Linguist perspective here, albeit not specialized on this area in particular, it that artificial languages have a hard time becoming a naturally used language, I would think because of the lack of incentive, if no international relevant force makes an effort to make it so, you are asking people with an already constrained time and energy to do are very hard and time consuming thing that is learning a language, with the hope that maybe someday it will be useful. Not to mention that natural languages have cultural meaning which may connect people with their own culture or cultures they have affinity for and that can be another source of motivation which artificial languages sometimes lack. So I found the idea about making this language a somewhat nation neutral natural language is nice, but somewhat wishful without big changes in how international relations works. Not least of because whitout a generalized contact with different locations that speak certain artificial languages become prone to heavy regional changes often denying their main appeal that is general inter comprehensability of different cultures.
Esperanto is not a useful language for communicating with just about anyone anywhere, no, but Esperanto certainly is a useful language for finding and connecting with people or even entire families who strongly value international peace and cooperation, and I honestly think that those people and the art and fun they create together are really reason enough to learn Esperanto.
Otherwise this comment gets into the question of desubismo vs desuprismo which Zamenhof himself talked about. The matter of Esperanto potentially developing mutually unintelligible regional variations, on the other hand... I really don't think this would be a problem.
Sent from Mdewakanton Dakota lands / Sept. 29 1837
Yeah that purpose is awesome, my issues are to the idea of making it a common language, every thing I said here on afterwards is related to that idea, because at first I've read that you DID think it was a good language to talk to anyone anywhere, not the contrary, so here is the expanded version of why I don't believed the folks(you mentioned their name but I do not recall) that want Esperanto to be a common language will not succeed: It seems a bit idealistic to me, because there is a very small amount of speakers, and that means a very small incentive to learning it, if you are not interested in learning it as a hobby, outside of the hobbylike allure there is very little logic to when deciding to learn one and only one second language, to pick Esperanto, as many other languages might offer carrer opportunities, travel opportunities and much more, Esperanto does not. That's not to say Esperanto is a bad language or that does not have upsides, but assuming people only have space for learning one other language it's rarely gonna be Esperanto. And if you cross this with the data of how many people world wide get to learn a language that's not spoken where or near to where they live, it puts the idea of Esperanto or any artificial language to be a common language. As things are set up the most culturally and economically powerful county kinda makes it's language the common one, because it materially benefits people to learn it. So until there is an agreement to collectively set a non national language to be the world standard and build it with support and incentive of international proportions, artificial languages will never become a common language, it's much too much effort to much too little gain, for much too long to justify the individual energy spent on learning it. At least it's how I see it. It's an awesome hobby with a lot of upside indeed, but just not practical enough for most people
Linguist perspective here, albeit not specialized on this area in particular, it that artificial languages have a hard time becoming a naturally used language, I would think because of the lack of incentive, if no international relevant force makes an effort to make it so, you are asking people with an already constrained time and energy to do are very hard and time consuming thing that is learning a language, with the hope that maybe someday it will be useful. Not to mention that natural languages have cultural meaning which may connect people with their own culture or cultures they have affinity for and that can be another source of motivation which artificial languages sometimes lack. So I found the idea about making this language a somewhat nation neutral natural language is nice, but somewhat wishful without big changes in how international relations works. Not least of because whitout a generalized contact with different locations that speak certain artificial languages become prone to heavy regional changes often denying their main appeal that is general inter comprehensability of different cultures.
Esperanto is not a useful language for communicating with just about anyone anywhere, no, but Esperanto certainly is a useful language for finding and connecting with people or even entire families who strongly value international peace and cooperation, and I honestly think that those people and the art and fun they create together are really reason enough to learn Esperanto.
Otherwise this comment gets into the question of desubismo vs desuprismo which Zamenhof himself talked about. The matter of Esperanto potentially developing mutually unintelligible regional variations, on the other hand... I really don't think this would be a problem.
Sent from Mdewakanton Dakota lands / Sept. 29 1837
Treaty with the Sioux of September 29th, 1837
"We Will Talk of Nothing Else": Dakota Interpretations of the Treaty of 1837
Yeah that purpose is awesome, my issues are to the idea of making it a common language, every thing I said here on afterwards is related to that idea, because at first I've read that you DID think it was a good language to talk to anyone anywhere, not the contrary, so here is the expanded version of why I don't believed the folks(you mentioned their name but I do not recall) that want Esperanto to be a common language will not succeed: It seems a bit idealistic to me, because there is a very small amount of speakers, and that means a very small incentive to learning it, if you are not interested in learning it as a hobby, outside of the hobbylike allure there is very little logic to when deciding to learn one and only one second language, to pick Esperanto, as many other languages might offer carrer opportunities, travel opportunities and much more, Esperanto does not. That's not to say Esperanto is a bad language or that does not have upsides, but assuming people only have space for learning one other language it's rarely gonna be Esperanto. And if you cross this with the data of how many people world wide get to learn a language that's not spoken where or near to where they live, it puts the idea of Esperanto or any artificial language to be a common language. As things are set up the most culturally and economically powerful county kinda makes it's language the common one, because it materially benefits people to learn it. So until there is an agreement to collectively set a non national language to be the world standard and build it with support and incentive of international proportions, artificial languages will never become a common language, it's much too much effort to much too little gain, for much too long to justify the individual energy spent on learning it. At least it's how I see it. It's an awesome hobby with a lot of upside indeed, but just not practical enough for most people