Re: Esperanto and Interlingua

"John" == John Swindle <jcswindle@xxxxxxx> writes:

>> Too much towards European languages.
John> Esperanto isn't badly weighted down with English yet.
>> When will there be some Far East elements, then?

John> One may hope.

I don't.



John> No. I don't know about that. Creoles seem to thrive as
John> isolating languages, but that wasn't what I was getting at
John> here. Zamenhof found himself at the center of a world that
John> was disagreeing with itself in lots of mutually
John> incomprehensible languages.

Northern US once disagreed with Southern US to such a degree that they
had a civil war, even though they spoke the same language.
Czechoslovakia broke apart in the 1990s, even though they speak
virtually the same language (at least mutually intelligible).

OTOH, the different Cantons of Switzerland has been staying together,
even though they speak many different languages (officially, four).
Belgium still hasn't split apart into a French-speaking subcountry and
a Dutch-speaking one, with the former joining the French Republic and
the latter joining the Dutch Kingdom.

Why?

Zamenhof's idea that the language barrier is the major cause of
disagreement is simply naive and groundless.


John> He listened to the languages he heard echoing around him
John> and constructed his international language accordingly.

Showing his ignorance and Self-centric thoughts. He didn't even learn
about languages spoken on the other side of the globe. And the he
naively believed his designed -- based on his confined surrounding --
to be good enough for international use. Totally ignorant and naive.


John> Zamenhof's main intention was to promote peace through
John> mutual understanding.

But that doesn't require a common language. And it doesn't help to to
introduce yet another brand new language.


John> Has Esperanto done that?

No. It's a complete failure.


John> Does knowing a shared language do that? Maybe.

I don't think so. See above. Explain to me why civil wars can exist,
and why multilingual nations are possible.


John> Not a linguistic question, I think.

Socialpolitical questions. That means, a language is not going to
solve it. Zamenhof hit the nail not on the head.


--
Lee Sau Dan 李守敦 ~{@nJX6X~}

E-mail: danlee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Home page: http://www.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/~danlee
.

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