[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/Art.png]]

I have finally published two of my [[novels|Fiction]] online: //[[The Microcosm of Paragon|TheMicrocosmOfParagon]]// and //[[Introducing Zirth|IntroducingZirth]]//, available [[on Lulu.com, in paperback, and for digital download|http://stores.lulu.com/corfizz]].\n\nUpdate: By reducing the font size to something more sensible, I have been able to lower the print cost of Paragon.

<<option chkGenerateAnRssFeed>> GenerateAnRssFeed\n<<option chkOpenInNewWindow>> OpenLinksInNewWindow\n<<option chkSaveEmptyTemplate>> SaveEmptyTemplate\n<<option chkToggleLinks>> Clicking on links to tiddlers that are already open causes them to close\n^^(override with Control or other modifier key)^^\n<<option chkHttpReadOnly>> HideEditingFeatures when viewed over HTTP\n<<option chkForceMinorUpdate>> Treat edits as MinorChanges by preserving date and time\n^^(override with Shift key when clicking 'done' or by pressing Ctrl-Shift-Enter^^\n<<option chkConfirmDelete>> ConfirmBeforeDeleting\nMaximum number of lines in a tiddler edit box: <<option txtMaxEditRows>>\nFolder name for backup files: <<option txtBackupFolder>>\n<<option chkInsertTabs>> Use tab key to insert tab characters instead of jumping to next field

Before you look at my map, take this quick quiz and see how much you know:\n*[[What language is spoken in Mali?]]\n*[[If you were travelling through the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which languages should you know?]]\n*[[What is the major language family of sub-Saharan Africa?]]\n*[[What's the major language of Ethiopia?]]\n*[[How many languages are spoken in Africa?]]\n*[[How far do you have to move before you need a different language in Africa?]]

*[[The full map|Images/AfricaLing.png]]\n*[["Upper Africa"|Images/AfricaLangs1.png]]\n*[["Middle Africa"|Images/AfricaLangsM.png]]\n*[["Lower Africa"|Images/AfricaLangs2.png]]\n\nThis should be helpful if you play my text RPG [[Lost in Translation|WorldConquest]], since the game follows this same "sandwich model of diglossia" (as I think of it).

The problem here is that there are many varieties of Arabic. As an official language, "Arabic" refers to "Modern Standard Arabic" (MSA), which is a Zweitsprache for anybody who knows it. In the Arab world there is a situation known as diglossia, where the people speak one language in their day-to-day affairs, but are bilingual in MSA, which is used in literature and the media and for communication between people who natively speak different versions of Arabic. (Imagine if everyone in Francophonic countries, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Romania all learnt Latin, and that would be a similar situation, including the fact that French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and Romanian are different languages but all descended from Latin.) Note, however, that speakers of different Arabic languages generally consider these languages to be dialects of Arabic, but we need to be as consistent as possible when selecting what counts as a single item in the list, so we will be sure to count only people who know MSA, something that often isn't made clear in other lists.\n\nWeber claims that there are 200 million speakers of "Arabic" and 21 million second language speakers. Now, if we look at the CIA World Factbook's population estimates for the relevant countries, we can see that there are about 330 million people living in the major Arabic countries. Unfortunately, not all of them //do// know MSA, this being dependent on their education, since you do have to //learn// it specifically. The Ethnologue claims that 100.5 million people in Arab states do not know MSA. Ordinarily we'd ignore this, but if we take 100 away from 330 we get 230, which meshes nicely with Weber's estimates and with most other figures that you generally find for Arabic speakers.

Similar to [[Essays]] but different enough to call them articles instead.

