A Minimalist's Basic Word List

[arpee]

This list is aimed at minimalistic languages. This list has the most useful words for compounding to make new concepts. Even if you do not like minimalistic languages, I'm sure this list will help you keep Neologisms to a minimal and Compounds to a maximum which would be really useful especially if you are making a Germanic con-lang...

1. Opposite, Anti-
2. Not
3. True, Really (can be used as to be)
4. Self
5. Other/Else
6. Cause (to be)
7. Change/Differ
8. Thing/Stuff
9. Help/Support
10. Liquid/Wet/Water/Drink
11. Gas/Wind/Air
12. Solid/Rock/Stone/Bone
13. Body/Form/Shape/Physical
14. Power/Energy/Strength
15. Good/Moral
16. Want/Need
17. Food/Eat
18. All/Universe/Universal/Entire/Whole
19. Quantity/Number/Much/Many/Very
20. Big/Major
21. Long/Length
22. Tall/Height
23. Thick/Fat/Width
24. Far/Distance
25. Old/Age
26. Child/Baby/Off-Spring
27. Seed/Egg/Root
28. Out/Outside/Foreign
29. In-The-Direction-Of (For/At/To)
30. Die
31. One/Single/Alone
32. Person/Human
33. Organism/Living-Thing
34. Earth/Planet/Ground/Soil
35. Light/Bright/Color
36. Fire/Heat/Hot
37. Attract/Pull
38. Piece/Part
39. Type/Kind
40. Sense (With any of the 5 senses)
41. Grow/Increase
42. Skin/Clothing/Bark (of a tree)/Peel
43. Open/Unlock/Orifice
44. Way/Path/Method

Possible Compounds:

Self: I
Opposite Self: You
Other Self: (s)he, it
Opposite Cause: Effect, Result, Event, Happen(ing)
Opposite All: none, zero
Opposite Big: Small, Minor
Opposite Long: Short
Opposite Tall: Short (height)
Opposite Thick: Thin
Opposite Far: Near
Opposite Old: Young, New
Opposite In-The-Direction-Of: Of, From
Opposite Out: In, Inside
Opposite Child: Parent
Seed Time: Start, Beginning
Die Time: End
Cause Die: Kill, Murder
Opposite Alone: Couple, Pair, Two
Opposite Earth: Sky
Opposite Help/Support: Problem, Obstacle, Hinderance
Not Sense Thing: Unknown, Secret
Not Sense Type: Secretive
Opposite Open: Lock, Close

* To Be Updated

[Khemehekis]

Nice! Very aUI-like.

[Darkgamma]

Cause-die cause self-self-gas anti-self: My fart killed him!

[arpee]

Cause-die cause self-self-gas anti-self: My fart killed him!

Huh? It should be something like this (SVO example):

[self-gas] [cause-die] [other-self].

anti-self would mean you since self means I.

[Darkgamma]

Cause-die cause self-self-gas anti-self: My fart killed him!

Huh? It should be something like this (SVO example):

[self-gas] [cause-die] [other-self].

anti-self would mean you since self means I.

Anti-self = not me = him/you
other-self = alter ego :P ?

I used self-self as "I"

Cause-die self-self-gas other-not-self - My fart killed him (VSO)

[arpee]

Cause-die cause self-self-gas anti-self: My fart killed him!

Huh? It should be something like this (SVO example):

[self-gas] [cause-die] [other-self].

anti-self would mean you since self means I.

Anti-self = not me = him/you
other-self = alter ego :P ?

I used self-self as "I"

Cause-die self-self-gas other-not-self - My fart killed him (VSO)

Ah. Now I understand why there were to "self", I didn't know what you were doing there. Also, 'anti-" and 'not' are two different words on this list, so probably you can have

anti self = you

and

other self =alter ego

and

not self = (s)he, it

...

[Darkgamma]

Anti-self anti-pull air-hear (you speak)
Self-self cause-die self (I killed (my)self)

...
This has quite so many possibilities

[Xing]

This list is aimed at minimalistic languages. This list has the most useful words for compounding to make new concepts. Even if you do not like minimalistic languages, I'm sure this list will help you keep Neologisms to a minimal and Compounds to a maximum which would be really useful especially if you are making a Germanic con-lang...

