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There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Re: Question about Latin.
From: Dirk Elzinga <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2. Re: Possible base-20 numeric system
From: Rene Uittenbogaard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3. Re: About making a translator
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4. (Mis)Naming a Language
From: David Peterson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
5. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
6. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Dirk Elzinga <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
7. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Jeffrey Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
8. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Doug Dee <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
9. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
10. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
11. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: David Peterson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
12. Re: Possible base-20 numeric system
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
13. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
14. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
15. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
16. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
17. Re: Possible base-20 numeric system
From: Jeffrey Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
18. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
19. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Jan van Steenbergen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
20. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Jan van Steenbergen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
21. Re: Naming your Language
From: Jan van Steenbergen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
22. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: David Peterson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
23. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Benct Philip Jonsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
24. ATTN Gary Shannon: Lepayu?
From: Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
25. Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 1
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 11:59:53 -0600
From: Dirk Elzinga <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Question about Latin.
On Oct 27, 2004, at 6:31 AM, Thomas R. Wier wrote:
> From: John Leland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>> I have always wondered if the Korean particle -kwa, which is used
>> very much
>> as -que is used in Latin could be related, or if that is just a
>> coincidence.
>> Certainly if the languages asa whole are related it must be very
>> distantly.
>
> Almost certainly, they are not related. Such chance similarities
> arise all the time between any two given languages, whether or not
> they are related: English 'bad' is not cognate with Persian /b&d/,
> but they mean the same thing; mod. Greek _oma_ 'eye' is likewise not
> related to Malay _oma_ 'eye'. Mark Rosenfelder has a good essay
> on the subject:
>
> <http://zompist.com/chance.htm>
>
> NB his comparison of Quechua and Semitic lexical items.
I have also begun compiling a list of false friends in English and
Shoshoni that I use when talking about the comparative method in my
classes:
kimma�'come' (come)
soosi�'foamy' (suds)
aantsi?i 'termite' (ant)
h1na(-pin)�'bitter brush' (henna)
nana�'relative' (nana)
papi�'older brother'�(papa)
p1s1�'it-/her-/himself'�(person)
poyokka 'trot'�(polka)
m1a�'moon'�(moon)
taipoo [taiBo:] 'white man'�(devil)
At least one of these has entered folk etymology status among Shoshonis
-- _taipoo_ 'white man' < 'devil'. It actually comes from the stem
_t1poo-_ meaning 'write, mark'.
Dirk
--
Dirk Elzinga
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
"I believe that phonology is superior to music. It is more variable and
its pecuniary possibilities are far greater." - Erik Satie
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 2
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 20:00:45 +0200
From: Rene Uittenbogaard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Possible base-20 numeric system
Henrik Theiling wrote:
>
> Trebor Jung <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
> > How do you think I should combine to form higher numbers?
>
>
> Well, if you want a system similar to decimal in English, decide how
> many digits would make a 'paket', say n, and then have words for
>
> 20^1 -> 20
> 20^2 -> 400
> ...
> 20^n -> if n = 3 (as in English), that'd be it, namely: 8000
>
> Then 20^n would correspond to the 'packet' number 1000 in English.
[snip]
> Chinese, Japanese, Korean (and others) have decimal with n=4. There
> are also natlangs that have n=2.
>
> As an option, don't be so regular, e.g. compare the Hindi system of
> numbers >= 100, it's quite interesting as the packets are sometimes
> n=2 and sometimes n=3.
>
> My conlangs Tyl Sjok and Qeng|ai have n=1, but it's a bit more
> complicated than that, since the base may be 2, 8, 10, and 16 (and in
> principle, anything between 2 and 16), and the exponents may be in
> exponential form as well.
Exponential form? Is this what you mean?
lu one
we two
ya three
ye four
es� five
es� six
ush� seven
ush� eight
shu nine
ins� ten
-- --
lu ins� eleven
we ins� twelve
ins� we twenty
ush� ins� shu ninety-eight
-- --
uts� a hundred
lu uts� a hundred and one
ye ins� ush� uts� shu nine hundred and seventy-four
-- --
uts� ins� a thousand (10 * 100)
tahw� ten thousand (10^4)
tahw� ins� hundred thousand (10 * 10^4)
tahw� uts� a million (100 * 10^4)
tahw� uts� ins� ten million (10 * 100 * 10^4)
moy� a hundred million (10^8)
moy� ins� 10 * 10^8
moy� uts� 100 * 10^8
moy� uts� ins� 10 * 100 * 10^8
moy� tahw� 10^4 * 10^8
moy� tahw� ins� 10 * 10^4 * 10^8
moy� tahw� uts� 100 * 10^4 * 10^8
moy� tahw� uts� ins� 10 * 100 * 10^4 * 10^8
This is what I made up recently for Eyahw�nsi.
