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I don't get this. No one is going to ever speak this language except the creator to himself. If it's not going to be spoken, why limit yourself to representatio

I don't get this. No one is going to ever speak this language except the creator to himself. If it's not going to be spoken, why limit yourself to representations that can be made in air by normal human beings? If it's not ever spoken, then there are better methods of encoding information.

ijlx 5y ago
Well, for someone interested in languages conlanging can just be fun! I don't think most people are under the impression that their language will be popular. It also serves as an interesting "what-if," i.e. what would a language look like if it were designed from the ground up to be as logical as possible. No idea if this is interesting to the average person, but it is to me. However (and I'm not saying this is or will be the case with Ithkuil) there are several constructed languages that do indeed have sizeable communities (the internet has made this easier): esperanto, toki pona, lojban, even klingon has multiple speakers.
fouc 5y ago
I don't know about Ithkuil specifically, but I know that lojban is a constructed language that has a small community around it that actively write/speak it amongst each other. But regardless, the whole exercise of creating a new language from scratch is definitely informative.
- okareaman 5y ago
  I definitely agree. I phrased my comment incorrectly so it sounds like I am being critical, when I was actually thinking of something else.
mkotowski 5y ago
> […] why limit yourself to representations that can be made in air by normal human beings? For a constructed language using non-human forms of expression, you can check out Rikchik language, created by Denis M Moskowitz [0]. > No one is going to ever speak this language except the creator to himself. Well, it’s a hobby and an art form. Do you ask someone drawing still life compositions, why he/she is doing this, when photography is a thing? Besides, people DO use the language in this particular example, although more as an interesting pastime activity than a regular language. Granted, constructing languages makes an extremely niche hobby. Still, without it there probably wouldn’t be The Lord of the Rings (for Tolkien’s opinion on language creation, check [1]). There are still people learning Klingon, Lojban, toki pona, Dothraki, and so on. Esperanto and modern Hebrew (to some extent) are also more practical examples of this art. For a more elaborate insight into this hobby, there is the book “In the Land of Invented Languages” by Arika Okrent. [0]: https://www.suberic.net/~dmm/rikchik/rikchik.html https://www.suberic.net/~dmm/rikchik/rikchik.html [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Secret_Vice https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Secret_Vice
- okareaman 5y ago
  > Well, it’s a hobby and an art form Understood. I think it's great. I was leading up to my question of why restrict yourself to the limits of spoken language when it will never be used for spoken communication. If communication efficiency is the goal then come up with a language that can express every human thought and emotion in the least amount of bits. Thanks for the links.
  - mkotowski 5y ago
    Well, the idea was to create the most efficient and compact language for humans to use. Having a species with 3000 vocal chords and 30 arms for a bonus sign language elements would be easier to work with, but wouldn’t be usable by humans. And as in my previous comment, languages for non-humanoid species do exists if someone prefers to go in that direction. Similarly, toki pona was designed to contain only the most popular phonemes among human languages, because it was designed with humans in mind. Edit: I should stop starting the comments with “well”, shouldn’t I? :P Edit 2: The “spoken” aspect can be similar to why we use CSV and TSV file formats, while even ASCII had from the beginning assigned characters for record delimiter — humans grasp easier thinks they can see/hear.
Smaug123 5y ago
It expands the mind! Note that Ithkuil III does kind of have the unpronounceable quality - I've heard it described as sounding like a "hacking cough". But the actual structure of the language is fascinating, and brings a lot of stuff about English into focus. English loves making new words, and the resulting combinatorial explosion makes various concepts unrepresentable. Ithkuil has very few words, but allows you to attach enormous amounts of grammar to them to adjust their meaning coarsely or finely. For an example of something I simply hadn't considered before, and which Ithkuil expanded my mind to encompass: it even has a grammatical way to indicate a statement that is true because it has just been stated. Search term: the "declarative" illocution. Just as you can adjust a statement using grammar to turn it into a question - i.e. a statement with neutral truth value pending a reply - you can turn it into a "declaration" (no real English equivalent exists) - i.e. a statement with a positive truth value pending the listeners' acceptance. Example: "this court is now in session".

