Re: The Great Sundering (was Re: basic morphemes of a loglang)

Hallo!

On Wed, 26 Nov 2003 16:43:38 -0500,
John Cowan <cowan@...> wrote:

> Jörg Rhiemeier scripsit:
>
> > Designing an auxlang means choosing features of a language
> > guided by the opinion that the choice taken serves to advance the
> > general design goals of an auxlang, namely [...].
> > Whichever choice you make, people will
> > judge your choice against the design goals mentioned above, and
> > some of them *will* have a different opinion than you have.
>
> What of it?  On this list, you can freely design auxlangs (I have
> done so) by stating the goals you want.  What is off-limits is
> arguing about those goals.
Absolutely.  However, stating the goals and presenting the features
that are meant to fulfill the goals entails the risk of treading
loose an argument about the goals, and whether the features meet
the goals.

> > Voilà, auxlang advocacy has crept in, and the crowd will (justifiably)
> > shout: "Take that to AUXLANG!"
>
> It's one thing to ask "Does feature X satisfy goal Y?" and another
> to say "Feature X is a Good Thing" with respect to some expressed
> or unexpressed goal Y.
True.  It is two different things, but some people don't realize,
and one thing may lead to the other.  I am NOT in favour of banning
auxlang design issues from CONLANG; if I created that impression,
I am very sorry!  All I wanted to say is that the line between
auxlang design discussion and auxlang advocacy is easily crossed,
and some people possibly keep their auxlang design issues out of
CONLANG because they don't want to risk treading loose an auxlang
advocacy thread in CONLANG.  Or they believe that the artlangers
that make up the majority of CONLANG are a pesky lot of snobs who
(1) don't care a heck of solving international communication
problems and (2) want to keep out everyone who stirs them up
from their game.  Of course, that's not what CONLANG is like.

> > The logical conclusion is not to discuss the design in CONLANG
> > in the first place, but to go to AUXLANG from the start.
>
> Not at all.  Design issues are almost irrelevant to AUXLANG-ites.
This is indeed true.  I occasionally look into the AUXLANG archive,
and there are hardly ever any design issues discussed there.
It is almost entirely about Esperanto vs. Ido vs. Interlingua
vs. Acadon vs. ..., i.e. about auxlangs vs. auxlangs
that are so similar to each other that they are probably mutually
intelligible, which makes all that bickering especially pointless.

The typical AUXLANG list member is not an auxlang designer,
but a follower of an auxlang designed by somebody else, who tries
to convince others that the auxlang of his choice was superior
to other auxlang designs.  AUXLANG would indeed be a much more
interesting place if it was about auxlang *design*
(which was, as far as I know, the original purpose of CONLANG,
before we evil artlangers took over ;-) ).

Most auxlang *designers* are not active in AUXLANG because they
are bored of the endless bickering characteristic of that list.
They *seem* to be absent from CONLANG because there are fewer
of them than there are artlangers, and the occasional auxlang
design related post gets drowned between artlang design related
posts and the enormous amounts of off-topic dross.

It is probably true that these days, more people design artlangs
than auxlangs.  The vast majority of those who believe in the idea
of an artificial international language have picked one of
the various proposals that are already there (in most cases,
that proposal is Esperanto, but Ido, Interlingua, Lojban
and a few others also have their committed communities),
and don't bother designing their own language.  Only a few
of those people find fault with every auxlang proposal they
have met, and concoct their own IAL proposal.

In constrast, among those who have realized that inventing languages
is fun, most actually make up their own language(s); the many artlangs
that are already there are a source of inspiration for new artlangs.

> > Not all auxlangers make that bold a claim, but all of them
> > believe that their auxlang will solve at least *some* of the
> > major problems of modern society, otherwise they wouldn't
> > take the trouble of working out an auxlang...
>
> Not at all.  Xuxuxi is an auxlang designed for artlang reasons;
> so is BrSc.
Yes, there are such cases, but the "typical" auxlang is designed
to better the world.  I was thinking of the typical auxlanger,
who tries to sell his work as a remedy for various social problems.
There is no such thing as a well-defined line that reliably
separates auxlangs from artlangs.  Of course one can design
an auxlang as an artlang, e.g. a fictional auxlang of a
fictional world.  (Are there auxlangs in Ill Bethisad, and if yes,
has anyone actually designed one?)  And then there are those
who take an artlang and propose it as an auxlang.  I have seen
such proposals for Quenya and Klingon.

Greetings,

Jörg.

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