PlaneShift
Gameplay => General Discussion => Topic started by: buddha on February 16, 2005, 01:39:03 am
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Perhaps there should be a language forum Some people are having difficulty getting around. We could announce what languages we speak to help out the new people.
Not sure if it will be picked up on, but it could be handy to know who speaks what.
Mulla : english native, un poco espanol, eine bischen deustch
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The official language of PS is english. If you\'re going to help people get into PS in their native languages, fine, but I\'m totally against the separation based on language that will inevitably happen if people can have the convenience of using their native language, instead of having to practice english. This separation will hamper RP, and be bad for a general mindset that might even culminate in racism towards RL people, that will manifest at least in guilds only accepting people who come from certain language areas, which would not even have any RP value. Furthermore, in todays world, being able to communicate in the english language is almost a requirement, so why not take the opportunity to learn it while doing something fun, where it doesn\'t matter if you make mistakes, than having to do so later under way less pleasant circumstances?
And before you accuse me of not knowing what it is like to be non-native english speaking: I am not natively english speaking, but AMOF, I don\'t see this matter in any way, and will decline to use my native language in PS.
In fact, I think it sucks very badly to have all these non-english content on the internet. It adds to redundancy, and the information I need might simply be written in any of the multiple languages I don\'t understand. If everyone would simply use english if by any means possible, the purpose of the internet, which is communicating information to the broadest base of people possible, would be achieved way better.
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I couldn\'t have said it better Saytra.
I\'ve even seen a little of this in-game already. People were RPing in the tavern, and they weren\'t letting anyone wield swords while in the tavern, which I think is appropriate. One person wouldn\'t remove his sword or even answer back because he couldn\'t speak English. It kinda ruined the atmosphere...
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Eh? If someone is having trouble with the game. /tell them and help em. Or let them go to help channel and type some random numbers. The advisors will pick up on it and redirect him :D No. seriously. English only outside of /tell
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Originally posted by Robinmagus
English only outside of /tell
Non-english is OK to overcome problems with the game, i.e., OOC things, but not for IC communication.
That\'s what I meant by saying:
Originally posted by Seytra
If you\'re going to help people get into PS in their native languages, fine
: I\'m not fond of it, but if it is the only way, then so be it.
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Wow, that seems incredibly narrow minded to me. I\'m sorry if the world isn\'t homogenous enough for you. Maybe we should enforce a blonde-haired blue eyed requirement as well?
These forums are seeming more and more xenophobic lately. I come from a place that is extremely diverse and I\'ve learned to enjoy being around people who are different from me. On my street in real life, there are people who only speak Thai or Spanish or (I think) Fillipino. We smile and wave and go to the same restaurants. It doesn\'t ruin the atmosphere for me. I live in a place where the national language is English, but my neighbourhood hardly has any English signs or businesses.
My point is, let\'s try to enjoy the fact that we get to interact with people from all over the world. Part of that means accomodating some language barriers, and I\'d like to help in that regard. I like diversity, even if it does step on your game.
EDIT: Seytra, your signature becomes terribly ironic when combined with your first post. Re-examine the phrase \"intellectual poverty\".
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Originally posted by Robinmagus
English only outside of /tell
This is wrong, wrong, wrong. English only in /shout and the Help channel. You may use any language you want in /say, /guild, /group, and /tell.
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The official language of PS is english. If you\'re going to help people get into PS in their native languages, fine, but I\'m totally against the separation based on language that will inevitably happen if people can have the convenience of using their native language, instead of having to practice english. This separation will hamper RP, and be bad for a general mindset that might even culminate in racism towards RL people, that will manifest at least in guilds only accepting people who come from certain language areas, which would not even have any RP value. Furthermore, in todays world, being able to communicate in the english language is almost a requirement, so why not take the opportunity to learn it while doing something fun, where it doesn\'t matter if you make mistakes, than having to do so later under way less pleasant circumstances?
And before you accuse me of not knowing what it is like to be non-native english speaking: I am not natively english speaking, but AMOF, I don\'t see this matter in any way, and will decline to use my native language in PS.
In fact, I think it sucks very badly to have all these non-english content on the internet. It adds to redundancy, and the information I need might simply be written in any of the multiple languages I don\'t understand. If everyone would simply use english if by any means possible, the purpose of the internet, which is communicating information to the broadest base of people possible, would be achieved way better.
That has got to be the most narrow minded rant ive ever heard. Ok, the offical language of PS is english, so that language should be used. But how can you expect everyone on the internet to use english? Oh, boo hoo you cant read some of the content? Oh, you must feel so left out being the majority of users who can read most things on the internet. Why in gods name should everyone be forced to speak english on the inernet? To make it easier for us? WTF???? Its called tolerance. Diversity. I only speak english, but i understand how bad it is as a language to learn properly. Linguistically english is one of the worst languages around with the amount of euphemisms, sayings, metaphors etc... plus the largely non-existent spelling rules (well for me :P) and the ridiculously felixble grammer system.... Im very happy i was born and english speaker because it is the language out of all in the world i would least like to have to learn. I would support a global language on the internet, but only if it wasnt english, so it would be easy to learn. Something like Korean, except more european. (latin perhaps? lol). I say korean because its a very structured, scientific language- everything can be said pretty much one or two ways, and you know exactly what everything means. Plus it is 100% phonetically correct- what you see written is exactly how you pronounce it, every time. If we had a global language, it surely would need to be a good language.
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:tup: Diversity
let me put it this way... I didnt spend the last four years of high scholl learning french for nothing...
not only this but i atleast consider picking up bits and peices of languages through experience fun...for example im only fluent in english and to an extent in french however i have over the years picked up rudiments of german russian latin greek and spanish... and i enjoyed the experience as such i beleive the use of multiple languages in a game should not only be allowed but encouraged it adds to the realism of the game and lets you learn how to say \"my name is \" in yet another language
sorry if i sound like im ranting
regards
-Tarach
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Sorry here, but I\'m gonna agree with Seytra. You come to America you don\'t speak english you gonna have a hard time. English is used widely in many countries, unlike most other languages which are kept in smaller regions, maybe one or two neighboring countries. I\'m so sorry if America\'s egotisical ass had to go and try to convert everyone to english, but thats the way it is, and our language no matter how hard it may claimed to be, or confusing, is a simple language at heart. You can\'t judge the language on the slang and non-correct terms made up and used everyday, even though I\'ve always wanted to make up a a word.
Anyway, I believe you the majority of PS users English is the native or a very well spoken language, so I think all people need to do is learn it and move on.
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Originally posted by Harkin
Sorry here, but I\'m gonna agree with Seytra. You come to America you don\'t speak english you gonna have a hard time.
planeshift.IT <--- .it = italy.. they arent coming to america... or even an american game XD plus i can indentify (for about 90% of the time) what i am listening to.. i might not understand it :/
I hope to learn a vast number of languages though :) probably gonna start with german and japanese (not only the 2 languages i like the best but also the 2 languages that have the coolest stuff on the internet in them) though i hope to at least learn to comprehend if not speak Mandarin, Korean and French (its possible.. each language you learn makes the next easier exponetialy, thats a proven fact) then perhaps Spanish..
Then i\'ll have the languages i want to learn and then the most spoken languaes that other multi-linguals can speak (so if i can speak their native language i can at least speak thier second hopefully :P )
Anyway it is narrow minded to expect everyone to learn english just for us.. i mean english is the most learned as it has the most technical terms (and therefore the best language for building learning and research) but we cant expect everybody to bend and learn it for us.. as i just stated i am more then willing to bend for others too...
Compromise is the ultimant solution for humanity :)
EDIT: also unlike what you think its the norm worldwide to at least speak two and then hopefully understand a third or fourth language... so crack a book get a tape and get learning! :D besides you can talk to your friends and your parents or anybody else wont know what the flip you are talking about now thats fun
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Originally posted by Foresteer
planeshift.IT <--- .it = italy.. they arent coming to america... or even an american game XD
Um, actually that\'s simply because Luca registered it as an italian domain quite a few years ago. It has nothing to do with what language the game uses. And in case you didn\'t know, quite a few of the developers are from America, so if you don\'t like American products, I suggest you dig a deep hole and jump down there, because that\'s as far as you\'ll ever get with such an attitude.
Anyway, you can talk whatever language you wish, be that russian, hebrew, german, african or whatever you wish, but NPCs will always talk english, and if you ever plan on using /shout or the help feature, it is english only. That\'s the only language rules, as Moogie already stated. And of course, these forums are also english only.
You people have to remember that PS is a free game, thus it is in the bottom of the food-chain. We\'ll of course recieve all those people who are too cheap to play P2P games, and a majority of those are also either unwilling to learn english, or unwilling to speak it, and that\'s just something you will all have to learn to live with. There\'s nothing you can do about it, and noone is going to start setting requirements on what languages you have to speak to play a game.
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Well, back to buddha\'s question : there\'s a forum and website in french - but I don\'t know about other languages. At some point during MB I seem to remember there was a project to make several websites \"officially\" related to PS in various languages like spanish, german, russian, etc... However to idea seems to have been dropped, but there will be a patch to translate the interface in french, and hopefully in other languages.
But I think it could be a good idea, just to help people get started, or to answer the troubleshooting questions. Specific, technical vocabulary (in this case computer-related or video games related) is the most difficult part of a foreign language to handle - it\'s not something you learn at school. But of course this would only be for people who _can_ speak english to a certain extend, but could feel most confortable using their mother tongue for technical of gameplay questions/problems.
As for the others, those who can\'t speak english at all, well there\'s nothing anyone can do, they\'ll just have to get over it since the esperanto thing didn\'t really work :P
But let\'s bless the use of english as an international language while we can, because soon, it won\'t be english anymore, but chinese. And that\'s a loooot more difficult to learn :D
(oh and Seytra, thanks for making my day with your hilarious post - and let\'s all boo the mean guys who\'re stubbornly unwilling to learn english. I mean it\'s not like you can\'t learn a whole language in 2 days, is it ? And I don\'t see why people would want to take this time to learn another language anyway... Tss how stupid they are)
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Speaking of websites and communities for non-English players, does anyone else find all the Zelphirien people are like this hidden, seperated community with almost no connection to the rest of us? I hate that. I don\'t want our community split because people don\'t want to mix and speak a common language.
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First, english is one of the easier languages to learn. Sure it doesn\'t have much rules, but it also doesn\'t have sex, \"bending\" (and numerical) modifications to nouns and verbs (sorry for the bad english :P). If you want something hard, learn hungarian or one of the chinese :P <-.
Secondly, the interface is easy to grasp, even if you don\'t understand the terms. I have no problem at all with it being translated, but would someone who doesn\'t understand the almost basic wordings of the interface be able to understand the complex game material? I very much doubt it. Given the roleplaying aim of ps, they couldn\'t contribute much to the atmosphere or gameplay.
So following my thread, they\'re isolated by default, unless they group with their like. But those groups are still isolated - take moogie\'s example.
For me, this isn\'t about xenophobia and narrowmindedness at all. I see english as the yliakum general language and all others as alien. So it would bother me if someone spoke slovenian or finnish in public, to some extent - I can tolerate aliens, but once there are too many, you move out etc (it\'s hard to live somewhere where there is no communication).
However, if someone spoke gobble, vodalian or some other language from the setting, that\'d be perfectly normal and acceptable.
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Moogie say :
because people don\'t want
I\'m not agree with the sentence \"we dont want\" because a lot of people can\'t speak and understand english language very well so a website in french or other language is very important for this player.
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Think of Hyplaa as a port city. Like port cities all over the world, you can\'t really control what\'s being spoken on the streets. This offends lots of people, but it\'s something you simply have to live with. Businesses (/help, NPCs) work in the mother tongue, mostly, but everywhere else it\'s catch as catch can.
I\'m glad some people agree with me, and I\'m disappointed (but I respect) by those who don\'t. However, I have to point this out: I started this thread simply to say \"Hey, I\'m willing to help Spanish and German speakers as best as I can.\" Then a few people essentially barged in and went off on what amounts to an anti-immigrant rant. Why did you bother? I didn\'t knock on your door. Are you so offended by the notion of multiculturalism that you just have to walk up to me on the street and say so? Let me go about my way! Leave me alone! I\'m just trying to help. You can sit in your linguistically homogenous cave all day and complain about \"those people\" but the rest of us are just trying to get along.
I deal with this type of xenophobia every day where I live. For your sake, just walk away. You are never going to prevent Spanish from being spoken in Hyplaa Plaza. If that offends you, start a \"White\'s Only\", ooops, I mean \"English Only\" tavern in Ojaveda.
Caym: William Shatner killed Esperantu. Blame him.
Moogie: you may be right because I don\'t think I\'ve ever come across a Zelphirien, but que sera sera.
