2009/4/3 Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>:
I think the reason that they don't allow geminate consonants is
that it
would introduce some difficulty in hearing a distinction between
"b" and
"b:". And the LLG worked very hard to make all the lojban sounds as
distinct as possible.
The difference between [b] and [bË] is most significant when they are
used as an inbetween sound, which is how they are used mostly.
[...]
As far as the long vs short vowels, I like that every letter in
lojban
corresponds to one and only one sound, even if it means that I
can't use
long "a" and "i" (the rest you can get through the vowels or
diphthongs).
I would consider ":" a marking-oriented letter like ",". It is useful
only when there is an adjacent letter to mark; it cannot be pronounced
alone.