Yes, natural languages are hard if you have to learn them as adults. 
Their grammars never fit altogether
into neat systems. There are always a lot of exceptions which have to be 
memorized or learned by use. As
children we learn them by use and they don bother us too much. English 
apparently much worse in this
respect because it is a kind of hodge-podge of other languages built on 
a more or less Germanic foundation.

Learning natural languages as adults is hard for most of us. Our 
language acquiring ability is greatest
when we are younger than 5 or 6 and for most people diminishes rapidly 
after that. I think that it is the fact
that that natural languages are not and cannot be made entirely 
systematic is what makes them such
powerful tools for communication.

It's no surprise that 20 minutes reading about grammar on Wikipedia left 
you with less than perfect
understanding of grammar. Many people have devoted their whole lives to 
it. A few years
studying their works and you might begin to get a glimmer.:)

David

Invisible wrote:
> I just spent 20 minutes reading various Wikipedia articles on grammar.
> 
> My head hurts now.
> 
> All I was trying to figure out is why there's no such word as "sheeps". 
> Several other words have this property, but I have no idea what it's 
> called.
> 
> Also: "transparent" is an adjective. But what the hell is 
> "transparency"? [Aside from also happening to be a noun. God English is 
> complicated!]

Post a reply to this message