What would YOU do?

[arpee]

You are back in ancient times, and humans are only able to process 10 words in their brain. You must find a way to communicate with them to teach them how to live a simply life, communicate with each other to form a society, and what to do to avoid an unearthly disaster approaching them. Which ten words would you use?

[Maximillian]

1. I as opposed to others; basicly, this would be 1P pronoun.
2. You as opposed to others; this would be 2P pronoun.
3. He/she/it/this/that/etc. as opposed to others; 3P pronoun, demonstratives, quantifiers, articles.
4. Human as opposed to other living beings.
5. Other living beings as opposed to humans; can also be used to mean "food", "meat", etc.
6. Plant as opposed to humans and other beings; can also mean "food", "fruit", "vegetable", etc.
7. Inanimate object as opposed to animate: humans, other beings and plants.
8. Good/positive as opposed to all negative qualities; for example, good plant can mean "food you can safely eat".
9. Bad/negative as opposed to all positive qualities; bad living-being can mean "beware of this animal, because it can hurt you".
10. Verb, any action relevant to the object shown; verb [showing an apple] good 3P plant means "eat this apple, it is good".

Other than this, I'd use reduplication to show number: I means "I", but I-I means "we". Different word order could also have some meaning: you verb plant is "you are eating an apple", while verb you plant "you ate an apple". Different intonations could be used for asking questions, expressing doubt, demanding, commanding, etc. Also facial expressions can be of help to show different feelings.

Actually, it's a very nice idea for a conlang for some primitive creatures.

[rickardspaghetti]

I wouldn't bother with a species that cannot even process as many concepts as a common rat. I would probably try with some of the suidae species instead. Pigs today already show so much promise.

[Micamo]

You are back in ancient times, and humans are only able to process 10 words in their brain. You must find a way to communicate with them to teach them how to live a simply life, communicate with each other to form a society, and what to do to avoid an unearthly disaster approaching them. Which ten words would you use?

1. If their linguistic capacities are so reduced, then there's no way they could possibly be human. Sapient, maybe, but their brain architectures would be too different for a modern human to be able to reproduce with them.

2. Even basic human communication requires the use of complex syntactic structures: That a species would evolve the neural hardware to process such structures in a language capacity and only have the ability to distinguish 10 semantic categories is the most absurd thing I've heard in quite a while.

3. A language consisting only of universal semantic primitives is neither possible nor desirable. Nobody here wishes to indulge your obsession with such lexical minimalism anymore.

[Ànradh]

1. If their linguistic capacities are so reduced, then there's no way they could possibly be human. Sapient, maybe, but their brain architectures would be too different for a modern human to be able to reproduce with them.

2. Even basic human communication requires the use of complex syntactic structures: That a species would evolve the neural hardware to process such structures in a language capacity and only have the ability to distinguish 10 semantic categories is the most absurd thing I've heard in quite a while.

3. A language consisting only of universal semantic primitives is neither possible nor desirable. Nobody here wishes to indulge your obsession with such lexical minimalism anymore.

I'd previously given you the benefit of the doubt myself, given the short time I've been here, but you do seem to be living up to your infamous reputation. Are you interested in anything else?

[Curlyjimsam]

1. I as opposed to others; basicly, this would be 1P pronoun.
2. You as opposed to others; this would be 2P pronoun.
3. He/she/it/this/that/etc. as opposed to others; 3P pronoun, demonstratives, quantifiers, articles.
4. Human as opposed to other living beings.
5. Other living beings as opposed to humans; can also be used to mean "food", "meat", etc.
6. Plant as opposed to humans and other beings; can also mean "food", "fruit", "vegetable", etc.
7. Inanimate object as opposed to animate: humans, other beings and plants.
8. Good/positive as opposed to all negative qualities; for example, good plant can mean "food you can safely eat".
9. Bad/negative as opposed to all positive qualities; bad living-being can mean "beware of this animal, because it can hurt you".
10. Verb, any action relevant to the object shown; verb [showing an apple] good 3P plant means "eat this apple, it is good".

Other than this, I'd use reduplication to show number: I means "I", but I-I means "we". Different word order could also have some meaning: you verb plant is "you are eating an apple", while verb you plant "you ate an apple". Different intonations could be used for asking questions, expressing doubt, demanding, commanding, etc. Also facial expressions can be of help to show different feelings.

