Re: CONLANG: Simplicity

[John Cowan <cowan@LOCKE.CCIL.ORG>]

Markku Kuoppassa scripsit (on Conlang):

> Robin Gaskell cited Claudio Gnoli:
>
> CG> I am wondering about redundancy from time to time.
> CG> While I am planning a logical conlang, I tend to remove anything
> CG> seems "meaningless" or "useless", but I'm afraid in this way I miss
> CG> some important function which is hidden in natlangs, such as
> CG> redundancy.
>
> IMHO, many of the constructors of logical languages miss the point when it
> comes to the definition of "logic". If it is their aim to build a language
 that
> shall be parseable by a computer, eliminating redundancy certainly *is*
> desireable.

I don't see any connection between machine-parsability and lack of
redundancy (or the desirability thereof).  Lojban is machine-parsable,
but has redundancy in several places.

There is phonological redundancy: we exploit only fairly common
sounds, having only 24 phonemes.  There is morphological redundancy:
compound words can often have several forms, semantically identical,
but some shorter (less redundant), some longer (more redundant).
There is syntactic redundancy: more than one way to say sentences.

> But some seem to believe that such languages could be spoken by
> human beings.

Human beings have spoken Lojban, although no human beings have
*acquired* Lojban as native speakers.

> That would include the proposal that a human brain works in the
> same way as a computer.

Not at all.  I hold no such views, nor AFAIK does anyone at
Lojban Central.

--
John Cowan                                              cowan@ccil.org
                        e'osai ko sarji la lojban