Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 January 11

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January 11

Completely unknown language

Say by some incredible coincidence earth recieved a transmission from an alien species- a recording of their language being spoken. What would we be able to tell about the language with no other information? What we would be able to tell if we recieved a written representation but no other information? 70.162.25.53 (talk) 01:20, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

If we heard a recording of their language, we could conclude with a reasonable amount of authority that they communicate (at least in part) auditorily like we do. If we saw their writing system, we wouldn't be able to tell much more than that they have a writing system. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 01:42, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

If we received a transmission that was purely auditory data, it would be a good indication that they consider an auditory recording to be an acceptable standalone means of communication. That is, they can use spoken language without visual or other clues and are likely do so. (It is interesting that human language is so purely auditory, despite the fact that humans face-to-face will communicate so strong in non-verbal ways. It seems quite possible that we could have evolved where purely auditory communication was purely a hack and real distant communication was done via video or writing.)

Likewise, if we saw their writing system, we know they consider visual media an acceptable means of communication. It would be interesting to see whether or not they use a black and white string of characters like most human languages--if they do, it would be an indicator they might use speech. (SignWriting, notably, is one of the few writing systems to be non-linear.) The number of symbols would give us a guess as to the nature of the writing system; alphabets tend to be small, less than 100 symbols, whereas ideographic systems tend to have thousands, and syllablaries somewhere in the middle. (A guess, but there would be a lot of guesses.) The amount of punctuation would make a huge difference; scriptio continua would be a lot harder to decipher than text with spaces and punctuation. If words could be split, we likely could separate content words from utility words (like conjunctions and articles.) Omnilingual has some interesting ideas on this.--Prosfilaes (talk) 02:49, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Given unlimited time and resources, would any level of deciphering be possible? I suspect not, but have seen movies and such where it happens (rather annoying me) - I have often wondered if my skepticism is valid. -Elmer Clark (talk) 02:51, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

It depends a lot on what we get. Even as fiction, Omnilingual really should be your starting point here; and it's not a bad story, either. If we get a context-less page of text, odds are we wouldn't be able to decipher anything. If we get enough text with some illustrations, I think given enough time we would be able to pull something out of it, even if most of it would be lost forever. However, if we get a introductory chemistry or math book, once we realize what the graphs are, a lot of stuff will reveal itself--as Piper points out, everywhere in the universe the elements go Hydrogen, Helium, Lithium. Dr. Feynman in one of his books discusses his deciphering of a Mayan math book. If we get a complete collection of Alpha Centuri's Dr. Suess, it should be pretty trivial. One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish alone would offer a good start.--Prosfilaes (talk) 03:36, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

It occurs to me that the Voynich Manuscript may be an example of this phenomenon - given the large amount of apparent context given there, if it is indeed written in some language, then the failure to decipher it over the centuries would seem to point to the answer being "no." -Elmer Clark (talk) 04:34, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

My favorite in the Message from Outer Space genre is His Master's Voice. Haukur (talk) 10:31, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

If the transmission were an attempt at contact, and the beings were of sufficient intelligence to actually be trying to transmit a message that they knew another race would be unable to understand, the message would, more than likely, be something that would be easibly understandable ... a Fibonacci sequence, Pi in some sort of notation, something of that sort, just to establish contact, then they and we might start sending other information back and forth, like some sort of electronic representation of the Pioneer plaque. Corvus cornix_talk 22:46, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

There is already an (easier) example from history. People could not decipher demotic or heiroglyphic script until the Rosetta stone was found, and those were human languages. Deciphering an alien one would be a whole lot tougher. And unless they have faster-than-light communication or are closer than we think, two-way communication would be a tad slow. Clarityfiend (talk) 06:46, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

The Indus script and Linear A are examples of undeciphered scripts/languages. We're not completely in the dark on them, though. Both suffer from the lack of long texts. Hieroglyphs do offer long texts and would, I think, have been easier to decipher, even without the Rosetta stone. Haukur (talk) 10:28, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

It always intrigues me to read that people assume alien civilisations that have the capacity to contact us must be fantastically more advanced than we are, yet would still fail to have the ability to give us a form of writing that we could reasonably quickly comprehend. -- JackofOz (talk) 09:00, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Be that as it may, the original poster was wondering about an incidental recording of spoken language, not explicit attempts to communicate or make contact. Some people like playing this game with human languages. See this Language Log quiz Haukur (talk) 10:28, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

If we had a video or a cartoon or something where we could have some visual references related to their sounds or writings then some educated guesses could be made, obviously with more possible accuracy depending on sample size, and completely unverifiable until we get a two way channel of communication wherewith to test our assumptions.

