From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Fri Sep 02 17:08:30 2005 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Fri, 02 Sep 2005 17:08:30 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.52) id 1EBLZy-0004cz-Fi for lojban-list-real@lojban.org; Fri, 02 Sep 2005 17:08:18 -0700 Received: from julia.math.ucla.edu ([128.97.4.5]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:DHE_RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA:32) (Exim 4.52) id 1EBLZu-0004cr-KI for lojban-list@lojban.org; Fri, 02 Sep 2005 17:08:18 -0700 Received: from xena.cft.ca.us (pool-71-107-57-250.lsanca.dsl-w.verizon.net [71.107.57.250]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (Client CN "Jim Carter", Issuer "UCLA-Mathnet Root Certificate" (verified OK)) by julia.math.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTP id A6EB151C69 for ; Fri, 2 Sep 2005 17:08:11 -0700 (PDT) Received: by xena.cft.ca.us (Postfix, from userid 500) id B21F5A06A6; Fri, 2 Sep 2005 17:08:11 -0700 (PDT) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by xena.cft.ca.us (Postfix) with ESMTP id ADED7A06A4 for ; Fri, 2 Sep 2005 17:08:11 -0700 (PDT) Date: Fri, 2 Sep 2005 17:08:11 -0700 (PDT) From: Jim Carter To: lojban-list@lojban.org Subject: [lojban] Re: lojban as an auxiliary language In-Reply-To: Message-ID: References: <737b61f305090214262772927d@mail.gmail.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Spam-Score: -2.6 (--) X-archive-position: 10481 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: jimc@math.ucla.edu Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-list@lojban.org X-list: lojban-list On Fri, 2 Sep 2005, Timothy Bovee/DayPoems wrote: > On 9/2/05, Chris Capel wrote: > > Does anyone have any thoughts about the propriety of using lojban in a > > situation where there is no other common language between two parties? > Whatever the difficulties in learning lojban, it has the advantage that > concepts are rigorously defined, allowing culture-neutral communication. :-) The more closely you look at the word list definitions, the more you realize that they were made to get the product working, not to be rigorous specifications of concepts. Compare, for example, the amount of useful material in a definition from the Oxford English Dictionary, and even those are descriptions of "English as she is spoke", not an experiment in prescriptive logical language. My favorite example of the kind of concept skew you mentioned: my Chinese wife and I were buying a picture frame and she was talking in Chinese with the vendor. She said, to my surprise, "we'll take the red one". To my English-speaking eyes the frame was black -- although in truth it was lightness 0.10 saturation 0.05 hue [whatever the number is for red]. I asked her about it later and it turns out that English has a region of "black" around the black point, whereas Chinese runs "hong" (red) right down to zero lightness. The Lojban dictionary does not specify colors in enough detail to be immune to this particular misunderstanding, and the focus of the project has been on the grammar and the structure words and the place structures, rarely on precisely defining the concepts that specific gismu are supposed to convey. On the original question of using Lojban as an auxiliary language, it has a lot of advantages over natural languages (particularly English and Chinese, which are the hardest common languages in my opinion), but a big disadvantage is that there are few people who know it and little written material likely to be useful in the auxiliary language role, such as maps and city guides. You need a critical mass, which Esperanto may have, but Lojban definitely doesn't. James F. Carter Voice 310 825 2897 FAX 310 206 6673 UCLA-Mathnet; 6115 MSA; 405 Hilgard Ave.; Los Angeles, CA, USA 90095-1555 Email: jimc@math.ucla.edu http://www.math.ucla.edu/~jimc (q.v. for PGP key) To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.