<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">I used to hate changes in the language back in my conservative days. I particularly hated phonetic spelling ("what do the damn Phoenicians have to do with anything?"). But now I think it's time for massive changes in the language. After all, the 'rules' of language should not actually impede communication, but they do.<br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">English is becoming the lingua franca of the world, and we need to keep it that way by changing and adapting.</div><br><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">Take spelling: English has a lot of old words still spelled the old way and it causes problems. (sough, bough, but tough). It is a very difficult language to learn because of it. We need to make it as easy as possible - right? Why not go to complete phonetic spelling? That's what we see on Twitter etc., isn't it? Why should written language be different? Why not go all the way and <br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">wrt lk ths - esy to gt, rgt? Very little if any slowdown even though we are all imprinted with the old language. Yes, there are problems with Old Hebrew and no vowels but we can deal with them. All it takes is standardization, such that 'rgt' means right and 'rte' means route. (This would do wonders for names as well - think of Polish names and our inability to pronounce them, like the Duke basketball coach - Krzyzewski, pronounced Shoeshefsky). <br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">Second, this goes right along with our powerful tendency to shorten, to elide. Contractions, gonna gotta shoulda, and the like show that we are going to be lazy - sorry - be efficient and get our message across as quickly as possible.<br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">I can see no downside to this, but given this group, I am sure I will hear of plenty.<br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">bill w<br></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Jan 12, 2016 at 9:46 AM, spike <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:spike66@att.net" target="_blank">spike66@att.net</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><br>
>... On Behalf Of Brian Manning Delaney<br>
<span class="">Subject: Re: [ExI] need a new word/suffix<br>
<br>
<br>
</span>>...Ah, Anders, thanks! I was misinformed about "Ni". - Brian<br>
<br>
Not just you Brian, we all were:<br>
<br>
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_who_say_Ni" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_who_say_Ni</a><br>
<br>
This brings back fond memories of a cheerfully misspent youth.<br>
<span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><br>
spike<br>
</font></span><div class="HOEnZb"><div class="h5"><br>
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