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Jordan: > On Sun, Jun 01, 2003 at 08:33:53PM +0100, And Rosta wrote: > > Formalists agree on the importance of the baseline, but not on the > > importance of it being frozen > > Well, they definitely disagree on what should be in it. Again, largely differing along the conservative-progressive spectrum; the difference concerns more how much the current prescription should be changed. For a given degree of change, we largely agree about which changes should be made. Yes, we do argue all the time over details, but it is rational debate that usually homes in on some sort of shared view. > The formalist > view requires that it be definitely proscriptive, if that's what > you're talking about with frozenness > > And the baseline is currently unfrozen, I remind you, but it is > still proscriptive Baseline = a definite specification that everybody heeds Frozen = baseline does not go through incremental version changes > > 'Whorfians' like to study exotic languages in order to discover new > > ways of conceptualizing things. Such novel conceptualizations can > > be found here and there in Lojban, too, generally arising because of > > Lojban's formalism and its having been created by nonlinguist nerds > > That's just their rhetoric. (If you are refering to xod's religion) Just rhetoric because it isn't borne out in practise? Maybe. Or even the principle is just rhetoric? I don't think so. > > In reality they're just naturalists: they support every attempt > to make lojban more english-like I'm a bit lost about who we're talking about here. If we're talking about the "I don't understand the logic, so I'm going to use Lojban as if it were my native English" school, then I agree. But if we're talking about the "Certain natural languages can express conceptually fundamental notions that Lojban cannot express in any practical way" school, then I don't see that as particularly naturalistic; it's merely the wish that Lojban be able to equal the expressive capabilities of natlangs. > > > Yeah, but we all know whorfianism (not xod's religion; I mean the > > > Sapir-Whorf hypothesis) is bunk. I think Lojbanists should drop > > > all this "testing the sapir-whorf hypothesis" crap, or at least > > > footnote it with "A largely untenable, racist viewpoint, which is > > > more or less demonstratably false" > > > > I have of course said similar things (albeit a little less vehemently) > > But the founding intent of Lojban was to complete the Loglan project, > > and the original purpose of the Loglan project was ostensibly to test > > SW. So you're saying that Lojban should alter its avowed goals -- > > that is, change what it says its goals are > > Obviously what I am saying is that lojban should alter (remove) > this *particular* so-called "goal" Yes, I understood that. > We all know it's a pretty amorphous goal anyway; no particular > scientific test was ever suggested or anything of the sort > It appears it was basically just name-dropping of a then-popular > linguistic idea Yes. But a significant constituency of the Lojban community hold "that sapir whorf crap" dear. > > Anyway, this aside, there seems to me to be a marked discrepancy > > between the numbers of people who have an interest in Lojban -- > > even quite an active interest -- and the much smaller number of > > people who delve into its formal aspects. I don't really > > comprehend why the many members of the larger group who don't > > belong to the smaller are so interested in Lojban, though their > > interest is very real and not at all superficial > > I pretty much agree, I guess > > I also think anyone interested in lojban should read some books on > predicate logic, and don't buy the common rhetoric that you "shouldn't > have to" do that just to understand features of the language Ideally all lojbanists would do that. OTOH, learning lojban as a means of learning logic seems like quite a good thing. Someone knowing nothing about logic could read CLL and come out with a fair grasp of the basics. I'm sure my involvement with Lojban has sharpened my logical sensibilities. --And.