Ren�
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________________________________________________________________________
Message: 3
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 20:14:36 +0100
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: About making a translator
On Wednesday, October 27, 2004, at 12:34 , H. S. Teoh wrote:
> On Wed, Oct 27, 2004 at 02:30:28AM +0400, Alexander Savenkov wrote:
>> Hello,
>>
>> 2004-10-26T16:06:04+03:00 Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>
>>> But, as Richard has written & I have discovered from experience, it
>>> is a highly non-trivial task.
>>
>> According to what I've read, this is an impossible task for now.
>> Machine translation will be possible with the invention of AI.
> [...]
>
> Impossible to be 100% correct, yes. But may be possible to do an
> approximation.
Yes, especially if the translation is of a text in some well defined
knowledge domain such as nuclear physics, pop music, the Harry Potter
stories, or whatever. But a general purpose translator is not possible at
present.
> The essence of the problem is that natural language is inherently
> ambiguous, and requires (usually implicit) context to interpret
> correctly.
In fact it requires 'real world' knowledge - in other words a truly
immense knowledge base.
> Take for example the following quote, which I got from
> somebody on this list:
>
> Time flies like an arrow.
> Fruit flies like a banana.
It's a couplet I often quote. I forget the details, but "Time flies like
an arrow" was deliberately devised to test an early natural language
parser at, I believe, MIT (almost certainly written in LISP). From what I
remember, some rather liked the machines suggestion of a species of fly
know as "time flies" all going crazy over an arrow hence the second
sentence :)
> The second sentence is particularly pathological, in that it has two
> possible parses, both of which have sensible semantics:
> 1) Fruit-NP flies-V like-ADV (a banana)-NP
> 2) (Fruit flies)-NP like-V (a banana)-NP
The first sentences is actually even more ambiguous if one relies just on
a syntactic analysis, depending whether we take "time", "flies" or "like"
as the main verb, thus:
Taking "time" as the imperative of the verb "to time" and 'flies" as a
plural noun, being the direct object of the verb "time", we have:
1. Time flies in a similar way to that in which you would time an arrow.
2. Time flies in a similar way to that in which an arrow would time flies.
Ok K - the second meaning is particularly stupid and no human interpret it
that way. But it requires _semantic_ knowledge to realize that. On syntax
alone the meaning is possible. Both those parsings assume "like" is a
conjunction meaning "in a similar way that" (i.e. it means "as"). "like"
could be an adjective, defining those darn "flies", thus:
3. Time only those flies which have a similar shape to an arrow.
If we take "time" as a noun, being the subject of the verb "flies" (3rd
pers. singular of the present tense of "to fly") we get:
4. Time flies in an analogous way to the way an arrow flies.
So far we have been taking "like" either as a conjunction meaning "in a
similar way that" or "in an analogous way to" or as an adjective meaning
"similar (to)" ; but we could take "like" as a verb, being the third
person plural with subject "flies". "Time" is an epithet noun, that is we
have our species of fly known as "time flies:, thus:
5. Time-flies are just crazy about eating an arrow.
> The problem with this kind of ambiguity is that it is an inherent
> ambiguity in English grammar. (And it's not just English alone; I
> believe most, if not all, natlangs are inherently ambiguous.)
This type of ambiguity is typical of languages with little morphology and
great reliance on syntax, like English or modern Chinese. But ambiguity is
inherent in all natural languages, if only because on the semantic level
words often have wide ranges of meaning.
[snip - but all very true]
> applied to make guesses that are right 90% of the time. Approximate
> being the keyword here, however, because currently existing
> translators fall woefully short of the quality needed for general use.
Yep!
> As someone once said, "Heuristics are buggy by definition, because if
> they weren't buggy, they'd be algorithms."
Exactly so.
> Perhaps AI might help in
> improving this, but with the current state of AI, I'm not holding my
> breath.
Nor I - my lungs ain't big enough :)
Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
===============================================
Anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight,
which is not so much a twilight of the gods
as of the reason." [JRRT, "English and Welsh" ]
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 4
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 15:43:28 EDT
From: David Peterson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: (Mis)Naming a Language
Hi all,
I'm still offlist, but I thought I'd bring up something that happened
to me.
Yesterday I received an e-mail from a lecturer at CSU Sacramento
(a.k.a., Sac State--the rivals of the UC Davis Aggies) asking about
languages that have a drum register. [In Africa, certain tone
Bantu languages can be whistled or drummed, since they have
rules about tonal phrasal patterns. They can't communicate *completely*,
but they can do a lot.] Anyway, this professor specifically wanted
some phrases from a language called Kele. This is because,
unbeknownst to me, there's a tone Bantu language called "Kele".
Undoubtedly, he found me on the internet because of my
language, which I called "Kele":
http://dedalvs.free.fr/kele/
I gave him some info on who he could talk to to get some info
on the real Kele, but I'm a little put out that I unintentionally
mislead someone.
