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yaaqov wrote (edited )

Lojban isn't particularly speakable, though. In addition to allowing sequences of sounds that only a very small number of the world's languages already do (thus making pronouncing it difficult for anyone who doesn't speak one of those languages already), its syntax and semantics is utterly unnatural, in many ways unlike any natural human language at all.

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elyersio wrote (edited )

Sounds like you're describing Klingon.

I'll entertain the latter thought, but I've looked at Lojban and it's quite pronounceable. It uses the same sounds as Esperanto AFAIK.

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yaaqov wrote

As far as I know, every structure in Klingon can be found in some language. That's more than could be said of Lojban.

And, well, Esperanto also allows plenty of consonant clusters that are rare crosslinguistically, like /gn/ or /kv/ in word initial positions, for instance. Lojban allows things like /txl/ word internally, where /x/ is the ‹ch› sound in "Bach" or "Chanukah"—also really marked in such a sequence. Of the most widely spoken languages on Earth, only Russian (and Arabic, depending on the variety) approaches the permissiveness of Lojban or Esperanto with respect to these factors.

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