I found this week whilst searching around google for international/global language that there is such a thing as an international auxiliary language which is meant for communication between people from different nations who do not share a common native language. I reckon this interesting because thinking Chinese, Spanish or English would be high on any list of widely spoken languages not really thinking there would be a language specifically devised to be nationless or ‘of the people.’ After a while I came across Esperanto which apparently is a language with no nation. Thinking more of something like a tech language of internet speak. Language seems much more fluid than I’ve realised and only on looking in to things a bit find that English is so widely spoken because of historical factors, Chinese is the most widely spoken language but only because of the size of it’s nation and at around 100 AD Latin looked set to dominate it’s slice of the world.
I wouldn’t usually write about such things as politics and news stories but killing people is was a significant part of this week. I was watching the news with my mum when reports of the bomb in Pakistan were coming through. My mum takes very little interest in politics at home or abroad and was just plainly aghast at this. She asks me why people do this and what do they hope to achieve? Sadly, I cannot answer the question for her because it seems that what is hoped for is usually what has happened. Buildings blown up and people dead. They achieved what they wanted, but why she asks again. Why don’t they take it to the Government or the people of the Government instead of murdering people in a hotel? It scares me and makes me wonder, what is it that I do trying to get an education, being with my family and wanting a better life for the next generation that is so wrong? Perhaps it’s my blindness to what goes on in the world, how I treat my neighbour and how other people are being treated that leads to such violence.
Something closer to home is Mark Kermode and his Movie blog which this week has been looking at the Shetland Film Festival. He points out a a short called Masks which is described as ‘the destruction of personal identity through the misuse of drugs’ and it is haunting. It looks to be put together and edited very well and does have a certain impact in context of looking at the world we live in. I’m not sure it is even supposed to answer any questions of why we live our lives the way we do and if we didn’t have the short description it could say something else all together. I do recommend people watch it though because in context it is quite amazing. Mark Kermodes Movie Blog
I also note this week the collapse of an investment bank. I’ve copied this excerpt from Naomi Klein.
“Consider that in North America, everybody under the age of 40 grew up being told that the government can’t intervene to improve our lives, that government is the problem not the solution, that laissez faire was the only option. Now, we are suddenly seeing an extremely activist, intensely interventionist government, seemingly willing to do whatever it takes to save investors from themselves.”
I was just watching the BBC’s Click which this week features a few things of interest, notably the New Vision For Computing In Africa and Computer Aid International. They’re also looking for the open-source community to help with the production of software for disadvantaged people.
‘Technologies come at a high price,’ and Computer Aid want to get the costs down to reach more people and ‘not just about teaching people, it is about getting them into jobs.’
I particularly like this one because of using open source software myself as well as the obvious ‘hard wired‘ altruistic reasons.
Click also featured NerdTests.com, am I a nerd? ….
… Well, it seems I’m a low ranking nerd, something of a disappointment.
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9 Comments
Hi Jason. Thought you might like to see http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8837438938991452670
Amike salutas Brian Barker
Learning languages and learning about other cultures is certainly a good thing, but a neglected question is, as you suggest: which language should I learn? I hope you’ll allow me to make the case for learning Esperanto, the planned international language. The Esperanto Association of Britain is offering a free postal course in the language. Contact details:
Esperanto Association of Britain
Esperanto House
Station Road
Barlaston
Stoke-on-Trent
ST12 9DE, U.K.
Tel: 0845 230 1887
Tel: +44 (0)1782 372141
e-mail: eab@esperanto-gb.org
web: http://www.esperanto-gb.org
A good place to start (in several languages) is http://www.esperanto.net
“Why don’t they take it to the Government or the people of the Government instead of murdering people in a hotel?”
I can’t condone terrorism, but neither can I condone a government that fails to listen to and represent its voters, such as when the nation asked the Government not to go into Iraq, not to sign the European Treaty (to give us a referendum) and not to bring in and charge us for the National ID Card and National Database.
In such a climate, just how does one get the attention of the Government that sees protesters as a mere petulance?
As I said, terrorism isn’t the answer, but what is?
