5 ms·

I wonder if Hebrew scores so high because most words leave out the vowels. There are technically annotations on the consonants about which vowel should be prono

by WJW 5y ago

I wonder if Hebrew scores so high because most words leave out the vowels. There are technically annotations on the consonants about which vowel should be pronounced, but outside primary school and language schools for immigrants nobody seems to use them. Arabic has a similar setup, I'm not familiar with Gujaranti but I wouldn't be surprised if it turns out to have a very similar setup.

samatman 5y ago
glsh cld wn ths cntst hndly if we chs crflly nd use th occsnl matrs lctinis
- linux2647 5y ago
  “English could win this contest handily if we chose carefully and use the occasional …”?
  - wolfgang42 5y ago
    My guess is “amateurish elocutionist” but I needed computer assistance: $ for t in matrs lctinis; do echo; grep '.*'$(echo $t | sed 's/./&.*/g') /usr/share/dict/words | grep -Ev "s$"; done Amaterasu amateurish amateurism humanitarianism masterstroke materialism materialist materialistic materialistically maturest metatarsal miniaturist misanthropist elocutionist For my own amusement, I also came up with another grammatically plausible “parsimonious” (inserting the fewest extra letters) interpretation: > Galosh-clad win this contest handily if we chase carefully and use the occasional mantras, elocutionist!
    - sarabande 5y ago
      This is great! As someone who immediately recognized it as 'mater lectionis' I wondered how someone unfamiliar with this aspect of Hebrew would attempt to solve the puzzle.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - tomsmeding 5y ago
    Probably "matres lectionis": https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mater_lectionis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mater_lectionis (probably should have been "mater lectionis" (mtr lctinis?) given the rest of the sentencr ;) ) I didn't know this term existed, but the letters felt like Latin to me. Presumably the point is to use some well-chosen vowels where they are necessary for disambiguation.
    - samatman 5y ago
      Just so, and this is the reason the trick works so well in Hebrew: aleph, vav, yod, and ayin, serve as vowels in most contexts where such are needed.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
fortran77 5y ago
Hebrew also omits the verb "to be". It is assumed in most cases, and tenses and possessives are denoted in suffixes. Prepositions become prefixes, as does the word "the." So "I am happy" is אני שמח (Ani Sameach lit. "I Happy") And "The book is in the house" is הספר נמצא בבית HaSefer (the book) Nimtza (is avaiable) B'Bayet (in [the] house). Six words become three. (Hebrew was my second language, after Yiddish. Grew up in Brooklyn, and learned "English" on the streets.)
- messe 5y ago
  > Six words become three. Sure, but should you be counting words or morphemes as a measure of complexity?
- kbrannigan 5y ago
  So English was your third language? That's fascinating
- newsbinator 5y ago
  Well ה (the) and ב (in/at) might be comparable "words" too, so more like 6 words become 5.
- ncpa-cpl 5y ago
  Interesting. Spanish on the other hand is very flexible with ommiting the subject. So "I am happy" would become "(Yo) estoy feliz" or (I) am happy.
golemiprague 5y ago
thematrixturtle 5y ago
Most Indian scripts including but not limited to Gujarati are syllabaries: each letter has a default vowel (a) and the shape is altered in systematic ways to indicate a different vowel.

by WJW 5y ago

samatman 5y ago

glsh cld wn ths cntst hndly if we chs crflly nd use th occsnl matrs lctinis

linux2647 5y ago
“English could win this contest handily if we chose carefully and use the occasional …”?
- wolfgang42 5y ago
  My guess is “amateurish elocutionist” but I needed computer assistance: $ for t in matrs lctinis; do echo; grep '.*'$(echo $t | sed 's/./&.*/g') /usr/share/dict/words | grep -Ev "s$"; done Amaterasu amateurish amateurism humanitarianism masterstroke materialism materialist materialistic materialistically maturest metatarsal miniaturist misanthropist elocutionist For my own amusement, I also came up with another grammatically plausible “parsimonious” (inserting the fewest extra letters) interpretation: > Galosh-clad win this contest handily if we chase carefully and use the occasional mantras, elocutionist!
  - sarabande 5y ago
    This is great! As someone who immediately recognized it as 'mater lectionis' I wondered how someone unfamiliar with this aspect of Hebrew would attempt to solve the puzzle.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- tomsmeding 5y ago
  Probably "matres lectionis": https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mater_lectionis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mater_lectionis (probably should have been "mater lectionis" (mtr lctinis?) given the rest of the sentencr ;) ) I didn't know this term existed, but the letters felt like Latin to me. Presumably the point is to use some well-chosen vowels where they are necessary for disambiguation.
  - samatman 5y ago
    Just so, and this is the reason the trick works so well in Hebrew: aleph, vav, yod, and ayin, serve as vowels in most contexts where such are needed.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

fortran77 5y ago

Hebrew also omits the verb "to be". It is assumed in most cases, and tenses and possessives are denoted in suffixes. Prepositions become prefixes, as does the word "the." So "I am happy" is אני שמח (Ani Sameach lit. "I Happy") And "The book is in the house" is הספר נמצא בבית HaSefer (the book) Nimtza (is avaiable) B'Bayet (in [the] house). Six words become three. (Hebrew was my second language, after Yiddish. Grew up in Brooklyn, and learned "English" on the streets.)

messe 5y ago
> Six words become three. Sure, but should you be counting words or morphemes as a measure of complexity?
kbrannigan 5y ago
So English was your third language? That's fascinating
newsbinator 5y ago
Well ה (the) and ב (in/at) might be comparable "words" too, so more like 6 words become 5.
ncpa-cpl 5y ago
Interesting. Spanish on the other hand is very flexible with ommiting the subject. So "I am happy" would become "(Yo) estoy feliz" or (I) am happy.

golemiprague 5y ago

thematrixturtle 5y ago

Most Indian scripts including but not limited to Gujarati are syllabaries: each letter has a default vowel (a) and the shape is altered in systematic ways to indicate a different vowel.