1. Opposite, Anti-
2. Not
3. True, Really (can be used as to be)
4. Self
5. Other/Else
6. Cause (to be)
7. Change/Differ
8. Thing/Stuff
9. Help/Support
10. Liquid/Wet/Water/Drink
11. Gas/Wind/Air
12. Solid/Rock/Stone/Bone
13. Body/Form/Shape/Physical
14. Power/Energy/Strength
15. Good/Moral
16. Want/Need
17. Food/Eat
18. All/Universe/Universal/Entire/Whole
19. Quantity/Number/Much/Many/Very
20. Big/Major
21. Long/Length
22. Tall/Height
23. Thick/Fat/Width
24. Far/Distance
25. Old/Age
26. Child/Baby/Off-Spring
27. Seed/Egg/Root
28. Out/Outside/Foreign
29. In-The-Direction-Of (For/At/To)
30. Die
31. One/Single/Alone
32. Person/Human
33. Organism/Living-Thing
34. Earth/Planet/Ground/Soil
35. Light/Bright/Color
36. Fire/Heat/Hot
37. Attract/Pull
38. Piece/Part
39. Type/Kind
40. Sense (With any of the 5 senses)
41. Grow/Increase
42. Skin/Clothing/Bark (of a tree)/Peel
43. Open/Unlock/Orifice
44. Way/Path/Method

Possible Compounds:

Self: I
Opposite Self: You
Other Self: (s)he, it
Opposite Cause: Effect, Result, Event, Happen(ing)
Opposite All: none, zero
Opposite Big: Small, Minor
Opposite Long: Short
Opposite Tall: Short (height)
Opposite Thick: Thin
Opposite Far: Near
Opposite Old: Young, New
Opposite In-The-Direction-Of: Of, From
Opposite Out: In, Inside
Opposite Child: Parent
Seed Time: Start, Beginning
Die Time: End
Cause Die: Kill, Murder
Opposite Alone: Couple, Pair, Two
Opposite Earth: Sky
Opposite Help/Support: Problem, Obstacle, Hinderance
Not Sense Thing: Unknown, Secret
Not Sense Type: Secretive
Opposite Open: Lock, Close

* To Be Updated

Why these lists, rather than others?

[arpee]

xingoxa, I already explained why in the beginning. If you want to keep Neologisms down to a minimum and compound words to a maximum or if you are making a minimalistic language - this list will be a good start since no other list (that I know of) has this intention in mind...

[Xing]

xingoxa, I already explained why in the beginning. If you want to keep Neologisms down to a minimum and compound words to a maximum or if you are making a minimalistic language - this list will be a good start since no other list (that I know of) has this intention in mind...

But why these lists, rather than some of the numerous other possible lists? Many of your primitive concepts could be analysed as compounds. You could have other words as "primitive", while some of your primitive words could be compounds.

"Die" and "child", "grow/increase", "human/person", could well be compounds of simpler words/concepts.

Instead treating "earth" as primitive and "sky" as a compound, you could treat "sky" as primitive as earth as a compound (cf Polynesian lalolagi - "beneath the sky", "earth"). Instead of analysing end as "die time", you could analyse "die" as "end life".

It's no secret I'm no fan of minimalist languages. But if you're going to provide a list of supposedly "primitive" concepts, I think you should argue for for choice of concepts. (Are there actual tests showing that exactly this list would be "optimal" in some sense, or?)

[Darkgamma]

xingoxa, I already explained why in the beginning. If you want to keep Neologisms down to a minimum and compound words to a maximum or if you are making a minimalistic language - this list will be a good start since no other list (that I know of) has this intention in mind...

But why these lists, rather than some of the numerous other possible lists? Many of your primitive concepts could be analysed as compounds. You could have other words as "primitive", while some of your primitive words could be compounds.

"Die" and "child", "grow/increase", "human/person", could well be compounds of simpler words/concepts.

Instead treating "earth" as primitive and "sky" as a compound, you could treat "sky" as primitive as earth as a compound (cf Polynesian lalolagi - "beneath the sky", "earth"). Instead of analysing end as "die time", you could analyse "die" as "end life".

It's no secret I'm no fan of minimalist languages. But if you're going to provide a list of supposedly "primitive" concepts, I think you should argue for for choice of concepts. (Are there actual tests showing that exactly this list would be "optimal" in some sense, or?)

I think he didn't want to simplify it that much :P End-life-time, under-sky-life-grow - plant instead of earth-life(-grow)

[eldin raigmore]

I don't think one needs to defend a chosen set of "primitives" as somehow better than or more primitive than or more natural than some other set.

One need only defend it as adequate and minimally so.

Not that that's been done.

[Zumir]

Minimalist languages are cool as long as they're more Damin than Toki Pona.

[roninbodhisattva]

Minimalist languages are cool as long as they're more Damin than Toki Pona.

Do you actually know anything about Damin to make this statement worthwhile?

Also, Toki Pona.

[Zumir]

As much as you can learn from wikipedia :oops: .

[Xing]

One could ask oneself, is the sole goal of the language to have as few primitive words/concepts as possible? The idea behind a minimalist language of this kind must be that compounds are at least to some degree self-explanatory. The more compounds one uses, the easier will the language be to learn.