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This is wrong, wrong, wrong. English only in /shout and the Help channel.
I think it\'s great that the shout channel is English only, but why the Help channel? Non-English speaking people will probably have a much greater need for help considering how they, other than the regular questions, might have questions regarding translations or things like that. Having a bilingual GM that can help with translations and give explanations to things, should allow non-English speaking players to integrate more quickly.
Now of course we couldn\'t expect all languages to be covered on the help channel, but the more the better right?
Let me know if I\'m completely wrong here...
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Originally posted by Willen Dragonlezard
[...] a lot of people can\'t speak and understand english language very well so a website in french or other language is very important for this player.
Does anyone realize that not everything on the internet is meant to tailor to everyone in the world?
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I feel like some people don\'t understand, english as a whole is an easy language, and due to my great knowledge of the english language it has become very easy for me to learn my second language of German, which in large is also an easy language to learn, but like every other language i get confused with the whole use of genderized objects :P
i dont care what people speak or how they speak it, but in large I feel in this game people should at least try english as the main language, as a good learning experience and also the ability to create a community as a whole without any language barriers
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As an example I present Jayose. Even as native speaker, I found it hard to get the right combination of words for him. (They may have changed this). So when a Spanish speaker is trying to say \"can I have to scroll?\" and says instead \"gives me the scroll\" or something to that effect they will be frustrated.
In real life I have had people walk up to me and ask me to translate. Why not in PS? Jayose doesn\'t understand accents very well, I happen to. Think of being an American listening to a Cockney, sometimes they are hard to follow, even though they are speaking English. If they come find Mulla and ask \"could you help me\" I can try. I don\'t see that as destructive to the game experience at all. In fact, I like practicing my spanish skills!
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OK, I\'ve been accused of being narrow-minded three times if my count is correct. Also, I was misinterpreted and also I don\'t see any conflicts in my sig and any of my posts, especially not my first one (be it on ths forum or on this thread).
So I\'ll start off with \"xenophobia\" and \"multiculturalism\" vs. \"official languages\". The way I see it, if anyone moves to a place that has another language than they do, they are obliged to learn the language of that place, and use it. Why? Simple: because otherwise they will never be able to integrate. Don\'t confust \"integration\" with \"everyone being equal\", because they\'re by far not the same.
Refusing to learn / use the language of the place leads to parallel societies, something which is extremely bad, as any expert on culture and society can tell you. I\'m not \"anti immigrant\", as I think exactly the same way about people from my country who move elsewhere. I\'m \"anti separatism\", and that wholeheartedly, and therefore agree 100% with Moogie on the Zelphirien case (and all the similar ones). And no, I don\'t want to make everyone be equal. IMO, everybody is entitled to their own beliefs and ways of life, but only to the extent to which it doesn\'t harm integration, i.e., participating in the community.
Example: If you wish to paint your rooms with catholic symbols, and also wear them all time, then fine. If you, however, only talk to catholic people, then not fine. Same for any other thing you can imagine. Diversity is good but, like everything else, it must not be overdone, for it will be turning into something bad if overdone. Language barriers aren\'t anywhere near good, they\'re totally and utterly bad.
As for my sig va. the post, and the people who accuse me of whining about the content that I can\'t access:
The purpose of the Internet is communication. The purpose of communication is getting information accross. The purpose of a website is to communicate to as many people as possible.
Therefore, it is much more efficient to post information in english than in any other language, because for the same effort (approximately), a way greater number of people can be reached.
I\'m not feeling \"left out\", BTW, and there is no reason to attack me personally for disliking tha fact that some information might simple be inaccessible to me. Really, I couldn\'t care less. The only thing that I care about is getting the information I require. It\'s no different from getting a 404 error on the only websearch hit.
Therefore, I\'m just saying that it is a stupid thing to post information that has relevance beyond the usual \"family\" homepage in another language than english, if you would be able to do it in english with reasonable effort. I am not expecting anyone to learn english for just that purpose, though it might actually be a good idea if you really care about distributing that information. Anyway, I totally don\'t expect anyone to learn english just for PS, and if you read my posts carefully, you\'ll find that I didn\'t say anything else.
Furthermore, english is a very easy language to learn, for the reasons that have been stated already. If chinese becomes as important as english is ATM, this will indeed be a hell of a lot harder to learn, yet it would be stupid to not learn it, for the reasons I outlined.
Anyway, as Moogie / Gronomist have clarified the requirements, or rather the lack of requirements, I\'ll narrow the scope of my posts to the forum, the help and shout channels, and designate them as \"recommendations\" and \"wishes\" of what I see as \"best practice\" WRT the other forms of interaction, therefore in agreement with Harkin.
Edit: Since buddhas post was posted while I was typing:
This way is perfectly fine with me, because it will further learning in both ways. It would not be fine if you would be offering to create localised groups in PS, be it official guilds or not, or encouraging use of native languages in PS, or supporting \"convenience\" translations. Obviously, I have misunderstood your original post\'s intention.
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Seytra:
1. I think your count is correct.
2. \" Refusing to learn / use the language of the place leads to parallel societies, something which is extremely bad, as any expert on culture and society can tell you. \"
False. It\'s viewed as bad to many Western Academics, but many people, including those who are very religious (I am not) whole-heartedly embrace having a parallel society. Think of the Amish in the United States. They are neither violent nor xenophobic, but have a way of life completely disparate to the standard American fair. Your statement is too general.
3. (a) \" Diversity is good but, like everything else, it must not be overdone, for it will be turning into something bad if overdone.\" (b) \"Language barriers aren\'t anywhere near good, they\'re totally and utterly bad. \"
(a) True (b) False. The first is for society to self-regulate. The second is has no real basis. For instance, language barriers can be \"good\" in times of war. You don\'t want your enemy knowing what you are saying. Thus, your claim is empty, though I undestand why you said it.
4. \"The purpose of the Internet is communication.\"
False. The internet has many purposes. I use it to get data for my research, for instance. That is not communicating. This is too broad of an assumption.
5. \"Therefore, I\'m just saying that it is a stupid thing to post information that has relevance beyond the usual \"family\" homepage in another language than english, if you would be able to do it in english with reasonable effort. \"
I am a mathematician. Should I not post equations on the internet to avoid excluding non-mathematicians?
6. \"Furthermore, english is a very easy language to learn, for the reasons that have been stated already.\"
I think most linguists would beg to differ with this one. Any experts out there?
7. As to intellectual poverty. You may consider that you are subjecting yourself to it by expecting homogeneity. As I mentioned, I am a scientist. Because of that, I am quite used to being wrong. But I have also had moments where I did NOT accept standard practices and forced the establishment to re-think their assumptions. This is because I think differently than some others. Look up the Saphir-Worf hypothesis, if I spelled it correctly. Multiple languages encourage multiple trains of thought and multiple approaches.
8. \"In fact, I think it sucks very badly to have all these non-english content on the internet. It adds to redundancy, and the information I need might simply be written in any of the multiple languages I don\'t understand.\"
I think this is why people have accused you of being narrow-minded. And I hold to that.
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Originally posted by buddha
2. \" Refusing to learn / use the language of the place leads to parallel societies, something which is extremely bad, as any expert on culture and society can tell you. \"
False. It\'s viewed as bad to many Western Academics, but many people, including those who are very religious (I am not) whole-heartedly embrace having a parallel society. Think of the Amish in the United States. They are neither violent nor xenophobic, but have a way of life completely disparate to the standard American fair. Your statement is too general.
Of course they (religious people) do! It\'s because they don\'t want to mix so that they won\'t be confronted with differences and new ideas. It\'s the very thing I see as bad, so it\'s proving my point.
As for the Amish: if they were to move into a city, and start to demolish buildings and removing roads (i.e., performing a special sort of ghettoization), even if they had bought them previously, would that be good? What about the person living in the middle of it due to not wanting to sell their home (until it becomes unbearable to live there)?
The amish aren\'t a \"parallel society\" IMO, because they are more or less like a separate state. I\'m talking about areas in which people from multiple cultures / whatever are living.
Originally posted by buddha
3. (a) \" Diversity is good but, like everything else, it must not be overdone, for it will be turning into something bad if overdone.\" (b) \"Language barriers aren\'t anywhere near good, they\'re totally and utterly bad. \"
(a) True (b) False. The first is for society to self-regulate.
It\'s for society, any society, to work, and this is something that is universally seen as \"good\".
Originally posted by buddha
The second is has no real basis. For instance, language barriers can be \"good\" in times of war. You don\'t want your enemy knowing what you are saying. Thus, your claim is empty, though I undestand why you said it.
I honestly can\'t see any good in war. And besides that, the language barrier has increasingly no meaning in war, that\'s why all communication in war is being encrypted, and decrypted by the \"enemy\" side. If the only pro-language barrier is that it is supportive for war, then this IMO is another reason to get rid of it!
Originally posted by buddha
4. \"The purpose of the Internet is communication.\"
False. The internet has many purposes. I use it to get data for my research, for instance. That is not communicating. This is too broad of an assumption.
No, utterly true. \"Communication\" can very well happen asynchroneous. By writing a website, or publishing information, I am communicating to each and every reader of it. Exchange of information, any type of information, is communication. Communication can be uni- or bidirectional, but it still is communication, so the assumption is valid.
Originally posted by buddha
5. \"Therefore, I\'m just saying that it is a stupid thing to post information that has relevance beyond the usual \"family\" homepage in another language than english, if you would be able to do it in english with reasonable effort. \"
I am a mathematician. Should I not post equations on the internet to avoid excluding non-mathematicians?
You\'re deliberately confusing language with content. Mathematics has the beauty of having standardised notation, for the exact purpost of being intellegible by everyone regardless of language. If you, however, wish to help others understand the mathematics you post, then it is your wish to give additional information, and to the largest number of people, so if you can only write the text once for whatever restrictions, would you choose english or gaelic, provided that you\'re capable of writing in both?
Originally posted by buddha
6. \"Furthermore, english is a very easy language to learn, for the reasons that have been stated already.\"
I think most linguists would beg to differ with this one. Any experts out there?
It\'s backed by my own experience and the experience of others, as well as grammar. However, I\'m nowhere near competent on this one, so yes, any experts?
Originally posted by buddha
7. As to intellectual poverty. You may consider that you are subjecting yourself to it by expecting homogeneity. As I mentioned, I am a scientist. Because of that, I am quite used to being wrong. But I have also had moments where I did NOT accept standard practices and forced the establishment to re-think their assumptions. This is because I think differently than some others. Look up the Saphir-Worf hypothesis, if I spelled it correctly. Multiple languages encourage multiple trains of thought and multiple approaches.
Can you provide a link and / or a summary of that hypothesis?
I don\'t think that language has anything to do with the way a person thinks, especially because psychology works perfectly well regardless of language. The only thing that multiple languages might support is that people will need to think about things for themselves because they cannot access the information. However, while occasionally something valuable might come out of that, most of the time it will simple be reinventing the wheel, i.e., furthering waste of time. I, too, like to create solutions without looking at how it was previously done, but by far not in all cases. Following that logic, it would lead to immense scientific advances to take from scientists every possibility to communicate. However, history proves that science has advanced faster and faster, proportionally to the ease of communication.
Originally posted by buddha
8. \"In fact, I think it sucks very badly to have all these non-english content on the internet. It adds to redundancy, and the information I need might simply be written in any of the multiple languages I don\'t understand.\"
I think this is why people have accused you of being narrow-minded. And I hold to that.
Would you please care to elaborate why that makes me narrow-minded?
1) it does add to redundancy, there can\'t be any doubt about that.
2) the information may very well be unattainable for me if it is provided only in one of the minir languages, especially those that don\'t have a decent online translator available
So what is wrong with that? If I were to replace \"me\" by \"the majority of people on the internet\", which is also true, would that make said majority narrow-minded, or just me for posting this fact?
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Originally posted by buddha
6. \"Furthermore, english is a very easy language to learn, for the reasons that have been stated already.\"
I think most linguists would beg to differ with this one. Any experts out there?
Well I\'m not an expert at all, but I\'ve been studying english linguistics for 2 years and that must be the most difficult subject I ever had to learn ! Phonetics/phonology, grammar, syntax, etc. are not the funniest subjects to study either...
I\'m totally amazed when I see such things as \"english is easy to learn\" or \"people are too lazy to learn it\" etc...
Hellooo, learning to speak a foreign language, even poorly, takes YEARS. It took me 10 years of studies, travelling half the world away to speak english like I do, and that\'s still not enough to be called fluent, and you come here and say anyone can learn english in, like, 2 weeks during their free time ?! Welcome to reality !
