct in leading the community is wise and
>effective. I object only to those goals; and I rather suspect that
>the goals have changed.

Whose goals have changed?  Mine?  The community's? or merely the set of goals
voiced my the outspoken on Lojban List.  The latter has probably changed.
The former probably has not.  The community is not a monolith, so its goals
are probably a fuzzy set.

>Both the design and the procedure of developing
>it have been far from optimally conducive to establishing a flourishing
>community.

True, but that has been true since 1954.  The goals that we have retained
despite their being anti-community-growth are those we consider basic and
emblemmatic to the Loglan Project.
>For example, ease of learning vocab has been sacrificed to
>the theoretically interesting but practically useless goal of
>self-segmentation.

I think you would find that most people consider the goal quite useful.
Especially since we who were in the community prior to GMR experienced non
segmentable lujvo.  Self-segmentation at the sound level was a major point
of the 1960 SCiAm article and hence definitive of the language (as is the
weighted multi-language word base), and it was that article that captured
the interest and enthusiasm of a LARGE section of the community (and still
brings us new people on a regular basis, BTW, even though it is 36 years
old).

>There has been an inordinate amount of tinkering
>to effect very small-scale improvements.

Probably true, but at the time the tinkering was done, it was not always known
thatthe improvements would be small-scale.  Witness for example perfectives,
tu'a, tagged-fu'ivla - all of which I think have turned out to jhave MUCH
broader effect on the language than we realized when we did the tinkering.
Likewise, the equivalence of short and long scope "nu" which was the first
major deviation we had from JCB's language.  Only the negation issue and
the tense redesign were, I think, realized at the time they started to be
inherently "major" in their effect.

>You spent many years doing pretty much what I think we should carry on
>doing, until you reached a point (a couple of months ago) where you did
>an about turn and sought to bring down the guillotine on grammar changes
>irrespective of their merits. You could have baselined the language years
>ago; the changes made in recent years have been few and minor.


WE DID baseline the grammar years ago.  We could not baseline the language
until we documented all that wasbeing baselined.  And the process of
documentation has brought out a few errors, and more weaknesses.
But the language HAS largely been stable the last 2 years since Grammar 2.33
and Nick's original dikyjvo work.  But without documentation in print, the
community will not believe that we are serious about the baseline.  JCB pulled
the carpet out from a stable(-if-inadequate) language before.  People do not
want to feel that LLG which purported represents THEM, might do the same.
But the community has been burned many times, as pc and Chassell I think have
said more succintly and effectively than I have.

>> And yes, I do feel that a language that is not spoken is not a language,
>> and hence the theoretical stuff that is not used or usable is largely a
>> waste of time. But I do recognize that other people like the intellectual
>> game. I can respect this, so long as they respect the needs of those who
>> have other goals.
>
>I'm not convinced that you do respect this, or even understand it.
>As for those who value the intellectual game, everyone who such a
>description appears to fit supports the goal of publishing the
>reference materials as soon as their authors are able to finish them,
>and, I imagine, supports the goal of building a self-sustaining
>community around lojban.

This has been less than clear to me, and the continuying agitation for
a commitment to continuing change in the language tells me that those
supoorting that type of commitment do not understand the concerns of the
community that has largely held back from learning the language.

I myself have sympathy with the intellectual game aspect of the language.
However, i haven;t been able to play the game for years - this is my work and
not my play, alas , and I get too mentally exhausted from the work aspect to
use it for play as well.  It also hurts that I haven't nearly the background
to understand the intellectual games that have gone around inthe last year or
 so.  I don;t have time to read the advanced linguistics works that will give me
that background.

>Yes, but he's still competent to contribute to the progress of the lojban
>design. For example, if the guillotine has not fallen, then he would
>have been contributing to the addition of new cmavo, and probably selmao,
>for fuzziness.

The guillotine fell over 3 years ago, but it was not a clean cut, and we have
had to try twice more to produce a clean cut.  Hopefully this time it will
work, because we are announcing that the guillotineis falling and tying down
the neck as much as possible so it cannot move during the fall.  Yecch!
what a bloody metaphor! (and a worse pun zo'o).