Kirilo81:Please have a look at the first paragraph of the Antaŭparolo:

Kiam nia lingvo estos oficiale akceptita de la registaroj de la plej ĉefaj regnoj kaj tiuj ĉi registaroj per speciala leĝo garantios al Esperanto tute certan vivon kaj uzatecon kaj plenan sendanĝerecon kontraŭ ĉiuj personaj kapricoj aŭ disputoj, tiam aŭtoritata komitato, interkonsente elektita de tiuj registaroj, havos la rajton fari en la fundamento de la lingvo unu fojon por ĉiam ĉiujn deziritajn ŝanĝojn, se tiaj ŝanĝoj montriĝos necesaj; sed ĝis tiu tempo la fundamento de Esperanto devas plej severe resti absolute senŝanĝa, ĉar severa netuŝebleco de nia fundamento estas la plej grava kaŭzo de nia ĝisnuna progresado kaj la plej grava kondiĉo por nia regula kaj paca progresado estonta.

It is part of the plan to change the Fundamento in case of the Fina Venko, and I think discussions coming up again and again, e.g. about the conditional past, the asymmetric system of gender assignment, the ata/ita debate, or problems like the low distinctiveness of the personal pronouns show fields worthy of occupation for the to-be "aŭtoritata komitato", so they are not necessarily a waist of time and energy.

Just because Zamenhof said "until that time, the fundemanto..." etc. doesn't necessarily mean he was in favor of changing it. All he is saying is that up to the time Esperanto has not been adopted, the fundamento is untouchable and that does NOT necessarily mean that after that happens (IF it happens) the language MUST be changed. It's not an either/or proposition.

Kirilo81:It is part of the plan to change the Fundamento in case of the Fina Venko, and I think discussions coming up again and again ... show fields worthy of occupation for the to-be "aŭtoritata komitato", so they are not necessarily a waist of time and energy.

An excellent point. Moreover, discussion of that sort is inevitable, whether it’s a waste of time or not.

As for the Fina Venko, years ago, I finally got around to reading Robert Graves’ I, Claudius, which I only knew from the TV version up until then. One amusing bit I remember is that the narrator explains why he wrote his family history in Greek: Latin might be the language of the government, employment, etc. now, but Greek, as a more expressive, logical, and cultured language, would surely win out in the end as the world’s lingua franca, so when remote posterity finally rediscovered his magnum opus, Greek’s Fina Venko would have already occurred and his story would be immediately intelligible.

The point: no matter how awesome Esperanto already is or might become with a little tweaking, internal awesomeness does not a lingua franca make; we’ll see the Fina Veno before we see the Fina Venko, so if there are changes that a majority of people want, the Academy might as well consider making them sooner rather than later as long as the Fina Venko isn’t the only reason for holding off.

sudanglo:Yeah, and invalidate over 100 years of literature and course books. How would this not be confusing to 'new people'?

Fussing over which changes would antiquate the literature and teaching from Esperanto’s antiquity is a little late at this point. As it is, reading something like al feliĉulo eĉ koko donas ovojn, many modern readers have to remind themselves, “Oh, yeah. Everything was masculine by default back in olden times.” Suffixes like ant, ist, ul, etc., were masculine, too. And li was masculine as well as neuter when the gender of something wasn’t known, at least in Zamenhof’s own usage.

If, hypothetically, Esperanto were ever going to be adopted, the form that would be under consideration would be the form in currency at the time, not the Esperanto of Zamenhof’s era. If the Academy mandated that, henceforth, all Esperanto teaching and reading materials would only be written in Cyrillic, then Эсперанто would be the only Esperanto, and forum denizens would be quibbling over whether or not the Apocalypse would be triggered by ич instead of iĉ.

The ship of change has already sailed, and the good ship Fina Venko is never coming, short of a fiat by an eccentric dictator. It’d probably be better to think in terms of “what, if anything, are the language’s outstanding problems, and how can we fix them?” rather than “how can we keep up the appearance of timeless fossilization in case someone notices us?”

morfran:

The point: no matter how awesome Esperanto already is or might become with a little tweaking, internal awesomeness does not a lingua franca make; we’ll see the Fina Veno before we see the Fina Venko, so if there are changes that a majority of people want, the Academy might as well consider making them sooner rather than later as long as the Fina Venko isn’t the only reason for holding off.

Uh, actually, no. The Akademio is NOT a prescriptivist group (it doesn't 'lay down the law' in that they decide what will be proper); but rather a descriptive group; they DESCRIBE what has already been accepted by the Esperantistaro as a whole.