So, my question: Has something similar happened to anyone
else? And, do you think I should change the name of the
language? Would you, in this situation? Also, what if someone
created a language with a name like Teonaht, not knowing
that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this
imaginary person) was far better?
You don't have to reply offlist; I'll follow the thread via the
archives.
-David
*******************************************************************
"sunly eleSkarez ygralleryf ydZZixelje je ox2mejze."
"No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn."
-Jim Morrison
http://dedalvs.free.fr/
[This message contained attachments]
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Message: 5
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 16:58:04 -0400
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
"Also, what if someone created a language with a name like Teonaht, not knowing
that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this imaginary person) was far
better?"
:) Off with their heads!!
I'd say that in the case of invented languages, the original inventor, i.e., whose
language has been in circulation longer on CONLANG, has dibs on the name, regardless
of whether it or the newly named language were better than the other. That part's
irrelevant. But If someone created a language that was much better than mine and
called it Teonaht, heh heh, I'd ask them to change the name and join me in Teon!
The situation you describe is more of a bother because Kele is the name of a natural
language. Hoo boy. What a troubling coincidence. I'd say that you'd have to
capitulate to the status of the natural language and its name, which has been around
longer than you have been inventing. Since a scholar did misunderstand you, you might
be forced to modify the spelling. But what a pain. I think I made the spelling of
Teonaht deliberately eccentric so that it would stand out as invented, unique...
although I was not consciously aware at the time of this particular problem you
describe.
Which moves me to wonder whether there are any separate natural languages that share
the same name? There have to be, given how many there are and have been in the world.
Sally
----- Original Message -----
From: David Peterson
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Wednesday, October 27, 2004 3:43 PM
Subject: (Mis)Naming a Language
Hi all,
I'm still offlist, but I thought I'd bring up something that happened
to me.
Yesterday I received an e-mail from a lecturer at CSU Sacramento
(a.k.a., Sac State--the rivals of the UC Davis Aggies) asking about
languages that have a drum register. [In Africa, certain tone
Bantu languages can be whistled or drummed, since they have
rules about tonal phrasal patterns. They can't communicate *completely*,
but they can do a lot.] Anyway, this professor specifically wanted
some phrases from a language called Kele. This is because,
unbeknownst to me, there's a tone Bantu language called "Kele".
Undoubtedly, he found me on the internet because of my
language, which I called "Kele":
http://dedalvs.free.fr/kele/
I gave him some info on who he could talk to to get some info
on the real Kele, but I'm a little put out that I unintentionally
mislead someone.
So, my question: Has something similar happened to anyone
else? And, do you think I should change the name of the
language? Would you, in this situation? Also, what if someone
created a language with a name like Teonaht, not knowing
that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this
imaginary person) was far better?
You don't have to reply offlist; I'll follow the thread via the
archives.
-David
*******************************************************************
"sunly eleSkarez ygralleryf ydZZixelje je ox2mejze."
"No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn."
-Jim Morrison
http://dedalvs.free.fr/
[This message contained attachments]
________________________________________________________________________
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Message: 6
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 15:27:26 -0600
From: Dirk Elzinga <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
On Oct 27, 2004, at 2:58 PM, Sally Caves wrote:
> "Also, what if someone created a language with a name like Teonaht,
> not knowing
> that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this imaginary
> person) was far better?"
> �
> :)� Off with their heads!!
> �
> I'd say that in the case of invented languages, the original inventor,
> i.e., whose language has been in circulation longer on CONLANG,�has
> dibs on the name, regardless of whether it or the newly named language
> were better than the other.� That part's irrelevant.� But If someone
> created a language that was much better than mine and called it
> Teonaht, heh heh, I'd ask them to change the name�and join me in
> Teon!��
> �
> The situation you describe is more of a bother because Kele is�the
> name of a natural�language.� Hoo boy.� What a troubling coincidence.�
> I'd say that you'd have to capitulate to the status of the natural
> language and its name, which has been around longer than you have been
> inventing.� Since a scholar did misunderstand you, you might be forced
> to modify the spelling.� But what�a pain.� I think I made the spelling
> of Teonaht deliberately eccentric so that it would stand out as
> invented, unique... although I was�not consciously aware at the time
> of this particular problem you describe.�
> �
> Which moves me to wonder whether there are any separate�natural
> languages that share the same name?� There have to be, given how many
> there are and have been in the world.
I just took a quick look at http://www.ethnologue.com , and found a
couple of pairs in the A's and B's:
Amba (Uganda)
Amba (Solomon Islands)
Bati (Indonesia)
Bati (Cameroon)
I'm sure that more could be found without too much trouble.