Sure it\'s not _the_ hardest language to learn (I\'m not even sure you can say that because it depends A LOT on how your native language is close to the one you\'re trying to learn - and I\'ve tried ancient greek, russian, polish and spanish), but I wish people would show a bit more respect to those who dedicated years of they life just to be able to talk with you here.
Which also proves that your reproaches to people posting here and whose native tongue is not english are absurd. If we took all that time to learn english, it\'s obviously because we think that being able to speak that language is very important to communicate with people all over the world. Well I didn\'t, I\'m sure I would have somehow found a use for those ~5600 hours.
As for the Zelphirien thing, it\'s nonsense. First, if anyone has problems with this guild here is not the place to discuss it, and then the french website has no connection whatsoever with the Zelphirien guild.
And I don\'t see how a \"hidden, separated community\" would have got its place on the official website (and why it would take time to interact with people here).
I saw that Seytra and buddah have been evoking the influence of cultural difference in wars. My opinion is that the difference in itself is not the root of conflict, it\'s this weird idea that we humans all have : everything or everyone that is different is an enemy.
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Originally posted by Mooggie
does anyone else find all the Zelphirien people are like this hidden, seperated community with almost no connection to the rest of us? I hate that. I don\'t want our community split because people don\'t want to mix and speak a common language.
no more no less than other guilds. As far as I am concerned, the Blitzer, the Ordo, the Feline Lair... are \"hidden seperated communities\" as well. (but i reco i never took the time to visit their website, which i\'ll try to do as soon as i can)
I\'m perfectly aware that some players feel uneasy with Zelph speaking mainly french between themselves. Just be sure that every Zelph player really wants to be as implicated as possible in the PS\'adventure. Please be nice and keep in mind that many french people do not receive a proper training in foreign language. But all the french players I know (& as one of the French Forum admin, i know quite a lot) are committed to speak and improve their English as much as they can.
And just to be supportive with Caym, learning English is not as easy as it may seem at the first place. I\'ve been learning it for about 15 years, I lived for a full year in London and spent the equivalent of a second one in other English speaking places and still have some problem.
And even if you speak a perfect Oxford it takes some times to get an understanding of written slang as you sometimes read it on the shout canal.
\"coz I got a STR 45 aint gonna uze me fists\" might be hard to translate to \"Since I have 45 in Strength, I think it might be a better idea to buy a weapon instead of using my bare hands\"
PS is a great projet, and since we commit to it and want it to be the perfect MMORPG (boo EQ, Wow... ;-) ) it sometimes lead to unnecessary tensions.
And final words: yes we wanna be a part of the whole PS community, coz it wont be fun if we were only playing in our little sandbox.
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I see many interesting points here. First, English I feel is an easy language outside the slang and all the other made up stuff, but isn\'t a language just made up anyway? So anyway, depending on how you look at it, the average person growing up in America takes english class every year in school, basically until their 18 about. Then we look at post highschool, the use of the english language and the meaning of every word can take years, as it takes americans about 16 years to learn, growing up in a english speaking country. So think about that, before saying 15 years to learn english is a long time, 15 years to learn about perfect a foreign language I feel is a reasonable amount time, as it takes usually about just as long to learn your native language.
I also see a great reason to make the majority of content available on the internet to english, as said before so that the widest amount of people can understand it.
I know I\'m an idiot but why don\'t we all start speaking \"Galactic Basic\"? Maybe it\'ll be easier on all of us! :D
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Originally posted by lynx_lupo
First, english is one of the easier languages to learn. Sure it doesn\'t have much rules, but it also doesn\'t have sex, \"bending\" (and numerical) modifications to nouns and verbs (sorry for the bad english :P). If you want something hard, learn hungarian or one of the chinese :P <-.
actualy english is comparitevly one of the hardest to learn... granted \"american english\" has ceased to use proper grammer of the old english and been abberviated so far thats its actualy pretyy easy to grasp
And ok granted grom i wasn\'t aware of that.. americans still can have an elitist view as its if nothing else STILL close-minded and ignorant of us to expect everybody to learn our language just so we dont heaven forbid learn another XD
(sidenote i am kinda tired my copatriots thinking the world is our all you can eat buffet table meant to cater for us.. not pointing any fingers at anyone here, as you guys do seem to mostly exceed the norm)
I mean i am for ever one mostly speaking the same language.. but if you force everyone to learn the same language you are pushing us closer and closer the the NWO many of us are spending our lives fighting :/ ... so i am more for everyone speak the same few langauges not the same ONE language
I mean why not learn a few of the \"standards\" of online activity as well (german, english, japanese, polish as spanish?) if we expect them to learn ours lets at least also put forth the effort and learn something they would know (most of the world unlike us is increasingly multi-lingual)
the world is diverse.. i would immediately commit suicide (not really i would pick up a firearm and proceed to \"redivercify\" by killing the current one nation earth but whatever :P ) if we all blended together under one flag and one language and one culture.. i mean the world would be ever suckier then it is now
Analogy there are many tasty soups... force them to use the same ingredients (same lagnuage) and man you get a buch of \"differnet\" boring soups that are all the same and bland... it would be the same as eating the same meal every meal for the rest of your life (having things to much the same over to long a length of time is proven to drive humans insane as well)
in closing a summary: They learn a language you learn a language.. eventauly ya\'ll will speak the same language :D and you both be smarter for it (plus you can converse with others without forcing them to be just like you.. i mean i could talk to myself if i wanted that).
I just think its a moderation issue.. if most moderators only speak english they can only moderate english.. therefore make everyone speak english and they can always be watched and monitered
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Every person is perfectly able to learn at least 2 foreign languages to an acceptable fluent extent. I don\'t think one global language would destroy others (more than they diminish now), the cultural consciousness is too high.
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Example: If you wish to paint your rooms with catholic symbols, and also wear them all time, then fine. If you, however, only talk to catholic people, then not fine. Same for any other thing you can imagine. Diversity is good but, like everything else, it must not be overdone, for it will be turning into something bad if overdone. Language barriers aren\'t anywhere near good, they\'re totally and utterly bad.
your definiton of diversity is skewed look it up(not insulting you...at least not purposely)
First, english is one of the easier languages to learn. Sure it doesn\'t have much rules, but it also doesn\'t have sex, \"bending\" (and numerical) modifications to nouns and verbs (sorry for the bad english ). If you want something hard, learn hungarian or one of the chinese <-.
wow...just wow... english as a whole is perhaps one of the most difficult languages to learn as it is one of the extremely few languages that DOESNT have a sex-dependant variable in its structure, its grammatical systems are semmingly random at times and it is RAMPANT with redundancies or things that only work SOME of the time...thus making it more difficult for non0native english speakers to get around it than a language WITH the sex-dependancies...i could go on for awhile so im just going to stop myself now....
7. As to intellectual poverty. You may consider that you are subjecting yourself to it by expecting homogeneity. As I mentioned, I am a scientist. Because of that, I am quite used to being wrong. But I have also had moments where I did NOT accept standard practices and forced the establishment to re-think their assumptions. This is because I think differently than some others. Look up the Saphir-Worf hypothesis, if I spelled it correctly. Multiple languages encourage multiple trains of thought and multiple approaches.
yes i BELEIVE you did spell it right(my spelling went to hell after AP Biology,and french i suppose as well, anyways it SOUNDS right) and if i might add nice referance :D
just a few comments
regards
-Tarach
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Woop Woop we are getting really open minded thinking going on! If you learn 3 langauges (you native and then the 2 other the average person can learn) then we wouldnt need a world language averybody would speak many of the same language.. If i speak native english then Japanese and German and you Speak native German then Polish and Italian then it may take some time to figure out which language is mutual but we can still communicate :D
also i love thinking in multiple trains of thought.. one is never enough.. hell 10 isn\'t :) the faster you think the faster you learn.. and the smarter we ALL get due to you and i like the sound of the world ceasing to be dumb ;)
(man i hope i can learn every major and semi-major language.. that would own.. there is this pimsleur approuch that says it can teach you language like a baby learns it.. so technicaly you will learn every language at a \"native\" level! also it teaches you at the rate of a baby 1-15 parts of language every hour.. loosk interesting i am seriously stoked about it)
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I see many interesting points here. First, English I feel is an easy language outside the slang and all the other made up stuff, but isn\'t a language just made up anyway? So anyway, depending on how you look at it, the average person growing up in America takes english class every year in school, basically until their 18 about. Then we look at post highschool, the use of the english language and the meaning of every word can take years, as it takes americans about 16 years to learn, growing up in a english speaking country. So think about that, before saying 15 years to learn english is a long time, 15 years to learn about perfect a foreign language I feel is a reasonable amount time, as it takes usually about just as long to learn your native language.
WWWWWWTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTFFFFFFFFFFF????????????
(thats a WTFx alot)
English is not an easy language to learn. It is one of the hardest, because of the grammer. Get me people who have english as their second language, and im sure they\'ve tell you. I had alot of friends from school who had english as a second language, and lemme tell you, it takes a LONG time to learn it properly. The trouble with enligsh isnt the words are harder, just the grammer structure is exactly not that- not structured for ease of use. I know people who have been living in an English speaking country for 7+ years and still have difficulty with grammer. These arnt people just coming to australia and speaking their own language, im talking about people who go to school and speak english for 200 days a year for seven years straight, and they still havnt mastered the complexities of the grammer. If you have a good founding in english, you simply dont realise this, because we\'re used to it. I dont find english hard at all, but i understand how other people do. Im sorry, but you people saying english is such a simple language are just wrong. I have no idea who keeps this myth alive, but it is an extremly naive view. That said, people should still learn english to play PS, of course. But it would be good if there was some help for the major non enlgish groups, just to help them along. Certaintly though they should make an attempt to perfect their english skills, and they should be encouraged to do so.
@moogie- yeah, you probablly do feel left out, you cant talk to them.... but imagine them, until they get better english they cant talk to the other 98% of PS. We should encourage people to learn english, but there\'s no point being too harsh on them, as long as it is made clear that the main communication in the game is english.
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i mean if english is that hard how come i am speaking or rather writing it so well, even though i spent only 4 years in an english speaking country...
it\'s not hard really. The hardest thing in english are articles, the \'a\'-s and \'the\'-s.
7 years is enough to learn any language if you live in a country where that language is official. People who live 7 years in a country and still don\'t speak it well usually live in a close knit community... like china towns ...thus they are never forced to speak the country\'s language in everyday occasions, where they use the language only at work and school.
Best way to learn a language is to be surrounded by it constantly, and use it constantly....if you go to let say Japan... and live there for 2 years, speaking only japanese(or as much as possible) and spending time in front of tv watching jap tv... you\'d be surprised how quickly you would learn the language.
This is especially true if you are under 40...and if you already know more than one language.
p.s.
hah i missed the \'a\' in the title...
p.p.s.
ok let\'s agree for the sake of the argument that english is hard.. hard compared to what.... tell me which language is easy to learn.
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7 years is enough to learn any language if you live in a country where that language is official.
So you suggest everyone who wants to play PS has to spend 7 years in the US before they can play ? :P
Ok just kidding, I agree with you here. That\'s what teachers keep saying anyway.
p.p.s.
ok let\'s agree for the sake of the argument that english is hard.. hard compared to what.... tell me which language is easy to learn.
Well every language is hard to learn ;)
But as I said earlier, it depend wholly on the languages you already know.
A few examples : french people who have never studied spanish can understand some of it because both languages are very close. English is a lot harder to learn for us because the grammar and even vocabulary have nothing in common compared to \"latin\" languages. Take the tenses (most funny part imo) : you can\'t even compare the abstract concepts or use of french simple past and english preterite !
And there\'s the even worse problem when not only the alphabet is different, but it contains letters that represent sounds that don\'t even exist in your native language (take the \"th\" in english, or the weird \"chtchj\" in polish...).
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ok agreed.... but for an asian speaking person it\'s not any easier to learn french than it is english.
and yes every language is hard to learn...or as person who likes languages i would say that it\'s not hard but it takes time to learn. You can\'t memorize a language and when learning a new never compare it to a language you know, tie its tenses and words not to the words and tenses of another language but to the abstract meanings, the things themselvs....it\'s hard to describe....
i am going to use japanese again...cause i am trying to learn it..
let say the word neko...means cat. I don\'t memorize it like that. i memorize it as a name of small furry animals that go \'miew\'
ok here\'s a graphical representation of how thought process most people do when someone says the word neko
neko->cat(as an english word)-> mental image of the cat
what i try to do is tie the word neko directly to the mental image of a cat
neko->mental image of a cat
and i stop...here...sorry....sorry everyone...i got carried away.
