Re: [lojban] Re: Specific terminology - the case of philosophy terminology

Reminder to self: easy on the irony among geeks. I pretty clearly said that Lojban is capable of being used for philosophy, though I did question why one would want to. Not doing so is (again rather clearly) a matter only of good taste. As for Sanskrit, it is created only in the sense of being a (slight) regularizing of the language of existing texts (some of the rics, for example are not quite Sanskrit, having wild forms. By the Vedanta everything is pretty much in place and thereafter Panini rules). Those texts are already religious moving toward philosophical so there is probably no way to keep it from going on in that way (even the Kamasutra reads like a theology manual, and also much of the epics). So, go, do philosophy -- but figutre out how to order a pound of butter and a dozen eggs first (or last, of course -- after satori, the dishes).

From: Escape Landsome <escaaape@gmail.com>
To: lojban@googlegroups.com
Sent: Monday, March 19, 2012 1:41 PM
Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: Specific terminology - the case of philosophy terminology

HOW TO MAKE A MAJOR DRAWBACK APPEAR as if it was a good point !!!

> A (philosophical) argument can be made that the inability of Lojban to
> translate philosophy is a positive sign that it is a truly logical language,
> well suited for the real world. But, since it is possible to say nonsense
> in Lojban, I suspect that philosophy will not be a problem (the hardship of
> vocabulary creation aside -- and maybe the necessity of figuring out what
> these guys are really saying, if anything).

This proves too much. Are you telling us Lojban couldn't be used to
write love letters as well ?

Anyway, you make a drawback (Lojban cannot be used to translate this
kind of thing) appear as if it were an advantage, this is rather
funny. At least the guys who designed Sanskrit did not have the
same prohibitions : not only they somewhat-created a new "logical"
language, but they thought its primary use was to speak about
IMPORTANT things, that is, litterature, philosophy, poetry, science,
this kind of things.

I agree we should begin by translating tiny piece of texts, that are
not too complex, to begin with. But we should also pursue high
goals, otherwise you will only get mediocre results.

And, also, it's a bit strange that a "logical" language should render
us the service of "forbidding" some kinds of _expression_. Rendering
some kinds of _expression_ impossible is NOT the work of Logic, this is
Ideology' 's work. You are not an ideologist, I hope... In "1984",
the NEWSPEAK language is designed so as to render impossible such
notions as democracy or religion. Is it what you would call a
logical language, with an inability to translate bad things ?

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