I guess I’d say “modern, popular, real” languages are all about equally as expressive – I suppose languages that grew in isolation and/or in a constrained social context might be less – they might have a bit more grace in expressing certain things – I’m trying not to be totally chauvinist – but to not have a concept of time seems to be like the ones that count “one two three many”…

I would agree that most languages are roughly equal in expressive power BUT that doesn’t mean they’re all capable of expressing the same things. There are languages, for example, with no real concept of time. How would you discuss something that happened a week before last Tuesday in a language with no concept of time? Some languages have a concept of time that is reversed from English’s. To access the past we go back in time, they go forwards.

A time-free language simply can’t discuss many of the things we take for granted in modern society. And if you tried to use English in a time-free manner you’d just confuse people.

I was going to reply to your blog but somehow it got misplaced or i changed my mind earlier.

You wrote:
We don’t really have a word for work that you do that is simply undesirable, like washing dishes. You don’t really ‘toil’ at washing the dishes, and it’s not really a hardship. It’s just undesirable work.

I was wondering if “chore” would fit the bill. I guess it might have some unintended implication, it’s association with childhood, or kind if implies a likely reputation (though often not, as in “man, this assignment turned out to be a real chore”)

And I guess that’s a counterthrust to this essay- most languages are (or so I’ve read) roughly co-equal in expressive power, the main difference is in what you HAVE to say. Sure it’s cool to be able to say in a word what you might otherwise need a phrase for, but I still enjoy digging into the nuances of English more than looking outside, or inside in the case of conlang (of course I’m a lazy and poor memorizer, soI might be sour-grapesin’ it <- fun idiom, that, and I love that English lets me verbify it.)

I admit my word for water would be less "lelea" and more "blursh" but maybe that's just me. (Or maybe Kirklang should use the word bloors for standing water, and blurk for frozen. crap, now you got me doing it)

This is something I can do, while asking me to move to Ignacio, Colorado and join the Ute community is something unrealistic. And standing by and just watching the languages disappear doesn’t seem to be too helpful either.

Sejong financed the creation of a language entirely separate from Chinese because he didn’t want his kingdom beholden to the Chinese in such a fundamental way. Case in point: Japan, whose language actually requires an integral knowledge of Chinese. Language is power.

Regarding learning Na’vi (or Klingon, or Elven, or Esperanto for that matter)… if it makes you happy, do it! Who cares what people think? Thanks for a thought provoking post.