Why learn Esperanto?

General discussion about learning languages
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Deinonysus
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Deinonysus » Wed Jul 14, 2021 1:55 pm

rdearman wrote:
Saim wrote:
rdearman wrote:Esperanto isn't any different from programming languages, which are all constructed languages.


In that case it is totally different from natural languages, as programming “languages” are not languages at all.

Blasphemy! Non programmer ! Heretic !

Actually I may start another thread about this. PLs have syntax, lexicon, etc.

I'll only buy it if the whole thread is in Python. ;)
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby luke » Wed Jul 14, 2021 4:00 pm

Deinonysus wrote:
rdearman wrote:
Saim wrote:
rdearman wrote:Esperanto isn't any different from programming languages, which are all constructed languages.


In that case it is totally different from natural languages, as programming “languages” are not languages at all.

Blasphemy! Non programmer ! Heretic !

Actually I may start another thread about this. PLs have syntax, lexicon, etc.

I'll only buy it if the whole thread is in Python. ;)

And me, ksh.

It seems like it would be a fascinating topic/thread.

Certain programming languages are better suited from some things than others. Some PLs are easier to learn. Some are more ubiquitous. Some are dated.

Would be curious what parallels and divergences we'd find between languages to help humans interface with computers (and computers with other computers) and languages to help humans interface with other humans.

Programmers have style. Some use circumlocutions because they aren't aware of certain built-in features of the language, etc.

Python has its Guido van Rossum. Esperanto had Zamenhof.

There are forces in each language community to conserve what was, for backward compatibility and continuity. Other forces find innovation necessary, even if it breaks with the past.

So, count me in :)
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby tommus » Wed Jul 14, 2021 4:58 pm

Let a = 25;
if (a > 10) {Print(a);}
exit();
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Saim » Wed Jul 14, 2021 8:10 pm

luke wrote:I don't know that I agree entirely with the first premise, as one difference is that programming languages are for interfacing with computers and Esperanto is for interfacing with humans.


Yes, I don’t think Esperanto is very much like programming languages at all. I was mainly disputing the metaphor. Comparing Esperanto to something that quite obviously isn’t a language doesn’t help the case that it is similar to natural languages.
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Cainntear » Wed Jul 14, 2021 8:36 pm

Le Baron wrote:
Cainntear wrote:My subjective view of Esperanto is that the balance of evidence makes it sound like something I do not want to learn.Can you accept that without insulting or belittling me?


There is no 'balance of evidence' pointing in that direction. It's an entirely subjective view which you are free to hold.

Which of those statements do you actually mean? The two are incompatible. The first states I'm wrong, which seems pretty much to be an attempt to state an objective truth.

I have stated objective facts about Esperanto and I have stated subjective opinions about Esperanto, and I am not afraid to accept and recognise the difference.

After all I'm the one who has been fooled into thinking this failed travesty of a tongue is a 'real' language, so the joke's on me really.

What have I said that has insulted you or Esperanto. Did I say it wasn't a "real" language? I don't believe I did. Did I call it "failed" or a "travesty"? Absolutely not.

I seem to recall you recently accusing me of taking offense where there was none, and here you are, literally inventing insults for yourself and getting angry at people who didn't even say them.

I'm sure everyone by now is tired of Esperanto. Let the thread fall onto page 2.

Is this a deliberate windup, or do you genuinely think that you can insult and belittle other people, then claim the last word by saying "let's change the subject" straight after doing so?
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Cainntear » Wed Jul 14, 2021 8:55 pm

rdearman wrote:
Cainntear wrote:Esperanto does not behave like natural languages.

There is this nasty little thing, often called "human nature" where humans tend to change things over time to suit themselves. Given enough time, and people, humans will force their nature on to any language.

I have no problem with that statement, but it does raise the question of whether enough time has been given. You think there has, I think there hasn't.
So if there is a problem with numbers, using your example, humans will simply drop what doesn't work and adopt what does, even if it seems irrational from the outside.

Except there's an active centralising tendency

Esperanto is more than 130 years old, and it has changed from the original. Probably fewer changes than English because Esperantists actively try to stop the evolution of dialects, phonology, morphology, etc. but nonetheless it has changed and evolved just like natural languages. I would argue that for the last 75 years it has become a natural language and, like the Académie Française, Esperantists are fighting a loosing battle to stop it from changing.

And yet, Esperanto is still very much mutually comprehensible with the original form, and many rules and patterns remain unchanged. Those rules were constructed, and there's a deep ontological argument about whether something consciously constructed can ever become natural just through having existed, or if it has to be actively altered by natural forces to become natural, or if it never ever becomes natural.

As discussed here, antonyms exist, but the community actively resists them. But antonyms are something languages appear to "want" to have (as much as we can anthropomorphise language evolution!) I would be interested to hear if anyone knows of a language that was not consciously constructed or engineered that naturally evolved a word for cold that is effectively "unhot". I am led to believe there is none, and for me personally, if a constructed language does one thing that no known natural language does, I do not believe we can claim it to be natural.

