Re: Ideographic Conlangs

From: "Tim May" <butsuri@...>
> Muke Tever writes:
>  > From: "Tim May" <butsuri@...>
>  > > Egyptian isn't ideographic, it's logographic.  It's an important
>  > > distinction - all known scripts in human history have had a
>  > > phonetic component (there have been attempts* to _construct_
>  > > ideographic scripts, but I don't think any of them have achieved
>  > > completion, let alone been widely adopted).
>  >
>  > But the phonetics often become divorced from the script, and so the
>  > script doesn't synchronically have _any_ phonetic component.  Isn't
>  > the Japanese use of kanji like this?  One character, without any
>  > change in form, can stand for several different morphs of similar
>  > meaning (and probably different meaning too, but I'm not exactly
>  > accomplished enough in Japanese to know any).
>  >
> This is true, but Japanese also contains phonetic characters*.
In different scripts...

But yeah, the Arabic numerals could go there too, being as 1234567890 are a
widely-used script with no phonetic component (even within a single
language--you could accept "1" being pronounced [thuw] but then what's it doing
in "11"?)

*peers extremely closely at what he wrote*

Good heavens.  I mean "1" being pronounced [wVn].   [thuw] indeed...

    *Muke!
--
http://www.frath.net/

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