Update

human_language.md

@@ -67,19 +67,19 @@ This section lists some of the most notable human languages. In the brackets the
     - ...
   - **Slavic languages** (~300 M native speakers): Hard to learn, many grammatical cases and inflections, spoken in central/east Europe and north Asia.
     - **Bulgarian** (*как се казваш, "Kak se kazvash?"*): TODO
-    - **Croatian** ([aio], *Kako se zoveš?*): Kinda similar to Czech/Slovak/Polish, seems to have a lot of "ch" (as in "chicken") sounds.
-    - **[Czech](czechia.md)** ([oea], *Jak se jmenuješ?*): Very similar to Slovak but has a harder sound, contains the infamous "ř" which some consider the most unique and possibly most difficult sound to pronounce in any language -- by this it can be recognized.
-    - **Polish** ([iae], *Jak się nazywasz?*): Similar to Czech/Slovak, has many "sz", "sh", "ch" sounds, stress usually on penultimate syllable.
-    - **Russian** (~150 M native speakers, [oea], *Как тебя зовут?, "Kak tebia zovut?"*): Written in Cyrillic, characteristic sounds like "blj", speaking with duckface and long end and middle parts of words.
-    - **Slovak** ([aoe], *Ako sa voláš?*): Super similar to Czech (mutually intelligible), sounds much softer and more pleasant, especially e.g. the letter "l", also compared to Czech doesn't have [bullshit](bullshit.md) like "ř" and vocative case.
-    - **Ukrainian** ([oan], *Як тебе звати?, "Jak tebe zvati?"*): Different from Russian but sounds the same.
+    - **Croatian** ([aio], *Kako se zoveš?*): Kinda similar to Czech/Slovak/Polish, seems to have a lot of "ch" (as in "chicken") sounds, has 7 cases.
+    - **[Czech](czechia.md)** ([oea], *Jak se jmenuješ?*): Very similar to Slovak but has a harder sound, stress is on first syllable, has 7 cases, contains the infamous "ř" which some consider the most unique and possibly most difficult sound to pronounce in any language -- by this it can be recognized.
+    - **Polish** ([iae], *Jak się nazywasz?*): Similar to Czech/Slovak, has many "sz", "sh", "ch" sounds, stress usually on penultimate syllable, has 7 cases.
+    - **Russian** (~150 M native speakers, [oea], *Как тебя зовут?, "Kak tebia zovut?"*): Written in Cyrillic, characteristic sounds like "blj", speaking with duckface and long end and middle parts of words, has 6 cases.
+    - **Slovak** ([aoe], *Ako sa voláš?*): Super similar to Czech (mutually intelligible), sounds much softer and more pleasant, especially e.g. the letter "l", also compared to Czech doesn't have [bullshit](bullshit.md) like "ř" and vocative case, has 6 cases total.
+    - **Ukrainian** ([oan], *Як тебе звати?, "Jak tebe zvati?"*): Different from Russian but sounds the same, has 7 cases.
     - ...
   - ...
 - **Other languages**:
   - **Arabic** (~400 M native speakers, *ما اسمك؟, "Ma ismuka?"*): Sounds fast, weird script written right to left, difficult to learn.
   - **[Chinese](chinese.md)** (~1 B native speakers, *你贵姓大名?, "Ni quixing daming?"*): Considered the hardest language ever, has many variants and dialects that are even mutually unintelligible (and as such is actually sometimes rather considered a language family), most notably Cantonese and Mandarin, has most native speakers of all languages, has many soft sounds like "shii", "shoo", "chii", plus those "ching chong" sounds along with weird intonation (the language is tonal, meaning pitch changes meaning of words), writing system is a disaster (one character per word).
   - **[Esperanto](esperanto.md)** ([aie], *Kio estas via nomo?*): Most famous [constructed language](conlang.md), even has a few native speakers, sounds similar to Italian, in general resembled Romance languages, is very easy to learn thanks to completely regular grammar and vocabulary borrowed from many existing languages.
-  - **Finnish** ([ena], *Mikä sinun nimesi on?*): TODO
+  - **Finnish** ([ena], *Mikä sinun nimesi on?*): Has 14 cases and inflections, so word order is not fixed, stress often on first syllable.
   - **Greek** ([aoi], *Πώς σε λένε?, "Pos se lene?"*): Famously using the weird Greek alphabet, its old version is very historically significant.
   - **Hebrew** (*מַה שִּׁמְךָ?, "Ma shimkha?"*): TODO
   - **Hindi** (~350 M native speakers, *तुम्हारा नाम क्या हे, "Tumhaara naam kya he?"*): Sounds quite fast, has that very specific "clicky" pronunciation of certain sounds like "t", "r" and "d", weird script, women talk in high pitch squeaking.
@@ -97,6 +97,8 @@ This section lists some of the most notable human languages. In the brackets the
   - **Yiddish** (*װי הײסטו, "Vi heystu?"*): Language spoken by [Jews](jew.md), developed in Jewish diaspora, an interesting "Frankenstein monster" mix of German, Hebrew and other languages.
   - ...
   
