Hi all I have been following this seriously off-topic thread for a little while now and can't resist a few words. Indulge me please! 2.5 has been forgotten a long time ago.
On 19 Mar 2003, Jarod Wilson wrote: > > Some of the spellings are very out of the ordinary. I'd like for other > > groups that speak different languages to clean up the spelling, same > > sounds for different letters and such cleaned up. > > Know much about Esperanto? Sort of an attempt to do that (and wipe out > language barriers the world over). My boss is a part of the "Esperantic > Studies Foundation". They have a big meeting in San Diego next week... > > > I guess that the point that I was trying to convey was the unimportance > > of completely correct spelling. When your program does not have a spell > > checker, you are pretty much on your own, for spelling. > > I was attempting humor. I understood your point. Good spelling has its > benefits, though. :) > Whether spelling is important or not, I guess only in English could this question be asked. I believe spelling is very important but my kids don't seem to agree. There are two ways of working with language - visual and aural. Bad spellers tend to be the latter and good spellers the former. Learning another language is generally easier if you are visual but complete fluency is then more difficult. For students of English, the origins of the US English lie in Noah Websters decision in 1789 that a (then new) nation is defined by it's language and he set about changing the spellings. It was not as a result of any decision in Congress or anything so democratic, just an example of the free market that would never have been allowed in certain other countries. Clearly, clever man though he was (and more likely an astute businessman interested in selling his dictionary rather than the then current Samuel Johnson's version) he hadn't realised the English is primarily a spoken language derived from many sources and mapped onto an unsuitable (Latin) alphabet: it was an impossible task. All phonetic languages really have their own alphabets or are very closely related to ones that do - which may just be accents. This is particularly visible in continental Europe where words like Centre are written the US way rather than the British way which is of course derived from French. Of course when the US joins the EU - or more likely takes it over - there may be some justification for these errors .... :-))) So we are stuck with at least two (written) versions of essentially the same language, which makes it very difficult for non-native speakers (of either version) to get it right. Massive credit to all that do - and in some cases write better than the natives. As Webster must have realised, it is impossible to make English phonetic and not too many people speak Esperanto, mainly because it has no geographical, economic or political base. If you want a phonetic language there are many around - from a European tradition, my favourite is Italian which is contemporary, based on Latin, the language of music and is wonderful to hear and speak but I recognise that there are many other traditions and candidates. As I said - seriously off-topic:)! John John Logsdon "Try to make things as simple Quantex Research Ltd, Manchester UK as possible but not simpler" [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] +44(0)161 445 4951/G:+44(0)7768982349 www.quantex-research.com -- Phoebe-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/phoebe-list
