[Poster’s note: This file is a copy of the descriptive text contained
\nin a brochure which The Loglan Institute sends out in response to an
\ninitial request for information, plus brief descriptions of some of
\nthe materials available for purchase. For a printed copy of the bro-
\nchure or any other information, write to The Institute at the address
\ngiven here, or send CompuServe MAIL to Kirk Sattley 76010,1363.]<\/p>\n
THE LOGLAN INSTITUTE, INC.
\n A Non-Profit Research Corporation
\n 3009 Peters Way
\n San Diego, CA 92117<\/p>\n
What Is Loglan?<\/p>\n
Loglan* is a speakable, human language originally designed to
\nserve as a test of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis that the structure of
\nlocal human languages places local constraints on the development of
\nhuman thought, and hence, on human cultures. If this hypothesis is
\ncorrect, a language which “lifted” those constraints — that is to
\nsay, which reduced them to some formal minimum — should in a certain
\nsense “release” the human mind from these ancient linguistic bonds
\nand, in any case, have notable effects on both individual thinking and
\non the development of a global human culture.<\/p>\n
Since its original development in the late 1950’s and 1960’s
\nLoglan has acquired certain other properties that make it interesting
\nto computer science, principally (1) its total freedom from syntactic
\nambiguity. This feature of the language, together with (2) its audio-
\nvisual “isomorphism” (which means that the Loglan speechstream breaks
\nup automatically into fully punctuated strings of separate words) and
\n(3) its borrowing algorithm (by which the International Scientific
\nVocabulary goes into Loglan virtually ad libitum) makes it an ideal
\nmedium for three uses: (i) for international information storage and
\nretrieval, (ii) for machine-aided translation between natural lan-
\nguages, and (iii) for spontaneous interaction between computer-users
\nand their machines. Finally, Loglan is (4) culturally and politically
\nneutral in the sense that its basic predicate vocabulary has been
\nengineered to be maximally memorable to speakers of the eight most
\nwidely spoken human languages: English, Chinese,Hindi, Russian,
\nSpanish, French, Japanese and German.<\/p>\n
All these features taken together have suggested to many loglan-
\nists that their adopted language is ideally suited to become a second
\nlanguage for the world. For others, conducting a scientific test of
\nthe Whorf hypothesis with Loglan has the highest priority. For still
\nothers, its use at the human\/machine interface is the most challenging
\nrole for Loglan in the years ahead.<\/p>\n
Going Public Again<\/p>\n
Your inquiry reaches The Institute at a most interesting time.
\nLoglan is in the midst of “going public again”. This is the third
\nand, we trust, final time. The first time we went public was in 1960,
\nwhen James Cooke Brown’s article on “Loglan” was published in the
\nScientific American for June of that year. (Reprints of this article
\nare still available.) The second time was in 1975, when two of our
\nbooks, Loglan 1, a grammar, and Loglan 4 & 5, a dictionary, were pub-
\nlished in paperback for the first time. The 15-year interval between
\nthe 1st and 2nd “goings public” was mainly occupied by three activi-
\nties: (a) the development of Loglan grammar on computers, (b) the
\nconstruction of its internationally-based lexicon, and (c) the prepa-
\nration of the several earlier editions of the 1975 volumes. The
\nsimilar interval between the 2nd and 3rd “goings public” was mainly
\noccupied by engineering three final design features into the language.
\nOne of these was the formal discovery and demonstration of the syntac-
\ntically unambiguous grammar mentioned above. This feature had long
\nbeen planned but had had to wait for the development of mathematical
\ntools powerful enough to install it; these became available in 1975.
