calls his hypertext article a "rant" in its very directory name, but I would call it an informed rant, as the author evidently knows a good deal more linguistics and more about non-Indo-European languages than most advocates for Esperanto as a world auxiliary language.
He completely overlooks the point many people will find Esperanto easy to learn.
Which people? Based on what evidence?
I have studied (in chronological order)
German (school study, beginning in elementary school)
Russian (" ", begun in secondary school)
Esperanto (self study, begun in secondary school with a friend from my Russian class)
Modern Standard Chinese (school study, begun in university)
Cantonese (" ", begun in university)
Biblical Hebrew (" ", begun in university)
Literary Chinese (" ", begun in university)
Attic Greek (" ", begun in university)
Biblical Greek (" ", begun in university)
Taiwanese (self study sometimes with Mandarin-speaking tutor, begun after university)
Japanese (self study with Mandarin-speaking tutor, begun after university)
Hakka (self study with Mandarin-speaking tutor, begun after university)
and some sporadic self-study of Latin, French, Spanish, Indonesian, Mongolian, Aramaic, and other languages, begun and resumed here and there in the above time span. I have been employed for years as a Chinese-English interpreter and translator and read German comfortably.
There is nothing particularly easy to learn about Esperanto. In particular, there is nothing particularly easy to learn about Esperanto for native speakers of non-Indo-European languages. One participant on the sci.lang Usenet newsgroup showed, more than a decade ago, that the percentage of Esperanto speakers on the continent of Asia has to be strictly less than 1 person in 1,000. He wasn't axe-grinding for English--he himself was a Han Chinese from Hong Kong, a native speaker of Cantonese, who usually took a kind of pan-Chinese view of linguistic issues. Esperanto's lack of network effects--the paucity of people who speak it or write in it--means a learner who tries to learn it in natural settings by direct exposure finds Esperanto much more difficult to learn than many other languages. It's easy to encounter conversations in French or Spanish (I encountered them frequently when I lived in Taiwan) or German (the same) or even Russian (that was more rare in Taiwan when I first lived there, but is easy here in the United States). It is exceedingly difficult to find live conversation in Esperanto anywhere but in an Esperanto club meeting.
Here are some informational questions, for anyone with knowledge of the subject to answer:
1) What consumer product, produced anywhere in the world, has product labeling or assembly directions or instructions for use printed in Esperanto?
2) What terrestrial broadcast TV station, anywhere in the world, has a regular news program in Esperanto? How about the same for a broadcast radio station?
3) What weekly news magazine anywhere in the world with professional journalists on staff publishes in Esperanto?
4) What international scientific meetings are conducted regularly with Esperanto as the working language?
5) What scientific journal, anywhere in the world, expects articles to be submitted with an Esperanto abstract?
6) What hotel, restaurant, or travel agency, anywhere in the world, advertises for new employees who are expected to be fluent in Esperanto?
Esperanto's fussiness in grammar and difficulty in learning killed its network effects, and its lack of network effects kills its future prospects for growth. Esperanto's peak number of speakers at a given moment across all time is less than the number of speakers English and Chinese (and probably other languages) each add each year simply by natural increase and voluntary second-language learning.
The author of the link I submitted above
http://www.xibalba.demon.co.uk/jbr/ranto/
calls his hypertext article a "rant" in its very directory name, but I would call it an informed rant, as the author evidently knows a good deal more linguistics and more about non-Indo-European languages than most advocates for Esperanto as a world auxiliary language.
He completely overlooks the point many people will find Esperanto easy to learn.
Which people? Based on what evidence?
I have studied (in chronological order)
German (school study, beginning in elementary school)
Russian (" ", begun in secondary school)
Esperanto (self study, begun in secondary school with a friend from my Russian class)
Modern Standard Chinese (school study, begun in university)
Cantonese (" ", begun in university)
Biblical Hebrew (" ", begun in university)
Literary Chinese (" ", begun in university)
Attic Greek (" ", begun in university)
Biblical Greek (" ", begun in university)
Taiwanese (self study sometimes with Mandarin-speaking tutor, begun after university)
Japanese (self study with Mandarin-speaking tutor, begun after university)
Hakka (self study with Mandarin-speaking tutor, begun after university)
and some sporadic self-study of Latin, French, Spanish, Indonesian, Mongolian, Aramaic, and other languages, begun and resumed here and there in the above time span. I have been employed for years as a Chinese-English interpreter and translator and read German comfortably.
There is nothing particularly easy to learn about Esperanto. In particular, there is nothing particularly easy to learn about Esperanto for native speakers of non-Indo-European languages. One participant on the sci.lang Usenet newsgroup showed, more than a decade ago, that the percentage of Esperanto speakers on the continent of Asia has to be strictly less than 1 person in 1,000. He wasn't axe-grinding for English--he himself was a Han Chinese from Hong Kong, a native speaker of Cantonese, who usually took a kind of pan-Chinese view of linguistic issues. Esperanto's lack of network effects--the paucity of people who speak it or write in it--means a learner who tries to learn it in natural settings by direct exposure finds Esperanto much more difficult to learn than many other languages. It's easy to encounter conversations in French or Spanish (I encountered them frequently when I lived in Taiwan) or German (the same) or even Russian (that was more rare in Taiwan when I first lived there, but is easy here in the United States). It is exceedingly difficult to find live conversation in Esperanto anywhere but in an Esperanto club meeting.
Here are some informational questions, for anyone with knowledge of the subject to answer:
1) What consumer product, produced anywhere in the world, has product labeling or assembly directions or instructions for use printed in Esperanto?
2) What terrestrial broadcast TV station, anywhere in the world, has a regular news program in Esperanto? How about the same for a broadcast radio station?
3) What weekly news magazine anywhere in the world with professional journalists on staff publishes in Esperanto?
4) What international scientific meetings are conducted regularly with Esperanto as the working language?
5) What scientific journal, anywhere in the world, expects articles to be submitted with an Esperanto abstract?
6) What hotel, restaurant, or travel agency, anywhere in the world, advertises for new employees who are expected to be fluent in Esperanto?
Esperanto's fussiness in grammar and difficulty in learning killed its network effects, and its lack of network effects kills its future prospects for growth. Esperanto's peak number of speakers at a given moment across all time is less than the number of speakers English and Chinese (and probably other languages) each add each year simply by natural increase and voluntary second-language learning.