With just sounds or writings there's less we could get but that doesn't mean we can't get anything. There's more information in sounds but quite a bit in both. With sounds we can get a phoneme inventory and learn something about their physiology depending on what sounds are made and which ones are used more (many phonological rules are motivated by ease of articulation). With words we can learn a lot more from something that's physically written than something that's transferred electronically. If it's physically written we can see the materials and make inferences about the resources of the planet. We can also learn about the physiology by seeing how the strokes are made and the culture by seeing how the letters are organized and how economical they are in construction. If it's syllabic or alphabetic then we can try and figure out what some of the modifiers are. We can likewise try to pick out modifiers in spoken language and thereby get a sense of the organization of the morphology or even syntax, even though we probably won't have a clue of the meaning of any of it. -LambaJan (talk) 05:15, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Ordinata

What does ordinata mean in one word? It's a Latin title for some theological debates. --Omidinist (talk) 05:39, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Generally it would come directly from the verb ordino and mean simply set in order; it would be either a feminine singular, or a neuter plural of ordinatum (like my Greek-derived wikiname Noetica: I am, of course, neuter plural). Stelten's Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin gives no special meaning for ordinatum or ordinata. Does it constitute a title by itself, or can you give us a fuller title?

It is most likely something like ordinance, or statute; or, adjectivally, ordained or ordered.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 09:40, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

As Ordinatio, it is the title of a book by John Duns Scotus, the theologian. --Omidinist (talk) 10:47, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Ordinatio is Ordination. Would that fit? --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 11:05, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not ordination. Please look at this explanation in Britannica: [1]. --Omidinist (talk) 11:42, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Ordinatio is the root of our word ordination, but those kinds of words (an abstract noun formed from the past particle) did not really mean the same as their English derivatives, at least classically. "Ordinatio" could mean "an ordaining", or, apparently in this case, based on Britannica's note, "an ordering" or "an organizing" (as opposed to his lecture notes, which were probably less organized). It wouldn't be unusual for Duns Scotus to use ordinatio as simply "ordination" since that is the more likely medieval usage, but I guess Duns Scotus was a better Latinist than most medieval writers. Adam Bishop (talk) 11:58, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Omidinist, I asked above: "Does it constitute a title by itself, or can you give us a fuller title?" You have not answered that. Since you want help, please answer such questions. You have given us no context or source, except for another word that you did not enquire about.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 19:35, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I am really sorry, Noetica. As I found out later, ordinata is an altered form of ordinatio. And ordinatio is the full title of a book by itself. Thanks for your care. --Omidinist (talk) 20:27, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

If ordinatio means "revision", then ordinata could mean "something (feminine singular) that has been revised", or "things (neuter plural) that have been revised". It is the past participle of the verb that gives the noun ordinatio, most likely used as a noun.  --Lambiam 23:19, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

French "e" and English "s"

A lot of French and English words are quite similar, but the French starts with an "e" and the English starts with an "s", for example, école and school; état and state; étude and study, Étienne and Stephen etc. Does the English come from the French, or do they share some common etymology? Is there a reason for this pattern? --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 10:38, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

You have indeed noticed a pattern. Try looking up the Spanish equivalents of Stephen and school and see if that gives you any ideas. Haukur (talk) 11:17, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Another hint: they don't start with an "e", they start with an e accent aigu. See French language#Writing system. (It was hard to find in Wikipedia, that tidbit about the history of French orthography.) --Milkbreath (talk) 11:40, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