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Originally posted by Moogie
Originally posted by Robinmagus
English only outside of /tell
This is wrong, wrong, wrong. English only in /shout and the Help channel. You may use any language you want in /say, /guild, /group, and /tell.
everything is told by my dear Moogie. So why keeping speaking ? Moreover, if your language is the best just tell me why some english speaker arent able to understand another english speaker ? I mean Canadien, British and Texas unhabitants are sometimes not able to understand each others... personaly I think the best english is the british one so please forget all your american expressions... lol If you have a problem with that please create another rule : the game is originaly created by Luca and I think he is Italien so please speak only italien during one week... it will be a carnage lol
No be serious fken! I think everybody must be allowed to play ps... even the one who cant speak a good english. The rules for the /shout are correct but I think the one who want to shout in their native language could be allowed if they translate it in english in the same line... something like \"aidez moi svp/ help me please\"
Im sorry but here I feel like if you are telling us \"hey you cant speak english ! This is our territory here get out of my face\"... And as I ever said, The one who write here and try to keep some priviledges must change their mind... Here I saw angry against noobs for example and I think this is not the correct image of ps! There is nothing to command and no superiority in Yliakum : we are all new in this world cause even if we are older dont forget that the game isnt older than 5 years... when you were 5 how were you ? were you really able to create the rules ? I mean : consider you are too young to be superior than anybody and then you\'ll be better... that\'s my mind...
I hope moogie will close this thread very soon cause I really think it\'s not a good image of the community...
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People misunderstood my last post, english is any easy language compared to learning any language, its hard? Took 15 years to learn english, as a non-native speaker? Well then it\'s taken me 15 years of school to get as far as I am, and there is still one more year of school for me left.
Don\'t take my posts as saying I\'m against foreign languages, I\'m learning German and one day I hope to learn another language, maybe Japanese.
Sidenote: In english it is very easy to express yourself, throw out one or two words and you can freely express yourself. Over all, the \'a\' and \'the are easy, there is no gender attached so you can use them in almost any situation:
I ate a cat.
I ate the cat.
Both make sense and are perfectly done.
The cat was very tasty, maybe I\'ll have a dog next.
The cat was very tasty, maybe I\'ll have the dog next.
It all depends if you are talking about a specific cat or dog, or in general. Sorry for my very bad examples. :\\
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How often do I need to post that I am not natively speaking english myself? I know how it is to learn english, and I found it by far easier to learn than Latin, exactly because the grammar isn\'t that strict, and ambiguity, or worse, wrong meaning, isn\'t created by simple mistakes in the vocals words end in. \"the\"s and \"a\"s also help to designate contextual relations, which also are done by endings in latin. In english, it is almost impossible to completely alter the meaning of a sentence by spelling and grammar errors.
I\'ve been learning school-english, and it worked just fine for communicating in text-form. Speaking and understanding spoken english is a different matter, but that took only half a year.
Anyway, I, for one, would be perfectly happy to see a real, actual, universal world language, as I could be sure that nobody needs to learn multiple languages, but at most two (in a transition phase), and still communicate with everyone. There are aspects of our freedom that are incredibly more important stripped away on a daily basis, the loss of which doesn\'t benefit us. I\'d happily exchange this evil for the common language \"evil\".
Oh, and I don\'t mean to imply that everyone needs to learn english \"properly\", allright? Just enough to be able to communicate, and this takes a lot less effort and time.
OK, now I have managed to track down a document talking about this \"Saphir Worf hypothesis\" (the spelling is corect), so that I have a clue what it\'s about (as nobody cared to provide any links, this is the best I can do). However, not surprisingly, I disagree with it. I think that language is created to prevent a representation of the world as percieved by the individual, not the other way round. It is no incident that societies that live in regions that have great amounts of snow tend to have many words for snow. This has a simple reason: it is a dominant factor in their environment, and it\'s specific properties are of such importance to everyday life, that it is necessary to create words / expressions for it! We\'re doing this every time something new is found / invented.
Therefore, it still is my opinion that language has absolutely nothing to do with the way a person thinks. Instead, the way a person is brought up, and the culture the person is surrounded by, determines how this person percieves the world and thinks.
However, not even this can completely form a person, as there are always different ideas and opinions, even in the most homogeneous environment (it may be impossible to talk about them in certain societies (religions are notorious for that) , but they are there).
@ Tarachnul: according to dictionaries, \"diversity\" is a value-neutral term, and as such cannot be \"overdone\", because it simply \"is\". So I agree, my definition was incorrect.
Therefore, it is more precise to say that I think that diversity needs to be reduced in almost all aspects of life in order to form a working society, because otherwise there will be no interaction and no understanding, which will build up either tensions or simple disregard, both of which make \"society\" impossible. On some aspects, diversity needs to be reduced to a minimum (human rights), while on some aspects, like religion, it hardly matters how diverse people are.
@ Kaseijin: this way (direct imaging) is the only way to be able to fluently speak and understand a language. It can be learnt easily by living in a country that speaks this language, but may also be able to be brought about artificially, though this isn\'t learnt in school (instead, you learn the way of intermediary translation).
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Seytra: \"Therefore, it is more precise to say that I think that diversity needs to be reduced in almost all aspects of life in order to form a working society, because otherwise there will be no interaction and no understanding, which will build up either tensions or simple disregard, both of which make \"society\" impossible. On some aspects, diversity needs to be reduced to a minimum (human rights), while on some aspects, like religion, it hardly matters how diverse people are. \"
I believe that Hitler and Saddam Hussein would be delighted by your arguments.
Now, I am not calling you a racist, nor am I implying that you would agree with Hitler or Saddam Hussein. In fact, over your last several posts I have become convinced of your sincerity. I believe that you think you are truly being compassionate in your statements.
However, you are making broad generalisations. You are making huge statements about society, the structure of language in the brain and the origins of conflict. For instance Saphir and Worf are professional linguists, people who have studied a very long time, yet you discard their research without so much as a survey. You are entitled to you opinion, of course, but can\'t you see that you are stepping into an arena of which you know almost nothing?
A very quick path to intellectual poverty is along the road of \"I already know everything\", which is the road you are traveling with your posts. Your calls for linguistic homogeneity indicate you feel you know the \"solution\" to perfect communication. You would argue that the Basque people stop speaking Basque already and just get on with Spanish or, better yet, English. To anyone with an academic background, this is narrow-minded.
Instead of reading a single post on linguistic theory and declaring it rubbish, spend some time and educate yourself on the topic. Your arguments are vapid.
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Originally posted by buddha
I believe that Hitler and Saddam Hussein would be delighted by your arguments.
The easy \"argument\" to discredit someone with whome one doesn\'t agree. It will nmot stop me, nor change my stance, nor will it make me act as if I were convinced otherwise. You\'re by far not the first to be trying to pull that one on me. :rolleyes:
If his ideas weren\'t so popular, I assume you\'d be putting Bush on this list as well.
Originally posted by buddha
Now, I am not calling you a racist, nor am I implying that you would agree with Hitler or Saddam Hussein. In fact, over your last several posts I have become convinced of your sincerity. I believe that you think you are truly being compassionate in your statements.
Your wording of this is really admirable. You make it sound like someone who tries to tell a child that it\'s completely bone-headed, without actually saying it, to make it not feel bad.
Originally posted by buddha
However, you are making broad generalisations. You are making huge statements about society, the structure of language in the brain and the origins of conflict. For instance Saphir and Worf are professional linguists, people who have studied a very long time, yet you discard their research without so much as a survey.
Well, from what I was able to find (as you still haven\'t posted any references), it seems that at least one third of all psychologists disagree with that theory, and that another third isn\'t sure about it. This doesn\'t give it too much scientific clout IMO.
Furthermore, linguistics tend to be full of assumptions that cannot be proven and also full of ambiguities. I have rarely seen a linguistic deduction that was unquestionable. Therefore, I indeed don\'t hold too much respect for that particular field of science.
Originally posted by buddha
You are entitled to you opinion, of course, but can\'t you see that you are stepping into an arena of which you know almost nothing?
Well, I am just following different trains of though there. Thinking independantly, without letting the \"truths\" of established science blind me. Indeed I don\'t know very much about linguistics itself, but I am fairly good at observation and deduction, and if what I observe and deduce is in contradiction with some established truth, I will question the \"truth\" until proven wrong, which must include a logical explanation for all my observations.
Originally posted by buddha
A very quick path to intellectual poverty is along the road of \"I already know everything\", which is the road you are traveling with your posts.
I don\'t see myself doing that. If I were doing so, I would not have bothered to try to find something on the Saphir Worf theory. You, however, haven\'t even done so much research as to be sure of the very spelling of it. Basicly, it looks like you\'re trolling.
Originally posted by buddha
Your calls for linguistic homogeneity indicate you feel you know the \"solution\" to perfect communication.
Well, observation surely proves that communication works much better if both partners speak a common language, and also that there is way less overhead when there is only one single language at all.
Originally posted by buddha
You would argue that the Basque people stop speaking Basque already and just get on with Spanish or, better yet, English.
Absolutely. A language isn\'t a prerequisite for cultural definition. In fact, there are many cultures that share a language but are different.
Originally posted by buddha
To anyone with an academic background, this is narrow-minded.
It is quite nice to see how you imply that I don\'t have academic background, while you know absolutely nothing about me. Also, it is quite interesting how you are constantly trying to emphasize that you are a \"scientist\", while failing at even the most basic ways of properly conducting scientific work (like referencing your sources).
Furthermore, you still haven\'t stated why exactly believing that having a universal language would be beneficial is narrow-minded.
Originally posted by buddha
Instead of reading a single post on linguistic theory and declaring it rubbish, spend some time and educate yourself on the topic. Your arguments are vapid.
A particular theory, out of the vast and constantly changing field of linguistics. And, I\'d like to remind you, one that isn\'t even accepted by the majority of linguists.
Anyway, how about you trying to support your claims by presenting the literature that supports it, so that I can follow your thoughts? References are more than overdue.
Also, how about you not constantly insulting me, but properly refuting my claims? The only things I see you doing are
- making a bold statement to the essence that I\'m wrong
- giving either an insult or some superficial \"argument\" that is supposed to look as if it would counter my claims
- finish with another bold statement that I\'m even more wrong
As I said above, your posts have all signs of a troll.
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Hi,
I\'ve been lurking on the forums and playing the game occasionally for several months now, but this is only my second post. Disclaimer: I haven\'t played any other MMORPGs, and only a few single player RPGs, so I have very little knowledge of what ideas have been tried elsewhere and whether or not they worked. Anyway...
A point that is being overlooked is the importance of non-verbal communication. In everyday speech, we don\'t just listen to the words a person says - their facial expression, tone of voice and stance can convey a lot about how they feel, and many people also use gestures to emphasise what they are saying.
If you ask someone \"how are you today?\", and they reply \"I\'m fine\" in a low, slurred voice while frowning, they\'re obviously not telling the truth. If you invite someone to go out somewhere, they will not only say something like \"Great, I\'d love to do that!\" or \"Err, no, I don\'t really like that place\" but will say it in a certain tone of voice. You will probably be listening more for the tone than the words - if it were a foreigner who hadn\'t learnt intonation properly and. In this case the single word \"yes\" or \"no\" would be sufficient to convey the relevant information - the rest is just to fit social conventions of politeness.
When people meet in RL who can\'t speak the same language, gestures are better than nothing, e.g. pointing and finger-counting when trying to buy something. I\'m currently taking a Teaching English as a Foreign Language course - to give us would-be teachers an idea of what it will be like for our students, trying to learn English from a teacher who doesn\'t know their language, we were given 6 hours of Russian lessons delivered entirely in Russian. The teacher had to use simple words, exaggerated tones and lots of body language to communicate anything. At the end of 4 lessons, I still wasn\'t sure of the Russian word for \"listen\", but the teacher always emphasised it by cupping her hand around her ear, which made the meaning clear.
What does this have to do with Planeshift? To point out that players in PS should be able to make some sort of gestures. This idea is not new - a quick search of the forum reveals that it\'s been intended since the beginning. I just wanted to point out that IMHO, gestures are an important feature, especially if PS is intended to be a role play focused game. They would add a lot of depth to role play, and with enough flexibility, possibly have the side benefit of helping players overcome language barriers.
Consider the example mentioned earlier, of the player who walked in to the tavern with a sword, and didn\'t understand the instructions of the people already there to put it away - which is quite a plausible scenario. With facial expressions, shaking heads and pointing, the people there might not have been able to communicate to the newcomer \"no weapons allowed in here\" (and the same would be true in a similar RL situation with real gestures), but could at least have expressed their displeasure and desire for him to leave. Rather than spoiling the role play, this would have fitted in or maybe added to it.