Dirk
--
Dirk Elzinga
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
"I believe that phonology is superior to music. It is more variable and
its pecuniary possibilities are far greater." - Erik Satie
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 7
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 17:48:48 -0400
From: Jeffrey Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
On Wed, 27 Oct 2004 16:58:04 -0400, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
>
> "Also, what if someone created a language with a name like Teonaht, not
> knowing that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this
> imaginary person) was far better?"
>
> :) Off with their heads!!
>
> I'd say that in the case of invented languages, the original inventor,
> i.e., whose language has been in circulation longer on CONLANG, has dibs
> on the name, regardless of whether it or the newly named language were
> better than the other. That part's irrelevant. But If someone created
> a language that was much better than mine and called it Teonaht, heh heh,
> I'd ask them to change the name and join me in Teon!
>
> The situation you describe is more of a bother because Kele is the name
> of a natural language. Hoo boy. What a troubling coincidence. I'd say
> that you'd have to capitulate to the status of the natural language and
> its name, which has been around longer than you have been inventing.
> Since a scholar did misunderstand you, you might be forced to modify the
> spelling. But what a pain. I think I made the spelling of Teonaht
> deliberately eccentric so that it would stand out as invented, unique...
> although I was not consciously aware at the time of this particular
> problem you describe.
These days, googling before settling on a particular name will eliminate a
lot of the potential conflicts. In this case I endorse your suggestion of
changing the spelling, if possible, since David is bothered by it.
> Which moves me to wonder whether there are any separate natural
> languages that share the same name? There have to be, given how many
> there are and have been in the world.
I remember reading (in some book that attempted to classify all known
natlangs) that there was a name used by 3 different languages (in Africa,
New Guinea, and South America, or something like that). It was a short
name, maybe only 4 letters.
>
> Sally
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: David Peterson
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Sent: Wednesday, October 27, 2004 3:43 PM
> Subject: (Mis)Naming a Language
>
> Hi all,
>
> I'm still offlist, but I thought I'd bring up something that happened
> to me.
>
> Yesterday I received an e-mail from a lecturer at CSU Sacramento
> (a.k.a., Sac State--the rivals of the UC Davis Aggies) asking about
> languages that have a drum register. [In Africa, certain tone
> Bantu languages can be whistled or drummed, since they have rules
> about tonal phrasal patterns. They can't communicate *completely*,
> but they can do a lot.] Anyway, this professor specifically wanted
> some phrases from a language called Kele. This is because,
> unbeknownst to me, there's a tone Bantu language called "Kele".
> Undoubtedly, he found me on the internet because of my
> language, which I called "Kele":
>
> http://dedalvs.free.fr/kele/
<remark type="smartass">At least he didn't ask if a language called
Kelerinete had a clarion register.</remark> -- Sorry, I couldn't resist!
> I gave him some info on who he could talk to to get some info
> on the real Kele, but I'm a little put out that I unintentionally
> mislead someone.
>
> So, my question: Has something similar happened to anyone
> else? And, do you think I should change the name of the
> language? Would you, in this situation? Also, what if someone
> created a language with a name like Teonaht, not knowing
> that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this
> imaginary person) was far better?
>
> You don't have to reply offlist; I'll follow the thread via the
> archives.
>
> -David
> *******************************************************************
> "sunly eleSkarez ygralleryf ydZZixelje je ox2mejze."
> "No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn."
>
> -Jim Morrison
>
> http://dedalvs.free.fr/
Jeff
current music: "Can You Hear the Drums, Fernando" or whatever that song is
called.
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Message: 8
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 18:27:40 EDT
From: Doug Dee <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
In a message dated 10/27/2004 4:58:58 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
>I'd say that in the case of invented languages, the original inventor, i.e.,
whose language >has been in circulation longer on CONLANG, has dibs on the
name,
I'm not sure that circulation on CONLANG should be decisive, since after all
most of the world's population doesn't subscribe to this list.
However, if we've appointed ourselves to be the arbiters of names, I'd better
stake a claim.
Notice: I have conlangs under construction called Revonian, Katevan, Lorian,
and Frankish. Now no one else on earth can use those names, since I was here
first. ;-)
Doug
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Message: 9
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 20:04:12 -0400
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
On Wed, Oct 27, 2004 at 06:27:40PM -0400, Doug Dee wrote:
> Notice: I have conlangs under construction called Revonian, Katevan, Lorian,
> and Frankish. Now no one else on earth can use those names, since I was here
> first. ;-)
Think a natlang might have dibs on that last one. :)
-Marcos
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Message: 10
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 20:59:31 -0400
From: John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
Sally Caves scripsit:
> Which moves me to wonder whether there are any separate natural
> languages that share the same name? There have to be, given how many
> there are and have been in the world.
Ethnologue lists several even in the basic language list, and when you
get to dialects, there are many such overlaps.
