Paul's Comments

There are some people who "complain" about how the invented language Esperanto never took off despite the supposed advantages that it provides over other existing languages.

I can, to some extent, agree with that point. I am a native (and exclusive) speaker and writer of English, and I know how complicated the language is. There are lots of rules, exceptions, exceptions to the exceptions ("I before e except after c except in Budweiser"), and enough nuances and variations to make someone who's first learning English want to pull their hair out.

But those who are not happy about the lack of take up of Esperanto forget that a language is a living thing, it expands - or contracts - as a result of those involved in its use as they add or subtract words from the language to cover appropriate situations. And probably, most important, is the language's ability to "borrow" words from other languages.

English is not a monolithic system, it is basically a core language that has borrowed a lot from other languages over centuries. When a good word comes up in another language, we're not afraid to borrow steal that word and absorb it into the language, eventually making it a part of the language.

You can tell when a word has been considered absorbed. One of the "rules" of English is if you use a word from another language you're supposed to italicize it. While we would italicize words like chemin de fer (railway), we use Spanish words like taco, burrito; french words like au pair , assurance, and other languages or countries: bushveldt (South Africa), and these are all generally written sans italic ("sans" is a French word). All of these words came from some other language or culture.

I suspect Esperanto doesn't really adequately support absorption from other languages. Also, there's a problem of support, e.g. the "network effect," in that as more people use a language there's more reason for others to use it.

But "network effects" don't answer everything or this blog would be in Chinese. How well the language is carried elsewhere and what are the uses of the language, does it work well for the uses it is given?

Speaking of Chinese, the "fractionalizing" effect is another factor. A fractionalization of a language is known as a "dialect," where the language has different words, terms and in some cases might be so bad as to be unintelligible and might as well be a different language.

English has no more than two or three dialects, most of which are only slightly different from each other (British vs. American and maybe one other) and some minor technical differences (accents and usage) that allow most people anywhere in the world to understand a speaker of English from anywhere else. I routinely listen to the BBC World Service over the Internet and with few exceptions, never have any trouble understanding them or being aware of what they're talking about unless they refer to some local incident in the U.K. papers. In fact, the American influence on English is so strong that in almost every case, even where discussing something priced in British Pounds, the BBC World Service will quote prices in (U.S) Dollars without giving an exchange rate. But if they discuss something priced in Euros or other country's currency, they will routinely give the exchange rate, but not in (U.K.) pounds, but in dollars.

How many dialects does Chinese have? 50, 100? I just did a quick Google search; one guy's blog says that since China has about 8,000 counties, there are probably about that many dialects. Wikipedia lists 7: Gan, Guan (Mandarin), Hakka, Min (Taiwanese), Wu, Xiang, and Cantonese. And from what I understand, there are enough differences between them that they might as well be 7 different languages.

Educational opportunities are also important. I may have said this on this blog before, but it would bear repeating. Because of the number of people in schools in China and its enormous population, there are more people in China who can understand English than there are people living in the United States.

Also, carryover of a language to subsequent generations is critical to its continued success. Unless someone learns a language, then decides to have kids and use that language during the formative years when the child is learning language, their use of the language dies with them.

The "single language" factor is also important. If I am in a particular country and born there, I can learn that country's language (or primary language if it has more than one) and manage adequately to make a living or operate in that society. Since Esperanto has no specific country or place, it's only value is as a separate language in addition to some other language. I doubt anyone could manage to survive if they only thought in and understood Esperanto.

Hundreds - probably thousands - of languages have existed over time, and as those in those societies died out, the language died with them. If a language can't evolve to cover new situations, it will end up being replaced, which is why Latin is not popular except for poetic use, e.g. when I want to refer to someone who is the most important in a peer group, I can refer to the "leader of the group", (or "Leader of the Band" if I want to use the title from a Dan Fogelberg song) or I can refer to them as primus inter pares, my favorite latin term meaning "first among equals".

English has worked so well for commercial transactions because we've invented very precise and technically adequate words to describe most commercial transactions or activities. And because the computer was basically invented by Americans, most computer terms tend to be American English, which increases the network effects of the language.

When you're in diplomatic situations, however, French is the language of choice for this application. Part of the reason is that it is supposedly very civilizing and makes it difficult to be insulting, meaning that the communication tends to be more gracious, which is important, I suppose, when two rival countries are staring each other down with military weapons.

There is a joke about a short pamphlet listing "Major French Military Victories," and the rest of the pamphlet is short because it's blank. Perhaps it's because the French language doesn't provide good ways to get angry or express offense at others. I don't know, but I've heard that some of the extremely precise insults and swear words that English has - and I've probably used every one of them at one time or another - have no exact correspondence in other languages, or are much weaker in tone and force than they are in English.

So, coming to a conclusion, maybe Esperanto didn't have good enough swear words to be able to make it worth while to use it.