Why I am doing this

Please pick one:
  1. I wish to become famous.
  2. I want to get rich.
  3. I hope to bring peace and happiness to the whole human race.
  4. I have a poor grasp of reality.
  5. All of the above.
The correct answer is either two or four ...  Ask me again in a hundred years.

Forty years ago I read the book Babel 17 by Samuel R. Delany. The titular 'Babel 17' was a language that enhanced cognition (and some other stuff happened, it is a fun story). This is probably the seed of this particular obsession.

Since then I have often been annoyed by the arbitrary nature of the English language. Many words are composed of almost random letters that make inconsistent sounds. It is obvious that the whole thing was originally designed by illiterates.

I mean, if they had had a proper language they wouldn't have needed English, would they.

So, over the years I have maintained an interest in language, phonology, communication, computers, data modeling and visualization, the psychology of learning, philosophy, mathematics. taxonomy and other methods of classification. I've been looking for a simple ideogram that I could use to create a new language from the ground up. When I settled upon the current glyph everything else just sort of imploded to form Instrumentation.

It was like a miracle, but without the music.

In the final analysis, my reason for doing this is the only truly valid reason for ever trying to create anything new or different.

I didn't have any choice.


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