T0dd:One of the things that has always struck me about Esperanto is that, despite its "needless" complications, it has a kind of integrity, an internal balance that I associate more with works of art than with theory-driven things. For example, critics of Esperanto often point out that the agreement of adjectives with nouns is a cumbersome requirement that English and many many other languages do well without. That is undoubtedly true. And yet...on more than one occasion, in spoken Esperanto, that agreement has given me a "second chance" to discern the case and number of the noun, so that I can sort the meaning out in my mind. It serves as a kind of "semantic echo", so that in "birdojn bluajn" I hear the 'jn' twice and it underscores that I have a plural accusative. Esperanto, unlike ethnic language, has to function across wider gaps in linguistic custom, and so a bit of extra redundancy is actually helpful. I doubt that Onklo Zam thought of it in this way, but he seemed to have an instinct for these things.

Yes. I agree with that idea. Language incorporates a certain amount of redundancy such that, if you miss a bit, you still get the general idea.

It is similar to "error correcting codes" used across noisy computer communication lines. Mobile phones make use of that prinicple.

The choice of what features to include in any kind of protocol (language), that support that notion, is as a matter of design and is inevitably somewhat of an art.

Thus, the "needless" complications may, in the long run, make communication easier. For all the scorn that critics have heaped upon the obligatory accusative, it can be very helpful to use those -n endings to work out complex sentences. In speech, sentences tend to be simpler, with SVO word order, but in writing (as in any language), things are not always so simple.

We all have our pet peeves in Esperanto, where we wonder what Onklo Zam could have been thinking. My own is his penchant for near-homophones, the so-called "paronimoj."

Thus we have "posta" and "poŝta", "stelo" and "ŝtelo", "procedo," "proceso," and "procezo," and so on.

Of all the features in E-o that one has real practial implications. I've already been caught out by "sia" versus "ŝia". Getting it wrong can completely change the meaning of a sentence.

Also, I can easily remember that mardo and marto are Tuesday and March - but remembering which is which is something that I find doesn't stick in my mind. I have to repeatedly look them up despite the fact that these are common, easy words.

It is particularly bad where not only is it the case that two common words differ by just one letter, but that they differ by a similar letter.

Going back to the redundancy in communication idea, it effectively makes two meanings differ by just "one (computer analogy) bit". The error correcting capability of the communication goes out of the window.

Z clearly did this, in most cases, to preserve internationally recognizable forms, without resorting to multiple meanings. In my view, he would have been better off avoiding these and pulling words from other languages.

Well, I agree. It would have been better, in a significant minority of cases, to use a root from a another language, alter a root to avoid this problem or even invent a completely new root. But I have taken the view that E-o, despite the odd wart, is a language in actual use. The alternatives basically are not.

And what was he thinking using 'ekz-' and 'eks-' instead of the very international 'ex-' spellings?

Not one of my pet hates. X is a horrible letter. It can represent a number of quite different sounds - at least as many as ks, kz, eks, z and the E-o ĥ.

Nick

erinja:I agree with Todd's interpretation that "we" is different than "plural I".

Yeah, well, I know what you mean. But even that is arguably a view. In this case a, perhaps, Western view. Some of the Eastern religions/philosophies would maybe differ in that interpretation.

The term "we", can be thought of as meaning that several persons collectively belong to one group or entity. And further that "I" am fully part of being that group, just as others are too. Thus all within the group are being the group and the individuals that comprise the group are simply plurals of "me".

It is the notion that if you harm someone else you harm me too, because that someone else is part of me through being part of mankind.

At the level of mankind as a whole this is a difficult notion for many to grasp. Even if the "someone else" is a fellow occupant of the same town, they seem somehow distant.

But when it gets closer, it is easier to grasp. To take an emotive analogy, what about the subject of rape. To many women this is an intolerable crime, as bad as, if not worse than murder. But to many men, the attitude can be more ambivalent. Or, it can be ambivalent while the victim involved is an unknown "someone else". If the victim is, however, your wife, your sister, your mother, your daughter, then it takes a whole different character. Restrained by modern laws from murdering the culprit, the male relatives of such a person feel fully as violated as the victim herself. And that is when you see the truth of the fact that someone else who is part of your family is not just another separate individual who happens to be in the same group. Rather that someone else is, in some sense, truly a plural "me".

So yes, I get the notion that I/we, mi/ni can be viewed as not being a singular/plural pair. I am not sure the view is, however, wholly correct.