--
Why are well-meaning Westerners so concerned that John Cowan
the opening of a Colonel Sanders in Beijing means [EMAIL PROTECTED]
the end of Chinese culture? [...] We have had http://www.reutershealth.com
Chinese restaurants in America for over a century, http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
and it hasn't made us Chinese. On the contrary,
we obliged the Chinese to invent chop suey. --Marshall Sahlins
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Message: 11
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 21:34:45 -0400
From: David Peterson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
I wrote:
<<
"Also, what if someone created a language with a name like Teonaht, not knowing
that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this imaginary person) was far
better?"
>>
Huh. It occurs to me that the sentence I wrote was ambiguous in a bad
way. What I meant to suggest was that Sally's Teonaht was the better
language than Bizarro World Teonaht. You know, I remember when I
wrote that sentence that once I got to the part in parentheses I totally
got lost. Oops. :(
Anyway, in light of everyone's replies, I think I'm going to change the
name of Kele to Kelenala. I googled for it, and Google said, "Did you
mean Kalevala?" A good book, so I don't mind the association.
Anyway, "kele" in Kelenala means "enjoyment", or "to enjoy", and "nala"
means "tongue", which also means "language", so I think the pairing
is a good one. So, Kelenala it shall be, henceforth.
Of course, now I need to go about changing it on all my webpages, and
changing the Langmaker entry, maybe getting Janko to change the name
on his webpage, and on and on...
-David
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Message: 12
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 21:18:15 -0500
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Possible base-20 numeric system
Danny Wier wrote:
> From: "Jeffrey Jones"
>
>> Didn't know that about Hindi. I suppose Sanskrit is no worse than Polish?
>
>
> I know little Sanskrit, but I think its number system is probably pretty
> complicated. A lot of it is probably due to those sandhi rules.
>
>> I'm considering an ordinary hum-drum base 1280 number system for one
>> of my
>> projects. This could be broken down into an alternation of base 32 and
>> base
>> 40.
>
>
> I was just contemplating base-840, which can be divided by all whole
> numbers
> from 1 to 8. Or base-2520, for 1 to 10. Then I just decided to stick with
> base-60, which can handle 1 through 6. At least for now.
>
> (All this work on Just Intonation is making me obsessed with prime
> numbers.)
>
Zariva could be considered base 125. Numbers below 125 use a combination
of either base 5 or base 7 or both (here's that link again):
http://listserv.brown.edu/archives/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind9902D&L=conlang&P=R1781
The basic roots cover 1-5, 7, 10, 15, 25, 49, and powers of 125. All
other numbers are combinations of these, with additional prefixes and
suffixes for "one less", "two less", "one more", "two more", and "twice".
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Message: 13
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 22:14:33 -0500
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
David Peterson wrote:
> So, my question: Has something similar happened to anyone
> else? And, do you think I should change the name of the
> language? Would you, in this situation? Also, what if someone
> created a language with a name like Teonaht, not knowing
> that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this
> imaginary person) was far better?
Well, there are only so many 4-letter names. There are also natlangs
that have similar names to unrelated langs in other parts of the world;
I believe there's a Tonga language which is unrelated to Tongan, for
instance. But if it turns out that there's a natlang called Kishtlanarn,
I might want to rename it.
This sort of thing happens all the time. I had a character named Rissa
in a story I wrote a long time ago; it turned out that there's a book
about a character named Rissa, so I changed the name to Thrissa. Later I
found out that Rissa is the scientific name of a kind of gull called a
kittiwake (two species: black-legged, R. tridactyla, and red-legged, R.
brevirostris). Even longer words can have accidental resemblances; the
people known as the Sangari were originally called Sarangi until I found
out that that was a kind of string instrument from India. So I wouldn't
worry too much about 4-letter names; there are bound to be coincidental
resemblances.
I don't think I've ever had a language with the same name as another
language, but it would depend on the language. If there's any chance
that I might have heard of it, I might think about renaming it. But with
thousands of languages, some known by more than one name, it's not
surprising that some of them have the same name as others.
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Message: 14
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:48:23 -0400
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
I understood you perfectly, David; :) I was just kidding and poking a bit
of fun at Teonaht. Thanks for the compliment. Teonaht has its huge
problems these days.
I love the name Kelenala! "Tongue joy!" Let people think it's the Kalevala
and be surprised. :) (It bugs me when Google tries to correct me.)
I'm curious to know if your correspondent replied to your correction, and if
so, what he said.
Sally
----- Original Message -----
From: "David Peterson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Wednesday, October 27, 2004 9:34 PM
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
>I wrote:
>
> <<
> "Also, what if someone created a language with a name like Teonaht, not
> knowing
> that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this imaginary
> person) was far better?"
>>>
>
> Huh. It occurs to me that the sentence I wrote was ambiguous in a bad
> way. What I meant to suggest was that Sally's Teonaht was the better
> language than Bizarro World Teonaht. You know, I remember when I
> wrote that sentence that once I got to the part in parentheses I totally
> got lost. Oops. :(
>
> Anyway, in light of everyone's replies, I think I'm going to change the
> name of Kele to Kelenala. I googled for it, and Google said, "Did you
> mean Kalevala?" A good book, so I don't mind the association.
