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Posted: Tue Jan 09, 2007 8:20 am
by clem
Cases --> more complexity means more flexibility.

It's funny to see how differently Indo-European languages evolved and how some of them kept the use of cases and others replaced it with articles, in-sentence location and ordering. Look at French for instance: a strict sequence of words in order and nearly no cases at all.

Thanks to a trivial grammar it's really easy to understand French. (of course "conjugaison" makes it really hard to speak :)).

Most of the French vocabulary comes from Latin, but when you look at its grammar.. Jesus.. it just lost all of it :)

We might say the same of American when compared to English in a thousand years... look at the similarities in the vocabulary, but where is the grammar gone ?? :)

PS: This is definitely an interesting thread.
Clem

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Posted: Tue Jan 09, 2007 8:41 am
by npap
clem wrote:Cases --> more complexity means more flexibility.

It's funny to see how differently Indo-European languages evolved and how some of them kept the use of cases and others replaced it with articles, in-sentence location and ordering. Look at French for instance: a strict sequence of words in order and nearly no cases at all.

Thanks to a trivial grammar it's really easy to understand French. (of course "conjugaison" makes it really hard to speak :)).

Most of the French vocabulary comes from Latin, but when you look at its grammar.. Jesus.. it just lost all of it :)

We might say the same of American when compared to English in a thousand years... look at the similarities in the vocabulary, but where is the grammar gone ?? :)

PS: This is definitely an interesting thread.
Clem

Hello Clem,
The old world has a lot to teach the new one. This definitely is an interesting thread. Linguistics is an interesting subject. And since Linux MInt seems to have a worldwide acceptance, it would be interesting to see the opinion of other people in the wide world web.
Greetings, Don

Posted: Tue Jan 09, 2007 5:17 pm
by hairy_Palms
We might say the same of American when compared to English in a thousand years... look at the similarities in the vocabulary, but where is the grammar gone ??
the spellings already gone :)

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Posted: Tue Jan 09, 2007 6:10 pm
by npap
Hello hairy Palms,

Perhaps, if they did away with the crazy spelling of many languages there wouldn't be many illiterates in the world.
Latin is a good example of sensible spelling. It's a WYSIWYG system. You read
what you write, (you spel it the wey you speek it). It looks funny, doesn't it.

But does it make sense to use different sounds for the same letter? For example:
'a' as in bath and 'a' as in bathe, and 'a ' as in bear.
' i ' as in eye and ' i ' as in bit.
'e' as in bed and 'e' as in see.
' s ' as in chess and ' s ' as in Zoo.
And when do you use two Rs or two Ms or two Ts or two Ss ?
To me, all of this stuff is nonsense.

I think some written languages were made up by illiterates, or maybe by smart people who didn't like the idea of everybody knowing Reading , Writing and Rithmitic.

Best regards

Posted: Tue Jan 09, 2007 6:25 pm
by clem
They were not "made"... they just "got there".

Clem

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Posted: Wed Jan 10, 2007 7:51 am
by npap
clem wrote:They were not "made"... they just "got there".

Clem
Hello Clem,
Since the stuff got into the recycle bin or trash can by accident, maybe it's time to empty it.

This topic, by the way, ended up to be what it was not meant for; just like language spelling.
But, oltho i am an advoket of languej accurasy, i think English is not a gud kandidet for any linguistik kontest.
I'm afraid French also falls in the same category to some extent.

Greek is an exception since it's based on definite rules, although these rules are just as complicated as lawyer jargon: the party of the first part and the party of the second part. Maybe they should have a party with a lot of whiskey or Cogniac. They would find the best settlement, I'm sure.

Languages are supposed to be tools of communication , and since our civilization is based on the accurate exchange of ideas, we should at least upgrade the system.
I realize that this would be the greatest revolution of the ages. Poor Socrates would stir in his grave to hear about such a movement, although he himself was a revolutionary to begin with.
He was forced to commit suicide by drinking a poison because he "introduced new daemons" , ( the word Daemons meant Gods of some kind). Or was it that he was starting some sort of revolution?
Regards,

P.S. Would it be possible to move the contents of the threads that are not related to the topic of ' User Permissions' to a special, new heading? I would suggest using the 'General Talk' heading again.
Erosso optime

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Posted: Wed Jan 10, 2007 7:55 am
by npap
rlozano wrote:LoL...

such a funny and very informative discussion around here.... :-)
Thanks riozano,
Perhaps you have something interesting to say from your part of the word.
Regards

Posted: Wed Jan 10, 2007 8:26 am
by clem
Khaire Npap,

I sometimes move threads in the right sub-forums, but if there's a bit of chaos in one of them it's not a big deal. :)

If you're interested in artificial languages I recommend you learn Esperanto. It's 100% logical, modular and also very flexible. Without the use of cases (well.. almost) they managed to give sentences a lot of flexibility in the placing of their words.

But it's like everything. Without imperfections.. you can't see the beauty. Esperanto is very well though of, it's universal and almost-universally easy to learn, it's logical...etc... but it's not that funny to use.

We can princess all we want about the imperfections and illogical things in French writing, English pronunciation, or even about the complexity of Latin grammar.. in the end of the day they're languages which are very nice to use.. and very beautiful too.

These languages are only human after all and that makes them beautiful.

Erroso optime (is there two "s" in "erroso" ??)
Bene vale.
Clem