Re: Latin in the future?

Peter Knutsen wrote:
Does
Latin have some useful characteristics that English does not have?

It's nobody's native language, and thus might be seen not to offer
any group an unfair advantage. Esperanto would serve the same purpose
(and be easier to learn) but doesn't have the emotional stature of
a famous dead language.

Latin would have the disadvantage of having no ready-made vocabulary
for modern technology, but creating some would be easy enough. Modern
Hebrew managed the transition very quickly, as I understand it.

The spacefaring people in my back-burner SF novel speak something
which is grammatically Arabic with tons of English loanwords and
some sloppy smoothing-down meant to make it easier on the computer
(i.e. simplifying the orthography). This links to some very
deep backstory about who first developed the stardrive and what
cultural resources they drew on to form starship crews. (The
stardrive is liable to make you crazy if you aren't psychologically
prepared for it.)

Of course, I probably do a poorish job of this as I know no Arabic.
I picked out a few words to use from vocabulary lists, but it's an
amateur effort at best.

Mary Kuhner mkkuhner@xxxxxxxxxx
.

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