Esperanto isn't any different from programming languages, which are all constructed languages. They change over time with features or bugs fixed, just like Esperanto.

Computer languages evolve by conscious direction. Natural language normally do not, the interference of pedantic schoolteachers and well-intention academies notwithstanding.

If there are rules that the Esperanto community has chosen to add to Esperanto consciously, that's not like evolution in natural languages, and only sustains the status of Esperanto as a conlang and not a natural language.

And computer languages are very different from Esperanto except in one respect: their inventions were both informed by models of language that are now considered naïve. These models are radically different though -- Zamenhof was going by traditional teaching and grammar, whereas the computer programming pioneers were mostly informed by Chomsky's generative grammars and his bizarre notion that grammar carries no semantic meaning.

So I would argue that Esperanto does behave like natural languages, just because humans are involved.

That same statement would justify calling Navi or Lojban natural languages, which renders the term meaningless.
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Le Baron » Wed Jul 14, 2021 10:13 pm

Cainntear wrote:I seem to recall you recently accusing me of taking offense where there was none, and here you are, literally inventing insults for yourself and getting angry at people who didn't even say them.

But 'm not even 'angry'. I've only addressed posts where people have said daft or uninformed things about Esperanto from a position of near-zero knowledge of it. If you see anger in the posts I can't help that.

Cainntear wrote:Is this a deliberate windup, or do you genuinely think that you can insult and belittle other people, then claim the last word by saying "let's change the subject" straight after doing so?

I have to admit some of the last few posts have indeed been something of a 'windup', since it's hard to take some posts really seriously. You do realise though that you've written more stuff to me (and I do like to be written to) complaining about belittlement and insults than about Esperanto? I may have been dismissive of several ideas (which I stand by because I don't think they have any worth), but there have been no insults. It's hard to make guesses about everyone's differing offence threshold; otherwise no-one would say anything above the level of the apathetic for fear of treading on toes. I'm not trying to insult you or anyone.

The thread had calmed, why flare it up again?
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Le Baron » Wed Jul 14, 2021 10:19 pm

Saim wrote:
luke wrote:Yes, I don’t think Esperanto is very much like programming languages at all. I was mainly disputing the metaphor. Comparing Esperanto to something that quite obviously isn’t a language doesn’t help the case that it is similar to natural languages.


Humour me for a moment. How are programming languages not languages? And what must they be called instead of programming languages?

Isn't the function of a language to carry informational content in decipherable form? Where the receiver also knows how to process and decipher the encoded messages? Which is what writing is.

I'm an amateur at this, but I'm willing to learn.
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Deinonysus » Wed Jul 14, 2021 10:55 pm

Le Baron wrote:
Saim wrote:
luke wrote:Yes, I don’t think Esperanto is very much like programming languages at all. I was mainly disputing the metaphor. Comparing Esperanto to something that quite obviously isn’t a language doesn’t help the case that it is similar to natural languages.


Humour me for a moment. How are programming languages not languages? And what must they be called instead of programming languages?

Isn't the function of a language to carry informational content in decipherable form? Where the receiver also knows how to process and decipher the encoded messages? Which is what writing is.

I'm an amateur at this, but I'm willing to learn.

Programming languages use what look like words but are basically a human-readable shorthand for asking a computer to move 1s and 0s around. Different programming languages might work in different ways, but that's essentially how they work. Any computer program written in a human-readable language could have theoretically been written in binary, but that would be a huge pain in the butt.

This is fundamentally different from how human languages work. They aren't based on commands to alter 1s and 0s, they refer directly to real physical or abstract things or actions and they're used to convey the stort of information that is useful to humans.
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Re: Why learn Esperanto?

Postby Le Baron » Wed Jul 14, 2021 11:40 pm

Deinonysus wrote:Programming languages use what look like words but are basically a human-readable shorthand for asking a computer to move 1s and 0s around. Different programming languages might work in different ways, but that's essentially how they work. Any computer program written in a human-readable language could have theoretically been written in binary, but that would be a huge pain in the butt.

This is fundamentally different from how human languages work. They aren't based on commands to alter 1s and 0s, they refer directly to real physical or abstract things or actions and they're used to convey the stort of information that is useful to humans.


Yes, I've used them. Though I'm no 'programming expert'. The notion of 'human-readable shorthand' for interfacing with a computer tells me that it actually is a language, since if you use this written shorthand to make requests and the receiver deciphers, understands and carries out the instruction, you have communicated with it. The moving of 1s and 0s to accomplish the task is of little importance because it's something aside from the act of communicating requests (and getting feedback).
Just like if you ask a man to make you a sandwich, if he understands you, then language has succeeded. How he goes about the task is something else.
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