How to implement gestures is a difficult question - AFAIK, it hasn\'t been attempted much before, and of course it will be impossible to have as much freedom as in real life (where you can wave two arms and legs around freely and make all sorts of faces). Someone in another thread mentioned the idea of the player being able to point at things by clicking on them, and their character would then point in that direction with their finger. If it were possible to drag the mouse to move the character\'s arms about, this would be a good starting point. Also, it would be good if characters\' heads moved realistically as the player looks around with the mouse - this would allow nodding and shaking of the head ( \"yes\" and \"no\" ), but it might be better to have shortcuts for these.
I think the technology to do this sort of thing is basically there with cal3d\'s skeletal animation, by moving control points around, but I\'m not quite sure what the capabilities of the engine are.
Comments, anyone?
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1. \"Thinking independantly, without letting the \"truths\" of established science blind me. \"
I love this one, it\'s like those people who claim \"Evolution is only a theory\". Can you guess the flaw? (Hint: gravity is only a theory as well.)
Perhaps you can take a moment to notice that I have provided counter-examples to your gross claims. That does not require citation.
2. \"Furthermore, linguistics tend to be full of assumptions that cannot be proven and also full of ambiguities. I have rarely seen a linguistic deduction that was unquestionable. Therefore, I indeed don\'t hold too much respect for that particular field of science.\"
First, exactly how many linguistic deductions have you seen? I\'m not defending the science, but you are making another broad statement. Can you please cite something here, since the bibliography is suddenly so important? Second, it\'s very easy to disregard other fields with which we are not familiar. That is a common academic mistake.
3. \"It is quite nice to see how you imply that I don\'t have academic background, while you know absolutely nothing about me. \"
This is true. I inferred it. I could be wrong.
4. Please don\'t mention Bush, he makes me very angry and to this point it\'s all been fun.
5. I never supported nor detracted from the Saphir-Worf hypothesis. I mentioned it only to point out that many experts may disagree with you about the value of multiple languages. In fact, it is probably rubbish, but that is not my place to say.
6. You never prove that I don\'t have a invisible elephant friend. He talks to me and helps with my research. All that is well and good, you don\'t have to believe me UNTIL I start demanding that you bring him food or something. Once I start making claims that influence your life, you will probably want to establish the existence of Frank (the invisible elephant, did I mention his name?). Now, the onus is suddenly upon ME to prove his existence, not upon you to DISPROVE his existence. If I make the claim, I must supply the proof.
You cannot prove that reindeer don\'t fly, not even by killing all of them by throwing them off the Empire State Building. You cannot, in general, prove a negative.
So why am I bringing poor Frank into this? Well, YOU are making claims that YOU are not supporting, often without even the courtesy \"this is my opinion\" disclaimer. And the claims you make, about who should be able to speak which languages in an international game, may effect my game play. Your claims are vapid.
7. \"Well, observation surely proves that communication works much better if both partners speak a common language, and also that there is way less overhead when there is only one single language at all. \"
This is a little blue, but I met an Hindu girl once, and, um, we did fine with a major language barrier... Just another counterexample to a wild claim. I take issue with the word \"proves\" in the above statement.
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You are, yet again, not providing any links, not supporting your claims and, as a new addition, you are twisting my words to mean the opposite. Also, you put in things that are absolutely irrelevant to the discussion.
What you\'re doing here isn\'t scientific work, neither is it contributing to a discussion. It\'s trolling, and I have had enough of it. :tdown:
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Originally posted by fken
I mean Canadian, British and Texas unhabitants are sometimes not able to understand each others....
so true so true XD i use ya\'ll and howdy and other texan phrases though and my english is spoken just fine :D (i\'m a little weak in spelling but speaking i am very good at)
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I love this one, it\'s like those people who claim \"Evolution is only a theory\". Can you guess the flaw? (Hint: gravity is only a theory as well.)
ROTFLMAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You wouldnt go under the alternative name of Bernel or Griff would you?
Its just i had a huge discussion with someone else about this fact on another board. (Good old utopia temple boards).
Anyway the point i made was gravity is not a theory, it is a scientific law, so you cannot compare the two. So you\'re incorrect in that statement.
You are, yet again, not providing any links, not supporting your claims and, as a new addition, you are twisting my words to mean the opposite. Also, you put in things that are absolutely irrelevant to the discussion.
What you\'re doing here isn\'t scientific work, neither is it contributing to a discussion. It\'s trolling, and I have had enough of it.
Oh boo hoo you get the sympathy vote in the arguement. Seriously if hes so wrong then take him down. Did you ever think its a bit hypocritical to say \"hes not providing any links\" and then go on to accuse him of all this stuff without showing where or when he did it ? :P Something about that seems a bit strange to me...... lol
Comments, anyone?
Yeah, take it to the suggestions board.
Ok thats a bit harsh, what you said certaintly has its merits. And i think it would be good if implemented, but its not really what the discussions about. But thanks for the good idea. You should actually post that on the suggestions board.
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I just have to be clear here: Gravitation is a theory. I was too loose with my language. There is a \"Law of Gravity\" which says physical objects obey gravitational pull and a \"Theory of Gravitation\" which is everything we use to describe it. All of electromagnetism is a theory as well. Why this is true is locking into the technical definition of the world \"theory\",
Theory: \"A theory is a logical explanation or model based on observation, facts hypotheses, experimentation, and reasoning that attempts to explain a range of natural phenomena. Theories are constantly subject to testing, modification, and refutation as new evidence and ideas emerge. Theories also have predictive capabilities that guide further investigation. \"
This is taken from Amy Leinen, but is a pretty good representation of what you will see in any undergraduate book on biology. They have to keep reminding people what the word actually means...
Thus ramlambmoo (great name, by the way) I was only incorrect as I used the term \"gravity\" rather than \"gravitation\". So I will correct my self and say
\"Evolution is only a theory.\" <=> \"Gravitation is only a theory.\" And now I can compare the two. Thanks for keeping me honest. If anyone cares, I will post the difference between the two.
I know Seytra has had enough of me. I can understand that, I can be annoying. But what claims did I make in the last post? Did you want a link to Frank? That\'s problematic, because Frank doesn\'t exist. At least, not to me and no I can\'t prove it!
You just made a claim that I made claims. Can you support that? Once again, I just provided counterexamples.
Ram, I have never been called Bernel nor Griff, but plenty of other things with a sharper ring, if you know what I mean.
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And by the way Seytra, you can\'t leave now. There have been like 800 views to this post. We\'re providing a service! It\'s a lively debate! C\'mon, how often do you actually see that anymore? I know we can\'t get it on American T.V.
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\"Evolution is only a theory.\" <=> \"Gravitation is only a theory.\" And now I can compare the two. Thanks for keeping me honest. If anyone cares, I will post the difference between the two.
Yes, you summed it up rather well.
Ram, I have never been called Bernel nor Griff, but plenty of other things with a sharper ring, if you know what I mean.
Ah, rightio then. Its just those were the two people i was having the amazingly animated discussion with about the evolution topic.
Back on topic: theres an relative ranking for the difficulty of learning languages that the CIA uses to show how many years it takes to get fluent in that language. Spanish is like 15 month - 2 years, north Korean is like 5-10 years or something, but those are only from memory and i cant find it anywhere on the web, and i cant remember the name of the system. Ill post back here when i find it.
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linguistics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistics) aren\'t only based on assumptions.... not any more then any other social science. And i agree on that point with buddha, don\'t discredit a science you don\'t know much about.....why thought would be... sciencism
sapir worf theory is not a widely accepted one in linguistics... actually i think it\'s pretty old...and discredited.
i am surprised this post hasn\'t been moved to hydlaa plaza...it didn\'t belong here from the getgo
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i think we\'ve all stated our points quite frankley.. nothing much more to talk about (hence the reason i haven\'t posted any more.. i made my point.. everybody get smarter and learn a few language then everybody will know at least one common language most of the time)
And perhaps this is more hydlaa plaza material
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4. Please don\'t mention Bush, he makes me very angry and to this point it\'s all been fun.
please do as he asks...or i will become angry and rant about his policies for hours on end until you all just wish id shutup...i dont want that...
Its just i had a huge discussion with someone else about this fact on another board. (Good old utopia temple boards).
Anyway the point i made was gravity is not a theory, it is a scientific law, so you cannot compare the two. So you\'re incorrect in that statement.
sorry but your wrong...the law of gravity and the theory of gravity are not the same thing
ok now thats done i will reiterate what i have already \"said\" (insert hand gestureamijig here) diversity is a good thing...as such diversity of language is a plus...conformity begets efficiancy yes but efficiency leaves little room for creativity(EX:by definition art is an inefficient practice its wrong i know but its still true)...seytras veiw propogates conformity which in turn furthers efficiency however as planeshift is a game with many players from a variety of diverse cultures i cant see how efficiency should take precedence over their personal rights...
regards
-Tarach
*Edit:I know Seytra has had enough of me. I can understand that, I can be annoying. But what claims did I make in the last post? Did you want a link to Frank? That\'s problematic, because Frank doesn\'t exist. At least, not to me and no I can\'t prove it!
WHAT!?!?!!? since when...is he dead...i hadnt seen him for a few weeks so i was wondering :rolleyes: :P....
FYI:this is likely my last post on this subject as i have already made my point(feel free to prove me wrong by saying something that makes me post again) :rolleyes: :P
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What about the strong magentic and the weak magnetic (gravity A and gravity B?)as outlined in the string theory? also the basis of Bob Lazars supposed S-4/Area 51 work? those are hypothetical :D (yay i just make this converstaion more complex!)
Gravity A is the strongest but called and works atmoicly between the nucleus and the protons and electrons of the atoms and Gravity B which is the gravity keeping your toosh in that chair between planets and other larger objects..
Anyway diversity good... do we want to be a mindless though albeit effecient hive with only one diversity (what our \"queen bee\" thinks is our exact thoughs)?
EDIT: Originally posted by Tarachnul
4. Please don\'t mention Bush, he makes me very angry and to this point it\'s all been fun.
please do as he asks...or i will become angry and rant about his policies for hours on end until you all just wish id shutup...i dont want that...
same... \"Save a TREE pull up a BUSH!\"
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same... \"Save a TREE pull up a BUSH!\"
keep fighting the good fight...
What about the strong magentic and the weak magnetic (gravity A and gravity B?)as outlined in the string theory? also the basis of Bob Lazars supposed S-4/Area 51 work? those are hypothetical (yay i just make this converstaion more complex!)
whyd you have to do that...i avoided it on purpose...as i didnt want to have to further explain the differance between a theory and a hypothesis...but here goes...
Hypothesis: a statement which can be tested through empirical methods
Theory: basically a \"proven\" hypothesis but not yet a law
Law: as close to proven fact as you can get in science
(ha! i even went the extra mile and did laws) :D
(note that these are all EXTREMELY general as i was to lazy to type anymore so dont go putting this in your college essay)
regards
-Tarach
*Edit: i did at that thank you kasejin it must have just slipped my mind
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you forgot about axioms
an axiom is a self-evident truth upon which other knowledge must rest.
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And what about czech translation? two of gm are from czech republic, I can take a part..
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you forgot about axioms
an axiom is a self-evident truth upon which other knowledge must rest.
Indeed, but its used in maths more than in science. Im not aware of many scientific axioms, i think none exist- apart from those used in maths- i could be wrong here, but i certaintly havnt heard of any.
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this is relatively true but math and science tend to walk hand in hand
\"a mathmaticien is just a failed scientist\"
-a famous person whom i will not name
(ha! buddha :P )
regards
-Tarach
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Originally posted by Tarachnul
\"a mathmaticien is just a failed scientist\"
-a famous person whom i will not name
(ha! buddha :P )
Your mother should slap you for this. Okay, here goes an old joke...
A biologist thinks he\'s a biochemist.
A biochemist thinks he\'s a chemist.
A chemist thinks he\'s a physicist.
And a physicist thinks he\'s God.
But God think he\'s a mathematician.
Yeah, I\'ve been scratching my head to think of axioms outside of math, but I haven\'t come up with one yet. It\'s hard to get as precise in other sciences. I mean, one of the four/five Euclidean axioms is \"For any two distinct points P and Q there exists a unique line that passes through P and Q.\" Most other sciences don\'t get down to this level of detail.
Have we gone a little off topic?
By the way, a lot of the fun has gone out of this since Seytra left. Anyone want to step in for him?
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Originally posted by ramlambmoo
Oh boo hoo you get the sympathy vote in the arguement.
I don\'t care about sympathy votes. There is no need to imply that I\'m whining or whatever.
Originally posted by ramlambmoo
Seriously if hes so wrong then take him down.
I have, several times. His last post before me refusing to continue to pointlessly refute his arguments IMNSHO is so obviously wrong that it\'s not even required to refute it.