I’m not sure the answer I have to this one is effective. I’ve used my democratic right and chosen not to vote but I didn’t get much support. I know for sure that in the next election I won’t be voting for the government. But what real difference is there?
Certainly that is true of the Labour and Conservative governments, and to a certain degree, the Liberal Democrats. However, there is a ‘difference’ party out there (the BNP party) but its motives and morals are somewhat daunting (and in some cases, dubious)
Bigger than my concern of those who choose not to vote, is ‘Blind Voting’, where people don’t really understand what it is that they are voting for and just vote for a name that sounds good or on false information they may have received down the pub.
P.S. I suppose that when people become exasperated at the political system, they choose all kinds of potentially harmful ways to get their views heard, and the increasing support the BNP is receiving could just be one example.
Then there is justification enough for me to go out and vote. I’ve been thinking that the Liberal Democrats seem to be making ground in recent years. This surely is a good thing in our ‘two party’ system, but can many people really envisage the Lib Dems in opposition, as it were, let alone government? Having said that, since we’ve had a lifetime of one or the other other partys then perhaps we should start to consider the alternatives more? Do you know much on Proportional Representation? Perhaps you could write a post about it if you do?
I did recently ask someone who will be a new voter at the next election who he thought he might vote for and I was met with the reply that he didn’t know anything about any party. Of course I took the opportunity, perhaps hypocritically, that he should look into this. To be fair on the persons intelligence I don’t believe he would vote without an understanding but I see your point about blind voting and I certainly know many of them.
I will have to do some research into the actual and specific differences between the proportional and non-proportional representation voting systems. However, as a matter of interest, and to test if I actually know what I’m talking about, I will state what I currently understand; after all, one of the big arguments against the calls for a referendum on the European Treaty, was that not enough people had actually read up on what the specific changes to the treaty actually were. But then, I think that the calls for a referendum were not actually about the treaty but because those calling for it, wanted to say ‘no’ to Europe altogether.
When we go for a general election, we don’t vote for the party we want to win but instead, we vote for the party candidate in our area who belongs to the party that we want. That is fine so long as the party you want to vote for has enough constituent MPs to cover all areas. This is obviously not the case. That means that if the party you want to win does not have a constituent MP in your area, you cannot vote for that party. You would either have to not vote or vote for a party you never intended to vote for.
When people say they want Proportional Voting, what they are saying is they want to vote for the party as a single entity so that the size of the party does not influence the final out-come. This would give every party a fair chance (in theory).
One of the reasons why the Liberal democrats find it so hard to get a foot in, is not only their size but because people know that the party is too small to cover all areas, they don’t want to waste their vote on a party they know isn’t going to win.
Another point is that if, as has recently been discussed, the government made voting compulsory, then that would mean the big parties would have an even bigger chance of staying in the lead. By some voters choosing not to vote, it gives the smaller parties a better chance at the polls.
My final point is this, if I am mistaken in my understanding of the voting system, then the question has to be, how many other people also don’t understand how it works? How could this lack of understanding be damaging the outcome of elections?
A wikipedia link about proportional voting:
A wikipedia link about what some call ‘non-proportional voting’:
“One of the reasons why the Liberal democrats find it so hard to get a foot in, is not only their size but because people know that the party is too small to cover all areas, they don’t want to waste their vote on a party they know isn’t going to win.”
This reminds me of an election advert the Lib Dems did a good few years ago that featured John Cleese. The line that stuck in my head was something along the lines of 50% of the population thought that if the Lib Dems had a chance of winning the election people would vote for them.
I thought it incredible at the time,thinking that these people obviously didn’t have stomach to want change our political system (although I’m not sure the Lib Dems want to do this now?) and instead simply went for the consensus view.
What will it take? Should I stand up, say my name and declare I want to vote Liberal Democrat?
Perhaps I should a 12 step group?
Would you make the article about electoral systems in the form of a new post? Then we can make comments for it from there.
A couple of time management issues have cropped up, but I still intend to work on an ‘easy read’ piece that I hope will clarify the specifics of our electoral system – and educate myself while about it.