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Esperanto a waste of time?

 Language Learning Forum : Esperanto Post Reply
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Aquila
Triglot
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Netherlands
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 Message 161 of 351
22 December 2009 at 2:23pm | IP Logged 
Volte wrote:
I could go on, but I'll simply second Doviende's advice instead: read this thread.


The arguments for using Esperanto are strong in my opinion, and I believe that there’s still a future for Esperanto. I also think the popularity of Esperanto is still increasing. Because of the internet and the wish to communicate with people from all over the world.

It will probably not be the biggest language of world – the language with the highest number of speakers, but it could, and it already can, be very useful.

Edited by Aquila on 22 December 2009 at 2:25pm

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Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
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Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese

 
 Message 162 of 351
22 December 2009 at 6:29pm | IP Logged 
ChiaBrain wrote:
I have to say, after reading this thread I am genuinely curious about Esperanto.
Natural human languages, while beautiful, seem so haphazard and arbitrary at times
especially compared to computer languages.
I'm really curious to see how an "engineered" human language compares to naturally
evolved human languages.


Esperanto isn't all that engineered, despite having being intentionally created. It has some nice ideas and regularities, but there are plenty of blurry details in the end, just as in any other spoken human language.

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koffiegast
Diglot
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 Message 163 of 351
23 December 2009 at 1:53am | IP Logged 
ChiaBrain wrote:
I have to say, after reading this thread I am genuinely curious about Esperanto.
Natural human languages, while beautiful, seem so haphazard and arbitrary at times
especially compared to computer languages.
I'm really curious to see how an "engineered" human language compares to naturally
evolved human languages.


If you wish to see a language that allows you to understand semantics easily (e.g. no idioms or comparable constructions) Esperanto is probably the same as every language. The easiest parts is most likely that it is more systematic and allows easy word constructions and is really predictive. Something like a computer language won't really work for human language, as the human language involves many different constructions that would involve several programs using computer language in order to be computed. Basically.
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Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
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Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese

 
 Message 164 of 351
23 December 2009 at 3:13pm | IP Logged 
koffiegast wrote:
ChiaBrain wrote:
I have to say, after reading this thread I am genuinely curious about Esperanto.
Natural human languages, while beautiful, seem so haphazard and arbitrary at times
especially compared to computer languages.
I'm really curious to see how an "engineered" human language compares to naturally
evolved human languages.


If you wish to see a language that allows you to understand semantics easily (e.g. no idioms or comparable constructions) Esperanto is probably the same as every language. The easiest parts is most likely that it is more systematic and allows easy word constructions and is really predictive.


I'd say Esperanto is mildly easier, but on the whole, agree.

koffiegast wrote:

Something like a computer language won't really work for human language,


Fully agree.

koffiegast wrote:

as the human language involves many different constructions that would involve several programs using computer language in order to be computed. Basically.


That makes no sense whatsoever.

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koffiegast
Diglot
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Netherlands
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 Message 165 of 351
24 December 2009 at 3:44am | IP Logged 
Volte wrote:

koffiegast wrote:

as the human language involves many different constructions that would involve several programs using computer language in order to be computed. Basically.


That makes no sense whatsoever.


It's hard to explain ;)
You could say perhaps that the language we use to communicate is incomplete in order to fully convey messages, because we use other kinds of information in order to fully understand communicated messages. This basically differs from programming languages where every step has to be stated (even with libraries and such), you could say that programming languages used as human languages simply seems impractical. Simply because human languages are more evolved to what it is now that is convenient for humans, programming languages involves a lot of stating things over and over again and everything has to be very precise, I don't see myself talking in a programming language where I first have to state several objects, their properties, etc.

Sure language can be made more logical (see www.ithkuil.net a 'an priori' engineered loglang), but one should ask himself how far can you go when it comes to making semantics logical without using too many complex word structures (e.g. that it is convenient).
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Snesgamer
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 Message 166 of 351
24 December 2009 at 5:44am | IP Logged 
Personally, my opinion is that any time and effort spent learning Esperanto could probably be spent more productively studying a dead language (such as Latin) that actually has a rich body of literature already behind it. With so many dead and dying languages around, it seems a shame to me that time is thrown away by studying a new-fangled one like Esperanto.
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Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
Joined 6437 days ago

4474 posts - 6726 votes 
Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese

 
 Message 167 of 351
24 December 2009 at 3:39pm | IP Logged 
Snesgamer wrote:
Personally, my opinion is that any time and effort spent learning Esperanto could probably be spent more productively studying a dead language (such as Latin) that actually has a rich body of literature already behind it. With so many dead and dying languages around, it seems a shame to me that time is thrown away by studying a new-fangled one like Esperanto.


Given that you're studying Spanish and French, I don't see why you object to people studying "new-fangled" living languages.

I've productively studied Latin and Esperanto; there's no comparison. By the time you know basic Latin grammar, you can be thoroughly intermediate in Esperanto. While you're still struggling with basic sentences in authentic Latin texts, you can be fluent in Esperanto and read it comfortably, occasionally referring to a dictionary.

Both Esperanto and Latin have rich bodies of literature. Given the choice to only be able to read one, fluently, with no work, I might actually choose Esperanto - its body of literature is more interesting to me, heretical as it is to say this.


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Gusutafu
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 Message 168 of 351
24 December 2009 at 7:59pm | IP Logged 
Volte wrote:

Both Esperanto and Latin have rich bodies of literature. Given the choice to only be able to read one, fluently, with no work, I might actually choose Esperanto - its body of literature is more interesting to me, heretical as it is to say this.


I personally think Greek is more interesting than Latin, but this statement is quite astonishing. To compare Esperanto texts to Latin literature. You can't be serious.


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