ijlx 5y ago

Well, for someone interested in languages conlanging can just be fun! I don't think most people are under the impression that their language will be popular. It also serves as an interesting "what-if," i.e. what would a language look like if it were designed from the ground up to be as logical as possible. No idea if this is interesting to the average person, but it is to me. However (and I'm not saying this is or will be the case with Ithkuil) there are several constructed languages that do indeed have sizeable communities (the internet has made this easier): esperanto, toki pona, lojban, even klingon has multiple speakers.

fouc 5y ago

I don't know about Ithkuil specifically, but I know that lojban is a constructed language that has a small community around it that actively write/speak it amongst each other. But regardless, the whole exercise of creating a new language from scratch is definitely informative.

okareaman 5y ago
I definitely agree. I phrased my comment incorrectly so it sounds like I am being critical, when I was actually thinking of something else.

mkotowski 5y ago

> […] why limit yourself to representations that can be made in air by normal human beings? For a constructed language using non-human forms of expression, you can check out Rikchik language, created by Denis M Moskowitz [0]. > No one is going to ever speak this language except the creator to himself. Well, it’s a hobby and an art form. Do you ask someone drawing still life compositions, why he/she is doing this, when photography is a thing? Besides, people DO use the language in this particular example, although more as an interesting pastime activity than a regular language. Granted, constructing languages makes an extremely niche hobby. Still, without it there probably wouldn’t be The Lord of the Rings (for Tolkien’s opinion on language creation, check [1]). There are still people learning Klingon, Lojban, toki pona, Dothraki, and so on. Esperanto and modern Hebrew (to some extent) are also more practical examples of this art. For a more elaborate insight into this hobby, there is the book “In the Land of Invented Languages” by Arika Okrent. [0]: https://www.suberic.net/~dmm/rikchik/rikchik.html https://www.suberic.net/~dmm/rikchik/rikchik.html [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Secret_Vice https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Secret_Vice

okareaman 5y ago
> Well, it’s a hobby and an art form Understood. I think it's great. I was leading up to my question of why restrict yourself to the limits of spoken language when it will never be used for spoken communication. If communication efficiency is the goal then come up with a language that can express every human thought and emotion in the least amount of bits. Thanks for the links.
- mkotowski 5y ago
  Well, the idea was to create the most efficient and compact language for humans to use. Having a species with 3000 vocal chords and 30 arms for a bonus sign language elements would be easier to work with, but wouldn’t be usable by humans. And as in my previous comment, languages for non-humanoid species do exists if someone prefers to go in that direction. Similarly, toki pona was designed to contain only the most popular phonemes among human languages, because it was designed with humans in mind. Edit: I should stop starting the comments with “well”, shouldn’t I? :P Edit 2: The “spoken” aspect can be similar to why we use CSV and TSV file formats, while even ASCII had from the beginning assigned characters for record delimiter — humans grasp easier thinks they can see/hear.

Smaug123 5y ago

It expands the mind! Note that Ithkuil III does kind of have the unpronounceable quality - I've heard it described as sounding like a "hacking cough". But the actual structure of the language is fascinating, and brings a lot of stuff about English into focus. English loves making new words, and the resulting combinatorial explosion makes various concepts unrepresentable. Ithkuil has very few words, but allows you to attach enormous amounts of grammar to them to adjust their meaning coarsely or finely. For an example of something I simply hadn't considered before, and which Ithkuil expanded my mind to encompass: it even has a grammatical way to indicate a statement that is true because it has just been stated. Search term: the "declarative" illocution. Just as you can adjust a statement using grammar to turn it into a question - i.e. a statement with neutral truth value pending a reply - you can turn it into a "declaration" (no real English equivalent exists) - i.e. a statement with a positive truth value pending the listeners' acceptance. Example: "this court is now in session".