Curiously, could someone tell me the point of learning Latin? I am serious when I ask this. I am a web designer and I use lorem ipsum as filler text. It’s Latin, and the point of it is that it’s a dead language.
So why? 
There are MANY books written in Latin, especially during the Middle Ages and Renaissance, that have not been translated into any modern language. If you want to read those books, you have to know Latin. It used to be those books were hard to get access to, locked away in university libraries, but now they are online, thanks to GoogleBooks and other digital library projects. So, if you read Latin, you can read all these old books - I study folktales and fables, so for me it is really exciting to get to read all these hundreds-year-old stories that have survived only in Latin.
The point of Lorem Ipsum is that it’s meaningless Latin, so even a latinist will focus on the page layout and not be distracted by the text content.
Sine sensu est “Lorem Ipsum” in quo est utilitas eius, deinde et latinista operam dabit ad formam elementorum in paginâ non ad scripturae sensum.
Just point your browser here
http://www.slu.edu/colleges/AS/languages/classical/latin/tchmat/pedagogy/latinbenefits.html
The point of learning latin is to read the Aeneid in latin. It’s so much better than in English.
Latini discendi summa in eo constat: Aeneiden latinè legere. Sic facere sublimius quam anglicè est.
Really, what’s the point of anything? What’s the point of reading Shakespeare, doing sudoku puzzles or watching American Idol on TV?
Thank you lauragibbs, I see your point of wanting to learning it. I guess our interests lie elsewhere.
Adrianus, I am fully aware and had NO confusion apart from learning the point of (Lorem Ipsum filler text) ONLY for that reason. Also if I may add, if Latin is SO much better than English, than I think the great heads of the world would push it towards a universalist unity. But since I don’t see that happening, I will be having to tell all my clients about that it is just filler text, and has no meaning other than to occupy space on their website until they provide me with content.
An eloquent cry of despair! You’re right. Better if they were all in Latin. 
Desperationis clamorem eloquentem! Rectè dicis. Id melius sit si omnia ista in sermones latinos convertantur.
I guess it’s not really despair. I just think there are a lot of things in life that we do because we enjoy them, whether they be because of personal fulfillment, mental stimulation, pure entertainment or whatever.
I think it’s actually quite nice that Latin is a dead language. When I study it, I study the same material that someone studied 100 years ago. There is a finite corpus of work out there that interests me, and reading that material as it was written by its original author is exhilarating and of value in its own right.
On the contrary, I see many students learning Spanish in high school or college, thinking they will use this language in their everyday life. The truth is that few of them ever reach a level of fluency that allows them to communicate with native speakers, and most of the Spanish-speakers here in America speak English so much better than these students speak Spanish, that to attempt any conversation in Spanish between a native speaker of Spanish and a native English speaker here in America is generally little more than a request for a free tutoring lesson.
In short, because it’s a pleasing, enjoyable, and rewarding pastime. I do not expect that learning Latin will ever make me more money (although if homeschool parents asks me to tutor their children, it might).
The obvious follow-up question is, what exactly do you find rewarding about the difficult work of learning Latin?
Simply this: whenever anything more complicated than a technical manual is translated from one language to another, some of the meaning is always “lost in translation.” Additionally, the sound of the language, the cadence, musicality, and poetry, is ALWAYS lost. I am a college professor of English, and I know the strength of Shakespeare is not in the originality of his plot, but in his execution of the details, especially the poetry.
I have wanted to read the Aeneid in Latin since I first read it in translation in high school. It was like smelling a great meal, but not being allowed to eat it. When I got to college, I bought Pharr’s reader of the first half of the Aeneid, even though my schedule didn’t allow me time to take Latin classes. This, now, is my attempt to fulfill that old longing.
I don’t ever say that people “ought” to learn Latin, or “ought to want” to learn Latin. I say that it is a beautiful language that gives direct access to much great literature and poetry. If they enjoy the literature and poetry in translation, they will not enjoy it less in the original.
For the record, I like Latin, and I like reading and studying it. However, I think most of these arguments (e.g. “Fashioning community across boundaries of time and space”) could be made about any other language with a large written corpus or historical influence. Also, some of these advantages could be gained by reading in translation (e.g. “Irreplaceable educational experience bearing on personal growth and fulfillment”).
“The classical liberal arts give us an invaluable praxis for transcending ethnocentrism and destructive radical fundamentalism.” I support a liberal arts education, but I wish this claim were true. I’d say that the classical liberal arts are ethically neutral. For example, why were imperialism and other forms of oppression thriving in Europe at the same time that the classical liberal arts were in their heyday (e.g. 18-19th century England, France, Belgium, etc.)? Often classical liberal arts ideals have been used to justify reprehensible practices (imperialism and slavery). Of course, they have also been used by champions of human rights and freedom. I suppose you could argue that those people lacking in ethics have an incorrect or faulty understanding of the classical liberal arts.
I guess I fall into the “studying/reading Latin is a pleasant and gratifying hobby for me, although I don’t expect to gain any real objective benefits from it” group.
I don’t think Adrianus (or anybody else) is suggesting that Latin is “better” than English. Rather, his example was about how it is better to read a literary text in its native language rather than in translation. So if your goal is to read Latin literature, learn Latin. If not, then you probably don’t need to worry about it. In that sense, Latin is better than English for reading Latin literary texts like the Aeneid, and English is better than Latin for reading English texts like Shakespeare.
As thesaurus says. Also, I wouldn’t trust great heads to do anything other than to bang together. That’s how heads get big in the first place, from vanity and bruising.
Ut dicit thesaurus. Porrò magna capita aliquid facere aliter quam inter se contundere non credam. Sic magna in primordio fiunt capita, per vanitatem cicatricesque.
