Subject: RE: [lojban] registry of experimental cmavo

From: "And Rosta" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2001 03:26:41 +0100

Xod:
> On Tue, 17 Jul 2001, And Rosta wrote:
[regarding the purported tendency of usage to identify or remedy
'problems' in the design:] 

> > Anyway, try not to get me started on this "let usage decide", "thousand
> > flowers bloom" baloney.
> 
> I think it's not so much "let usage decide" as much as it is "let the
> users decide". One really needs to spend dozens or hundreds of hours
> thinking in Lojban, or trying to, to be able to suggest meaningful
> improvements. How else does one know which is really desirable from the
> Lojban perspective, and which are the attempted importations of English or
> other foreign sources?

I don't share your apparent mystical sense of the Lojban soul. To me,
Lojban is essentially a system for mapping known logicosemantic forms
to known phonetic forms. So for me, there is no Lojban perspective;
there are simply design issues concerning how to optimize the mapping.
And of course I think spending dozens or hundreds of hours thinking
about logic and semantics is on balance more relevant to design issues
than spending dozens or hundreds of hours 'thinking in Lojban', whatever
that means.

None of which is to go against "let the users decide". I'm all for you
doing whatever makes you happy, and for LLG honouring its policy of
conservatism in accordance with the wishes of almost the totality of
the Lojban community. What I describe as "baloney" is the intellectual
rationale for LLG's policy, not the political rationale, which I
regard as unassailable.

> This is the difference between a language that's actually used by people,
> vs. entertainment for language nerds; a specialized sort of crossword
> puzzle.

I'm not sure what your "this" refers to. But you seem to be reiterating
the distinction that I too have drawn between "a language that's actually
used by people" and the abstract grammar of a language. I wouldn't
liken the latter to a crossword puzzle; it's a more a design/engineering
thing than a puzzle-solving thing.

--And.