[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/Attitudes.png]]

These compositions were made mostly with ~GarageBand (i.e. a software MIDI synthesiser, rather than with real instruments).\n*[[A Major Problem|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/A%20Major%20Problem.mp3]]. (Get it?)\n*[[Iridescence and the Prince's Revenge|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/Iridescence%20and%20the%20Prince's%20Revenge.mp3]], with input from 'Celestianpower'. This one features an oboe and a story.\n*//Laughing with Terror//, a composition in G Minor, with assistance from 'Celestianpower', is available:\n**[[With upsetting and in places highly exaggerated ambient sounds|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/Laughing%20with%20Terror.mp3]]\n**[[Without such upsetting ambience|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/MarchofDoom.mp3]]\n**I give credit to [[Bjorn Eriksson|http://soundtransit.nl/search/artistinfo.php?id=43]] for the sounds of the twittering birds, jeeps and (apparently) apes in Mikumi National Park, Tanzania, obtained from ~SoundTransit under the CC Attribution licence.\n*[[G Major Joy|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/G%20Major%20Joy.mp3]] is the antidote to //Laughing With Terror//, and a testament to how different G Major is from G Minor. Another 'feel-good' piece.\n*[[The Learning Curve|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/LearningCurve.mp3]] (so called because it began as my first serious composition) is actually now the merger of three and a half different compositions. The transition between each piece is marked by a SwooshingSound effect, but the music is otherwise seamless. Since it's quite long, it's harder to perfect - in other words, I think it has flaws. Although instrumental, its classical elements are also supplemented by pop-style beats and repeating melodies. But here it is anyway.\n*[[Sin|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/Sin.mp3]]. I'm not sure why I called it Sin, but there must have been some logic behind it. It is a much edgier piece than the others.\n*[[Drop Down|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Audio/DropDown.mp3]] is ambient electronica (!). Motifs from Pachelbel's Canon are subtly interleaved. I give credit to the user 'morewaves' for the sound of a river in Japan, obtained from [[Freesound|http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/samplesViewSingle.php?id=31539]], the user 'tigersound' for a sound effect also from [[Freesound|http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/samplesViewSingle.php?id=9085]], the user 'djgriffin' on Freesound for his [[Tibetan throat singing|http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/samplesViewSingle.php?id=15488]] and the Freesound user 'cyberworm' for the [[throat singing|http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/samplesViewSingle.php?id=38552]] briefly heard at the end, all of which are under the CC Sampling Plus licence.\n\nI hereby also acknowledge [[Ben Boldt|http://benboldt.spymac.com/instruments.html]], for his software instrument collections, which I believe are used in A Major Problem, G Major Joy, Sin and Laughing With Terror.\n\nNote that these pieces of music, as per the licence notice on the right-hand side, are all under the CC Attribution licence.\n

Bengali is the national language of Bangladesh and the state language of West Bengal, in India. Statistics for both aren't too difficult to come by, and so the only complication is with two "dialects" of Bengali called Chittagonian and Sylheti. Should we include them? And if not, then how are we supposed to know how many people to subtract, since we cannot guarantee that they are //all// bilingual in Bengali?\n\nWeber estimated 185 million (1997) and the Encarta 1998 estimate is 189 million. Ethnologue again cites the 1999 World Almanac with a figure of 211 million but this time it includes second language speakers. Now, the Indian census tells us that 8.1% of the population of India spoke Bengali in 2001, and if we assume that the percentage remained the same, we can use CIA's 2008 population estimate to get 93 million Bengali-speaking Indians (the population of West Bengal is about 80.5 million though). It also estimates that Bangladesh has a population of 153.5mil. Adding those together gives 246.5 million, which suggests that the estimate of 230 million [[provided here|http://banglapedia.org/HT/B_0137.htm]] is probably about right. Given that the assumption that 100% of Bangladesh speaks Bengali is probably wishful thinking, let's go with 230 million.

Bilden is a flashcard program, which distinguishes itself from the hundreds of other flashcard programs by a few factors:\n\n*The entire interface is command-based. To make a flashcard with //Bilden// on one side and //educate// on the other, for example, just type 'Bilden', press enter, type 'educate', press enter. To review your flashcards, type 'card', press enter.\n*Because it is an interpreted program, it's cross-platform: Windows, Linux, Mac, Palm OS, Pocket PC, toaster...\n*Flashcards that you keep getting wrong are shown to you more often than those you keep getting right.\n*The first time a flashcard is selected, it shows you both sides and asks you to remember them.\n*You can carry on using it as long as you want. Some software will give you, say, 10 flashcards at a time. But in Bilden, when you are shown a flashcard, the command prompt you get afterwards can be used for anything. For example, if you notice a mistake in a flashcard you're being shown, you can correct it immediately, without losing your progress.\n\nThe downside is that it only supports Latin scripts and accents that are part of the Latin-1 character encoding.\n[>img[Bilden|http://www.corfizz.com/Bilden.png]]\nThe program hasn't seen much in the way of testing, so you should consider it beta software. If you use it, please contact me if you find any bugs or have any suggestions.\n\n[[Download Bilden|http://www.corfizz.com/Bilden.ulx]]\n\nYou'll need a [[Glulx interpreter]] to run it.\n

