From gordon.dyke@bluewin.ch Sun Jul 28 13:07:35 2002 Return-Path: X-Sender: gordon.dyke@bluewin.ch X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_7_4); 28 Jul 2002 20:07:35 -0000 Received: (qmail 75802 invoked from network); 28 Jul 2002 20:07:33 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.218) by m11.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 28 Jul 2002 20:07:33 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mta9n.bluewin.ch) (195.186.1.215) by mta3.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 28 Jul 2002 20:07:33 -0000 Received: from oemcomputer (62.202.156.74) by mta9n.bluewin.ch (Bluewin AG 6.5.026) id 3D3E5FFE00090CB7 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Sun, 28 Jul 2002 22:07:31 +0200 Message-ID: <003301c23672$87dd63c0$4a9cca3e@oemcomputer> To: "jboste" References: <4.3.2.7.2.20010730221611.00b10c00@pop.cais.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20020723025544.032cba90@pop.east.cox.net> <20020723103956.E28971@miranda.org> <20020723202414.4923.qmail@pi.meson.org> <1027862685.31650.35.camel@bapli> <20020728170257.GA69422@allusion.net> Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: lojban brochure Date: Sun, 28 Jul 2002 22:07:36 +0200 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4133.2400 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4133.2400 From: "G. Dyke" X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=81437350 X-Yahoo-Profile: gregvdyke Jordan : FWIW, I think this comparison is a good idea. The proficency of humans with computer programming languages is important for lojban because it suggests that the LALR(1)-ness of the lojban grammar shouldn't make it more difficult for humans than natural languages. Additionally this comparison certainly targets the core potential lojban audience, which seems to be people interested in either languages, computers, or both. ----------- I'm not really sure that we are capable of seeing any difference in between an LALR1-lang and a nat-lang, where we can only do a maximum of about 7-token look-ahead anyway. Aside from that, as I've already pointed out, Lojban is easy on syntax, but hard on semantics while programming languages are frequently the other way round. (Even though you can often know that a program is correct without having the faintest Idea what the programmer intended). I think using "Lojban" and "programming language" in the same breath is bad PR : non-computer linguists are going to be thrown straight away by any such comments, while programmer may be lured by false (or stereotyped) pretences. Sticking a label of "computer language for communication" (which even such sentences as "lojban is no more difficult to learn than a programming language" *might* do) on Lojban is not desirable in a brochure. (We can tell people on irc and stuff that "Lojban is no more ...") but a printed brochure should avoid throwing off people because of (unfortunate) sterotypes mu'omi'e greg.