And it/they ĝi/ili certainly are a pair. And for the users of some languages the lack of a (commonly used) singular vi, is also problematic.

(Also there is matter, as has been pointed out, of elegance, simplicity. If you want to say something like, "please don't steal our books", in a language with accusatives and adjective/noun agreement, but no "ni", then "our" becomes something like mijajn. Mi has be pluralised, converted into an adjective, repluralised and put in the accusative. There comes a point where minimal root words with lots of affixes starts to get cumbersome).

Nick

waxle:Ah, but we DO have a singular "vi", equivalent to the English "thee" or "thou": "ci". It exists, but isn't used very often at all. I tend to think that it isn't because of the prevalence of the singular/truly plural words for "you".

Yeah, I know. English "thou" came from the same place as the German "du". I believe, however, the Germans consider it impolite to address a singular stranger as "du". The Russians are the same as the Germans in this respect (and maybe a whole bunch of other languages???)

In English, so I understand, "thou" also fell into less frequent use because of the politeness consideration. Indeed it became so impolite, that it fell out of use altogether!

I'm really not sure why this politeness thing came about in the first place. Today, sometimes even "you" is considered impolite in some circumstances (some people seem to take it as short for "Oi you" or "you lot"), as if it is somehow disrespectful. Teachers and parents particularly seem to take this attitude towards children.

I think I read somewhere that the Indonesians have all sorts of different "you" words for different situations.

Quite why the 2nd person should have been subjected to this kind of mauling just because some lord or other disliked the peasants looking them in the eye (or whatever the exact reason for it is), it is rather bizare in the modern world.

Nick

nw2394:
Well, I agree. It would have been better, in a significant minority of cases, to use a root from a another language, alter a root to avoid this problem or even invent a completely new root. But I have taken the view that E-o, despite the odd wart, is a language in actual use. The alternatives basically are not.

True. And of course Esperanto does accept new words as replacements for older words, some of which have either become archaic or have taken on new meaning. Most people use "evolui" and "evoluo" now, rather than the "evolucii"/"evolucio" of the Fundamento. So if enough people get fed up with a particular word, it will eventually be replaced.

Not one of my pet hates. X is a horrible letter. It can represent a number of quite different sounds - at least as many as ks, kz, eks, z and the E-o ĥ.

Nick

Indeed, X is like C in that it is used for a lot of things. But just as Zam chose a single phoneme for C, I figure he could have done the same for X--probably just the 'ks' sound. We'd all get used to it. But he didn't, and that's that.

nw2394:
The term "we", can be thought of as meaning that several persons collectively belong to one group or entity. And further that "I" am fully part of being that group, just as others are too. Thus all within the group are being the group and the individuals that comprise the group are simply plurals of "me".

It is the notion that if you harm someone else you harm me too, because that someone else is part of me through being part of mankind.

I found myself thinking about this while driving around yesterday. That is, while I don't doubt that the pronoun "we" is often used to express of emphasize solidarity with a group, I think that usage is actually an expansion of its ordinary role as a pronoun. A well-known example is the papal "we," where the Pope purports to speak for the Church, i.e., the corporate Body of Christ. But I'm sure that at other times, the Pope uses the more conventional "we." For example, if he's delayed and needs to check in with his personal secretary, he might say "We're still at the airport" and not be referring to the corporate Body of Christ.

As I thought about it more, it occurred to me that the pronoun "we" could be eliminated altogether and replaced with other pronouns, notably "I and you (sing. or plural)," "I and they" etc.

"We saw you" = I and they saw you.

"We saw them" = I and you saw them.

In short, the actual meaning of "we" is "I and at least one other person" where that other person or persons could be designated by a 2nd or 3rd person pronoun. Context determines whether "we" includes or excludes those to whom one is speaking. So a language could actually have *two* pronouns for "we", and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that some do.

At the level of mankind as a whole this is a difficult notion for many to grasp. Even if the "someone else" is a fellow occupant of the same town, they seem somehow distant.

But when it gets closer, it is easier to grasp. To take an emotive analogy, what about the subject of rape. To many women this is an intolerable crime, as bad as, if not worse than murder. But to many men, the attitude can be more ambivalent. Or, it can be ambivalent while the victim involved is an unknown "someone else". If the victim is, however, your wife, your sister, your mother, your daughter, then it takes a whole different character. Restrained by modern laws from murdering the culprit, the male relatives of such a person feel fully as violated as the victim herself. And that is when you see the truth of the fact that someone else who is part of your family is not just another separate individual who happens to be in the same group. Rather that someone else is, in some sense, truly a plural "me".

