Loglan is a constructed language originally designed for linguistic research, particularly for investigating the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis. The language was developed beginning in 1955 by Dr. James Cooke Brown with the goal of making a language so different from natural languages that people learning it would think in a different way if the hypothesis were true. Loglan is the first among, and the main inspiration for, the languages known as logical languages, which also includes Lojban and Ceqli. Dr. James Cooke Brown (July 21, 1921 - February 13, 2000) was a sociologist and science fiction author. ... Year 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday (link displays the 1955 Gregorian calendar). ... It has been suggested that Vorlin be merged into this article or section. ... In linguistics, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (SWH) states that there is a systematic relationship between the grammatical categories of the language a person speaks and how that person both understands the world and behaves in it. ... A constructed or artificial language — known colloquially as a conlang — is a language whose phonology, grammar, and/or vocabulary have been devised by an individual or small group, instead of having naturally evolved as part of a culture. ... It has been suggested that Vorlin be merged into this article or section. ... Logical languages, sometimes called loglangs, are constructed languages usually intended as experiments in logic or philosophy. ... ISO 639-1 is the first part of the ISO 639 international-standard language-code family. ... ISO 639-2 is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. ... ISO 639-3 is an international standard for language codes. ... Articles with similar titles include the NATO phonetic alphabet, which has also informally been called the “International Phonetic Alphabet”. For information on how to read IPA transcriptions of English words, see IPA chart for English. ... Unicode is an industry standard designed to allow text and symbols from all of the writing systems of the world to be consistently represented and manipulated by computers. ... A constructed or artificial language — known colloquially as a conlang — is a language whose phonology, grammar, and/or vocabulary have been devised by an individual or small group, instead of having naturally evolved as part of a culture. ... In linguistics, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (SWH) states that there is a systematic relationship between the grammatical categories of the language a person speaks and how that person both understands the world and behaves in it. ... Year 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday (link displays the 1955 Gregorian calendar). ... Dr. James Cooke Brown (July 21, 1921 - February 13, 2000) was a sociologist and science fiction author. ... It has been suggested that Vorlin be merged into this article or section. ... Lojban (IPA , official full name Lojban: a realization of Loglan) is a syntactically unambiguous, predicate logic-based constructed language which was created by the Logical Language Group in 1987 as a realization of Loglan, with the intent to make the language more complete, usable, and freely available. ...

Dr. Brown founded The Loglan Institute to develop the language and other applications of it. He always considered the language an incomplete research project, and although he released many papers about its design, he continued to claim legal restrictions on its use. Because of this, a group of his followers later formed The Logical Language Group to create the language Lojban along the same principles, but with the intention to make it freely available and encourage its use as a real language. Lojban (IPA , official full name Lojban: a realization of Loglan) is a syntactically unambiguous, predicate logic-based constructed language which was created by the Logical Language Group in 1987 as a realization of Loglan, with the intent to make the language more complete, usable, and freely available. ...

Supporters of Lojban use the term Loglan as a generic term to refer to both their own language, and that of The Loglan Institute. They refer to the latter language as TLI Loglan when in need of disambiguation. Although the non-trademarkability of the term Loglan was eventually upheld by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, many supporters and members of The Loglan Institute find this usage offensive, and reserve Loglan for the TLI version of the language. For other senses of this word, see Trademark (disambiguation). ... PTO headquarters in Alexandria The United States Patent and Trademark Office (PTO or USPTO) is an agency in the United States Department of Commerce that provides patent and trademark protection to inventors and businesses for their inventions and corporate and product identification. ...

Grammar

Brown intended Loglan to be as culturally neutral as possible, and metaphysically parsimonious, which means that obligatory categories are kept to a minimum. An example of an obligatory category in English is the time-tense of verbs, as it is impossible to express a finite verb without also expressing a tense. Look up parsimony in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... It has been suggested that Verbal agreement be merged into this article or section. ... A finite verb is a verb that is inflected for person and for tense according to the rules and categories of the languages it occurs in. ...

Also, Brown intended the language to be totally regular and unambiguous. In particular, phonemes that could be confused with each other were to be avoided. In human language, a phoneme is the theoretical representation of a sound. ...

The language’s grammar is based on predicate logic, which is why it was named Loglan, an abbreviation for "logical language". This has been thought to make it suitable for human-computer communication, which led Robert A. Heinlein to mention the language in his science fiction novel The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress. ... Trinomial name Homo sapiens sapiens Linnaeus, 1758 Humans, or human beings, are bipedal primates belonging to the mammalian species Homo sapiens (Latin: wise man or knowing man) in the family Hominidae (the great apes). ... The NASA Columbia Supercomputer. ... Communication is a process that allows beings - in particular humans - to exchange information by several methods. ... Robert Anson Heinlein (July 7, 1907 – May 8, 1988) was one of the most popular, influential, and controversial authors of hard science fiction. ... The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress cover The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is a 1966 science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein about a lunar penal colonys revolt against rule from Earth. ...

