@valhalla @kinkkong that king conquered my lands, destroyed my kingdom, and nowadays we are called freeloaders and north Italians (who came to “liberate” us) still act racists towards us. No thanks, that king is no king of mine. May he burn in hell.

Btw I love French, but it’s also because of France that the interwar project to use Esperanto as internal language was vetoed. Esperanto might have had a chance if not for the French.

@valhalla @kinkkong, this make sense! But even better would be to use a language that is even more neutral, not just "second" in some small countries.

There is #Esperanto - a constructed language that belongs to no specific nation but to whole humankind. Much easier to learn and use, while fully capable of expressing wide range of things. Already works for usual people, and with small additional development it will work fully even in high profile EU political context.

@Pare @valhalla @kinkkong, it makes more sense. Europe needs a mutual language to unite, and that will not happen using a national language of one of the big members.

Better would be even more neutral language, like #Esperanto, as it belongs to no specific nation (not even some competitor nation, like English does), so it can unite people and nations of Europe.

@kubofhromoslav @Pare @valhalla
That's reasonable. But I don't like Esperanto (eo/epo) that much. I'm in favour of #Volapük (vo/vol). I don't know anything about it, yet, but I like the many umlauts:

vo.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cifapad

More about Volapük: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volapük

Hi @kinkkong! We are dedicated to diversity and multilingualism. However, this particular social media page is in English because, for practical reasons, it is not feasible to do it in all 24 official EU languages.

You could consider checking out the pages run by our colleagues in the EU Representations in the Member States, which are available for every country and in every EU language. Find out more here: link.europa.eu/dhBrwm

Representations in Member States | European Commission

Commission representations perform various functions such as liaising with local authorities and media, organising official visits, and providing political information and analysis.

^{European Commission}

Why not #Latin? It has several advantages:

1. It is the base for may European languages and left impressions on all the others.

2. It has been proven to work as an auxiliary language historically as well as contemporarily (Vatican).

3. Many pupils already have to learn it all around Europe for no good reason. It would give a meaning to common practice.

4. Its complicated grammar would make Esperanto look even more desirable.

@valhalla @kinkkong
Is there a "main official language" for countries in the EU?

For example Belgium uses three official EU languages

Official languages are official for EU, not necessarily for some of the countries, and they must be approved by EU, not by the single countries, right?

When Ireland became a member, only English was added as official, is it their "main" language?

Belgio - paesi dell'UE| Unione europea

Scopri di più sul sistema politico, sull'economia e sul commercio del Belgio, sulla sua rappresentanza nelle varie istituzioni dell'UE e sui finanziamenti che riceve dall'UE.

^{European Union}

@proedie @kubofhromoslav @Pare @valhalla
Let's not forget #Ithkuil!

Any privileged language based on the roman alphabet would be unfair against our friends from #Bulgaria and #Greece.

Ithkuil comes with its own writing system and a #grammar that has little in common with any #language we know.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ithkuil

It's not as easy to learn as #Latin or #Sanskrit, but translating a sentence can be done in four simple steps:

ithkuil.net/texts.html#karenin…

Your fourth argument is quite funny 😆.

And also the extremely complicated relation between how one writes and how one pronounces English should make #Esperanto desirable.

The cost of learning a common language would decrease a lot! And also the number of people with a good level in the common language.

Currently, lots of young people study the English language in Europe, but many of them are not able to reach a good enough level.

@proedie I prefer Celtic. 😎

@kubofhromoslav @Pare @valhalla @EUCommission @kinkkong

@proedie @Pare @valhalla @kinkkong, I learnt both #Esperanto and #Latin and I confirm that Latin's complicated grammar makes Esperanto even more desirable 😅

In short, despite its many cool features, especially historic significance, Latin is just too hard for masses. We definitely can have an inteligencia layer fluent in Latin, but it would do little to unite Europe.

@benny @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla @EUCommission, couple of reasons.

English is not super neutral. Indeed, a bit in EU (only in 2 quite small countries), but definitely not on the world stage.

English's role is *national* communication. International use blends it.

English is unnecessary hard to use. Good for national communication, but for international one, and unification of Europe, we need a language that masses can use comfortably.

@benny @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla @EUCommission, it doesn't make sense to use language that is hard, or even harder than it could be. For masses we need a language that is *easy* to learn and use, while being fully capable. So, equally easy for everyone.

Such language is a nice hypothetical exercise, but doesn't exist. Esperanto is closer to that from what I know.

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @kinkkong @valhalla I started studying English 40 years ago, with many years of lessons at school every week, let's say for 10 years. Then I kept on using it almost every day, attending also many conferences.

I started studying Esperanto 10 years ago by myself, with just a tenth of lesson via e-mail by a professor, and I use it when I have the chance to.

My level for the two languages is almost the same!

Yes, English is MUCH harder than Esperanto!

@benny @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla (2 months intensive study, 22 months of mostly using on internet) I get to same level as in English in 15 years of school learning.

Clear difference 😎

@benny @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla is pretty regular and designed for ease of use. Eg. you can learn couple of prefixes and suffixes (eg. "mal-" means opposite) to create a lot g other words just from 1 root.