Actually, it's a very nice idea for a conlang for some primitive creatures.

I'm not sure you need both with personal pronouns. Have some kind of pronominal argument, perhaps (though you could maybe merge it with "human"), but a lot of the time grammatical person can probably be inferred from context or, if absolutely necessary, through gesture.

[arpee]

1. I as opposed to others; basicly, this would be 1P pronoun.
2. You as opposed to others; this would be 2P pronoun.
3. He/she/it/this/that/etc. as opposed to others; 3P pronoun, demonstratives, quantifiers, articles.
4. Human as opposed to other living beings.
5. Other living beings as opposed to humans; can also be used to mean "food", "meat", etc.
6. Plant as opposed to humans and other beings; can also mean "food", "fruit", "vegetable", etc.
7. Inanimate object as opposed to animate: humans, other beings and plants.
8. Good/positive as opposed to all negative qualities; for example, good plant can mean "food you can safely eat".
9. Bad/negative as opposed to all positive qualities; bad living-being can mean "beware of this animal, because it can hurt you".
10. Verb, any action relevant to the object shown; verb [showing an apple] good 3P plant means "eat this apple, it is good".

Other than this, I'd use reduplication to show number: I means "I", but I-I means "we". Different word order could also have some meaning: you verb plant is "you are eating an apple", while verb you plant "you ate an apple". Different intonations could be used for asking questions, expressing doubt, demanding, commanding, etc. Also facial expressions can be of help to show different feelings.

Actually, it's a very nice idea for a conlang for some primitive creatures.

Hmm, what about having a word for opposites? You can get rid of "you", "bad", and "non living", and add in opposite, and you'll have two more spaces for words...

Lodhas, I like minimalistic languages the best. That my only interest when conlanging.

[Thakowsaizmu]

You are back in ancient times, and humans are only able to process 10 words in their brain. You must find a way to communicate with them to teach them how to live a simply life, communicate with each other to form a society, and what to do to avoid an unearthly disaster approaching them. Which ten words would you use?

You clearly understand nothing of human evolution, the brain or language. My cat knows more than ten words.

[Visinoid]

You are back in ancient times, and humans are only able to process 10 words in their brain. You must find a way to communicate with them to teach them how to live a simply life, communicate with each other to form a society, and what to do to avoid an unearthly disaster approaching them. Which ten words would you use?

You clearly understand nothing of human evolution, the brain or language. My cat knows more than ten words.

Dogs can understand up to 100 words... Those things he's describing aren't human at all.

This line shouldn't have been written, in ancient times it never happened.

ALSO, wrong section, this should be in... Dunno where it should be, but it shouldn't be in conlangs.

[Xing]

You are back in ancient times, and humans are only able to process 10 words in their brain.

Does it mean we must use only 10 lexical entries? Or can we form Tokiponish expressions like "good person" = "friend"?

Are there any grammatical constraints? Can the words be inflected? (Then we could drop a lots of functional words we would need otherwise).

You must find a way to communicate with them to teach them how to live a simply life, communicate with each other to form a society, and what to do to avoid an unearthly disaster approaching them. Which ten words would you use?

What kind of society would it be? What kind of disaster are we talking about? Different words could needed to avoid different kinds of disasters.

But to be at least somewhat constructive, I think that the most basic "words" (if we can call them that) needed for survival in some kind of primitive social structure, would be interjections, simple commands and similar expressions. (Like "food", "enemy/danger", "GO AWAY!!!", etc.) Not so much words with real informative content.

[roninbodhisattva]

I wouldn't bother with a species that cannot even process as many concepts as a common rat. I would probably try with some of the suidae species instead. Pigs today already show so much promise.

*like*

[arpee]

You are back in ancient times, and humans are only able to process 10 words in their brain.

Does it mean we must use only 10 lexical entries? Or can we form Tokiponish expressions like "good person" = "friend"?

Are there any grammatical constraints? Can the words be inflected? (Then we could drop a lots of functional words we would need otherwise).

You must find a way to communicate with them to teach them how to live a simply life, communicate with each other to form a society, and what to do to avoid an unearthly disaster approaching them. Which ten words would you use?

