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> > Diphthongs like "ea" and "ey", or "ao" contrasted with > > "au", simply should not exist. > I follow you on ao and au, but why the first? Is it that "ea" tends to > sound like "eya"? I don't find any particular difficulty in distinguishing between "au" and "ao". I mean, when pronounced with Spanish clear u and clear o. In Spanish there are some pairs such as "tao"--[ta.o], the balance of ying and yang; and "tau"--usually [taw] but also [ta.u], the Greek letter. I think the problem English speakers find with ao/au is that they use English diphthong "ow" /AU/ (the weak part of which is an open u, i.e. a middle sound between those of Spanish u and o) to imitate both. Try to pronounce "ao" as English "ah-aw", "au" as English "ah-ooh" and "aw" as English "ow". Do you still find them that difficult to distinguish? > >These are the reason > > Lojban switched to ai, ei, oi, au, V'V as its only > > vowel combinations. > > > > V.V, with a glottal stop between the vowels, sounds > > much uglier to me than V'V with an h-sound. But now I > > see that neither should be necessary. > > > > Why make new letters for [dZ] and such? This was my > > idea in the C(C)V(V) form. CC does not include CW. So > > this would allow for both "jai" and "djai", assuming j > > is changed to be the single phoneme [Z] like it should > > be. Like it should be? For which undefeatable reasons? Using <j> for /Z/, and <y> for /j/ only creates the unnecessary problem of leaving <x> unused and /@/ uncomfortably unassigned and unassignable unless introducing such a horrendously awkward oddity as using <x> for /@/, or some non-letter such as <->. > Here's what I believe the CC combinations would > > be, though I must be forgetting some: > > > > dj dz jb jd jg jv sf sk sp st ts xf xk xp xt zb zd zg > > zv Personally, I find <jb>, <jd> or <jg> "uglier" than <xf>, <xp> or <xt>. > > (Those x-combinations are ugly as heck. If only x were > > c.) And why not just assigning /S/ to <c>? Is there any good reason against that? > And I would be happy in this case with letter values: > > c /S/ > j /Z/ > y /j/ > w /w/ > x schwa Certainly, I would be COMPLETELY HORRIFIED with the uncomprehensibly oddity of <x> = /@/ AARRRRGHHHH !!! X-(S) and even more considering that the alternative assignment c /S/ j /j/ y /@/ w /w/ x /Z/ quite on the contrary shows no oddity at all but makes pretty good sense. > The last is annoying, but this way we get to keep y and w with their obvious > values, Obvious? For whom? I recall a post to Google groups by a Swede some time ago complaining about English use of letter <y>, which he "instinctively felt" as a vowel letter, for the consonant /j/, which he "instinctively", "obviously", associated with letter <j>. Best regards, Javier