The Unnecessary Complexity of the English Language
LjSpike
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I'm just going to list a few of the bits of English I dislike the most, the rest of you can join in too!
1) Extra as a word vs. a prefix - Getting on an extra ordinary train I suspect would be a pretty lame thing to tell someone about, but an extraordinary train, well that'd be a story. Perhaps it was a train that was on time for once! This theme carries through with other examples such as extra terrestrial, extraterrestrial.
2) This one cropped up recently. "then" and "than". They seem to be interchanged so unusually and follow very little pattern. I'm not sure fully the difference in use they actually have (aside from the fact you don't use "than" to show the order of events ever).
3) "too" and "to". I get that the number "2" is written "two", however "too" and "to" seem to mean the same thing? It appears to be something about if its at the end of a sentence. I just use "to" all the time as its easier to just use one I find.
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There's a long history of attempts at language and spelling reform of the kind you're describing -- you may have just been born in the wrong century. You can learn about them here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-l ... ing_reform
One of the many advocates for spelling reform was Melville Dewey, the father of the Dewey Decimal System, who for a while was spelling his own name Melvil Dui.
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There Are Four Lights!
I actually wrote a language rant a while ago. Here is what applies to English:
Capitalisation
Why does capitalisation even exist? I mean, sure it starts a sentence in many languages, but there are perfectly good alphabetic languages that don't use capitalisation for the most part! How is a language benefitting from capitilisation anyway?
Verb conjugation
I swim. You swim. He swims. Like capitilisation, how does subject verb agreement benefit a language in any way? Why can't we just keep the verb in the infinitive? I think that having a pronoun before the verb should be enough to figure out who or what is doing the action.
Also, English is spelled with an alphabet, but it is not phonetic. Well, doesn't that defeat the whole purpose of an alphabet?
Oh well, nobody can control language.
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Life ... that's what leaves the mess. Mad people everywhere.
1) Extra as a word vs. a prefix - Getting on an extra ordinary train I suspect would be a pretty lame thing to tell someone about, but an extraordinary train, well that'd be a story. Perhaps it was a train that was on time for once! This theme carries through with other examples such as extra terrestrial, extraterrestrial.
2) This one cropped up recently. "then" and "than". They seem to be interchanged so unusually and follow very little pattern. I'm not sure fully the difference in use they actually have (aside from the fact you don't use "than" to show the order of events ever).
3) "too" and "to". I get that the number "2" is written "two", however "too" and "to" seem to mean the same thing? It appears to be something about if its at the end of a sentence. I just use "to" all the time as its easier to just use one I find.
The difference between "then" and "than" is quite clear. "then" is an adverb or conjunction used for ordering events. For example: "I will go to the movies, then I will go shopping." It can also be used like "therefore" to convey a cause-effect relationship. For example: "If I have enough money, then I will buy a new skateboard." "Than" is simply used for comparing the value of two things. For example: "Bob is taller than Sue."
"to" and "too" are very different. "to" is a preposition describing direction toward something. For example: "I will send the letter to Mike." "too" can have two different meanings. In the first case, it means "also". "I like cake, but I like pie, too." "Can I go, too?" In the second case, it is an adverb meaning "in excess". For example: "That laptop costs too much money."
I am a strong supporter of spelling reform, particularly in educational/ESL contexts. English is far more complicated to learn than other languages- they're often not 100% standardised but they're far more so than English.
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LjSpike
Pileated woodpecker
![User avatar](./download/file.php?avatar=124000_1486053341.jpg)
Joined: 23 Dec 2016
Age: 24
Gender: Male
Posts: 188
Location: About 55° N, 3° W
Im hoping actually myself to learn japanese. Its quite a nice sounding language and seems to follow quite strong rules, and the use of Ideograms I quite like.
_________________
Why not visit my blog over here!
-------------------
RDOS Aspie Quiz
Neurodiverse (Aspie) score: 162 of 200
Neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 52 of 200
LINK: http://www.rdos.net/eng/poly10a.php?p1= ... =66&p10=74
-------------------
Score breakdown for RAADS-R
Total: 185.0 | Language: 17.0 | Social Relatedness: 90.0 | Sensory/Motor 45.0 | Circumscribed Interests: 33.0
LINK: http://www.aspietests.org/raads/questions.php
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