Zompist Bboard Again

Pertinent: the cover of the current Private Eye.

How much blame for the current constitutional crisis can be ultimately put on the FPTP voting system? I'd say quite a bit; in a coalition the government would have fallen quite some time ago.

It's true! I noticed, in a trailer on the BBC for a programme called "Back in Time for School", a blackboard on which was clearly written "Baa Baa Black Sheep" in Esperanto! Could Zamehof's most famous creation be undergoing a revival underneath our radar?

Much of the criticism of Esperanto is aimed at its unsuitability as an IAL, for which the criterions are rather stricter than for an ordinary conlang. In your opinions, how does it fare when considered just as a conlang, with no intended uses otherwise?

Back to Bad Conlangs: I get the impression from people's replies that it's probably impossible to create a conlang which everyone will consider to be Bad. Although it might be an interesting exercise (but not for me!) Relex Esperanto? Well, there is that, but surely you want some sort of a challenge?

IMO combining aspects of 2-3 different natlangs seems like a good way to go. Heh. I do that all the time! The main point it to not overdo it so that there are a few key features that can stand out rather than being swallowed by too much noise. It's a bit like cooking a steak with flavouring so that...

If you're speaking in a language which makes gender distinctions about objects or places in a different language which also makes gender distinctions, do you use the same genders in both languages? Assuming that "el Alhambra" is feminine, for example, do you say "die Alhambra" in...

My most recent conlang was heading in an analytic direction, but nobody noticed.

zompist wrote: ↑Sun Jan 06, 2019 8:42 am Though like everything else about the language, it's hard not to look at the set and want to fiddle with it.

Admittedly this is a problem with any auxlang - everyone who sees it thinks he or she could do it better.

"Laws Intended To Protect Firefighters Who Get Cancer Often Lack Teeth", via RationalWiki

Salmoneus wrote: ↑Fri Jan 04, 2019 6:04 pm

Linguoboy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 04, 2019 12:45 pm my excrescent t's

?

!

Gosh, I'm flattered. Unfortunately none of these reconstructions would work for any other verbs, but never mind.

For those of you that care: https://web.archive.org/web/20060923075 ... ahaha.html. Deity-VOC, this brings back memories.

... and you may say to yourself, "My God! What have I done!" I think Sal's saying that it's not possible to have objective standards for judging conlangs. Well, if I may put my head on the chopping-block and let it be kicked around for a bit, as it were: here's what I remember of the verba...

This thread reminds me of the following book, which I found pretty hilarious: How Not to Write a Novel: 200 Classic Mistakes and How to Avoid Them--A Misstep-by-Misstep Guide To paraphrase Roger Lass, nobody with an interest in writing novels should be allowed to not have read this book. I'm glad y...

It's easy to give examples of things you shouldn't do when creating other forms of Art, such as "don't use every synonym of 'said' you can think of" and "don't switch viewpoints within one sentence", or "keep your eyelines consistent". Beyond obvious things like "d...

mèþru wrote: ↑Thu Jan 03, 2019 6:50 am I agree completely with alice.

I agree completely with mèþru.

I don't think there's anything particularly cool about Esperanto which either (1) doesn't actually already exist in perfectly workable form in a natlang or (2) hasn't been done far better in another conlang. But that's just me. OTOH, reading Justin Rye's Ranto will teach you a *lot* about many of th...

Raholeun wrote: ↑Wed Dec 26, 2018 9:09 am

alice wrote: ↑Wed Dec 26, 2018 6:26 am The SCK, of course. Why aren't you?

Because I do not own a credit card and I would need one to order it off Amazon. Recommendations or alternative paths to purchase it are welcome.

I use a debit card with Amazon.

The SCK, of course. Why aren't you?

I forgot:

7. Presumably, if you're brave, there's nothing to stop you making up your own theory of syntax and basing your conlangs on that?

("reify"? I've only ever heard that word in distinctly Marxist contexts. Is this a subtle reference to Chomsky's politics?)

I haven't finished it yet, but these might still be interesting. 1. I have to redo all my conlangs. Doesn't Mark realise how many there are? 2. Page 169: HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! You can never have too many words for insects. Who is this "Sam" supposed to be? 3. Syntactic theories seem to be a lot...