Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 exptools 1/6/84; site ihuxq.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxj!ihnp4!ihuxq!ken From: ken@ihuxq.UUCP (ken perlow) Newsgroups: net.nlang Subject: Re: The physical laws of spelling reform Message-ID: <1322@ihuxq.UUCP> Date: Thu, 8-Nov-84 20:25:40 EST Article-I.D.: ihuxq.1322 Posted: Thu Nov 8 20:25:40 1984 Date-Received: Sat, 10-Nov-84 07:37:22 EST References: <1310@ihuxq.UUCP>, <2718@ncsu.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, IL Lines: 46 -- [I said] > If it's worth modifying English spelling simply because it seems hard, > why stop there? There's lots of subjects that really are hard. Take > math, for instance. We could start with PI=3.14159... --which is awfully > tricky--and simplify it to 3.14, or maybe an even 3. [Jon Mauney] >> And since redefining pi causes trouble, we can expect similar problems >> with changing the spelling of words. Right. You can do better than that. Sure, I was being cute (well, trying), and maybe with the new, macho, every-man-for-himself-(sorry, gals) mentality so infectious these days, there's nothing to worry about any more. Back in the halcyon days of wimpish New Deal liberalism, we cared so much about equal opportunity that we revised standards rather than admit to individual differences. Now, well, just tell the little buggers to pray harder. > Discourage literacy? Hey, it's hard enough to read Shakespeare as it > is, what with all those Elizabethan in-jokes, but it's clear at least > what the words themselves are. Get a new generation addicted to > "nu-spel" and you can kiss literature goodbye. >> OK, Mister Smarty-Pants Communist, Mister Wheelchair General, >> how much of the world's great literature have YOU read its original >> form? Tolstoy? Kafka? Homer? Virgil? Let's face it, ever since the >> Bible was translated into the vernacular things have been going downhill. >> And by the way, it is not at all clear what some of Shakespeare's words >> mean. So what does it matter how those words are spelled? >> Jon Mauney, mcnc!ncsu!mauney Sorry, I meant *ENGLISH* literature--I thought that would be obvious. Of course it's not always clear what Shakespeare's words mean--that's what I said--but it *IS* clear what the words *ARE*. They are at least pronounceable, and can be looked up by the inquiring student. Until nu-spel, anyway. Kids raised on that pap may find real English as incomprehensible as Aramaic. So take *THAT* Mr. John Q. Smith from Anytown, USA! -- *** *** JE MAINTIENDRAI ***** ***** ****** ****** 08 Nov 84 [18 Brumaire An CXCIII] ken perlow ***** ***** (312)979-7188 ** ** ** ** ..ihnp4!iwsl8!ken *** ***