What kind of innovation(s) are permissible in tp?

[Kuti]

could you bring an example of real, but not natural and not just a game?

no

could you bring an example of real, but not natural ?

all conlangs

Even if it is advertised as a game, even if you use it as a game, even if you don't use it as a language, it is still a language.
And maybe the contrary is true too

[jan-ante]

Even if it is advertised as a game, even if you use it as a game, even if you don't use it as a language, it is still a language.
And maybe the contrary is true too

then, it is a toy language or a linguistic toy. agree?

[Jan KoAla]

it is a toy language or a linguistic toy.

I would be very curious to see what jan Mato and jan Kipo think about this.

[Kuti]

It would minimalize the language aspect and raise the toy aspect.

[janMato]

it is a toy language or a linguistic toy.

I would be very curious to see what jan Mato and jan Kipo think about this.

It is a toy in the sense of it being small, limited functionality, and a mostly closed system. It isn't a toy in the derogatory sense, I rather like the language and I think most people on this thread do as well, else they wouldn't have invested so much time into it.

The acid test of a language is if it can be use for any purpose that a natural language can and if it has native speakers. As for the first, that is pretty subjective, I'd guess most people think toki pona is pretty limited in the areas where it can be used-- diary writing, meditation, amusement, doing little linguistic thought experiments.

If a language has native speakers, even professional linguists typically will grant it some degree of respect. I would guess that if an eccentric family did raise their child to speak toki pona, the child would innovate so much to fill out the missing parts of toki pona, that it would be hardly recognizable. This kind-of sort-of was observed by Arika Okrent in her book when she met a native Esperantist and noticed his speech was hard to follow (faster/more complex speech), but the other Esperantists-as-a-second-language speakers were reasonably easy to follow.

[Kuti]

The acid test of a language is if it can be use for any purpose that a natural language can and if it has native speakers.

It would fail because it is a minimalistic language, it is not intended to be like a big natural language.

I have a simple bike, i'm not into sports, even if i try i would fail to win a race.
Your acid test would expect to much of toki pona according to higher standards.
If we want a test, we need a test which is suitable for little languages.

Il faut comparer que ce qui est comparable

[janSilipu]

I tend to be a formalist on these matters: if it parses like a language, and has a vocabulary like a language and can be used like a language in an open ended set of situations, then it is a language. Tp seems to fit. As to it's not being usable in certain situations, we just don't know. It has to build to that point. Cases where it seems to fail now may have been brought up to early, like calculus right after multiplication. Admittedly, nanpa suli is a clear built in limitation and there may be others (I really don't see how to duck the numbers). But many other projects require a built up culture of a sort, a pile of language/ literary lore (every book is a mirror of a preceding books, as they say). You can't do Kant until you have done Hume, who requires Descartes, and so on back -- in every field. Jokes need background; so do sermons. So let's slog on with primers and fairy tales and fables and imagined (or, hopefully, soon, real) conversations and see how far we can go. Doing this may well be the game, but it is a game with a language, not a mere toy.

[jan-ante]

It would fail because it is a minimalistic language, it is not intended to be like a big natural language.

I have a simple bike, i'm not into sports, even if i try i would fail to win a race.
Your acid test would expect to much of toki pona according to higher standards.
If we want a test, we need a test which is suitable for little languages.

that is, a pidgin. your can apply exactly the same test for pidgins and see that tp is still a toy pidgin

[jan-ante]

I tend to be a formalist on these matters: if it parses like a language, and has a vocabulary like a language and can be used like a language in an open ended set of situations, then it is a language. Tp seems to fit.

the underlined part of your definition is hard to formalise, i.e. you are not that a big formalist. moreover, you change the subject. everyone here (including myself) is agree that tp is a sort of minimalistic language. but what is exactly the sort? a "real" language? a "toy" language?

Doing this may well be the game, but it is a game with a language, not a mere toy.

which toy is "mere" toy? this one? or that one?

i agree with jan Mato, "toy" not a humilating label. it is an important part of human colture. e.g. the probability theory started from the dice toy/game (az-zar in arabic). then it evolves into a theory underlying almost every branch of modern science. but how toki pona could evolve? it seems that jan Kipo wants to force its linguistic evolution into just one more language. it is straightforward and apparent. perhaps some people considered an evolution of az-zar into a tool of sorcering or gambling, and that even happened. but it is far not the most influental branch of that evolution. to me the apparent linguistic evolution of tp is of that sort. tp could have much better offsprings than just one more "real" pidgin or "real" creole language.

[janSilipu]

Tp is not a pidgin; at best it has a structure or vocabulary likea pidgin. It is not at the confluence of two languages and certainly not of a dominant and an oppressed ones. But, that aside, it cannot develop by adding new vocabulary (this is one of the game parts) nor by expanding grammatical resources (ditto). So it must expand by building up expressions within itself and a tradition on which ( and how) these expansions are made. That the set of such expressions and the situations for their use is open ended means merely that they are not prescribed in advance and that we can always so far think of new ones. If eventually come to an end, then we will have found a limit to what we can say with this base, though not for every base of this size. And, as I said earlier, we may later find that this limit may be overcome from a later stage.