However, I am not going to feed a troll, as this is just a waste of time. A troll will never give in, he will use tricks to keep the discussion going while never providing anything useful. In fact, it is common for trolls to post easily refutable claims that are made to anger people into replying to them, if possible without reading through the entire discussion.
I am not retreating in order to not have to admit defeat, nor am I convinced of having been wrong, nor have I become unsure of the validity of my claims. The only thing I am doing is to save myself the waste of time to feed a troll.
Originally posted by ramlambmoo
Did you ever think its a bit hypocritical to say \"hes not providing any links\" and then go on to accuse him of all this stuff without showing where or when he did it ? :P Something about that seems a bit strange to me...... lol
Actually, no, I did never think that and don\'t think that now. In fact, he was accusing me of not having researched his beloved Saphir Worf hypothesis, though I actually tried to. At the very moment I indicated that I couldn\'t find any more material on this, he would have had to enable me and any reader of this thread to do that research by providing links to the theory, which he obviously must have, since he is trying to make the impression to have done extensive research on that topic. :rolleyes: Instead he kept using the hypothesis to \"refute\" my claims without quoting excerpts from his sources, therby denying me any chance of disproving him on his own grounds, while implying that that would be impossible for me, anyway.
Alright, so that everybody can see why I think that discussing with him has no merit whatsoever, I will analyse his last post before mine.
Originally posted by buddha
1. \"Thinking independantly, without letting the \"truths\" of established science blind me. \"
I love this one, it\'s like those people who claim \"Evolution is only a theory\". Can you guess the flaw? (Hint: gravity is only a theory as well.)
I was actually using his very own words here:
\"But I have also had moments where I did NOT accept standard practices and forced the establishment to re-think their assumptions. This is because I think differently than some others.\"
Furthermore, I never said something about theories in the relevant part of my post, therefore there is no benefit in dragging that in, except to dilute the actual point by trying to ridicule me for things I didn\'t even say. Even if taking into account that I obviously was referring to the Saphir Worf hypothesis, this isn\'t even important, because his statement, which implies that theories aren\'t facts, does in fact justify me not accepting it even more, instead of proving me wrong in doing so. I assume that this has been constructed for the purpose of making it look like I had said something horribly unsupportable or stupid. Without actually saying so (but instead making it look like that), he reserved the argument \"I was supporting your statement\", in case someone nailed him on that.
Originally posted by buddha
Perhaps you can take a moment to notice that I have provided counter-examples to your gross claims. That does not require citation.
The so-called counter-examples are like comparing apples and bananas. They are so different from the things they are meant to counter that no conclusion can be drawn from them regarding the original claims, as I will show later on.
Originally posted by buddha
2. \"Furthermore, linguistics tend to be full of assumptions that cannot be proven and also full of ambiguities. I have rarely seen a linguistic deduction that was unquestionable. Therefore, I indeed don\'t hold too much respect for that particular field of science.\"
First, exactly how many linguistic deductions have you seen? I\'m not defending the science, but you are making another broad statement. Can you please cite something here, since the bibliography is suddenly so important? Second, it\'s very easy to disregard other fields with which we are not familiar. That is a common academic mistake.
This isn\'t even countering my statement. He is, as usual, indulging himself in phrases like \"broad statement\". Additionally, he is now suddenly saying that he doesn\'t even support that hypothesis, and that he even thinks that it\'s wrong (thereby reserving the retreat of saying \"I always supported your view\", just in case someone would provide unquestionable proof to support my point of view).
Originally posted by buddha
3. \"It is quite nice to see how you imply that I don\'t have academic background, while you know absolutely nothing about me. \"
This is true. I inferred it. I could be wrong.
By saying this he creatres the illusion of actually discussing, by making it look as if he would actually reconsider anything. However, this point is unrelated to the discussion and therefore doesn\'t hurt his \"points\", and is an easy \"sacrifice\", done for tactical reasons.
Originally posted by buddha
4. Please don\'t mention Bush, he makes me very angry and to this point it\'s all been fun.
An absolutely irrelevant statement, meant only to distract from the actual discussion and to score sympathy points by implying that I supported Bush (without the implication actually being provable), designed to make me look bad.
Originally posted by buddha
5. I never supported nor detracted from the Saphir-Worf hypothesis. I mentioned it only to point out that many experts may disagree with you about the value of multiple languages. In fact, it is probably rubbish, but that is not my place to say.
This is typical for his style of argument: to cite things that he doesn\'t even support, but make it look like he supports them and also like he has a great deal of proof to support them, and then retreating by saying \"I just mentioned it\". Obviously it\'s just meant to provoke, and to force the defendant (me, in this case) to waste time refuting claims that are of no importance to him, hoping that I\'ll make mistakes that he can then use against me, or that I\'ll forget important things that may support my claims.
Originally posted by buddha
6. You never prove that I don\'t have a invisible elephant friend.
This is what I was referring to when I said that his \"counter-examples\" have no connection to the claims they are meant to look like countering.
Comparing someones delusions to a scientific theory is total rubbish, for the simple fact that there will be no theory without some facts that can be interpreted to support it, whereas someones delusions obviously are without anything to support them, except mental dysfunction. He\'s comparing mental illness to science.
Originally posted by buddha
He talks to me and helps with my research.
Here we have again the \"I am a scientist\" reference. These are obviously meant to create the impression that he is knowing much more than he actually does, and to prevent people from trying to counter his statements, because they are supposed to think things like \"I think he\'s wrong, but probably I just don\'t know enough to see that he\'s correct\". This is typical for trolls.
Originally posted by buddha
All that is well and good, you don\'t have to believe me UNTIL I start demanding that you bring him food or something. Once I start making claims that influence your life, you will probably want to establish the existence of Frank (the invisible elephant, did I mention his name?). Now, the onus is suddenly upon ME to prove his existence, not upon you to DISPROVE his existence. If I make the claim, I must supply the proof.
Here he is taking my words out of context and mangling them to look like meaning something totally different. He\'s trying to circumvent the requirement to support one\'s claims.
Originally posted by buddha
You cannot prove that reindeer don\'t fly, not even by killing all of them by throwing them off the Empire State Building. You cannot, in general, prove a negative.
Again something that doesn\'t have anything to do with the argument, but is supposed to be funny in order to score sympathy points.
Originally posted by buddha
So why am I bringing poor Frank into this? Well, YOU are making claims that YOU are not supporting, often without even the courtesy \"this is my opinion\" disclaimer.
Again, \"funny\" thing to gain sympathy, followed by a nukelike \"you are a hypocrite\" claim, which isn\'t supported by anything other than his own, flawed, example. Additionally, he is now accusing me of not working scientifically, while it isn\'t even uncommon to post opinions without stating explicitly that they are, because that is what is done in discussions, whereas it is very common to post references to what one thinks is important but that might not be conveniently available to the discussion partner.
Originally posted by buddha
And the claims you make, about who should be able to speak which languages in an international game, may effect my game play.
In order to look like actually discussing, here are some snippets that, while they aren\'t actually important to the discussion, aren\'t incorrect. He\'s bloating them and their importance in order to make it look like I am missing important facts. Facts, in fact, that it is constructed to look like I wouldn\'t acknowledge, despite them being utterly obvious, in order to make me look like a total fool.
Originally posted by buddha
Your claims are vapid.
This is another example of his rhetoric of trying to distract the attention of the reader from the actual subject. Bland statements like this one are much more likely to stick in the mind of the reader than an actual argument. By enclosing his weak defenses in statements like these, he is hoping that the causal reader will either not question his points or not even read them as it looks like theyre fool-proof (\"otherwise he\'d not say something bold like that, would he?\").
Originally posted by buddha
7. \"Well, observation surely proves that communication works much better if both partners speak a common language, and also that there is way less overhead when there is only one single language at all. \"
This is a little blue, but I met an Hindu girl once, and, um, we did fine with a major language barrier...
Yet again, this \"counterexample\" isn\'t even applicable to the point it\'s made to look like countering. Additionally, he\'s indirectly emphasizing his manlyhood by making it look like that he had her.
Originally posted by buddha
Just another counterexample to a wild claim.
And, of yourse, the usual finishing line of the type \"I have infinitely more wisdom than you\", obfuscating the weakness of his claim.
Originally posted by buddha
I take issue with the word \"proves\" in the above statement.
A prime example of where he is using unrelated and totally irrelevant things to detract attention from the main subject, and also to weaken his \"discussion\" partner by forcing additional workload on them.
As you\'ll have noticed, I have not bothered to counter his claims, as this would have been a total waste of time, since I still am convinced that he is just trolling. If you see me ignoring him, not just on this thread but everywhere, this is why.
This may very well have actually have been my last post on this thread, since I believe to have said everything I had to anyway.
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Yeah, I\'ve been scratching my head to think of axioms outside of math, but I haven\'t come up with one yet. It\'s hard to get as precise in other sciences. I mean, one of the four/five Euclidean axioms is \"For any two distinct points P and Q there exists a unique line that passes through P and Q.\" Most other sciences don\'t get down to this level of detail.
Have we gone a little off topic?
By the way, a lot of the fun has gone out of this since Seytra left. Anyone want to step in for him?
Um perhaps the point line axiom (i think this is an axiom, i hope im not accidentlly making this up) that the shortest line joining a point and a line is the perpendicular from the line that goes through the point. The geometric axioms i suppose can apply to science, in physics and such.
a little off topic? Lets see, we were talking about wethere there should be support for other languages in PS and now we\'re talking about evolution, scientific theory and axioms.... Id say just a little off topic :P
And seytras back, so there shall be much arguement left in this yet..
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I don\'t care about sympathy votes. There is no need to imply that I\'m whining or whatever.
You were complaining, making out (by implication) that you were the victim. So stop feeling sorry for yourself.
I have, several times. His last post before me refusing to continue to pointlessly refute his arguments IMNSHO is so obviously wrong that it\'s not even required to refute it.
However, I am not going to feed a troll, as this is just a waste of time. A troll will never give in, he will use tricks to keep the discussion going while never providing anything useful. In fact, it is common for trolls to post easily refutable claims that are made to anger people into replying to them, if possible without reading through the entire discussion.
I am not retreating in order to not have to admit defeat, nor am I convinced of having been wrong, nor have I become unsure of the validity of my claims. The only thing I am doing is to save myself the waste of time to feed a troll.
Look, you must know that you cannot win an arguement on the internet, unless the other person willingly gives in. No matter what you say people can always reply something irrelivant back to you. If you dont realise this fact then dont get into an arguement.
Actually, no, I did never think that and don\'t think that now. In fact, he was accusing me of not having researched his beloved Saphir Worf hypothesis, though I actually tried to. At the very moment I indicated that I couldn\'t find any more material on this, he would have had to enable me and any reader of this thread to do that research by providing links to the theory, which he obviously must have, since he is trying to make the impression to have done extensive research on that topic. Instead he kept using the hypothesis to \"refute\" my claims without quoting excerpts from his sources, therby denying me any chance of disproving him on his own grounds, while implying that that would be impossible for me, anyway.
Ahhh, rightio then. Ill take your word for it, since i cant work out what you\'re trying to say. Im glad you\'ve decided to quote him now, instead of just levelling accusations.
The so-called counter-examples are like comparing apples and bananas. They are so different from the things they are meant to counter that no conclusion can be drawn from them regarding the original claims, as I will show later on.
Care to give some examples to back up your claims?
This isn\'t even countering my statement. He is, as usual, indulging himself in phrases like \"broad statement\". Additionally, he is now suddenly saying that he doesn\'t even support that hypothesis, and that he even thinks that it\'s wrong (thereby reserving the retreat of saying \"I always supported your view\", just in case someone would provide unquestionable proof to support my point of view).
Well, there you go again on your hypocritical ways- you\'re not even properly countering his claims. How can you say something like that when you\'re not doing it yourself?
By saying this he creatres the illusion of actually discussing, by making it look as if he would actually reconsider anything. However, this point is unrelated to the discussion and therefore doesn\'t hurt his \"points\", and is an easy \"sacrifice\", done for tactical reasons.
You critise him when he disagrees with you, you critise him when he agrees with you? Thats just plain stupid. No wonder the arguement is getting nowhere...
An absolutely irrelevant statement, meant only to distract from the actual discussion and to score sympathy points by implying that I supported Bush (without the implication actually being provable), designed to make me look bad.
If its an irrelivant statement, dont make it important by replying to it. He in no way shape or form implied you supported bush, and just told you not to mention him.
This is typical for his style of argument: to cite things that he doesn\'t even support, but make it look like he supports them and also like he has a great deal of proof to support them, and then retreating by saying \"I just mentioned it\". Obviously it\'s just meant to provoke, and to force the defendant (me, in this case) to waste time refuting claims that are of no importance to him, hoping that I\'ll make mistakes that he can then use against me, or that I\'ll forget important things that may support my claims.