>
> Anyway, "kele" in Kelenala means "enjoyment", or "to enjoy", and "nala"
> means "tongue", which also means "language", so I think the pairing
> is a good one. So, Kelenala it shall be, henceforth.
>
> Of course, now I need to go about changing it on all my webpages, and
> changing the Langmaker entry, maybe getting Janko to change the name
> on his webpage, and on and on...
>
> -David
>
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Message: 15
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 22:50:04 -0500
From: Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
Jeffrey Jones wrote:
> These days, googling before settling on a particular name will eliminate a
> lot of the potential conflicts. In this case I endorse your suggestion of
> changing the spelling, if possible, since David is bothered by it.
Well, "Via ser^co - kishtlanarn - ne kongruas kun iuj ajn dokumentoj." So
I'm safe with that one at least. But googling for Vuki Lialia (not the
phrase, but the two words separately) turns up two pages in Fijian!
http://vosabula.tripod.com/id18.html
http://www.lightministries.com/id126.htm
Hmmm.....
Besides the obvious pages, googling for Lindiga brings up quite a few
pages in Estonian. There don't appear to be any extraneous references to
Tirelat; they all look like conlang-related pages. Jarda has a number of
unrelated links, including the Japanese American Relocation Digital
Archive and pages mainly in Czech and Slovak. Virelli is a family name
(Italian?). Vizaki brings up links to pages in Greek and what looks like
romanized Greek. Yasaro brings up references to a "Peter Yasaro" and
other Yasaro names, plus a number of pages of what looks like nonsense,
stuff like "Php yasaro xfowe vyxemu rfaynujy zeie php iwo da uu, oo
nikusaii rojimu xfowe."
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Message: 16
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:54:17 -0400
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> On Wed, Oct 27, 2004 at 06:27:40PM -0400, Doug Dee wrote:
>> Notice: I have conlangs under construction called Revonian, Katevan,
>> Lorian,
>> and Frankish. Now no one else on earth can use those names, since I was
>> here
>> first. ;-)
>
> Think a natlang might have dibs on that last one. :)
I think Doug was kidding with that last one. :) And I think I'm going to
copy him on that name Katevan. :)
S.
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Message: 17
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:59:55 -0400
From: Jeffrey Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Possible base-20 numeric system
On Wed, 27 Oct 2004 02:33:11 -0500, Danny Wier <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> From: "Jeffrey Jones"
>
> > Didn't know that about Hindi. I suppose Sanskrit is no worse than
> > Polish?
>
> I know little Sanskrit, but I think its number system is probably pretty
> complicated. A lot of it is probably due to those sandhi rules.
Ah yes. Sandhi would make even a perfectly regular system complicated.
> > I'm considering an ordinary hum-drum base 1280 number system for one of
> > my projects. This could be broken down into an alternation of base 32
> > and base 40.
I forgot to mention that 32 and 40 are tied into the phonology: there are
32 distinct C/V possibilities in even moras and 40 in odd ones.
> I was just contemplating base-840, which can be divided by all whole
> numbers from 1 to 8. Or base-2520, for 1 to 10. Then I just decided to
> stick with base-60, which can handle 1 through 6. At least for now.
>
> (All this work on Just Intonation is making me obsessed with prime
> numbers.)
(Had to look up Just Intonation, having forgotten which one it was -- as a
mainly-wind-instrument guy I never paid too much attention to tuning
systems)
Jeff
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Message: 18
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 07:13:30 +0200
From: Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
On Wed, 27 Oct 2004 22:50:04 -0500, Herman Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Vizaki brings up links to pages in Greek
where it's apparently someone's username
> and what looks like romanized Greek.
*nods* It is. A diminutive of "vyzi", "boob, tit". Hence, roughly
"boobie, tittie". Related to vyzaino "to suckle, nurse at the breast",
I imagine.
Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Watch the Reply-To!
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Message: 19
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 07:15:51 +0100
From: Jan van Steenbergen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
--- David Peterson skrzypszy:
> So, my question: Has something similar happened to anyone else?
Well, the primary condition for it to happen has been fulfilled,
because I d� have a conlang that shares its name with a natlang,
albeit an ancient one, namely Hattic. However, the situation you
described has not (yet) occurred to me.
> And, do you think I should change the name of the language?
> Would you, in this situation?
When I started Hattic, I had never heard of the real Hattic either.
It took me a while to discover it. But once I knew, I seriously
considered changing the name as well. Not that I particularly wanted
to: changing the name of a conlang is not a light thing to do, and I
was both used and attached to the name "Hattic". Well, I brought it
up here on Conlang, and after some discussion I decided to keep the
name. The chief argument were the many examples *here* of completely
unrelated natlangs with the same name.