What kind of society would it be? What kind of disaster are we talking about? Different words could needed to avoid different kinds of disasters.

But to be at least somewhat constructive, I think that the most basic "words" (if we can call them that) needed for survival in some kind of primitive social structure, would be interjections, simple commands and similar expressions. (Like "food", "enemy/danger", "GO AWAY!!!", etc.) Not so much words with real informative content.

These humans can only understand 10 words, however they would understand compounds if they make sense. In the future the humans will become smart and will create a weapon which will destroy the world. Right now, these humans have a low intelligence and the only thing they know is what you will teach them through the language. They don't even know how to communicate with each other without language.

[Trailsend]

In the future the humans will become smart and will create a weapon which will destroy the world

wait what

this thought experiment is becoming progressively more

[Micamo]

It's at times like this I imagine Arpee's non-conlanging hobby consists of building scale models of the UN, then smashing it while wearing a funny hat pretending that he's godzilla. I mean it's the ultimate power fantasy...

[Xing]

These humans can only understand 10 words, however they would understand compounds if they make sense. In the future the humans will become smart and will create a weapon which will destroy the world. Right now, these humans have a low intelligence and the only thing they know is what you will teach them through the language. They don't even know how to communicate with each other without language.

What is your criteria for a compound to "make sense"? That the meaning of it is completely predictable from its constituent parts? So that the compounds would ultimately amount to some kind of definite descriptions?

Is the ten word constraint a limitation of language, or a more general limitation of human cognition (that they only can grasp ten basic concepts)?

this thought experiment is becoming progressively more

[arpee]

What is your criteria for a compound to "make sense"? That the meaning of it is completely predictable from its constituent parts? So that the compounds would ultimately amount to some kind of definite descriptions?

Is the ten word constraint a limitation of language, or a more general limitation of human cognition (that they only can grasp ten basic concepts)?

Yes, be as accurately descriptive as possible without using too many words.

For example, if you have the word "heart", "water", and "life"...

if you say "life-water" that could mean a drink the promotes life, it could even mean "sexual fluids" or something like that, if you say "heart-water" it's easier to tell that you mean blood...

These humans have a good short term memory but a horrible long term memory. As they evolve they will have a good long term memory but a horrible short term memory. In the future, they will look at the scribes written which holds the prophecy of the nuclear disaster and the teachings about how to live a normal life - but of course through only 10 words they'll have to figure out how those words relate to their modern day technology and such, and since the ancients were simply minded the 10 words worked better for them...

[Thakowsaizmu]

Ok, how about these words:

Gu - 2ps

Le - necessitative particle

Ma - cessation

No - non-past non-future particle

So we can now express everything we need to!

Arpee, gu le ma no!

[Xing]

Yes, be as accurately descriptive as possible without using too many words.

It depends on how "accurate" the descriptions must be. In an English compound, there are multiple ways in which the constituent parts could be related. In an typical (headed) compound, one part (the modifying) modifies another part (the head). But it could modify in many different ways. It could refer to the material out of which something is made ("leather shoes"), the purpose or activity it was made ("sports shoes", "dancing shoes", etc.), the company that made it ("Apple computers"), or multiple other ways.

In order to tell the relation between the constituent parts in a typical compound, an English speaker must rely either on:
(1) Context, or general knowledge of what makes sense, or
(2) Memorisation. Memorise for each compound word what it means.

Since your creatures seem to have extremely limited cognitive abilities (they can only learn ten words...) (1) seems not to be very helpful. And it leaves us with (2). But then the compounds would really be separate words on their own, since their meaning is not obvious or deducible from their constituent parts.

And by the way, would couldn't "heart water" be interpreted as one's "favourite drink", or "most beloved drink"? Or a drink make of heart? (For example, a soup with animal hearts in it?)

[Thakowsaizmu]

And by the way, would couldn't "heart water" be interpreted as one's "favourite drink", or "most beloved drink"? Or a drink make of heart? (For example, a soup with animal hearts in it?)

Heart water makes me think of blood.

[masako]

I think arpee might be confusing words with ideas. Communication is not solely reliant on verbalization.

http://youtu.be/pIAoJsS9Ix8 >> http://youtu.be/nHuagL7x5Wc