5 ms·
As much as I feel sad about losing so many amazing languages, these arguments are weak emotional appeals at best. The only legitimate argument you can make for
by jfaucett 10y ago
As much as I feel sad about losing so many amazing languages, these arguments are weak emotional appeals at best.
The only legitimate argument you can make for keeping minority languages around is to basically reframe the context and say your goal as a society is to promote cultural and linguistic diversity because society needs it more than it does a highly effecient raw information processing system.
As a programmer, when you think how much easier everything would be if there were only 1 OS, 1 Web Browser, 1 programming language, 1 data exchange format, 1 byte order, etc, etc. and then you think about languages its clear how much easier everything would be.
Of course, we have different OSes, Browsers, Image Editors, because they are all better at different things and we aren't one organism - we as humans have different needs & preferences - which we bring to the table everytime we choose from one of the zillions of different options available to us.
Its the same with languages, when you want to be amazed by poetic eloquence and the rhythm and rhyme of words you read Pablo Neruda in Spanish, when you want to delve into highly analytical thought processes you read anything by the German Think Tanks such as Freud, Marx, Nietsche, Gauss, in German. When you want to talk to a superior in a formal setting, you adapt a different tone, appearance and language, as opposed to when you are splurting out your particular workplace jargon with collegues. The list goes on and on virtually forever, its even the case that the language we speak i.e. English, Spanish or whatever it may be - is completely unique to ourselves like a fingerprint which can identify us from all the other people on the planet.
Social Scientists study these aspects of our humanity, believing they give us insight not only into how people function but also into the optimization of more subjective qualities of that functioning such as happiness, group behaviors, moral motivations, etc.
But why does society need diversity more than efficiency? Someone else can give that one a try :)
- Chris2048 10y ago> But why does society need diversity more than efficiency? Someone else can give that one a try :) You'll soon find yourself in dangerous territory here. The current mantra is diversity is not only morally good, but also actually beneficial - but the former shrinks to the latter whenever challenged, with an extra helping of bad-faith accusation...
- sp332 10y agoThe moral argument is simply one of valuing equality. You don't deserve to have your chosen language canonized, and I don't deserve to have mine relegated to a cultural dustbin.
- Chris2048 10y agoValuing equality is valuing equality, not pretending it has virtues that it doesn't. Trying to trick people into doing something by misrepresenting it as beneficial is a sure way to lose trust, and the moral argument (respecting autonomy). When did 'deserve' enter the argument? Do I deserve to have two arms and two legs?
- sp332 10y agoRight, that's why I didn't do any of that. What would a moral argument even be about if it's not about deserving things? I don't know how many arms and legs you have now or how many you deserve, but it's unlikely that anyone else has a moral right to take any away from you.
- Chris2048 10y agoA common language, and an individuals limbs, differ in this context..
- x3n0ph3n3 10y agoI'm not sure where you're coming from education-wise, but monocultures are viewed as negatives even in computer science [1]. They reduce resiliency to unexpected disasters in both cyber and meat spaces. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoculture_(computer_science) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoculture_(computer_science)
- panic 10y agoWhat is "efficiency" in the context of an entire society? What are we working toward? What will we do when we get there?
- edanm 10y agoThere are lots of great answers to this. 1. Working towards greater productivity. (In case this seems pointless or otherwise unworthy, remember that greater productivity leads to, e.g., people living longer lives). 2. Workings towards more great artistic achievements. 3. Working towards greater scientific achievements, which will bring the above, + more free time, + reaching other planters, + immortality. You might not agree with all the above options, but if we, as a civilization, want to optimize towards something, there are plenty of great "somethings" to choose from. (and that are better than what most of humanity spends its time on, IMO).