This is an oft argued topic. If you link to a claim does that mean that you support it, and that you should defend it? Do you have any right to critise it if you are not an expert in that field? I agree that it detracts from his arguement if you devalue the studies he has quoted, and i dont think people should mention a study unless they\'re ready to defend it, unless they explicitly state they are only pointing out something about it.
This is what I was referring to when I said that his \"counter-examples\" have no connection to the claims they are meant to look like countering.
Comparing someones delusions to a scientific theory is total rubbish, for the simple fact that there will be no theory without some facts that can be interpreted to support it, whereas someones delusions obviously are without anything to support them, except mental dysfunction. He\'s comparing mental illness to science.
Is called an analogy- something that isnt directly related to the topic but if helpful in showing how the topic works. Examples and analogies are used to prove something about a topic by viewing it in a different way.
Here we have again the \"I am a scientist\" reference. These are obviously meant to create the impression that he is knowing much more than he actually does, and to prevent people from trying to counter his statements, because they are supposed to think things like \"I think he\'s wrong, but probably I just don\'t know enough to see that he\'s correct\". This is typical for trolls.
Um personally i thought what he was saying was a bit of humor, since he obvious dosnt have an invisible friend eliphant, and thus anything said regarding that is also evidentally not true.
Here he is taking my words out of context and mangling them to look like meaning something totally different. He\'s trying to circumvent the requirement to support one\'s claims.
1) He dosnt mention anything you say, so how is he taking your words out of context?
2) Hes not trying to circumvent the requirements, just pointing out where and when its nessacary to support ones claims and when not to.
Again something that doesn\'t have anything to do with the argument, but is supposed to be funny in order to score sympathy points.
It made a very valid point to do with the arguement:
You cannot, in general, prove a negative.
Perhaps you missed that?
Again, \"funny\" thing to gain sympathy, followed by a nukelike \"you are a hypocrite\" claim, which isn\'t supported by anything other than his own, flawed, example. Additionally, he is now accusing me of not working scientifically, while it isn\'t even uncommon to post opinions without stating explicitly that they are, because that is what is done in discussions, whereas it is very common to post references to what one thinks is important but that might not be conveniently available to the discussion partner.
You have made alot of claims that you did not support (until i pressed you about it):
You are, yet again, not providing any links, not supporting your claims and, as a new addition, you are twisting my words to mean the opposite. Also, you put in things that are absolutely irrelevant to the discussion.
What you\'re doing here isn\'t scientific work, neither is it contributing to a discussion. It\'s trolling, and I have had enough of it.
You should not muddy the water by mixing scientific material and opinion. There has been a discussion of a scientific paper, and now you say what you say is assumed to be opinion by default? You\'ve come out with this scientific type destruction of his arguement, touting to ... I will analyse his last post before mine.
You will analyse his posts, yet you state that by default what you say is opinion. So can we assume it is all opinion then?
Yet again, this \"counterexample\" isn\'t even applicable to the point it\'s made to look like countering. Additionally, he\'s indirectly emphasizing his manlyhood by making it look like that he had her.
Yes it is, its precisly applicable to the point he was counter exampling about the problem with language. Who cares what he indirectly emphasizing? How could he have put that exmaple without indirectly making that sort of claim? Just because you think he implying something dosnt nessacarily mean he is.
As you\'ll have noticed, I have not bothered to counter his claims, as this would have been a total waste of time, since I still am convinced that he is just trolling. If you see me ignoring him, not just on this thread but everywhere, this is why.
This may very well have actually have been my last post on this thread, since I believe to have said everything I had to anyway.
Yes, i definatly have noticed that. Lemme just clear something up. This entire arguement is a waste of time. Arguing on the internet is inherently a waste of time. Its like going for a swim and complaining when you get wet. If you dont like it, you shouldnt have started arguing in the first place.
Of course, it would be terrible if you lost the arguement because you have run out of enthusiasm. Please reconsider :P
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*Starts shouting*
JERRY JERRY JERRY
Please continue this its quite an intresting thread, personaly I hope that this argument continues for pages. Then we can see arguments and counter arguments.
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Yay PS now has its own daytime TV on the forums!! WOOP!
JERRY JERRY JERRY!!!
(seriously sticky and close it.. everything that needs to be said has already)
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Well.. I\'ve spent the last 10 minutes reading this thread..
Italian player here.... I\'m following PlaneShift development from the first public release years ago..
I don\'t have much problem writing and reading english, but I know that many people didn\'t know english as well as other. I\'ve playing on the United States official Dark Age of Camelot servers, along with a big italian player community, and many of them can\'t understand a single sentence in english..
I was providing a \"tell me what you need to say, and I will translate for you\" for everyone that ask for help..
But I found that sometimes english player just throw bad words to player that simply wrote \"Non capisco l\'inglese, scusami..\" (I don\'t understand english, sorry) ...
That is not a nice way to live together.. I (and I hope, many others ppl) will translate things from (and in) english for everyone that ask me to, but I\'m really hoping to never read some \"\"\"\"\"racism\"\"\"\" on the ingame chat for someone that don\'t write in english..
I agree with no regrets at the \"only english in shout channel\", in respect for the people (transl. from english is way better than trans. from a bunch of other language)..
For the Help channel, I\'m on the way to propose a better multi language support for player.. IE: If someone is not really used to english, asking for help in that language would change in a pain to understand a maybe stricly technical answer, or some complex step to do..
The fastest way, is to have a friend that translate for you what you have to say, and then the answer.. but the better way, is to promote some player to helper, creating this way a team that can cover most of the language in the game
just for example, I can answer help question fluently in italian, and I can answer also at english ones, so if someone ask for help in italian I can reach him directly with his native language (that I already know is a lot better in help services)
Well, I have way too much things to learn about PS before I can be really helpful, so \"me\" is only an example.. I think there is plenty of willing-to-help people out here
ATM I can just offer again the little translate service that I was providing in other games..
English-italian and Italian-english
(I also know a few words in french, but not enought to be useful to someone =\\ )
Just send a tell when needed =)
atm my character name is \"Blackwolf Moonshade\"
If I\'m online I will be happy to help in everything I can.
I think we may coexist.. at least we all lives in the same world ;P (twice.. Earth and PS =) )
FareWell
WoLf
[BTW sorry if something is wrong or in a bad grammar =) I\'m still italian ;P]
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(seriously sticky and close it.. everything that needs to be said has already)
What!?!?!? Theres always room for another round of claim / counter claim...
ATM I can just offer again the little translate service that I was providing in other games..
English-italian and Italian-english
(I also know a few words in french, but not enought to be useful to someone =\\ )
Just send a tell when needed =)
Thats extremly thoughtful of you, always glad to see someone doing something to help the other players. Lets just hope some nazi dosnt stop you doing it because they\'re afraid of being left out / scared other languages will take over PS / are xenophobic / dont like you / feel insecure. This sort of positive attitude will definatly help new players who arnt that good at english learn how the game works.
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I\'ll try to be brief, which is difficult for me.
Thanks for coming back, Seytra.
1. If you think this thread is a waste of time. Don\'t read it. How hard is that? Why must you call for its closure? We\'re dealing with a serious topic: who gets to speak what while in game.
2. I disagree that it\'s a waste of time if for no other reason than it\'s entertaining and thought provoking.
If I may paraphrase, Seytra made the following claims.
1. English is not a difficult language to learn.
2. We\'d be better off if we all spoke English.
3. The purpose of the internet is communication, therefore it demands a unified language.
So let me give you counterexamples:
1. Well, others have spoken on this one.
2. How can you make this claim? I pointed to the Saphir-Worf hypothesis to show that EXPERTS in linguistics disagree with you on this matter. The fact that you don\'t agree with the hypothesis nor the field of linguistics does not discount the fact that people who have made careers in the field think you are wrong. Not all of them, maybe not most of them, but some of them. Thus, you need to offer better support of this claim.
3. I disagree with the premise. The internet is a tool. There is no pre-set reason for it to exist besides the U.S. military. Also, \"communication\" is a broad term. Transferring data requires no language skill whatsoever. There are many methods which are independent of language. Hence, my Hindu girl example. (yes, I am manly and I did have her, go me!)
If you think I have misconstrued your arguments, I would be happy to revise, but I have tried to present them here with as little bias as possible.
Last, humour is a valid technique. Can I support that statement? Well, no. So I will retract it: Humour is not a valid technique.
Wait, this thread started with me saying \"I can try to help with Spanish if need be\", then you busted in. Who\'s the troll here?
/me smashes a hobbit\'s skull with his mighty club.
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please stop stop mentioning the sapir-whorf (notice the spelling), if anyone is going to discuss or mention it...please read a bit on it. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapir-Whorf_hypothesis) As i said before it\'s an old and widely discredited hypothesis. It basically says that language affects the way person thinks and sees the world... i don\'t see how that relates to PS...in fact the hypothesis could be used to support the view that allowing and encouraging use of other languages WILL have an effect on PS world... that people who play PS and speak for example french will percieve the game differently from those who play it while speaking english...thus causing a rift between those two groups.
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Why not just make an addition to a /help channel.
A Helper, when switching to /Help mode will get a pop-up allowing him/her to choose what languages other than English he/she can help in.
For example: \"/Russian\" or \"/Spanish\"
A foreign newbie, after switching to help channel will be able to check if there are any Helpers for his language:
\"/check Russian\" or \"/check Spanish\"
and get a message:
\"There are 3 Russian helpers currently on-line\"
Then, the newbie would type in something like this...
\"/speak Russian *********....\"
et cetera...
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please stop stop mentioning the sapir-whorf (notice the spelling), if anyone is going to discuss or mention it...please read a bit on it. As i said before it\'s an old and widely discredited hypothesis. It basically says that language affects the way person thinks and sees the world... i don\'t see how that relates to PS...in fact the hypothesis could be used to support the view that allowing and encouraging use of other languages WILL have an effect on PS world... that people who play PS and speak for example french will percieve the game differently from those who play it while speaking english...thus causing a rift between those two groups.
The Sapir-whorf (i can spell! :D) states that different languages promote different ways of thinking. And in case you noticed, this arguement dosnt relate to PS, its kinda shifted towards an arguement of languages on the internet, once we resolve this (ha! resolve it? lol) then i suppose we could apply the results of it to PS. Anyway the point is that if we all spoke the same language then we would lose ways of thinking, and lose alot of diversity and culture. This is a case of Diversity vs Economics. Having people speak different languages is not very effecient is it? Wouldnt it be better if we all spoke the same language? I mean some people might not like it a first but they\'d get used to it... Ok well while we\'re at it, everyone liking different foods is a pain in the ass... economies of scale says that if we all ate the same food we could focus technological advances on that food, and would have more effecient processing of that food, saving millions of acres of farmland and trillions of dollars. Not everyone would like it at first, but they\'re get used to it, and it\'ll be more effecient, wouldnt it? Oh and wearing different types of clothes is a pain, lets all focus on making one type, perfect it and save alot of money. Oh and different types of government- everyone is constantly changing anyway, lets just choose one and keep with that, no more need for revolutions and the such, they\'re such a waste of time. Oh, and different religions are a pain and ineffecient, same with different literature, music, art, race, skin, creed- we\'ll make it all the same, and then it would be amazingly effecient. And you know what? It would be amazingly effecient. And would then be a good thing? Hell no!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We must preserve the diversity and culture that we have. And dont say this sort of thing is exaggerated and wouldn\'t happen- If you demand unity for something as fundamentally different as language, you have already destoryed a huge section of culture in the world, and cutting out other differences in culture like food and clothing would be easier. Its all right to say everyone should conform, as long as you\'re the culture being conformed to. If you spoke only french or german or korean or japanese or chinese you wouldnt be as eager to have a common language, because you would understand the sacrifices that would have to be made.
Ok, now that we\'ve dismissed that stupid idea, lets get back to the topic, languages in PS. I think we should, wherever possible, be helping people who dont have a good grasp of english enjoy the game. The fact remains that the offical language of PS is english, and as such when all the quests and such are in english there will always be a big incentive for any serious player to learn english, if they are going to play. The cavet being we dont want to encourage seperation of the community into languages divided groups. You must remember, fundamentally that you cannot force people to be part of a community- you can only encourage them. We cannot force people to be nice role players getting on with everybody and involving in the community, you can only encourage it. I think basic language assistance like an explaination of the chat commands and other basic PS commands, and what to do, should be provided in other languages if there are volunteers willing to provide the translations. However i think that anything beyond the basic ideas of PS should not be officially given out in other languages, so that if players are serious about PS they will obtain some working knowledge of english.
