Re: OT: Tinkering versus creativity

Sally Caves, On 28/06/2006 00:26:
> Beauty, startling and evocative, in art and artlangs is largely personal
> and
> developed over a long period of studying it.  I prefer some pieces by Satie
> over Mozart any day, although Mozart is considered by far the more original
> and influential composer.  Because an artlang is primarily a personal
> development that will probably never see the light of day outside of our
> examination of it here, it can have no real impact on the world that would
> deem it a "step forward in knowledge, understanding, and achievement" in
> the
> way engineering does in its potential for application.
I quite agree that the criteria by which engelangs are to be evaluated are
entirely inappropriate to the evaluation of artlangs.

> Until we can actually SEE a whole conlang, instead of perusing its
> parts, we
> aren't in a position to say whether it is boring or not to us, unless it is
> vastly underdeveloped.  We can see a finished painting, we can hear a
> finished piece of music, we can't experience a finished artlang in this way
> because no artlang will EVER be finished. Only more developed, only more
> idiosyncratic.  I share with you the propensity for being bored with a lot
> of conlangs.  Maybe I don't peruse them enough.
Typically we get only glimpses of other people's conlangs, for so few are
comprehensively documented. When one reports oneself to be delighted, or bored,
or intrigued, or whatever, by such and such a conlang, one is clearly reporting
a response to those glimpses.

> Maybe I don't prefer to air that sentiment on a list full of conlangers.
Though if you were to discuss your tastes and interests in conlangs, I and doubtless
others would read it with great interest -- with interest in learning of the
nature of your tastes and interests, that is, not with any preconception that
those tastes and interests somehow determine some absolute value in particular
conlangs.

--And.

>
> Sally
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "And Rosta" <and.rosta@...>
>>
>>> IMAO, the lust for novelty in art (i.e. the propensity to endow
>>> novelty with aesthetic value) is merely symptomatic of an
>>> impoverished sensibility. And if I think of the artlangs I most
>>> admire, novelty is not in any way criterial to my admiration. But to
>>> engineering, and hence to engelanging, novelty is genuinely of value
>>> -- it is a step forward in knowledge and understanding and
>>> achievement. I infer from your comments that you have an
>>> engelanging-type interest in exploring the limits of how language
>>> could work, and in that light, your judgements make perfect sense to
>>> me. (And like you, and for broadly similar reasons, I find I have
>>> comparatively little interest in the great majority of conlangs, much
>>> though I like and esteem their creators.)
>>>
>>> --And.
>>>
>>
>
>