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As a native speaker of a romance language, I do not find English particularly insane. It is quite straightforward as a language. That is, written English is a

As a native speaker of a romance language, I do not find English particularly insane. It is quite straightforward as a language. That is, written English is a sane language, and spoken English is a sane language as well. The problem is that they are two unrelated languages :)

morningseagulls 7y ago
>That is, written English is a sane language, and spoken English is a sane language as well. What's your definition of "sane" here? >The problem is that they are two unrelated languages Sounds like Chinese/Mandarin to me. :)
mwyah 7y ago
I disagree with spoken English being a sane language. I have yet to find a deterministic way of knowing how to pronounce a word I haven't heard before. I can make up a word in Spanish and I know everybody will pronounce it the same way.
- enriquto 7y ago
  > I disagree with spoken English being a sane language. I have yet to find a deterministic way of knowing how to pronounce a word I haven't heard before. I do not understand what do you mean here. In spoken English, the only way to know about one word is by having heard it, so you know how it is pronounced. Illiterate people can speak perfectly correct English.
  - pbhjpbhj 7y ago
    But literate people can't speak all the words they know in an agreed way. It's like the whole "how do you pronounce Linux" thing. Then you move, and local people (in UK, say) pronounce the word differently (eg bath, heard).
  - mwyah 7y ago
    That is exactly my point. If you've never heard a word you can never know how it's pronounced. That's not the case with Spanish where I can make up a word and everybody will pronounce it (almost) the same way.
    - enriquto 7y ago
      This is not exactly true. There are some fundamental differences between spanish dialects. For example, "yo", "calle", are pronounced in an unrecognizable way between Argentina and Spain. But I agree that the mapping from written to spoken spanish is mostly deterministic (like that for French, Italian, and other romance languages). The mapping from spoken to written, of course, is not deterministic at all, which you can verify by looking at how illiterate spanish-speakers try to write.
    - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
      Curiously, Polish is apparently spelled phonetically. Know the sound of the letters, you can read out a Polish newspaper and sound pretty much like a native speaker.
      - HappySweeney 7y ago
        Same with Hungarian (Magyar). Spelling is over by grade 2.
gpderetta 7y ago
I actually agree wholeheartedly. My 5 year old is learning to read and write in English; his spoken English is quite good (his pronunciation is way better than mine of course), but I'm at loss of how to teach him properly to map the written to the spoken word (and the reverse mapping is even harder); he seems to be learning fine anyway.

morningseagulls 7y ago

>That is, written English is a sane language, and spoken English is a sane language as well. What's your definition of "sane" here? >The problem is that they are two unrelated languages Sounds like Chinese/Mandarin to me. :)

mwyah 7y ago

I disagree with spoken English being a sane language. I have yet to find a deterministic way of knowing how to pronounce a word I haven't heard before. I can make up a word in Spanish and I know everybody will pronounce it the same way.

enriquto 7y ago
> I disagree with spoken English being a sane language. I have yet to find a deterministic way of knowing how to pronounce a word I haven't heard before. I do not understand what do you mean here. In spoken English, the only way to know about one word is by having heard it, so you know how it is pronounced. Illiterate people can speak perfectly correct English.
- pbhjpbhj 7y ago
  But literate people can't speak all the words they know in an agreed way. It's like the whole "how do you pronounce Linux" thing. Then you move, and local people (in UK, say) pronounce the word differently (eg bath, heard).
- mwyah 7y ago
  That is exactly my point. If you've never heard a word you can never know how it's pronounced. That's not the case with Spanish where I can make up a word and everybody will pronounce it (almost) the same way.
  - enriquto 7y ago
    This is not exactly true. There are some fundamental differences between spanish dialects. For example, "yo", "calle", are pronounced in an unrecognizable way between Argentina and Spain. But I agree that the mapping from written to spoken spanish is mostly deterministic (like that for French, Italian, and other romance languages). The mapping from spoken to written, of course, is not deterministic at all, which you can verify by looking at how illiterate spanish-speakers try to write.
  - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
    Curiously, Polish is apparently spelled phonetically. Know the sound of the letters, you can read out a Polish newspaper and sound pretty much like a native speaker.
    - HappySweeney 7y ago
      Same with Hungarian (Magyar). Spelling is over by grade 2.

gpderetta 7y ago

I actually agree wholeheartedly. My 5 year old is learning to read and write in English; his spoken English is quite good (his pronunciation is way better than mine of course), but I'm at loss of how to teach him properly to map the written to the spoken word (and the reverse mapping is even harder); he seems to be learning fine anyway.