IMAGINE
....there’s a language that you can learn in a matter of weeks rather than months and years, and it’s as expressive as a normal human language.
It sounds a lot like an idea behind Esperanto, yes. And its inventor has tried to make its grammar simple and regular, its word formation logical and straightforward. However, learning Esperanto still requires you to memorize hundreds of word roots, taken mostly from European languages.
Absolutely most words in the world are arbitrary - lacking an obvious connection between what they mean and how they sound.
Some words, such as English “meaow” (and arguably Chinese “mao” or Egyptian “mau” meaning “cat”) are not so arbitrary - they are iconic.
The nature of a spoken language doesn’t allow for most words to be iconic.
....there’s a language that you can learn in a matter of weeks rather than months and years, and it’s as expressive as a normal human language.
It sounds a lot like an idea behind Esperanto, yes. And its inventor has tried to make its grammar simple and regular, its word formation logical and straightforward. However, learning Esperanto still requires you to memorize hundreds of word roots, taken mostly from European languages.
Absolutely most words in the world are arbitrary - lacking an obvious connection between what they mean and how they sound.
Some words, such as English “meaow” (and arguably Chinese “mao” or Egyptian “mau” meaning “cat”) are not so arbitrary - they are iconic.
The nature of a spoken language doesn’t allow for most words to be iconic.
