I forgot to mention - one place you will find English to be consistently longer than a latinate language is in English translation of, e.g. Spanish, poetry. This probably says more about the nature of poetry than it does about the respective languages.
On 12/20/07, Devon McCormick <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > This is not necessarily true - Spanish is one language that has no > shortage of translators in NYC. > > In most any translation comparison between English and a more latinate > language, English will be shorter - this is something I've paid attention to > ever since I read, some 35 years ago, in "The Way Things Work - the Book of > the Computer" that English is the most efficient language in terms of number > of letters. > > Don't get too nationally prideful though unless you are an Angle or a > Saxon or an ancient Norseman. It has a lot to do with verb conjugations > adding a few letters to verbs in these languages whereas in English we > usually add zero or one letter to conjugate a verb. Also, many of these > languages require that a noun have an article: e.g. "el Español" or "un > Español" versus "Spanish" or "Spaniard". > > Another interesting comparison of English to other languages is that, > according to the Guinness Book of World Records (and other sources), English > has substantially more words than any other language: > anywhere from half a million to a million versus fewer than 200,000 for the > next most wordy language ( > http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2001/JohnnyLing.shtml) . > > As for the English versus Chinese example, I would note only that > Chinese may require more brushstrokes than English. Also, ideograms > sacrifice a lot of usability to achieve their density - think > alphabetization and phonetics (however approximate this latter is in > English). > > On 12/20/07, Dan Bron <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > > > ... > > You know, I once had a similar feeling about English vs Spanish. I am > > barely literate in Spanish, but I know enough to read the signs on the > > subways. > > > > And, sometimes having no better option on my commute, that's what I > > do. And > > what I noticed was that where the English was to the point (more or > > less), > > all the Spanish was more than a mouthful. I don't mean it's difficult > > to > > voice, I mean that the Spanish used a lot more words to get around to > > the > > same idea. > > > > After a brief and silly moment of national pride, it hit me. The > > Spanish > > wasn't long winded because of an intrinsic feature of the language, it > > was > > long winded because it wasn't Spanish. It was English, crammed into > > Spanish. > > > ... > > -- > Devon McCormick, CFA > ^me^ at acm. > org is my > preferred e-mail > -- Devon McCormick, CFA ^me^ at acm. org is my preferred e-mail
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