I’m learning Latin and Greek because knowing them will allow me to read about 2500 years worth of material in the original languages. As has been said, people can read the most important books in translation, but they are never as good that way.
The oddity of Lorem Ipsum in the source code of a published webpage not displaying on the page itself but turning up in searches can arise because a designer either didn’t bother to remove hidden elements introduced by a third-party page-tool or by a third-party provider, or, worse, was unaware that they were there.
Inusitatè evenit lorem ipsum scripturam se ostendere non in paginâ editâ sed in fontis notis et proinde in proventibus quaerendi quod qui designavit neglexit elementa abscondita à provisore ab extrâ instrumentove ad paginas interretiales prodendas introducta amovere, setiùsve exstare elementa abscondita ignoravit.
Well personally, its the fact that Latin was one of the single biggest factors that carved the world today - There is no objective reason to learn it, but fully subjective. Latin is our history, and our history is us. We, the people of this blue marble must honour our history, respect it as we respect our parents - without it, you wouldn’t exist, I can assure you. And since it is the biggest part of our western history, it deserves to live on - not for objective reasons, but for all other reasons.
Plus, don’t you just love the feeling of reading the words that Livy or Caesar wrote and read, as they wrote and read them.
2500+ years of being the universal mother language, I think that merits it some respect in our everyday lives.
In the U.S.A. we are only taught how to USE grammar but not actually taught what, how or why these grammar rules stand. Honestly in my very first Latin course (Junior in High School) our teacher asked us to give him a verb. The class went silent. Finally I raised my hand and asked what a verb was. The saddest part is: no one in the class thought this was a stupid question.
Learning Latin is good for many things…
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Better understanding of English and other Foreign Languages
Indo-European branched off to make many languages, two of which are Latin and Germanic. From Germanic English was formed but much of our vocabulary was derived from Latin as well. If you were to draw a family tree of Language you could say Latin is English’s Uncle (but in some ways also English’s Father.) -
Latin helps English speakers break down large words that few people know the meaning of without a dictionary. In a way it can turn the student into a walking dictionary. It also helps Scientists and Medical Doctors understand more about diseases, medicines, procedures, etc.
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It is essential for Historians who specialize in a time period or area where Latin was used. When it comes to translation it is dangerous for a Historian to “take someone’s word on it.” If the translation they are using is incorrect then the Historian loses credibility and this can negatively affect their career.
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Archaeologists in the field (or out of the field) need to be able to translate newly found materials that have Latin script on them. If everyone stopped learning Latin then no one would be able to do this.
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Its fun! Seriously. It is difficult at first but once you get the hang of it you can say all sorts of fun things (insert evil smile here…)
In the U.S.A. we are only taught how to USE grammar but not actually taught what, how or why these grammar rules stand. Honestly in my very first Latin course (Junior in High School) our teacher asked us to give him a verb. The class went silent. Finally I raised my hand and asked what a verb was. The saddest part is: no one in the class thought this was a stupid question.
I personally think that grammar isn’t very important. Either we know it already, in which case it’s a part of our inherent knowledge of the language (our inherent grammar), or it’s something someone’s made up. Like the idea that it’s ungrammatical to split infinitives. Some guy tried to import that from Latin into English. Stupid idea. ‘To boldy go’ is grammatical in English. We don’t need a teacher to tell us what is grammatical and what is not.
And I don’t think it was a stupid question at all. No one is born knowing what a verb is. And truth be told, it’s not easy to define. You might be told in school that a verb is a ‘doing word’, but that’s clearly not the entire story. And that’s just a semantic definition, it doesn’t touch on syntax at all.
Why should kids know what a verb is? Does it actually have any impact on their life? I’m glad that in my English class, we learned about English literature and not English grammar. Second language learners of English may need to learn the rules, but we don’t.
On the contrary, I see many students learning Spanish in high school or college, thinking they will use this language in their everyday life. The truth is that few of them ever reach a level of fluency that allows them to communicate with native speakers, and most of the Spanish-speakers here in America speak English so much better than these students speak Spanish, that to attempt any conversation in Spanish between a native speaker of Spanish and a native English speaker here in America is generally little more than a request for a free tutoring lesson.
Does America teach Mexican Spanish or Castilian Spanish?
[Note 1: Almost every culture in the world today either has or is significantly affected by the “Cultural DNA” of the Greco-Latin tradition. We ignore it only to our great shame and ignorance.]
Of course the world’s been affected by Latin. But is it such a big deal if we are ignorant of this influence? If I was given the job of informing an alien about the cultures that exist in the world, I wouldn’t point them to learning Latin or Greek first. Maybe somewhere down the track.
This website actually seems to be implying that we must learn Latin, or at least that it should be strongly encouraged, since if we do not, we’ll be living in great shame and ignorance. Really guys? I can’t agree with that.
Vide http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split_infinitive#The_argument_from_classical_languages)
et hunc situm, http://www.insightin.com/esl/2000.php
6,000 most frequently used English words
The ranks of word frequency were calculated by running word list in wordnet dictionary database against a few popular search engines from 2002 - 2003. It basically uses search engine index databases as corpus. The size of the corpus ranges from 1 billion to 4 billions…1447 verb
1448 preach
1450 friendly
1451 observed
1452 fan
1453 connect
1453 Fig
1454 count
1454 egg
1454 items
1454 mention
1456 Texas
1457 calculate
Nor I, and many here, I suspect.// Tecum concurro, et plerique hîc, ut suspicor.
Latin is better than English in the sense that its grammar allows a more elegant and intellectually satisfying style. Or does anyone (who knows anything about it) disagree?