So, do I think you should change the name of "Kele"? Well, it seems
you have already come to a decision, but for what it is worth: no, I
don't think so. If you create a conlang with a name as short as this
one, the odds are that another language or dialect may exist with the
same name. In my opinion, that shouldn't be an argument against
keeping it. It could be recommendable to make it very clear on the
page of the language that it is a constructed language, having
nothing in common with the natlang Kele; just a matter of courtesy.
> Also, what if someone created a language with a name like Teonaht,
> not knowing that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to
> this imaginary person) was far better?
I would probably just point it out to this person, and ask him/her
politely to change the name or otherwise disambiguate (which in the
case of two constructed languages is definitely easier than between
two natlangs). If that doesn't work, well, there's always the option
of hiring a killer...
Jan
=====
"If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a closed room
with a mosquito."
Relay 10: http://steen.free.fr/relay10/
Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com
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Message: 20
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 07:26:11 +0100
From: Jan van Steenbergen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
--- Herman Miller skrzypszy:
> Besides the obvious pages, googling for Lindiga brings up quite a
> few pages in Estonian. [...]
Apart from a certain Mr. Wieslaw Wenedyk Dam, who apparently ran in
Polish municipal elections a few years ago but was not elected, all
occurrences of Wenedyk refer to my language (most of which are
numerous different copies of Wiki pages and of the Google directory).
Vozgian: my language only. Not that there are particularly many hits,
though.
Hattic: overwhelmingly about the ancient language of Anatolia. There
are so many hits, that I can't even be bothered to look for
references to my own Hattic. A pity, because that way I won't find
out how many people actually believe the nonsense I'm writing...
Askaic: a few references to my language (but not much, because it
still isn't online). Furthermore, a couple of references to "Askaic
Records", apparently some obscure grammaphone company, and one
containing a text like "She'll be your sex slave forever"...
Jan
=====
"If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a closed room
with a mosquito."
Relay 10: http://steen.free.fr/relay10/
Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com
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Message: 21
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 07:49:47 +0100
From: Jan van Steenbergen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Naming your Language
--- Scott skrzypszy:
> Just a quick question. I've been working on my conlang for a while
> now and have been using a word made up quite a while ago as the
> name of the language and the name of those who speak it. I've
> realized now it doesn't quite fit in with the language any more.
>
> How are some of the ways you have named your language and its
> speakers?
Now that we are at language names, I might as well answer to this
question too.
WENEDYK: name derived from Latin VENETI/VENEDI, which seems to have
been used for the Slavs, in particular the West Slavs. The name
itself made its way into Wenedyk from outside, probably from German.
VOZGIAN, HATTIC, ASKAIC: all chosen without any backstory (not even
within the languages themselves). Only later I started to look for
explanations of the names. For Vozgian, Jan Havlis^ presented me with
the Veztici as possible ancestors of the Vozgians; for Hattic, I
present no less than four different "theories" explaining the name
(one of which the inevitable relationship with ancient Hattic); for
Askaic, I haven't really found anything yet.
SLEZAN: Obviously from Silesia, where it is spoken.
Jan
=====
"If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a closed room
with a mosquito."
Relay 10: http://steen.free.fr/relay10/
Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com
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Message: 22
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 03:26:59 -0400
From: David Peterson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
To bring some closure to the issue...
Sally wrote:
<<
I love the name Kelenala! "Tongue joy!"
>>
~:D I really liked it too. And that's part of what made it easier to
change the name, in response to Jan. Also, though, in comparing
our situations, Hattic is an ancient language, whereas Kele is
apparently still spoken by a living community. I just felt a little
uncomfortable with using the same name for my created language,
since there's a live group of people who might not want the
association. Besides, I'm really beginning to like Kelenala.
Oh! That reminds me. One day I should tell everyone about my
latest conlang project. The name, in X-SAMPA, is ['sp&.nIS]. ;)
Sally also wrote:
<<
Let people think it's the Kalevala
and be surprised. :) (It bugs me when Google tries to correct me.)
>>
Isn't that presumptuous? "I'm sorry," says Google, "but it appears
to us that you need more practice operating your computer. Clearly
what you meant to type was..."
Sally still:
<<
I'm curious to know if your correspondent replied to your correction, and if
so, what he said.
>>
I actually got a reply today, and, rather surprisingly, he didn't say anything
about my language inventing. He thanked me for taking some time to address
his questions. (I do know a few things about African languages, so I tried to
help out.) One of the things I asked him was why he wanted Kele phrases
specifically, since I'd heard of whistling/drumming registers before, but
(obviously) never of the natlang Kele. He said it was because of one book
he had as a source, called The Talking Drums of Africa by J.F. Carrington
(anyone heard of it?), that focused exclusively on Kele. I let him know that
he might look at other languages that might be a little more well-known,
and he might get better results, and I put him in contact with a couple
professors I know who might help.