Now the notion that compounds are self-explanatory is not always true. (If it were, minimalist langs wouldn't need tonnes of pages to list the compounds. Compounds would be made and understood on the fly.) Often there will be many possible ways of constructing complex concepts from simpler or more primitive ones. Therefore, many compounds will ultimately be as lexicalised as simple, non-derived root words. A defender of a minimalist lang could claim that even if compounds are not perfectly self-explanatory, they often are self-explanatory to some degree, they give listeners some clues about what they mean.

The goal of a minimalist project need not to be to minimise the number or primitive roots as much as possible, but to find the optimal number of roots. Maybe 50, or 100, or 200 would be the optimal number of roots. Having fewer roots than that could lead to various problems. One could theoretically construct a language with two words, say "e" and "o", with any other word being a more or less complex compound. Like eeooeoe, eeoe, ooeoeeoooeoeooeoe, ooe ee, etc.
But the compounds in such i long would be very long and difficult. It could be be worth to include more roots, if it made compounds easier and less arbitrary.

[eldin raigmore]

Minimalist languages are cool as long as they're more Damin than Toki Pona.

Is Damin actually a "complete language", in that anything you could say in any other language you could also (eventually) say in Damin?

Isn't Toki Pona closer to "a complete language" in that sense than Damin?

Am I confusing Damin with Lardil?

[matthewmartin]

Damin is a dead language and every time I go looking, I find very little about it. Although I did find this, where you search in this book for Damin a few pages. In that book, it is claimed that "can express virtually any idea" I wish there was a public lists of the 150/200 stems or morphemes it's attributed. I also read here that there is a revival project going on. Lardil was the ordinary language spoken by the people who sometimes used Damin. Here is an intriguing quote about the relationship between the two: "It [Damin] must be such that it can be it can be learned quickly and, at the same time, it much be such that it can be used, in cooperation with *Lardil* inflectional morphology and syntax, to express any idea which Lardil itself can be used to express" So this speed reader gets the impression that Damin was kind of like Basic English, but with made-up roots.

Some tokiponists are certainly trying to use toki pona, for general purpose use. I think there are many scenarios where in toki pona it feels possible, but it feels like too much work, to say some thing or the other.

re: The language eo
The experiments with conlangs with 2 to 50 or so "words" do force one to start thinking about where one draws the line between meaningless phonemes and meaningful morphemes. I think the problem isn't so much that "eeoe" is difficult to parse, after, all it means "pickle-pickle-detoxification-pickle" It isn't merely hard to extract a meaning out of that compound word, it's impossible. I suppose my cat's language only has 2 words "gimme" and "food", but in all combinations they mean the same thing. Fake languages and communication systems with just 2 phonemes on the other hand are interesting, a better Morse code that wasn't just an encoding of English sounds like it would be useful.

[eldin raigmore]

Thanks, @matthewmartin.

[TBPO]

This is better list for me:

1. Opposite, Anti-
2 True, truth, to be
3. Self
4. Other/Else/Differ
5. Cause
6. Thing/Stuff
7. Help/Support
8. Liquid/water/air/gas/fluid
9. Solid/Stone/Body/Terrain
10. Good/Moral
11. Want/Need
12. Food/Eat
13. All/Universe/Universal/Entire/Whole
14. Quantity/Number/Much/Many/Very
15. Big/Major
16. Far/Distance
17. Origin/Seed/Egg/Root
18. In(side)
19. In-The-Direction-Of (ITDO) (For/At/To)
20. Live
21. One/Single/Alone/unique
22. Person/Human
23. Organism/Living-Thing
24. Light/Bright/Color
25. Fire/Heat/Hot/energy
26. Attract/pull
27. Piece/Part
28. Type/Kind
29. Sense (With any of the 5 senses)
30. Open/Unlock/Orifice
31. Way/Path/Method
32. Beginning
33. Time
34. Place

Possible Compounds:

Self: I
Anti-Self: You
Other-Self: (s)he, it
Anti-Cause: Effect, Result, Event, Happen(ing)
Anti-Beginning: End
Anti-All: none, zero
Anti-Big: Small, Minor
ITDO-Big: Long/tall/thick
Anti-Far: Near
Origin-Time: Young, New
Anti-Origin-Time: Old
Anti-ITDO: Of, From
Anti-In: Out, outside
Origin-Human: Child
Cause-Human: Parent
End-live: die
Anti-live: be dead
Cause-Die: Kill, Murder
Many-One: Couple, Pair, Two
Big-fluid: Air
Organism-fluid: Liquid
Live-Organism-Fluid: Water
Big-Fluid-Place: Sky
Anti-Help: Problem, Obstacle, Hinderance
Anti-Sense-Thing: Unknown, Secret
Anti-Sense-Type: Secretive
Opposite Open: Lock, Close