So yes, I get the notion that I/we, mi/ni can be viewed as not being a singular/plural pair. I am not sure the view is, however, wholly correct.

And it/they ĝi/ili certainly are a pair. And for the users of some languages the lack of a (commonly used) singular vi, is also problematic.

(Also there is matter, as has been pointed out, of elegance, simplicity. If you want to say something like, "please don't steal our books", in a language with accusatives and adjective/noun agreement, but no "ni", then "our" becomes something like mijajn. Mi has be pluralised, converted into an adjective, repluralised and put in the accusative. There comes a point where minimal root words with lots of affixes starts to get cumbersome).

Nick[/quote]

T0dd:"We saw you" = I and they saw you.

"We saw them" = I and you saw them.

In short, the actual meaning of "we" is "I and at least one other person" where that other person or persons could be designated by a 2nd or 3rd person pronoun. Context determines whether "we" includes or excludes those to whom one is speaking. So a language could actually have *two* pronouns for "we", and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that some do.

I'm fairly sure I've seen notes about something like that on the web somewhere. Also various versions of "they" as well.

But your interpretation of "we" is running up against my religious ideas. Personally I do not want to think of "I" as a separate individual all the time. (As in I am this individual defined by a body and am not someone else defined by their, different body). I don't, or at least try not to, think of I in that limited sense. My view is that a being can be anything, nothing (as in no thing) or indeed anythings plural. But I accept that mine is not a typical view.

"We" seems to function as an adequate word for most of us, so I guess we'll stick with it

Nick

nw2394:

erinja:I agree with Todd's interpretation that "we" is different than "plural I".

Yeah, well, I know what you mean. But even that is arguably a view. In this case a, perhaps, Western view. Some of the Eastern religions/philosophies would maybe differ in that interpretation.

The term "we", can be thought of as meaning that several persons collectively belong to one group or entity. And further that "I" am fully part of being that group, just as others are too. Thus all within the group are being the group and the individuals that comprise the group are simply plurals of "me".

It is the notion that if you harm someone else you harm me too, because that someone else is part of me through being part of mankind.

At the level of mankind as a whole this is a difficult notion for many to grasp. Even if the "someone else" is a fellow occupant of the same town, they seem somehow distant.

But when it gets closer, it is easier to grasp. To take an emotive analogy, what about the subject of rape. To many women this is an intolerable crime, as bad as, if not worse than murder. But to many men, the attitude can be more ambivalent. Or, it can be ambivalent while the victim involved is an unknown "someone else". If the victim is, however, your wife, your sister, your mother, your daughter, then it takes a whole different character. Restrained by modern laws from murdering the culprit, the male relatives of such a person feel fully as violated as the victim herself. And that is when you see the truth of the fact that someone else who is part of your family is not just another separate individual who happens to be in the same group. Rather that someone else is, in some sense, truly a plural "me".

So yes, I get the notion that I/we, mi/ni can be viewed as not being a singular/plural pair. I am not sure the view is, however, wholly correct.

And it/they ĝi/ili certainly are a pair. And for the users of some languages the lack of a (commonly used) singular vi, is also problematic.

(Also there is matter, as has been pointed out, of elegance, simplicity. If you want to say something like, "please don't steal our books", in a language with accusatives and adjective/noun agreement, but no "ni", then "our" becomes something like mijajn. Mi has be pluralised, converted into an adjective, repluralised and put in the accusative. There comes a point where minimal root words with lots of affixes starts to get cumbersome).

Nick

There is the Jamaican Rastafarian idiom "I-and-I", which I don't understand.
Peter

Or on a lighter note, there's the "new Esperanto pronoun" invented (jokingly) by some Boston-area Esperanto speakers who were frustrated by the common phenomenon of people suggesting "We should do this!" then not wanting to take the lead or do any of the work. This pronoun is "ŭi" its official definition is "ni, sen mi" ("we, without me") (basically, a backhand way of saying "you"!)

erinja:Or on a lighter note, there's the "new Esperanto pronoun" invented (jokingly) by some Boston-area Esperanto speakers who were frustrated by the common phenomenon of people suggesting "We should do this!" then not wanting to take the lead or do any of the work. This pronoun is "ŭi" its official definition is "ni, sen mi" ("we, without me") (basically, a backhand way of saying "you"!)

ŭikid smat!