The basic reason is that they come from Latin (or Greek through Latin), which had no problem starting a word with the cluster "st-". When these words evolved into French and Spanish, speakers of those languages did not like that cluster, so an extra e- was added to the front to aid pronunciation. In Spanish it just stayed like that, but French evolved so that the middle -s- (formerly of course the initial s-) was no longer preferable, and it was replaced entirely by the e-. This didn't happen in all the Latin-derived languages though, as Italian still retains the st- cluster. Adam Bishop (talk) 11:28, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

A similar thing happened, by the way, to the "-st" cluster in the middle of words; there the "s" disappeared and the preceding vowel got a circumflex: fête (feast), tempête (tempest), hâte (haste), hôpital (hospital). 194.171.56.13 (talk) 13:54, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Re Italian: since there are inscriptions showing that words spelled with st- in Classical Latin were pronounced ist- in Vulgar Latin, it's more likely that Italian lost the initial vowel rather than that it never developed it. Evidence for this comes from the Italian word for "Spain", Spagna, which comes from Latin Hispania, where the initial vowel (the H being silent) was there to begin with, but lost in Italian. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 14:16, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Also re Italian: s-impure masculine nouns (beginning with ps or s+consonant) take "lo" as definite article in the singular, and "gli" in the plural. "gli" is also taken by masculine nouns beginning with a vowel, and "lo" provides a vowel sound before the s-cluster. It's as though the language demands a vowel before s-impure. SaundersW (talk) 15:14, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

In the singular, at any rate. The normal plural form of the definite article would have provided a vowel too. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 15:21, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. The plural is behaving as though there is already a vowel. SaundersW (talk) 17:32, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

This is an epenthesis. Pallida  Mors 15:34, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, it isn't; it's a prosthesis. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 20:31, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I award you an étoile for that. Julia Rossi (talk) 22:03, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Wow, fascinating stuff. Thanks everyone! --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 00:24, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, Angr is right. It's a prosthesis. Loosely speaking, it's also an epenthesis. Indeed the article on epenthesis has an example regarding our discussion. However, Prosthesis is the restricted term to speak of these aditions at the start of a word. Pallida  Mors 21:46, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Commas in english

This is really bugging me. I'm not saying my english is perfect - I know it's not - but I see a lot of oddly placed commas around here. A few examples...

"Tachyons are exhibited in many novels of the late science fiction author, Frank Herbert"

"Their song, "Gardens of the Sinner", was featured in the rhythm game, StepMania."

To me, these imply that there is only one late science fiction author, and the band (Gamma Ray (band)) has only ever written one song, Gardens of the Sinner. Are the commas really supposed to be there? Thanks. Aeluwas (talk) 17:40, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Not to mention that they seem to imply that there's only one rhythm game. Aeluwas (talk) 17:41, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

You are absolutely right. Those commas are wrong for the reason you state. So that raises the question of why you haven't fixed them already. You've been around since at least May 2007. Be BOLD. --Milkbreath (talk) 18:15, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

The New Fowler's Modern English Usage agrees with you, Aeluwas. It says "Omit the comma in such oppositive phrases as my son Jon." I agree too. --Heron (talk) 18:18, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't see what's wrong with the commas around "Gardens of the Sinner." They are just for parenthesis. Recury (talk) 18:20, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

What I find wrong about that is that it begins with "Their song", as opposed to "One of their songs" or such. In any case, I'll be bold in the future, just wanted to make sure that I'm not actually changing perfectly good english! Aeluwas (talk) 18:24, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Their song, "Gardens of the Sinner", was... is perfectly correct as I was taught. I would not suggest correcting such things unless you want to provoke needless arguments. Rmhermen (talk) 19:30, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

The commas in Their song, "Gardens of the Sinner",... are acceptable (but not obligatory) if they had only one song, or only one song relevant in the context. For example: Their song, "Gardens of the Sinner", came second to Solid Space's song. If they'd entered "Full Moon over Barcelona", they would have won.

Here commas would be unacceptable: Their song "Gardens of the Sinner" is the best they've ever done.

Suppose I have two sons: Albert and Bob. I should write My son Albert is a doctor. But I might write My son, Albert, beat your son at chess. Bob wasn't there, and doesn't even play chess.

