Re: Promoting Lojban [was Re: Loglan still alive?]

[xod <xod@bway.net>]

On Thu, 18 Feb 1999, Steven D. Arnold wrote:


> Another thing that I'd love to see, and perhaps eventually write in Lojban,
> is a major philosophical work.  It seems Lojban would be uniquely suited to
> that.  


I have been sitting on several philosophical insights for the past several
years out of disgust for the sloppiness of natural language. Once I reach
the necessary threshold of Lojban fluency, I will probably take a shot at
expressing these ideas in Lojban. 




> IMO, the way for any language to become accepted is for it to find a niche.
> Once that niche is found, it builds it up and expands it.  If a couple
> people start publishing interesting works in Lojban, this will pique
> interest considerably -- especially if the work is still profound and
> interesting when translated to other languages.  Imagine a popular novel


In my opinion, this niche is philosophy and science. Once a rich
vocabulary is built, we may have a language which is truly superior for
discussion of logical relationships.

And yet, ironically for those who think intellect and emotion are opposite
poles, Lojban may be superior also for the transmission of emotional
states and poetry. I have had one poet approach me with interest in Lojban
in hopes that it would provide her with a culturally neutral language.

The point approaches soon when computers will be able to deliver really
workable real-time language translation in text. This will mean that
non-English speakers will have less incentive to learn English in order to
conduct commerce. More power to them! Of all languages to learn, English
is one of the hardest, and it's a bitter coincidence that it's the most
important.

What this means to me is that people will learn second languages for other
than useful reasons. Small, endangered languages will also be spared
destruction. Lojban will spread, if it ever does, because people enjoy the
subjective experience of using it, as opposed to it being "useful".

While I'm on a roll, let me also point out my interesting thought that
Lojban may outlive Esperanto. Esperanto is supposed to be useful, and so
suffers from the chicken / egg problem. Lojban is not intended to be an
interlingua, and so people learn it in regardless of the dearth of
speakers and literature. This may cause Lojban to grow to the point where
it actually does become useful, escaping that chicken and egg situation. 



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