Subject: Re: [lojban] The end of the wiki

From: Steven Belknap <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 29 Nov 2001 13:41:42 -0600

lojbab correctly points out that I have been a long time supporter of 
lojban. I read JCB's original 1960 Scientific American article around 
1968 or so. (My father had an extensive collection of Scientific 
American magazines, and I enjoyed perusing them.) I learned most of the 
Loglan vocabulary, spoke with JCB a number of times by phone, and had an 
occasional correspondence by mail, and later email. I made some 
suggestions to JCB about the language. I lost interest in Loglan in the 
early 1990s when a friend of mine who was also interested in Loglan 
pointed out some logical inconsistencies in the language, or more 
accurately in JCB's description of the language. (I suspect these issues 
have since been resolved, but I no longer remember the details of my 
friend's critique.)

I was quite disappointed that the original Loglan vocabulary was 
discarded in lojban, although I understand the legal reasons why this 
was done. This disapointment was assuaged somewhat by the discovery that 
a number of technically savvy persons were continuing JCB's work, and 
extending it. One of the suggestions I had made to JCB was that fuzzy 
logic be included in Loglan's structure.

Later, I made the same suggestion to lojbab privately and to the lojban 
list. I felt that the fuzzy logic issue was an important one because 
lojban's claim to fame was that it was a "logical language", yet it did 
not explicitly include fuzzy logic. This was a somewhat frustrating 
discussion, as many of my correspondents were either unfamiliar with 
fuzzy logic or believed (falsely, in my view) that fuzzy logic was 
already easily expressible in lojban.

I persevered, in part because (as lojbab noted in his post) lojban had 
not yet been baselined, and I thought that perhaps with a bit of 
persistence I could correct what I saw as the only grave deficiency of 
the language. Through the combination of experimental cmavo such as <xi> 
and some discussion about the metaphysics of lojban, I came away from 
this discussion mostly (though not entirely) satisfied.

I believe that LLG was correct in baselining the language and in 
resisting changes to lojban that are not a product of actual speakers 
(or writers) of the lojban. As lojbab correctly points out, my fuzzy 
logic "monomania" evolved into a concern about how the language would be 
"rebaselined" in the future to address issues raised through experience 
with its use. This is still a bit vague, I think, but I have no quarrel 
with the progress to date.

To those who would invent the "perfect" logical language, I would say 
that the best is the enemy of the good enough, and that the likely 
outcome of developing such a "perfect" language is that only one person 
will ever use it. A language must have some stability to attract and 
keep a community of users.

I post infrequently to the list because we have 3 children, aged 1,3,4. 
The time I formerly spent posting or playing with lojban, I now spend 
with them. I do read the list (almost) daily. I am hoping to teach my 
children the language. On this point, what is the latest with Macintosh 
software for learning lojban? I am now using MacOSX, which is a UNIX 
based operating system, and I wondered if anybody could translate some 
of the UNIX based lojban learning tools to the new Macintosh operating 
system.

-Steven

On Wednesday, November 28, 2001, at 04:46 PM, Bob LeChevalier (lojbab) 
wrote:

> At 06:39 PM 11/28/01 +0000, And Rosta wrote:
>>>>> <[email-masked]> 11/27/01 12:40pm >>>
>> #Because I'm interested in conlangs in general, and the lojban grammar
>> #in particular. And Rosta...aren't you the same in that way?
>>
>> Yes, but I joined the community in a kinder gentler era when my
>> bolshiness was treated most avuncularly by Lojbab, and now I'm part of
>> the furniture.
>
> Lojbab has not said anything that should be taken as 
> other-than-avuncular
> to tinkit (so far). But then, Lojbab did not always feel as avuncular
> about And's bolshiness as he may have acted.
>
> One difference, of course, is that when And was most offensive that
> language was not yet baselined. LLG officially has NO interest in any
> variants of Lojban, and our limited tolerance for differences is 
> extended
> towards the remnant of TLI in the interest of rapprochement behind 
> Lojban
> as the surviving version of Loglan. This will be challenging enough,
> without dealing with "reform" movements of the sort that have split
> language communities in the past.
>
> I have to offer to tinkit that I myself had my own "reform the world"
> proposal, the base-12 time system that was in the original textbook 
> draft,
> shot down by the community several years ago. While Lojban is a 
> radically
> different language from other conlangs, we have taken a fundamentally
> conservative approach to conlang design, sticking to JCBs original 
> premises
> as much as possible, and changing things only as needed to make Lojban 
> work
> as a living language. The Sapir-Whorf test is already designed into the
> grammar of the language; further radical changes from natlangs are not
> needed and indeed could be harmful.
>
>> I don't think anybody mentioned, btw, that you do post to the list and
>> the wiki *in Lojban*, which by usual criteria ought to place you on the
>> side of the angels.
>
> So long as he continues to do so, he is a Lojbanist. However, I had the
> impression that he was planning on getting those awful gismu out of his
> head, which means that we should not expect further Lojban postings.
>
> The wiki is not an official LLG site and is Jay's effort, so Jay has the
> right to decide the sorts of things he wants to see on that site. (The
> fact that I agree 100% with Jay's attitude toward the language as 
> expressed
> on his page makes supporting his policy easy).
>
> At 06:48 PM 11/28/01 +0000, And Rosta wrote:
>>>>> Robin Lee Powell <[email-masked]> 11/27/01 07:52pm >>>
>> #On Tue, Nov 27, 2001 at 03:57:10PM +0000, And Rosta wrote:
>> #> Steve Belknap was similarly monomaniacal about fuzzy logic and 
>> (quite
>> #> rightly) never got abused.
>> #
>> #I suspect he didn't post something titled "lojban uses fuzzy logic by
>> #default!!".
>> #
>> #I also suspect he didn't post something entitled "give me my brain 
>> cells
>> #back!" bitch about how stupid the language was, and then continue
>> #posting anyways. Mostly bitching about how stupid lojban is.
>
> Steve started posting on his issues pre-baseline, though too late to 
> make
> any significant changes. He also spent a long while supporting the
> language before he introduced his personal topic of interest, and he
> continues to support the language (Steve bought ten copies of the book 
> for
> distribution to libraries), even though he does not post.
>
> I also never really saw Steve as posing any sort of radical change. He 
> was
> merely asking how we would express various fuzzy logic concepts in 
> Lojban
> and trying to determine to what extent the language supported fuzzy
> logic. He apparently was satisfied by the conclusion, given his book 
> purchase.
>
> Steve's real challenge was over the long term management of the 
> baseline,
> as to whether and how we would discuss changes that might prove needed
> while during the baseline period.
>
>> Well maybe tinkit has the distinction of combining in a single person 
>> at once
>> several much abhorred vices. But no single vice is unique to him. Just 
>> as
>> Steve showed a similar monomania, so I've posted innumerable messages
>> criticizing Lojban.
>
> And drawn your share of fire for it. But I think you have also made
> considerable effort to build bridges to key Lojbanists, and made clear 
> when
> the chips are down that you support the language even when you disagree
> with some elements of the design. tinkit has said just the opposite, 
> that
> his disagreement has led him to abandon the language.
>
> It remains unclear whether he has useful contributions to make if he 
> ceases
> to post in Lojban, and has nothing constructive to say about the 
> language
> or the community. If he wants to go off and invent his own variant, he
> would be well advised to look at the historical record of Jim Carter's
> efforts, which did not offend LLG (though they did offend JCB), and Rex
> May's efforts. In both cases they set up their own site, and called the
> language something different and have been low key about their 
> criticism of
> the mainstream effort, letting their own language efforts speak for
> themselves. Negative criticism does not help anyone in the conlang 
> world -
> it only makes enemies.
>
>> Plus, as I just pointed out in my last message, tinkit
>> mitigates his vices by the Virtue of having quite a good 
>> lojban-to-english
>> ratio in his postings. He took the trouble to learn the language 
>> enough to use
>> it a bit, which surely means he can't squarely be placed in the bad 
>> guy camp.
>
> For that matter, if he wants to assume a hexidecimal base in his Lojban
> writing, he can. But he should not be surprised when his numerical
> statements are not understood as he intends.
>
> But it is always wise to respect your audience in the community. If no 
> one
> wants to hear more about his ideas, then to continue to promote them 
> merely
> arouses enmity and makes sure that his ideas will never get a hearing. 
> He
> would be better off making a personal web page advocating his ideas
> (probably mixed with other stuff that is less controversial) and letting
> people link to his pages via the webring or in free links. Perhaps Jay
> would even allow such a link on tinkit's page in the wiki. Arnt has 
> done
> well in posting some of his personal opinions mixed with good content on
> his Lojban pages, and this serves as a constructive model.
>
> lojbab
> --
> lojbab [email-masked]
> Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
> 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 
> 703-385-0273
> Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org
>
>
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