Oh, he also said his son, who's a senior in high school, is considering
UCSD for his undergrad. I'm debating whether or not to tell him that, in
my opinion, UCSD is really *not* an ideal place to go as an undergraduate,
even though it's the third ranked UC, for quite a number of reasons...
Anyway, he seems to be interested in web-based materials, so if he
sends me any updates, I'll pass them on to the list. For now, I should
really get to sleep, and get back to thinking about my phonetics project.
-David
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Message: 23
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 10:04:14 +0200
From: Benct Philip Jonsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
My conlang Sohlob was originally _Sahrab_, but then I discovered
that this is a Pakistani surname, so lest I offend some Mr/Ms
Sahrab I changed the name to _Sahlab_, only to discover that this
is a (modern) Egyptian drink of some kind(*), so I changed it
again to _Sohlob_, this time Googling to make sure it didn't exist.
Somehow the Egyptian association stuck though, for the conculture
and the land where it is located bears som similarity to ancient
Egypt.
(* I also had troubles keeping apart the lang's /r_0/ and /S/ in
my own pronunciation, so I changed all instances of /r_0/ to /K/
which is a cooler sound overall. Later I changed /S/ to /s\/ --
a much more distinctive sound -- and resurrected the /r_0/ ~ /K/
distinction in a dialect of the language, which has three dialects,
a fourth in the works and a sister language planned.)
David Peterson wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I'm still offlist, but I thought I'd bring up something that happened
> to me.
>
> Yesterday I received an e-mail from a lecturer at CSU Sacramento
> (a.k.a., Sac State--the rivals of the UC Davis Aggies) asking about
> languages that have a drum register. [In Africa, certain tone
> Bantu languages can be whistled or drummed, since they have
> rules about tonal phrasal patterns. They can't communicate *completely*,
> but they can do a lot.] Anyway, this professor specifically wanted
> some phrases from a language called Kele. This is because,
> unbeknownst to me, there's a tone Bantu language called "Kele".
> Undoubtedly, he found me on the internet because of my
> language, which I called "Kele":
>
> http://dedalvs.free.fr/kele/
>
> I gave him some info on who he could talk to to get some info
> on the real Kele, but I'm a little put out that I unintentionally
> mislead someone.
>
> So, my question: Has something similar happened to anyone
> else? And, do you think I should change the name of the
> language? Would you, in this situation? Also, what if someone
> created a language with a name like Teonaht, not knowing
> that one already existed, and (with no disrespect to this
> imaginary person) was far better?
>
> You don't have to reply offlist; I'll follow the thread via the
> archives.
>
> -David
> *******************************************************************
> "sunly eleSkarez ygralleryf ydZZixelje je ox2mejze."
> "No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn."
>
> -Jim Morrison
>
> http://dedalvs.free.fr/
>
--
/BP 8^)
--
Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se
Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant!
(Tacitus)
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Message: 24
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 11:41:16 +0200
From: Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: ATTN Gary Shannon: Lepayu?
Hey, especially Gary Shannon!
While digging through the heap of messages that I marked as
"interesting", I found mails about your one language that
has split verbs and two different opposites (un- and not)
etc. What has become of it? Have you typed up a grammar and
put it on the internet? If so, where can I find it? If you
realized everything as you made it up originally, it seems
to me this langauge is quite fun. I'm curious.
Thanks,
Carsten Becker
--
Eri silvev�ng aibannama padangin.
Nivaie evaenain eri ming silvoiev�ng caparei.
- Antoine de Saint-Exup�ry, Le Petit Prince
-> http://www.beckerscarsten.de/?conlang=ayeri
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Message: 25
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 12:38:26 +0200
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: (Mis)Naming a Language
Quoting Benct Philip Jonsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> My conlang Sohlob was originally _Sahrab_, but then I discovered
> that this is a Pakistani surname, so lest I offend some Mr/Ms
> Sahrab I changed the name to _Sahlab_, only to discover that this
> is a (modern) Egyptian drink of some kind(*), so I changed it
> again to _Sohlob_, this time Googling to make sure it didn't exist.
> Somehow the Egyptian association stuck though, for the conculture
> and the land where it is located bears som similarity to ancient
> Egypt.
>
> (* I also had troubles keeping apart the lang's /r_0/ and /S/ in
> my own pronunciation, so I changed all instances of /r_0/ to /K/
> which is a cooler sound overall. Later I changed /S/ to /s\/ --
> a much more distinctive sound -- and resurrected the /r_0/ ~ /K/
> distinction in a dialect of the language, which has three dialects,
> a fourth in the works and a sister language planned.)
Nevertheless, the thing the name always make me think of is Shelob. No offense
to arachnophobe sohlobophones!
Andreas
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