Re: CHAT: C in Greek Alphabet

Eugene Oh wrote:
> I agree that the change for sigma for most readers would seem mostly
> cosmetic and even disruptive (particularly since they assert that
> "it's becoming more common" without sayin
I guess it's seen as a move towards simplification. After all, there is
no justification from ancient or Hellenistic sources for maintaining a
difference between final & non-final sigma.

At one time in English (and other national forms of the Roman alphabet)
handwriting and printing there were different symbols for final &
non-final lower-case S (the non-final ones looking very similar to _f_
in print), but that practice has long been abandoned (except in German
Fraktur) in favor of a single symbol. I'm the same idea is behind the
practice of using _c_ for lower-case sigma in all environments.

But, unless the practice is actually adopted by the Greeks themselves
(and I'm not aware that there is a move in that direction - tho I may be
wrong about that), I see little prospect at the practice (desirable tho
it is IMO) being universally adopted.

g why), but the spaces
> provide convenient and useful word breaks for the modern reader
> accustomed to spaces, and ease the strain on your eyes. Nothing bad
> about that.
I don't think anyone is suggesting going back, so to speak, and printing
Greek or Latin without white spaces - to be logical it would also mean
printing everything in upper-case if one wanted to reproduce something
akin to ancient practice. But we live a society where we expect more or
less everyone to be able to read printed material for her-/himself. We
no longer rely on trained slaves to do the deciphering for us    :)

--
Ray
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