MarcoP > 12-06-2025, 07:30 AM
(12-06-2025, 06:51 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Stolfi, have you actually measured the entropy of monosyllabic languages? How do they need to be written down to achieve a conditional character entropy that's well under 3, while at the same time working with a very limited alphabet?
oshfdk > 12-06-2025, 08:34 AM
(11-06-2025, 11:17 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.OK, it seems I must flesh out my version of the "Chinese" theory.
ReneZ > 12-06-2025, 08:58 AM
Pepper > 12-06-2025, 09:02 AM
ReneZ > 12-06-2025, 09:11 AM
(12-06-2025, 09:02 AM)Pepper Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Are there any Asian languages (or any languages in general) that can't be captured in the Latin alphabet with a few modifications, like diacritics or use of punctuation symbols, to show elements like tone or non-European phonemes? I.E has a native Latin writer (for want of a better phrase) ever been forced to create a whole new alphabet in other circumstances?
kckluge > 12-06-2025, 09:43 AM
(12-06-2025, 09:11 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.(12-06-2025, 09:02 AM)Pepper Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Are there any Asian languages (or any languages in general) that can't be captured in the Latin alphabet with a few modifications, like diacritics or use of punctuation symbols, to show elements like tone or non-European phonemes? I.E has a native Latin writer (for want of a better phrase) ever been forced to create a whole new alphabet in other circumstances?
I understand the point, but let's also look at it from the other side.
The creator(s) of the Voynich MS were most probably not forced to do anything.
This seems to be something they wanted to do, in the way that they chose to do it.
Back to the question, one could argue that Mandarin Chinese qualifies for this.
The existing systems (let's just concentrate on pinyin) are many-to-one mappings.
All of the following: [...] are transliterated as li4 or lì
oshfdk > 12-06-2025, 09:43 AM
(12-06-2025, 09:02 AM)Pepper Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Are there any Asian languages (or any languages in general) that can't be captured in the Latin alphabet with a few modifications, like diacritics or use of punctuation symbols, to show elements like tone or non-European phonemes? I.E has a native Latin writer (for want of a better phrase) ever been forced to create a whole new alphabet in other circumstances?
ReneZ > 12-06-2025, 09:51 AM
(12-06-2025, 09:43 AM)kckluge Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.(12-06-2025, 09:11 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.(12-06-2025, 09:02 AM)Pepper Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Are there any Asian languages (or any languages in general) that can't be captured in the Latin alphabet with a few modifications, like diacritics or use of punctuation symbols, to show elements like tone or non-European phonemes? I.E has a native Latin writer (for want of a better phrase) ever been forced to create a whole new alphabet in other circumstances?
I understand the point, but let's also look at it from the other side.
The creator(s) of the Voynich MS were most probably not forced to do anything.
This seems to be something they wanted to do, in the way that they chose to do it.
Back to the question, one could argue that Mandarin Chinese qualifies for this.
The existing systems (let's just concentrate on pinyin) are many-to-one mappings.
All of the following: [...] are transliterated as li4 or lì
I think you're misreading Rene's use of "forced" there. He's not using it in the sense of "someone put a gun (or crossbow :->) to their head", he's using it (I think) in the sense of "none of the Jesuits (say) who worked up Romanization schemes for tonal Asian languages found the Latin alphabet so inadequate for the purpose that they were motivated to invent a new script."
By the way, welcome back.
Pepper > 12-06-2025, 10:04 AM
(12-06-2025, 09:51 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.More in general, I find most arguments along the lines of: "that would have been an unusual / unnecessary / illogical thing to do" too subjective and really too weak an argument to let it affect my thinking.
For one it is subjective, an another thing is that what would be illogical (did I forget: inefficient?) nowadays would not be so in the later middle ages...
(12-06-2025, 09:43 AM)kckluge Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I think you're misreading Rene's use of "forced" there. He's not using it in the sense of "someone put a gun (or crossbow :->) to their head", he's using it (I think) in the sense of "none of the Jesuits (say) who worked up Romanization schemes for tonal Asian languages found the Latin alphabet so inadequate for the purpose that they were motivated to invent a new script."
By the way, welcome back.
ReneZ > 12-06-2025, 10:19 AM
(12-06-2025, 10:04 AM)Pepper Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I think you mixed our names up but if I read this right yes, that's what I meant.