Loglan has no distinction between nouns and verbs. The predicate words can serve as verbs, nouns, adjectives or adverbs depending on where they occur in a sentence. Each predicate has its argument structure with places for arguments, which may be variables. For example: vedma, "X sells Y to P for price Q". Prefixes allow to reorder the argument structure of predicates, to emphasize one of the variables by putting it first. For example, to make price the first variable, use ju vedma (with the "little word" ju). Similarly, the sentence can be reordered to speak about seller, ware, or buyer. Tenses for time, location, actor, type of action, and others are provided by "little words" which are optional. Predicates can be compounded: a predicate can act as an argument of another predicate, when the former is prefixed by a "little word". In English, a noun or noun substantive is a lexical category which is defined in terms of how its members combine with other grammatical kinds of expressions. ... In linguistics and logic, a predicate is an expression that can be true of something. ... In grammar, an adjective is a word whose main syntactic role is to modify a noun or pronoun (called the adjectives subject), giving more information about what the noun or pronoun refers to. ... An adverb is a part of speech. ... In logic, the argument form or test form of an argument results from replacing the different words, or sentences, that make up the argument with letters, along the lines of algebra; the letters represent logical variables. ... In computer science and mathematics, a variable (IPA pronunciation: ) (sometimes called a pronumeral) is a symbolic representation denoting a quantity or expression. ... A pocket watch, a device used to tell time Look up time in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Actors in period costume sharing a joke whilst waiting between takes during location filming. ...

The language is designed so that the patterns of phonemes always parse into words uniquely. Even when run together, the words can be separated in only one way. In Loglan, one can directly and precisely say any of the different meanings of the English phrase "a pretty little girls’ school." This feature is so pronounced that people fluent in Loglan say impossible things as a sort of joke—a type of humor not supported by the linguistic machinery of other languages. In Loglan, it is also possible to say that John, a person, is literally a short word. In grammar and linguistics, parsing is the process by which a person makes sense of a sentence, usually by breaking it down into words or phrases. ... A joke is a short story or series of words spoken or communicated with the intent of causing laughter or being found humorous by either listener/reader or performer/writer. ...

Loglan and Lojban have a wide range of words used for expressing emotions and attitudes about what one is saying, but unlike natural languages, these are kept clearly distinct from the actual statements being made. This may be surprising to people who assume that a language based on logic would be computer-like, and devoid of human emotion. Emotional redirects here. ... Attitude may refer to: Aircraft attitude Attitude (magazine) Attitude, a song by American pop and jazz singer Suede Attitudes (band) Attitude Adjustment (Hardcore/Crossover/Thrash metal band) Attitude, song from Metallica on their album Reload. ...

In popular culture

Loglan was mentioned in a couple of science fiction works: Robert A. Heinlein’s well-known book The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, and Robert Rimmer’s utopian book, Love Me Tomorrow. Science fiction is a form of speculative fiction principally dealing with the impact of imagined science and technology, or both, upon society and persons as individuals. ... Robert Anson Heinlein (July 7, 1907 – May 8, 1988) was one of the most popular, influential, and controversial authors of hard science fiction. ... The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress cover The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is a 1966 science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein about a lunar penal colonys revolt against rule from Earth. ... Robert Henry Rimmer (March 14, 1917 – August 1, 2001) was the author of several books, most notably The Harrad Experiment. ... Left panel (The Earthly Paradise, Garden of Eden), from Hieronymus Boschs The Garden of Earthly Delights. ...

Loglan’s inventor, James Cooke Brown, also wrote a utopian science fiction novel The Troika Incident that uses Loglan phrases but calls the language a different name.

Loglan is used as the official interspecies language in the roleplaying game FTL:2448. A roleplaying game (RPG) is a type of game in which players assume the roles of characters and collaboratively create stories. ...

See also

• Artificial language
• Linguistics
• Lojban
• Philosophy of language

An artificial or constructed language (known colloquially as a conlang among aficionados), is a language whose vocabulary and grammar were specifically devised by an individual or small group, rather than having naturally evolved as part of a culture as with natural languages. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of language, which can be theoretical or applied. ... Lojban (IPA , official full name Lojban: a realization of Loglan) is a syntactically unambiguous, predicate logic-based constructed language which was created by the Logical Language Group in 1987 as a realization of Loglan, with the intent to make the language more complete, usable, and freely available. ... Philosophy of language is the reasoned inquiry into the nature, origins, and usage of language. ...

External links and references

• James Cooke Brown: Loglan. In Scientific American, June 1960.
• The Loglan Institute home page
• The Logical Language Group home page
• Loglan in Russia (ru, eo)
• Introductory Lojban book, free download or buy printed copy; under the Open Publication License.
• Lojban for beginners (lesson book; Creative Commons Attribution License v 2.5)