Your thoughts on extinct languages.

Raziaar

Raziaar

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So I'm sure by now you've all heard about the growing number of languages that are being forgotten. Quite a considerable number.

My question to you is... do you care? Do you think it's worth an effort of preserving these cultural languages? If so, do you have any preferences as to which ones should be saved, and which ones should be allowed to go extinct?
 
For archaeologists and a select few, sure, they can study whatever they want. Me? Don't really care. Not relevant to my life.
 
I care. Life without misunderstanding just isn't as funny. And if we all speak the same language .. What will happen to misunderstandings? For example, would you like to borrow my Winkelmesser?
 
Can I touch your Winkelmesser? Do you want to touch mine? I have 3, one for each of you. Give mister winkel pleasure and I return favor.
 
The languages should definatly be preserved, but not artificially kept alive.
 
I think it's sad as it means unique cultural forms will be forgotten, languages are fantastically rich forms of expression, and have ties to people's shared heritage.

I find the apathy displayed in this thread a bit disheartening actually

(I'd also like to point out that languages are a means of identifying with one-another)
 
First we translate all the possible knowlege held by people who speak only that language and/or books/writings etc.

Still a bit screwy with all the literature though. What happens then? There's some words... that don't have equivilents in other languages. Do we import them?
 
different languages only mean even more dividing. so that is bad.
 
Jintor said:
There's some words... that don't have equivilents in other languages.
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This is an important point. It's also one of the main reasons we should try to preserve dying languages, because it demonstrates how language isn't just a means of communicating. It's a way of interpreting the universe from the perspective of another culture.

As a hypothetical example, you might say 'chair' in your language and mean the type of chair you're familiar with and sit in a lot, but another person might say 'chair' in another language and mean an ever-so-slightly different thing based the role chairs play in their culture, the way they construct chairs, reflecting whether they use chairs less or more than you do, etc... That's the type of information you lose on a massive scale when a language dies, so you lose one culture's unique interpretation of the world, including including snippets of that culture's history and how they might view important concepts like 'love', 'beauty', 'justice' and all that.
 
Atomic_Piggy said:
This is why everyone has to speak english. :p
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lol I used to agree with this mentality at one time too but I think Laivasse made some pretty good points that one cant get unless you have experienced different cultures. I remember when I spent 3 months in amsterdam and how much of a shock it was to me to spend that much time in a different culture and then to come home.
In their music, for example, listening to someone sing in dutch or whatever was interesting cause even though I had no f*ckin clue what they were saying I could still feel it. On a related note when I got out of the central train station right I counted about 5 Mcdonalds along the streets running parallel to the red light district :dozey:.
 
Laivasse said:
This is an important point. It's also one of the main reasons we should try to preserve dying languages, because it demonstrates how language isn't just a means of communicating. It's a way of interpreting the universe from the perspective of another culture.

As a hypothetical example, you might say 'chair' in your language and mean the type of chair you're familiar with and sit in a lot, but another person might say 'chair' in another language and mean an ever-so-slightly different thing based the role chairs play in their culture, the way they construct chairs, reflecting whether they use chairs less or more than you do, etc... That's the type of information you lose on a massive scale when a language dies, so you lose one culture's unique interpretation of the world, including including snippets of that culture's history and how they might view important concepts like 'love', 'beauty', 'justice' and all that.
Click to expand...

from a technical point of view that's bullshit.
 
So every time there're two or more possibilities of something happening, the universe splits? That's a lot of universes.

EDIT: Damn, wrong thread.

EDIT2: I think that a lot of cultural and historical object would be lost of everyone spoke English (or some other language). For example, novels are always best when read in their original language.
 
I think only good things can come out of speaking less languages. Less languages = less confusion = more understanding = hopefully more unity in this world.
 
It's definitely a mixed bag. Personally, I find it rather frightening, because different languages contain different concepts that really can't be translated. If the world ends up speaking only English, I fear we'll lose those concepts forever (for the most part).
 
