From a.rosta@lycos.co.uk Sat Oct 05 09:32:22 2002 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_2_2_0); 5 Oct 2002 16:32:22 -0000 Received: (qmail 77325 invoked from network); 5 Oct 2002 16:32:22 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.217) by m13.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 5 Oct 2002 16:32:22 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO digitalkingdom.org) (204.152.186.175) by mta2.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 5 Oct 2002 16:32:22 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.05) id 17xruE-0005tH-00 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Sat, 05 Oct 2002 09:35:54 -0700 Received: from digitalkingdom.org ([204.152.186.175] helo=chain) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.05) id 17xrtg-0005sm-00; Sat, 05 Oct 2002 09:35:20 -0700 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Sat, 05 Oct 2002 09:35:20 -0700 (PDT) Received: from mailbox-8.st1.spray.net ([212.78.202.108]) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.05) id 17xrtX-0005rN-00 for lojban-list@lojban.org; Sat, 05 Oct 2002 09:35:12 -0700 Received: from oemcomputer (host213-121-67-97.surfport24.v21.co.uk [213.121.67.97]) by mailbox-8.st1.spray.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0F46926847 for ; Sat, 5 Oct 2002 18:31:00 +0200 (DST) To: Subject: [lojban] Why linguists might be interested in Lojban (was: RE: Re: a new kind of fundamentalism Date: Sat, 5 Oct 2002 17:32:39 +0100 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Importance: Normal In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20021003195927.031e3ec0@pop.east.cox.net> X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 X-archive-position: 1922 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: a.rosta@lycos.co.uk Precedence: bulk X-list: lojban-list From: "And Rosta" Reply-To: a.rosta@lycos.co.uk X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=122260811 X-Yahoo-Profile: andjamin Lojbab: > Finally and most importantly for one key Lojbanic purpose, Remind us what purpose it is, and why it is important? > linguists respect such usage-based norms and evolution and do not > much respect prescriptivism. The sort of prescriptivism contemned by linguists is not what you call 'prescriptivism', namely language design. > So long as prescribers have significant > clout over the language, we will have trouble gaining respect as a > language (and community) worthy of serious linguistic investigation. > Rather, we will be classed with the hoards of conlangs that never > stopped prescribing until they drove their prospective users away or > forced splintering from those who would not accept the prescription. Which linguists have you been talking to, or which linguists have given you this impression? Why, and under what circumstances, do you think linguists would be interested in Lojban? Speaking as a linguist, I find it hard to see how Naturalist Lojban would be of more than sociolinguistic or cultural-linguistic interest. Well, perhaps it might be of intrinsic interest to see how it evolves, what blend of the original design, of L1 influences, of usage norms, etc., compose the eventual product: but I don't see that any further generalizations about natural language or the human language faculty could be drawn from it. But I may be missing something. Although Engineered languages have not hitherto been of interest to linguistics (largely because they never existed, and because their very possibility has not occurred to linguists), I think they could be of considerable interest if they are any good. Current Minimalist (Chomskyan) theory is founded on the postulate that language is fundamentally "perfect" -- that underlyingly, language works in the optimal way, in a way that conscious design could not improve upon. This postulate is not informed by any serious investigation of what perfection is, because there is no history of people trying to think how the fundamentals of natural language could be improved upon. So in principle, intellectually rigorous engelanging has a role to play in defining Perfection, the limits of perfectibility, and the relation of natural language to these. Also, recent work on language evolution has just begun to investigate how natural language could evolve through normal selectional processes as a solution to a given design problem. Engelangers could in principle be ahead of the game here, in their understanding of the design problem and the range of possible solutions. (Andruc, our erstwhile Lojban colleague, is currently doing a PhD with two of the best people in this area, btw.) My (in this instance, comparatively privileged to some slight degree) opinions, then, are: 1. Lojban should not feel the need to make itself of interest to linguists, though it should welcome any interest that linguists do take. 2. Naturalist Lojban might in its own right be of some intrinsic interest to linguistics, but more as a curiosity than as anything that can advance the central research goals of linguistics. 3. Engineered Lojban as part of a larger program of 'engelangology' could in principle be of interest to linguists as advancing linguistics's central research goals, but in practise it is unlikely to happen, because of the paucity of competent people motivated to pursue engelanging for its own sake. However, a study of Lojban would still be very instructive for anybody interested in studying natural language as a solution to an engineering problem. --And.