Eg. bona = good, mal-bona = bad, bon-ulo = good person, bon-ega = great, etc.

I remember when I was new to Esperanto and tried to ask where is the canteen, using my own word created this way. And it was the official word! 😍

@kubofhromoslav @benny @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla
Heck yeah. Esperanto was specifically created so that even if you've never seen a particular word before there is still some chance you can figure it out from roots, prefixes, and suffixes. And, as pointed out, it strives for regularity.

I've never studied it seriously, but when I see Esperanto it's kind of like a game for me to unravel what it means. And you can get surprisingly close a lot of the time.

@kubofhromoslav @benny @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla
I just had a great example!

Ich kann nur ein bischen Deutsche, and I just came across the word 'einsehbar' - new to me, but I recognize 'sehen', and I know that '-bar' sagt dass etwas fähig ist. I'm not sure how adding 'ein-' affects the meaning, but I was able to keep reading, knowing that I was being told where I could go see the thing.

Esperanto says "what if that, but everywhere?".

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @Pare @valhalla
Never tried #Esperanto, but I've been struggling with #English now for multiple decades. It's horribly irregular. Sure, everyone knows that 🐟 is spelled "ghoti", but nobody knows how to pronounce Worcestershire.

That's why I'm in favour of #Spanish, which I learned many years after English. It's a piece of cake.

Also, #MAGA hates Spanish 🙂

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla
Ah, thanks! In this case it was a link to the journal paper that the article was about, so "you can look into" makes 100% sense.

And I'm pretty sure the Esperanto would be 'envidebla':

en- = 'ein-'
-vid-, from 'vidi' = to see
-ebl- = '-bar'/'able to' (Yeah, Esperanto's nicer to you if your native tongue is a Romance language than Germanic.)
-a = adjective ending.

(I'm happy to be corrected by serious Esperanto speakers.

@benny @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla @EUCommission, there definitely are some occasions when Esperanto speakers translate too directly from their native language and others are wondering what it means. That tends to disappear when speakers have contact from other Esperantists from different language families.

I still hear / read it sometimes, but rarely.

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @Pare @valhalla
Sure, but they claim that the #US were (or should be) an #English speaking country and everything should be #EnglishOnly.

Trump: "This is a country where we speak English, not #Spanish".

They closed the Spanish web page of the #CasaBlanca (#WhiteHouse).

Their hate of Spanish is irrational — and strong.

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla
I was wondering that too. My guess is that it's similar to the difference in English between 'see' and 'look at' respectively. Heck, doesn't French have both 'voir' and 'regarder'?

And my understanding is that even though it's rather informal, German has 'kucken' in addition to 'sehen'?

@kubofhromoslav
@benny
I second that:
Esperanto is *by far* easier to learn than English.

You wrote of "a planned language equally hard for everyone to learn".

Or equally (relatively) easy to learn, like Esperanto.

Look up "Paderborner Methode" on Wikipedia:
It's been around 50 years now that in this scientific experiment with different school classes, was found out that pupils who learned Esperanto *first* were mostly able to learn additional (European) languages easier and significantly faster than those who *only* learned the European language, without learning Esperanto.

50 years - and there's still an active recommendation by the UN to offer Esperanto lessons in all schools in Europe - ignored ever since, despite its advantages!

@proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla @EUCommission

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla
Heh, that's basically my Esperanto experience too.

I'm guessing that when you say "constant repetition" for English that means that there was lots of content around, and lots of stuff you wanted access to that required English. (Computer stuff? Entertainment?)

And Esperanto just does not have that vast, high-demand content (at least now). ....

@jztusk
I'm italian. I'd translate the #Esperanto verb "vidi" with the Italian "vedere", and the Esperanto verb "rigardi" with "guardare".

I agree, the English verbs "to see" and "to look (at)" should have the same differences.
@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @kinkkong @valhalla @EUCommission

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla
... and that constant exposure is how people really absorb language. So it's definitely true that Esperanto is *much* better structured than English, but as you demonstrate, content beats grammar.

As a native English speaker I've benefited a lot from English languages hegemony, but I can't pretend English isn't an absolute mess.

@benny @kubofhromoslav @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla
I've said that if you study two out of Spanish, French, and Italian you get the third one almost for free.

I think if you've studied Spanish and English, and are a native German speaker, I think you get Esperanto for free. 😄

@benny @kubofhromoslav @jztusk @proedie @kinkkong @Pare @valhalla ‘Vid’ means ‘see’ and ‘rigard’ means ‘look’. An invisible person is ‘ne·vid·ebl·a’, since you can’t see them even if you’re looking at them. (Inversely, you could say the sun is ‘vid·ebl·a’ but ‘ne·rigard·ebl·a’, since you can see it but can’t directly look at it. Well, you can, but only once.)

There are countless instances where you could have either few words with very broad meanings to cover many use cases, or a single, more specialised word for each single use case. Both extremes have their advantages and disadvantages, and Esperanto isn’t naturally optimised for one or the other.