[Heron, New Fowler's speaks of appositive phrases, not oppositive phrases. :) ]

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 20:04, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

@ Recury, parenthesis means the parenthetical bit can be safely removed without doing damage to the sense of the sentence. Does "Their song was featured in the rhythm game, StepMania", or even "Their song was featured in the rhythm game" sound OK to you? Sure, they're grammatical but do they tell you anything? Not really. Do they identify the song in question? Certainly not. Hence the words "Gardens of the Sinner" are not parenthetical but essential, and hence they should be written comma-free. -- JackofOz (talk) 21:25, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

It depends on the context. "Their song was featured in the rhythm game" might be all the necessary information in the paragraph, and its title is purely incidental, in which case the commas can and even should be there. But if it's crucial that it was "Gardens of the Sinner" that was featured, and not some other song of theirs, then of course the commas have to go. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 21:33, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, guys, but it's not about parenthesis, it's apposition. I can't believe that this is turning into a controversy. The commas are just plain wrong. Some things are wrong, and these commas are an example of wrong things. It's exactly like "Bob's wife, Judy, was a real looker." Without the commas, Bob is a bigamist. There is nothing hard or mysterious here; it only takes a moment's thought. --Milkbreath (talk) 22:20, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Your faith in the simplicity of the question and of language is touching, MB! (And I mean that in the nicest possible way, as Edna Everage would say.) Context often has a bearing on punctuation, and that includes the stylistic context of the whole sentence. On a point of detail: the commas are optional in Bob's wife, Judy, was a real looker, even if Bob lives his whole life with only one wife. The prevailing style would affect the choice to include or exclude them. Furthermore, recall that many people have more than one spouse in the course of a lifetime, and then the commas would clearly be wrong if it is necessary to distinguish Judy from the others. But to return to your assertion: The commas are just plain wrong. I assume you mean the commas in that original example:

Their song, "Gardens of the Sinner", was featured in the rhythm game, StepMania.

Well, this has been analysed above. Let's take a different angle on it. Set aside the comma after rhythm game, which is a separate matter. Suppose that "they" had produced a song, and a novel, and a play. Suppose that these three works have different names, and that all three are under discussion in the surrounding text. Then the commas would make perfect sense. In fact, it might be better to include them than exclude them. Context! As Aeluwas originally pointed out, there is a certain implication associated with those commas in this example, and when that implication is intended, the commas are indeed correct according to standard modern usage.

This is the problem with rules for punctuation: have too many, and they are unwieldy; have too few, and they will have exceptions.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 01:38, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

You're cool. I like your style of writing. But the fact remains that any copyeditor worth his salt removes those commas. The context is clear if you look at the page they're on, and if everything is optional, we might as well relax and blank the MoS page. And, by the way, it's unfair to assume ignorance of the importance of context, you know. Change the context to make the other guy wrong, and I'm always right? Nah, I'll stick to the facts. (I don't know Edna Everage, but you put me in mind of Edna Mode, who could say the same thing to good effect.) --Milkbreath (talk) 03:12, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

No, you're cool and clever! I admire your work. Some short remarks in reply:

• See Edna Everage, housewife superstar.
• We were given the examples without context, so we must judge them with respect to various possible contexts, rather than make a single one-size-fits-all ruling. I have supplied some contexts, and made tailored judgements to suit, ja?
• I too "stick to the facts"; but the facts are, regrettably, not simple.
• The world is complex and variegated. Spotty, even.
• Let's adjourn to my talkpage if there's any more to say, so we don't frighten the spectators.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 04:05, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Noetica, my New Fowler's (ISBN 0199690367) clearly says oppositive. Your version makes more sense, so perhaps my copy has a misprint. --Heron (talk) 14:05, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

...and now that I've read up on appositives, I would like to retract the 'perhaps' and say that my copy certainly has a typo. If only I had put in a [sic]! --Heron (talk) 14:30, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Heron, can you give me the name of the article in Fowler's that has oppositive, and any more narrowing information so I can track it down? (Page number also: but that will vary between editions and the various versions.)

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 22:59, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Sure. I'll reply on your Talk page. --Heron (talk) 10:03, 13 January 2008 (UTC)