Re: Conlang flag design; comments and proposals

Christian Thalmann wrote:

>> The building of Babel represents the striving for divinity through
>acts of
>> creativity, which in this story resulted in the first splintering of
>human
>> language.  The star compass can both represent the goal of heaven
>and the
>> fact that, after Babel, humans were spread to the four corners of
>the world.
>
>While Jan's idea of using the Tower of Babel as our badge
>is a stroke of genius (how many of us have never
>translated the Babel story?), this explanation is waaay
>too religious for this list, which has 1) nothing to do
>with religion and 2) a large population of non-Christians.
OK, how about this:

"The building of Babel represents the striving for new heights of
creativity, which in this story resulted in the first splintering of human
language.  The star compass can both represent the upward pull of the
creative impulse and the fact that, in the story, after Babel humans were
spread to the four corners of the world."

One man's religion is another man's mythology.  The Babel Text is actually a
Jewish text (adopted by Christians) but used by non-Christians conlangers
because it is a mythological story of many languages from one.  I was
explaining the myth: the settlers of Shinar are trying to reach their God by
working together to build something unique.  I was also thinking of Tolkien,
who often spoke of subcreation as a human imitation of divine creation.

BTW, Jan, I liked the way the tower looked like a pyramid, with a ramp going
up and around, up and around, striving upward.

Best regards,

Jeffrey