Subject: [lojban] Re: Official Statement- LLG Board approves new baseline policy

From: Steven Belknap <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 30 Nov 2002 19:31:23 -0600

I am not upset at the historical fact that Loglan is moribund. I 
accepted this long ago and began learning the new language. I have read 
about 3/4 of John Cowan's book. I have donated multiple copies of the 
grammer to libraries, and filled out requests for the book in many 
other libraries. There are 5 former Loglan fans who I've managed to 
interest in lojban. Another dozen or so newbies that I've convinced to 
buy the grammer or study the online materials. Whenever I meet somebody 
who I think might be interested, I tell them about lojban.

The toggle cmavo is not documented in Loglan, to my knowledge. So it 
"exists" only in lojban. If that is not a problem, than why not discuss 
it in the baseline documentation? I subscribe to the Loglan 
publications and listserv as well as the lojban listserv. Perhaps I've 
missed it, but I haven't seen any discussion in the Loglan community 
about transitioning to lojban.

My understanding is that many, but not all, of the refinements 
introduced into lojban have also been incorporated into Loglan.

I have posted to the lojban list many times in both English and lojban, 
although less often since the birth of my children. I read the listserv 
everyday. I visit Robin's lojban website everyday. I am teaching my 
children lojban, although I have been frustrated at the lack of a 
dictionary and better learning tools, particularly for children.

There are many people who bought the original JCB Loglan books, but 
were uninvolved in the political intrigues that led to the split 
between lojban and Loglan. I believe it would be politically wise to 
acknowledge Loglan in the baseline. Loglan is part of the history of 
lojban.

I am not suggesting that any changes be made to lojban, only that the 
lojban-Loglan relationship be addressed in the baseline. Why 
unnecessarily alienate people who are very likely to be interested in 
joining the lojban community?

JCB was a flawed human being, at times prone to petulance, 
mean-spiritedness, and poor judgment. So am I. Judging by your post, so 
are you.

-Steven

On Saturday, November 30, 2002, at 01:58 PM, Invent Yourself wrote:

> On Sat, 30 Nov 2002, Steven Belknap wrote:
>
>> lojbab has told us the decision of the Board, but not their reasoning.
>> Lojban is Loglan? Bah, humbug. Vacuous nonsense. Vigorous assertion
>> convinces me of nothing. Loglan is dead, long live lojban? Well, 
>> maybe.
>> But those who do not remember their past are condemned to relive it.
>> There is a substantial body of written Loglan text extant, which
>> despite flaws should not be completely ignored. I memorized every
>> blasted one of those Loglan predicates. I was pretty damned irritated
>> when I learned that this was all for not due to the fracture in the
>> Loglan community, and the subsequent moribund state of the parent
>> language. I can not support a lojban baseline policy statement which
>> does not cover Loglan. A joint lojban/Loglan toggling cmavo would
>> satisfy me. So would a formal autotranslate utility of some kind
>> (although some syntactic problems in Loglan would still have to be
>> fixed, if they haven't already been fixed.)
>
>
>
> So you're upset at the historical fact that Loglan is moribund, and you
> want a Lojban baseline policy to "cover Loglan" but offer no 
> justification
> except possibly to recover your lost hours learning Loglan words, and 
> then
> you call for a toggle cmavo which exists already but yet was never once
> seriously used (to my knowledge), and you imply that the Lojban 
> community
> is somehow responsible to steward the Loglan community's corpus. And
> finally, you close by calling for someone else to build software which
> you're not sure is possible to build at all because of your lack of
> familiarity with current Loglan.
>
>
>
>> What is the point of ignoring Loglan? This seems like pointless spite
>> towards a dead man. Whatever his shortcomings, JCB's memory deserves
>> better than this. In my conversations with him I was impressed by his
>> boundless optimism and creativity. I liked the guy. If this issue is
>> not resolved, I swear a mighty oath to use (wherever appropriate) the
>> word "simba" for "tiger" in all lojban communication henceforth.
>
>
>
> I don't actually recall ever seeing any Lojban communication from you. 
> I'm
> sure JCB was a wonderful man and a role model for us all, but Lojban
> baseline policy is not the place to eulogize him. Some of us (I can 
> speak
> for Nick and I) are seriously UN-interested in Loglan, and we 
> vigorously
> resisted any hint that Lojban would twitch for that ancient dream of
> rapproachment.
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
>
>
>
>
>
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