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there is such thing as too much diversity....
when? you may ask...well right here in planeshift...
diversity of servers.... devs think having multiple servers will dillute the game
for similar reason... i think encouraging non-english might dillute the game. Notice i said encouraging.... i think non-english conversations should be allowed... but (officially) translating guides having multi-language help channel will actually reduce the need for players to learn the language, and so they won\'t. Instead new players who don\'t know english will immediatelly flock togather with their respective language/ethnical groups. NONSENSE you may say, that won\'t happen. Why not? It happens in real world, i am going to use china towns as an example, not because i have something against them but because they can be found in almost every country. Some people will once upon arrive to a foreign country immediatelly go to the respective china town, get a place there,get a job there, buy stuff there and thus eliminate any need for learning a language.
Here\'s hypothetical situation...in PS where language communities are encouraged and supported:
A german speaking person who knows little english arrives to Hydlaa. He found it through his friends they play it also, they are in guild, in which 99% are german speaking. He immediatelly finds them, they help him out giving him some weapons, telling him to talk to the blacksmith, type \'give me a quest\' and \'yes\' later, and to go to the magic shop to get gold. He does so..but once he gets there he realizes he doesn\'t know how to mine... he types /help German...and asks how to mine... he gets an answer in german. This player in question is playing in elf ... and is approached by an elf, Albion, while he is digging... the elf Albion says \'hello, how goes the search for gold\', our hero...does not answer...or says \'i don\'t know english\'...and does not try to communicate because he does not need to talk to this elf ....he has his german speaking community who can provide him with all the information and role playing experience.
If language based communities were discouraged...our hero would be forced to crack open a dictionary...and see how you say certain things ... and learn a bit of a language. He would be forced to ask someone in English how you do earn some money, where do you find gold.
i am too tired to explain....my point.... but i will say this encouraging different languages and allowing language based communities will cause a rift between planeshift players. There is no question or doubt about it.
The real question is will this weaken or strengthen the PS experience?...i think it will weaken
Oh btw about Sapir Whorf.... i disagree with that hypothesis... i don\'t think that language shapes the way you think. It\'s people view of the world that shapes the language not the other way around. And people living in different places shaped their language differently to accomodate their conditions. Example english.... Australians act differently then British...even though they are originally british... because their surrounding changed... and their way of life changed.... and reflecting that language changed. Same with americans....American, Australian and British english all differ slightly, reflecting their different ways of life. If language shaped the way we think then language would never change...and 1337 would never exist.
i am tired of this discussion....it\'s difficult to have a serious forum discussion... replies are too far apart.... so you lose the mental momentum
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(officially) translating guides having multi-language help channel will actually reduce the need for players to learn the language, and so they won\'t.
In every debate about languages here, I\'ve always found this idea very intriguing, that learning a language is a sort of natural process and only a matter of good will.
As I stated earlier, such things takes YEARS of HARD WORK and a lot of motivation (it requires more than just a game).
So let me put this straight :
NOONE will learn a whole language just for a game. EVER.
Therefore the whole \"if we allow language support no one will make the effort of learning english\" thing is totally absurd. When they come on PS, people already know english, or don\'t, and if they don\'t, it\'s more than likely that they never will.
So there are only 2 solutions :
- You accept this fact and make language support available.
- You don\'t accept it and forbid people who don\'t speak english to play.
Pretty simple, eh ?
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I\'m totally agree with you Caym you have explain very good the raison of this language\'s problem in planeshift :)
id otn understand her all that say but i try to understand the minimum of this conversation and sorry if my english is not very good ;)
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A german speaking person who knows little english arrives to Hydlaa. He found it through his friends they play it also, they are in guild, in which 99% are german speaking. He immediatelly finds them, they help him out giving him some weapons, telling him to talk to the blacksmith, type \'give me a quest\' and \'yes\' later, and to go to the magic shop to get gold. He does so..but once he gets there he realizes he doesn\'t know how to mine... he types /help German...and asks how to mine... he gets an answer in german. This player in question is playing in elf ... and is approached by an elf, Albion, while he is digging... the elf Albion says \'hello, how goes the search for gold\', our hero...does not answer...or says \'i don\'t know english\'...and does not try to communicate because he does not need to talk to this elf ....he has his german speaking community who can provide him with all the information and role playing experience.
That can already happen, and already does happen. It has been stated that there is no problem with non english speech in /guild, /tell, etc. But i dont think its as extreme as you make it out to be.
Heres what im thinking at the moment:
1) you cant force people to roleplay.
2) Pretty much nobody will learn a language in order to play a game, as Caym rightly pointed out.
Therefore if a huge number of say german players are playing the same, and coversing in their own language, if you suddenly ban them doing so, you will not get one extra player into the english society, because they will just go and play another game. They will not suddenly decide to learn english to keep playing the game. Therefore having some support for other languages will increase the number of people in the game, some of whom may decided to converse in english later and become part of the community. Or you ban the other languages, and those players just dont play. My point is that forcing them to speak english will not make them participate more, but just drive them out of the game. Maybe thats what you want to happen, but it wont in any way shape of form promote the idea of a biggger and less devided PS community.
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I undertand Keseijin\'s fear of segregation. As I\'ve mentioned, I live in a linguistically segregated town. I\'m sure some of you do, too, since any port city is bound to be.
It is frustrating to feel like a minority in your neighbourhood when you are part of the \"majority\" culture, but this is price you pay for living in a free society.
However, I say \"If the German players want to form a guild: let them.\" To me, it opens up the idea that PS is an internation community. I don\'t think we should guarantee support in any language besides English, but I don\'t see the harm in a German speaking GM occasionally giving help in German, nor do I see the harm is putting up some post of people who are semi-bilingual who offer to help incoming non-english speakers.
Right now at any given time there are about 60-100 people on line. I don\'t think the German language community is large enough to isolate themselves, nor is any other language community. When/if they get to be that way, I won\'t be offended, unless they invade my guild and try to conquer it. (Has the German guild been eyeing the French guild?)
Ram: you\'re beginning to sound ungrateful for your MacDonald\'s and Nikes. :)
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Originally posted by Caym
NOONE will learn a whole language just for a game. EVER.
actually i learned good bit of english from playing police quest, space quest and leisure suit larry games when i was younger...
i mean fine... i just don\'t see how someone without an ounce of knowledge of english would want to play this game at all..And an ounce of knowledge is all you need to play this game.
language based communities aren\'t in the spirit of rp.... but whatever...
language based communities/guilds -> based on who the players are
race based guild/communties -> based on who the characters are
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If you want to be *really* purist about not letting languages split the community, there\'s always the option of inventing a whole new language for the game and only allowing that to be spoken... but then you probably won\'t get many players. :)
Although IMHO it\'s the lesser evil for multiple languages to exist rather than everyone speaking the same (and English did not become the international language by being any good for the purpose), ramlambmoo mentioned the idea that different languages are like different types of food. Indeed they both add diversity to to the world, but there is a serious flaw in directly comparing languages to food: everyone knows how to eat - there is no or very little learning needed to eat different types of food (maybe e.g. learning to use chopsticks and even that\'s usually optional), whereas a lot of effort is needed to learn to understand a new language. Even the effort involved in learning to cook different food is probably less than learning to speak a different language.
Can I just point anyone who hasn\'t seen it to my suggestion for a translation help channel (on the Wish List board):
http://www.planeshift3d.com/wbboard/thread.php?threadid=14746&boardid=11&styleid=3&sid=59f6e22ac12164b343e67d1b2ea07e6b
...and my post about gestures which is somewhere earlier in this thread, and maybe I should re-post it somewhere else.
And, not related to PS (but this thread isn\'t now anyway) - here\'s a few fun language-related links:
http://www.omniglot.com/ - if you think \"writing\" only means the letters A to Z, think again...
http://www.trigeminal.com/samples/provincial.html - \"Why can\'t they just speak English?\"... and the equivalent phrase in about 100 languages.
http://www.google.co.uk/language_tools?hl=en - by clicking the links under \"Use the Google Interface in Your Language\", you can see what Google looks like in all the supported languages without it changing your default language to them.
http://www.lojban.org/ - Lojban: the logical language - an interesting constructed language which is based on the principles of logic and aims to allow maximum flexibility of expression. But isn\'t, in my experience, quite as easy to learn as they claim.
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Ram: you\'re beginning to sound ungrateful for your MacDonald\'s and Nikes.
Dont get me started....
ramlambmoo mentioned the idea that different languages are like different types of food. Indeed they both add diversity to to the world, but there is a serious flaw in directly comparing languages to food: everyone knows how to eat - there is no or very little learning needed to eat different types of food (maybe e.g. learning to use chopsticks and even that\'s usually optional), whereas a lot of effort is needed to learn to understand a new language.
1) I didnt say languages and food were the same, i was just saying that those are two of the many things which add diversity, and which would increase effeciency if they were made uniform. I was just showing how if everyone conformed it wouldnt be very good.
2) Theres more to eating then shoving food in your mouth- if i go to japan and eat there it would be a couple of months before i would adapt and come to actually enjoy eating, because it would take a long time to get used to their food, just like it would take a long time to get used to language. Im not saying they\'re the same, the time span for language is significantly longer than food but there are similarities, and i think my point holds.
...and my post about gestures which is somewhere earlier in this thread, and maybe I should re-post it somewhere else.
I saw it, but due to the nature of the discussion it seems to have been lost in the flurry of arguements. Try posting it on the suggestion boards, if it hasnt already been suggested there.
actually i learned good bit of english from playing police quest, space quest and leisure suit larry games when i was younger...
ahhh, good old police quest and space quest, i remember those...
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Originally posted by ramlambmoo
The official language of PS is english. If you\'re going to help people get into PS in their native languages, fine, but I\'m totally against the separation based on language that will inevitably happen if people can have the convenience of using their native language, instead of having to practice english. This separation will hamper RP, and be bad for a general mindset that might even culminate in racism towards RL people, that will manifest at least in guilds only accepting people who come from certain language areas, which would not even have any RP value. Furthermore, in todays world, being able to communicate in the english language is almost a requirement, so why not take the opportunity to learn it while doing something fun, where it doesn\'t matter if you make mistakes, than having to do so later under way less pleasant circumstances?
And before you accuse me of not knowing what it is like to be non-native english speaking: I am not natively english speaking, but AMOF, I don\'t see this matter in any way, and will decline to use my native language in PS.
In fact, I think it sucks very badly to have all these non-english content on the internet. It adds to redundancy, and the information I need might simply be written in any of the multiple languages I don\'t understand. If everyone would simply use english if by any means possible, the purpose of the internet, which is communicating information to the broadest base of people possible, would be achieved way better.
That has got to be the most narrow minded rant ive ever heard. Ok, the offical language of PS is english, so that language should be used. But how can you expect everyone on the internet to use english? Oh, boo hoo you cant read some of the content? Oh, you must feel so left out being the majority of users who can read most things on the internet. Why in gods name should everyone be forced to speak english on the inernet? To make it easier for us? WTF???? Its called tolerance. Diversity. I only speak english, but i understand how bad it is as a language to learn properly. Linguistically english is one of the worst languages around with the amount of euphemisms, sayings, metaphors etc... plus the largely non-existent spelling rules (well for me :P) and the ridiculously felixble grammer system.... Im very happy i was born and english speaker because it is the language out of all in the world i would least like to have to learn. I would support a global language on the internet, but only if it wasnt english, so it would be easy to learn. Something like Korean, except more european. (latin perhaps? lol). I say korean because its a very structured, scientific language- everything can be said pretty much one or two ways, and you know exactly what everything means. Plus it is 100% phonetically correct- what you see written is exactly how you pronounce it, every time. If we had a global language, it surely would need to be a good language.
um... speaking of worst laguage to learn, try chinese, especially traditional chinese...which is using in Taiwan.
Instead of using spelling, we have over 400,000 characters exist. 4,000 of them are the common use characters. Lots of characters have two or three different pronunciations, applying the different pronunciation can lead the sentence to completely different meaning. And even by missing one tiny stroke of some characters can oppsite the meanings.
I havn\'t start to talk about the grammer yet...
why i\'m talking about those? i think i\'m just bored...
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>> would you choose english or gaelic, provided that you\'re capable of writing in both?
Theres no such language as gaelic. Gaelic is a term to describe 3 different languages and also as a term to describe a particular culture of people i.e > The gaels.
Theres Gaeilge (Irish Gaelic), Scottish Gaelic and Manx (Isle of Man).
I?d choose gaeilge.
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>>speaking of worst laguage to learn, try chinese, especially traditional chinese
I?ve heard that alright but i?d have to try it to believe it. English is actually supposed to be particularily difficult for non-native speakers but gaeilge (Irish gaelic) is extremely difficult.