+**Language curiosities**: Harold Whitmore Williams (*1876) allegedly spoke 58 languages and is sometimes considered the most accomplished polyglot. The most common sound found in all languages is "a", the most unique probably the Czech "ř". Language with smallest alphabet is probably Rotokas, spoken in Papua New Guinea, with only 12 letters. English word with the most meanings is apparently "set" (almost 200). Longest non-technical word in English is "antidisestablishmentarianism", but if we impose no limits, there is a name of a chemical that's 189819 letters long. TODO: more
+
 TODO: average word length, longest word, number of letters in alphabet, ...
 
 ## How To Learn A Foreign Language
@@ -129,7 +131,8 @@ Here are some tips for learning foreign languages:
 - Do NOT use fucking [proprietary](proprietary.md) [capitalist](capitalism.md) language "[apps](app.md)", they fucking just give you brain [cancer](cancer.md).
 - **Watch out for false friends**. These are words that look and sound very similar to words in a language you already know, but they mean something different, so you may easily end up using them wrong. For example "actual" in Spanish doesn't translate as "actual" in English -- in Spanish it means "current" (as in "current events") whereas in English it means "real".
 - If you want to get super serious and git gud even at pronunciation, there are techniques such as shadowing (trying to speak over native speaker recordings, imitating them) etc. But this is not needed if you just want to communicate or if you don't even talk to people [in real life](irl.md), it's just for nerds who wanna flex probably.
-- Especially if you're learning your first foreign language: be ready, make no assumptions about the new language based on your native language, different language may break all the rules of your language and importantly: different language is not just different words and grammar, it is also a **different [CULTURE](culture.md)**. Forget EVERYTHING you think you know and that you assume should hold, many words and sentences will be UNTRANSLATABLE. There will be many rules that make ZERO logical sense, for example a word may have different spelling in different contexts just because, or there will be many words for something that in your language only has one name, just don't ask why, it simply is so. The new language may for example have various politeness levels -- different ways of says "you" for instance, depending on whom you are addressing -- which will have no counterpart in English; there may be completely different tenses and cases, grammatical concepts you never heard of, words may have unclear translations or unexpected connotations, it may be uncommon to make [jokes](jokes.md) you're used to make (for example in [Czech](czech.md) it's not common to make [puns](pun.md) as much as in English), certain phrases will be used much more or much less frequently (e.g. in English it's pretty common to hear family members say "I love you" to one another, but this isn't common in many other languages), in some languages it's very common to greet strangers with many different phrases etc. Don't try to understand these differences logically, these are historical and cultural features which are sometimes untraceable leftovers from something that's already gone, you just have to learn it all by listening and using the language, you can't memorize it.
+- **Necessity teaches best**. Literally needing the language, e.g. due to having moved to another country, reliably leads to learning it.
+- Especially if you're learning your first foreign language: be ready, make no assumptions about the new language based on your native language, different language may break all the rules of your language and importantly: different language is not just different words and grammar, it is also a **different [CULTURE](culture.md)**, reflecting the needs and necessities of the people using it. Forget EVERYTHING you think you know and that you assume should hold, many words and sentences will be UNTRANSLATABLE. There will be many rules that make ZERO logical sense, for example a word may have different spelling in different contexts just because, or there will be many words for something that in your language only has one name, just don't ask why, it simply is so. The new language may for example have various politeness levels -- different ways of says "you" for instance, depending on whom you are addressing -- which will have no counterpart in English; there may be completely different tenses and cases, grammatical concepts you never heard of, words may have unclear translations or unexpected connotations, it may be uncommon to make [jokes](jokes.md) you're used to make (for example in [Czech](czech.md) it's not common to make [puns](pun.md) as much as in English), certain phrases will be used much more or much less frequently (e.g. in English it's pretty common to hear family members say "I love you" to one another, but this isn't common in many other languages), in some languages it's very common to greet strangers with many different phrases etc. Don't try to understand these differences logically, these are historical and cultural features which are sometimes untraceable leftovers from something that's already gone, you just have to learn it all by listening and using the language, you can't memorize it.
 - ...
 
 ## See Also