What amazes me about the above interpretation of "until that time, the Fundamento......" is that some apparently seem to think that when the entire world speaks Esperanto, there will miraculously be far less strife and arguing about change, than what we have seen here in the VERY limited group that is Lernu.net

orthohawk:Uh, actually, no. The Akademio is NOT a prescriptivist group (it doesn't 'lay down the law' in that they decide what will be proper); but rather a descriptive group; they DESCRIBE what has already been accepted by the Esperantistaro as a whole.

Oh, I know. I meant "Academy" as a stand-in for any authoritative body that could mandate changes, which, of course, we don't have. Should have been clearer about that, but I was already deleting text on account of space issues. Brevity not my thing.

AllenHartwell:. Ultimately it comes down to how much you respect the language and its goals. If you don't, then GTFO and find something else to ruin. I can't state it more clearly than this.

How much do you respect the goal of Zamenhof, the original creator of Esperanto.
His goal was to reduce conflict.
Providing everyone with a common language was the means he tried to achieve this goal.
Perhaps you could show more respect for this goal of Zamenhof by not constantly trying to stir up trouble.

morfran:
The ship of change has already sailed, and the good ship Fina Venko is never coming, short of a fiat by an eccentric dictator. It’d probably be better to think in terms of “what, if anything, are the language’s outstanding problems, and how can we fix them?” rather than “how can we keep up the appearance of timeless fossilization in case someone notices us?”

+ 1

If the same issues keep being raised by different people then they are obviously issues with the language and not just the eccentricities of individuals.

Can I remind everybody that this thread was about the accusative being phased out - which it isn't.

Kirilo, the ata/ita debate has long since been determined. Actually it was settled before it arose.It was only a handful of prominent Esperantists with certain mother tongues (German, Dutch Swedish, Danish) who stirred it up. I lived through that debate and in my experience there was little actual atismo in the speech of the Esperantists I met at international congresses.

On the past conditional, this seems to me a bee in the bonnets of certain Forum members. The usage has long since supported estus -inta to express, for example, 'I wouldn't have missed the train if you had ....'.

The issue of an intimate form of pronoun has been properly thrashed out and long since rejected. And as to political correctness on sexism - phooey.

Dear sudanglo, I didn't say I want anything of these changed,* I just said it are topics coming up frequently - at least in lernu, and of course there is a bias. E.g. I think there must not be any changes to the conditional, and with a worldwide userbase (instead of Western European) the awkward -intus will be fairly marginalized.

*With "low distinctiveness" I meant that the personal pronouns, all ending in -i, sometimes can hardly be distinguished acoustically. Ido did better in this regard.

ata/ita is still a problem, as the linguistic motivation for the official position of the Academy is poor, leading to an overuse of -ita. But of course atism is much more wrong and rightfully marginal.

@Orthohawk

Please have a look at the definition of the "aŭtoritata centra institucio" (what the Akademio is supposed to be, though it acts less and less in this manner) in the Antaŭparolo of the Fundamento, this is a highly prescriptive institution, not a club of linguists.

I'm back!

Bemused:

AllenHartwell:. Ultimately it comes down to how much you respect the language and its goals. If you don't, then GTFO and find something else to ruin. I can't state it more clearly than this.

How much do you respect the goal of Zamenhof, the original creator of Esperanto.
His goal was to reduce conflict.
Providing everyone with a common language was the means he tried to achieve this goal.
Perhaps you could show more respect for this goal of Zamenhof by not constantly trying to stir up trouble.

+1

orthohawk:What amazes me about the above interpretation of "until that time, the Fundamento......" is that some apparently seem to think that when the entire world speaks Esperanto, there will miraculously be far less strife and arguing about change, than what we have seen here in the VERY limited group that is Lernu.net

What I've said all along; if we don't have peace among ourselves, how could we possibly bring peace to the world??

At any rate, whatever changes may happen in Esperanto, rendering the older works unintelligible is exactly what is NOT supposed to happen.

Zamenhof:Por ke lingvo internacia povu bone kaj regule progresadi kaj por ke ĝi havu plenan certecon, ke ĝi neniam disfalos kaj ia facilanima paŝo de ĝiaj amikoj estontaj ne detruos la laborojn de ĝiaj amikoj estintaj, ― estas plej necesa antaŭ ĉio unu kondiĉo: la ekzistado de klare difinita, neniam tuŝebla kaj neniam ŝanĝebla Fundamento de la lingvo.

....

Sed, prezentante parton de la fundamento, tiuj ĉi arĥaismoj neniam estos elĵetitaj, sed ĉiam estos presataj en ĉiuj lernolibroj kaj vortaroj samtempe kun la formoj novaj, kaj tiamaniere ni havos la certecon, ke eĉ ĉe la plej granda perfektiĝado la unueco de Esperanto neniam estos rompata kaj neniu verko Esperanta eĉ el la plej frua tempo iam perdos sian valoron kaj kompreneblecon por la estontaj generacioj.

[emfazo aldonita de mi]