Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site spar.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!oliveb!Glacier!decwrl!spar!ellis From: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis) Newsgroups: net.nlang Subject: Making Esperanto universal.. Message-ID: <636@spar.UUCP> Date: Sat, 2-Nov-85 21:28:23 EST Article-I.D.: spar.636 Posted: Sat Nov 2 21:28:23 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 4-Nov-85 01:35:11 EST References: <30@druny.UUCP> Reply-To: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis) Organization: Schlumberger Palo Alto Research, CA Lines: 49 Keywords: understanding > It is used a lot in Europe and is gaining strength in the far east > and the third world. (200,000 Chinese are taking courses now!) >.. > The time you spend learning it will also help you learn other > romance languages. >-Neal McBurnett Esperanto is indeed a most transparent language -- with little more than a few fairly natural rules requiring less than 10 minutes' inspection, and a basic knowledge of the international Graeco-Latin root stock, one can automatically read Esperanto with remarkably few excursions to the dictionary. If all those Chinese speakers are learning esperanto, it would make sense to use esperanto as a medium for encouraging east-west understanding. Is there anyone `in charge' of the language? If so, would it be possible to encourage them to add a major stock of Chinese and Japanese stems as well, so that it would become an enterprise which drew together all the fertility of this planet? The Graeco-Latin core of Esperanto is a total win, considering how universally it is used in all scientific, artistic, and business circles. Adding noneuropean terms would seem to seal Esperanto's promise to become the international language this planet needs so badly. Several words I'd especially like to see (WG=Wade Giles, P=Pinyin, A=ancient Chinese, J=Japanese): la reno = Humanism (human) (WG jen, P ren, A zen) la dao = the Tao (WG tao, P dao, A dau, J do) la deo = Virtue (WG te, P de) or la tako = " (A tak, J toko) la tjeno = Cosmos (heavens) (WG t'ien, P tien, A tien, J ten) lau^a = venerable, ancient (WG,P lao, A lau) la kau^azo = frog (J kawazu <= ?? (WG ko, P go, A kap; WGP hia, A gha, J ka; WGP wa, A ua, J a; WG kuo, Pguo, A kwak)) Just a suggestion.. "Others are so bright and intelligent" -michael