\nAnother engineering challenge was to build a set of decipherable word-
\nparts from which all the complex predicates of the language could be
\nrecognizably constructed. Still a third engineering task was to build
\nits “borrowing algorithm”, the procedure by which natural language
\nwords, but especially the International Scientific Vocabulary, may now
\nbe freely incoroporated into Loglan. These last two features together
\nimplement yet another long-planned function of the language, namely
\nthat it should be capable of rapid, spontaneous, and yet continuously
\nintelligible growth.<\/p>\n
In short, modern Loglan is now ready for its many uses. Here are
\nthe publications and services which The Institute has prepared to let
\nyou examine this extraordinary language and decide whether and how you
\nwish to use it.
\n_________________________
\n*`Loglan’ is a registered trademark of The Loglan Institute, Inc.<\/p>\n
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +<\/p>\n
[Poster’s note: The following is a much abbreviated extract from four
\npages of descriptions of materials available. I have chosen the ones
\nI thought most likely to interest an inquiring language-lover,
\nespecially one who uses a personal computer.]<\/p>\n
BOOKS<\/p>\n
Loglan 1: A Logical Language
\n by James Cooke Brown, 4th Edition, 1989;
\n599pp. A general introduction and complete description of the Loglan
\nlanguage. Has detailed explanation of the language’s syntax and word-
\nconstruction, as well as pronunciation guides, historical notes,
\nspecimen translations, word-lists, and a chapter on testing the Whorf
\nhypothesis. [$21.50]<\/p>\n
Loglan 4 & 5: A Loglan-English\/English-Loglan Dictionary,
\n collated by
\nJCB, 2nd Edition 1975; 510pp. [New edition in preparation, old one
\nstill useful as word-source when checked against new Loglan 1.]
\n [Paperback $10.00; Hardback $15.00]<\/p>\n
SOFTWARE [All available for both PC-DOS machines and Macintoshes]<\/p>\n
MacTeach* 1: Forming Loglan Utterances,
\nMacTeach 2: Learning Loglan Words,
\nMacTeach 3: Learning Loglan Affixes,
\n by Robert A. McIvor, Evelyn R.
\nAnderson, and JCB, 1st Edition 1989. All of these use the “learning
\nladder” technique developed at The Institute to teach both utterance
\nformation and vocabulary acquisition. The technique helps the learner
\nmaster long lists of items with minimum overlearning and error-making.
\nMacTeach 1 comes with an input file of about 400 utterances, covering
\nabout 75% of the grammar. MacTeach 2 has an input list of more than
\n900 primitive words. MacTeach 3 has the complete set of combining
\naffixes used for forming complex predicates.
\n [$20.00 each, all three on one disk $50.00]<\/p>\n
LIP*, The Loglan Interactive Parser*,
\n by RAM, Scott L. Burson, JCB,
\nand other workers on the Machine Grammar Project. LIP will produce a
\nparse-tree or sentence-diagram syntactic analysis of any grammatical
\nsentence that is submitted to it, as well as pointing out where an
\nungrammatical sentence went wrong. LIP can also parse a text file,
\neither utterance-by-utterance or all at once, and allows individual
\nutterances to be modified interactively until they are correct. It is
\nthus a useful tool for an aspiring Loglan writer as well as a
\npractically indispensable one for a teacher or editor. [$50.00]<\/p>\n
AUDIO RECORDINGS<\/p>\n
Cassette 1: Readings from Loglan 1, Chaps 2-4,
\nCassette 2: Readings from Loglan 1, Chaps 5,6.
\n On these two
\ncassettes, all the Loglan sentences in Chapters 2 through 6 of Loglan
\n1 are plainly pronounced by competent readers, so the learner will
\nlearn to speak the entire grammatical range of Loglan utterance forms
\ncorrectly. [$10.00 for each cassette]<\/p>\n
MEMBERSHIP<\/p>\n
Ordinary membership is $50 per two-year period. Several classes of
\nmembership at lower and higher dues are available. Members receive a
\nquarterly newletter “Lognet” as well as a 40% discount on purchases
\nof all Institute materials.
\n_________________________
\n*`MacTeach’, `LIP’, and `The Loglan Interactive Parser’ are trademarks
\nof The Loglan Institute.<\/p>\n