I don't care if a language goes extinct, it will only go extinct if no one wants to speak it anymore.
 
To have unity there surely has to be differences. If we're all too similar we lose the point of life, and we might as well just kill each other.

Don't get me wrong I'm all for the "If you live in a country speak the language" thing. what people forget is thats not always going to be English.
 
Undecided. Just like how I'm undecided when I'm cleaning my house, and can't decide whether to throw something out or keep it for sentimental value.
 
JNightshade said:
It's definitely a mixed bag. Personally, I find it rather frightening, because different languages contain different concepts that really can't be translated. If the world ends up speaking only English, I fear we'll lose those concepts forever (for the most part).
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Well personally, I don't believe that's true.

If there's anything out there to be translated, I'm sure the English language can do it. There's so much useless shit in this language, that we can just about describe anything I bet. Sure it might not be concise or pretty, but trust me... we can get the point of absolutely anything across with a few sentences.

Undecided. Just like how I'm undecided when I'm cleaning my house, and can't decide whether to throw something out or keep it for sentimental value.
Click to expand...

So what you're saying is that one mans language is another mans garbage.

Your language is garbage to me.
 
It would be a bit boring if everyone spoke English. No Hungarian Monty Python sketches D:
Also, when you decide to speak just one language, you have to decide which it will be. There are a lot of people out there who don't speak English, who would probably be pretty pissed if their language dissapeared.
Apart from all that, one language is another step to everyone being the same. Which would be pretty boring. Then again, maybe I wouldn't say that if I was caught up in a war between two countries D:
 
I dont care, I wish everyone spoke one language anyway.

We need a language metiorite to kill them all out.
 
Raziaar said:
So what you're saying is that one mans language is another mans garbage.

Your language is garbage to me.
Click to expand...

Well then I forbid you to speak my language! I hope your Spanish is good. :frown:

I'm not saying that at all. I'm of the opinion, similar to what someone else said before, don't artificially keep languages alive, but if someone wants to keep a language alive, they should be supported within reason.

Languages are only kept alive because of the people behind them.
 
We should keep records of all known languages.
 
Do you care?
Yes

Do you think it's worth an effort of preserving these cultural languages?
Yes

If so, do you have any preferences as to which ones should be saved, and which ones should be allowed to go extinct?
All should be preserved. If you want to study past cultures you should be able to know the language. Or understanding your own culture for that matter, latin and greek being obvious examples.
 
I'm forced to study one (well, Irish isn't really extinct, but it's only beening kept alive through force) and it's my worst subject! D=
 
i mentioned my main reason, since i'm more of a unitarian.

what i meant with technical point of view was, that we keep holding on with different languages primarily because of emotion not because of reason.
 
kirovman said:
Well then I forbid you to speak my language! I hope your Spanish is good. :frown:

I'm not saying that at all. I'm of the opinion, similar to what someone else said before, don't artificially keep languages alive, but if someone wants to keep a language alive, they should be supported within reason.

Languages are only kept alive because of the people behind them.
Click to expand...

I was just joking.
 
I think these languages should be well documented for historians, including phonetics and meaning of phrases, etc . . . however for modern use it's just a waste of resources.

Overall? let it die.
 
i say we just grunt at each other. its amazing how well you can communicate by grunts, howls and pointing at things....
 
Jintor said:
Latin is awesome.
Click to expand...

That's what I'm studying now! I love it! Now I know Latin, Spanish, and English! Next up is either French or Italian.

My say in the matter is that we should speak different languages, I mean English is the "dominating" language NOW, before it was Latin, Spanish, French, and other languages' "turns." Just wait, maybe in a century or so, we'll all be speaking Chinese or Swedish, or Irish, idk!
 
I know english inside and out, and I'm pretty good at french and spanish. I think I'll move onto german if I get the chance to learn another language.

Also, why would you want to learn latin? No-one speaks it, so its not like it can be a conversation.
 
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