Quite the statement for an English comment. English spelling is nonsensical and in desperate need of a major reform. RobWords even made the case for using runes again as it would probably fix a lot of issues already. The language simply isn’t made for Latin letters.
But I don’t want to make this a sole whataboutism comment. Each language poses it’s own challenges. I will say that changing how roughly 100 million speak is easier said than done and would destroy a lot of culture. It would be much easier to force everyone to speak a different language entirely.
Personally I don’t think it should or could be done at all. Unlike a spelling reform that English needs desperately and German had plenty of recently. There is nothing wrong with a language being complicated but there’s plenty wrong with arbitrary spelling if you ask me.
My native language isn’t English in case you were assuming that. I mention it because my native language has gone through a reform for the reasons of simplification. English may be shit, but it was much much easier to learn than the hell I am going through with German. Even Japanese, which I touched for a few years wasn’t nearly as bad. The point of languages it to be simple and efficient, and they should evolve to that goal eventually.
The point of languages it to be simple and efficient, and they should evolve to that goal eventually.
That’s one hell of an assumption to bring to the table. There is no point to language, no end goal towards which they must, or even should evolve. They’re a natural creation of humans to facilitate communication, but coming from human beings, they’re naturally quite irregular and odd, at times.
I mean, I get it that German isn’t a cakewalk to pick up, but you’re also complaining about the unreasonable complexity in one of the less morphologically complex European languages. Take a gander at Polish, Icelandic, Basque, or Finnish, and German will probably seem quite charming and quaint with its handful of cases and corresponding forms of the articles.
They’re a natural creation of humans to facilitate communication
If a language is easy to learn and easy to use, more people will speak it. The languages that don’t adapt die with the people who still insist on using it. There is an evolution and there is a goal, as you said, to communicate. A simpler language is bound to be chosen over one that adds obstacles to communication.
In the same way evolution is mostly driven by an animal’s ability to pass off its genes, language is mostly driven by it’s ability to be used and learned.
Now I’m thinking about Esperanto, maybe that is not completely true, idk
But the point of a language is not to spread to the most people, it is for the peoples using it being able to use it in a way that makes it possible to communicate with their own in a way that makes sense within the local population, its culture and history.
Different languages have a different learning curve based on what language you grew up with. What is hard for you might be a cakewalk for someone coming from a different language, especially if you are coming from a different family of languages.
here is an evolution and there is a goal, as you said, to communicate
I would argue that this is just humans attributing intent to a natural process that has none, and is the same sort of erroneous attribution of intent to natural processses as when people say that history has some grand end goal it’s working towards. I believe this is amply demonstrated in the lack of success found by Esperanto and similar conlangs that were deliberately constructed in order to be easy to learn for a wide range of people as a neutral lingua franca. If what you claim about the purpose and goal of language were true, these conlangs should have seen widespread adoption and be the most widely spoken languages today, rather than their current status as quirky ideas that are mostly of no interest to people who aren’t complete nerds for studying languages.
Gendered nouns in German are just as stupid and arbitrary as spelling in English. Why is a pencil masculine? Why is beer neutral but coffee masculine? Why is school feminine?
Quite the statement for an English comment. English spelling is nonsensical and in desperate need of a major reform. RobWords even made the case for using runes again as it would probably fix a lot of issues already. The language simply isn’t made for Latin letters.
But I don’t want to make this a sole whataboutism comment. Each language poses it’s own challenges. I will say that changing how roughly 100 million speak is easier said than done and would destroy a lot of culture. It would be much easier to force everyone to speak a different language entirely.
Personally I don’t think it should or could be done at all. Unlike a spelling reform that English needs desperately and German had plenty of recently. There is nothing wrong with a language being complicated but there’s plenty wrong with arbitrary spelling if you ask me.
My native language isn’t English in case you were assuming that. I mention it because my native language has gone through a reform for the reasons of simplification. English may be shit, but it was much much easier to learn than the hell I am going through with German. Even Japanese, which I touched for a few years wasn’t nearly as bad. The point of languages it to be simple and efficient, and they should evolve to that goal eventually.
That’s one hell of an assumption to bring to the table. There is no point to language, no end goal towards which they must, or even should evolve. They’re a natural creation of humans to facilitate communication, but coming from human beings, they’re naturally quite irregular and odd, at times.
I mean, I get it that German isn’t a cakewalk to pick up, but you’re also complaining about the unreasonable complexity in one of the less morphologically complex European languages. Take a gander at Polish, Icelandic, Basque, or Finnish, and German will probably seem quite charming and quaint with its handful of cases and corresponding forms of the articles.
If a language is easy to learn and easy to use, more people will speak it. The languages that don’t adapt die with the people who still insist on using it. There is an evolution and there is a goal, as you said, to communicate. A simpler language is bound to be chosen over one that adds obstacles to communication.
In the same way evolution is mostly driven by an animal’s ability to pass off its genes, language is mostly driven by it’s ability to be used and learned.
Now I’m thinking about Esperanto, maybe that is not completely true, idk
But the point of a language is not to spread to the most people, it is for the peoples using it being able to use it in a way that makes it possible to communicate with their own in a way that makes sense within the local population, its culture and history.
Different languages have a different learning curve based on what language you grew up with. What is hard for you might be a cakewalk for someone coming from a different language, especially if you are coming from a different family of languages.
I would argue that this is just humans attributing intent to a natural process that has none, and is the same sort of erroneous attribution of intent to natural processses as when people say that history has some grand end goal it’s working towards. I believe this is amply demonstrated in the lack of success found by Esperanto and similar conlangs that were deliberately constructed in order to be easy to learn for a wide range of people as a neutral lingua franca. If what you claim about the purpose and goal of language were true, these conlangs should have seen widespread adoption and be the most widely spoken languages today, rather than their current status as quirky ideas that are mostly of no interest to people who aren’t complete nerds for studying languages.
Gendered nouns in German are just as stupid and arbitrary as spelling in English. Why is a pencil masculine? Why is beer neutral but coffee masculine? Why is school feminine?