Re: [lojban-beginners] taxonomic .a descriptive

["A. PIEKARSKI" <totus@rogers.com>]

>
>So, the poll is, what is your personal preference for species' names, and why? 
>Do you prefer taxonomic, descriptive, neither both, either depending on 
>circumstances, etc. etc., and what are your reasons?
>

For me, one of the biggest attractions of Lojban has been the lack of cultural 
bias 

(in so far as possible). I see that as one of the design principles.  Given that 
the 

community is dominated by Europeans, particularly Anglos, there is always a 
temptation to borrow words from English and the Romance languages, either 
because they sound familiar, or because they 'sound nice' (to us Europeans, 
of course!).  The more we do that, the more we lose 'cultural neutrality', 
the less 

we attract non-Europeans, the more we use European words ....ad nauseam.

That is why Linnaean is such a good source of words for species, where no 
reasonable lujvo or Type IV fu'ivla can be constructed.  Although rooted in 
Latin, it 

is recognized by the worldwide scienitific community and in that sense it is 
'culturally neutral'.  Also, it is a ready-made store of words - the hard work 
has 

already been done!

That is why, when considering a new scientific word, I go through these steps:

1) Can I come up with a reasonable lujvo?  'Reasonable' means 'is it acceptably 
descriptive' and not too long.
2) If negative to the above, can I construct a Type IV fu'ivla that will be 
widely 

recognized? 'Widely recognized' means recognized in a significant number of 
the world's major languages (one of these must be English or Chinese Mandarin).
3) If negative to the above, use Linnaean as a basis for a fu'ivla.  I have no 
fixed 

feelings on Type III versus Type IV.  The advantage of Type III is that the 
fu'ivla will 

be more meaningful to non-scientists.  The advantage of Type IV is that they are 

shorter.

totus

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