Inspired by "DividedWorld", the eminent historian, Matthew Tisot, decided to create a more logical "alternate empire" map of the world, using the following rules:\n*Each country selects the country with the next smallest population from the countries bordering it, e.g. the Colombia chooses Peru because, out of the less populous countries that border Colombia, Peru has the highest population.\n*A country always prefers to take over a country with a land border than one with a sea border.\n*If two countries are trying to take over the same country, the one with the higher population wins.\n*The country with the highest population is hence the 'parent' country. So, although Colombia takes over Peru, Colombia (and hence Peru also) is then swallowed by Brazil.\nThis "capture the flag" game produces the following result after the first round (Matthew came up with some of the new empires' names and I supplied the rest):\n[img[World|http://www.corfizz.com/Images/FlagsCapturedThumb.png][http://www.corfizz.com/Images/FlagsCaptured.png]]\n([[cc-by-nc-nd|http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/]])\n\nIf the game continued, the end result would, of course, be that China takes over the world.

Background: #000\nForeground: #fff\nPrimaryPale: #000\nPrimaryLight: #889\nPrimaryMid: #000\nPrimaryDark: #fff\nSecondaryPale: #aac\nSecondaryLight: #08f\nSecondaryMid: #db4\nSecondaryDark: #fff\nTertiaryPale: #000\nTertiaryLight: #888\nTertiaryMid: #fff\nTertiaryDark: #aaa\nError: #f88\n

My real name is Justin Morgan. You can e-mail me at this address:\nfeedback at corfizz dot com\n\nAnd my Skype user name is //entrentity//.

[[Updates]]\n[[16 April 2008]]\n[[Hello]]

The abstract of the essay:\n//The claim of personal causal efficacy in humans and other living things is not falsifiable, but has considerable counter-evidence from studies of consciousness. Still, there are benefits to rethinking the problem entirely. By considering the problem of assigning things identity, both in philosophical terms and in light of theories of quantum mechanics, we can establish that the 'person' in personal volition does not rightly exist; if generally accepted, this view would prompt a complete overhaul in our perception of ourselves.//\n\nYou can [[download the essay here|http://www.corfizz.com/Essays/DIE.pdf]].\n\nIt is in fact the first part of a series of essays, which I have arbitrarily named [[The Epsilon Essays]].

A tongue-in-cheek "divided world". National borders //are// arbitrary. So why not? Get used to the New World Order!\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Divided%20World.png][http://www.corfizz.com/Divided%20World.png]]\nPolitical incorrectness FTW!\n(That was an immature comment; I apologise. This is a serious, high-brow piece of political satire. Not just some map I drew over with a calligraphic pen in Inkscape.)\n\nIn case you can't see:\n*Austria, Hungary and the Czech and Slovak Republics have merged to give Czechaustria Hungakia.\n*Germany has taken over Poland (again :-O), and has also claimed the Netherlands and part of Switzerland.\n*France has claimed the French-speaking part of Switzerland, as well as Belgium and Luxembourg and also the ~South-East of England.\n*However it has lost Brittany to the new state of Cornwall (which includes Cornwall, England).\n*And Copenhagen has become a separate state.\n*Copenhagen has acquired the Faroe and Galapagos Islands.\n*Wales has now expanded its territory into England.\n*Scotland and the entire island of Ireland are now collectively known as Ireland.\n*England survives only in the form of the Falkland Islands.\n*However, Iceland appears to have survived with sovereignty intact.\n*Sweden, Denmark and most of Norway (and a slither of Finland too) have combined to give Scandonovia.\n*But the Norwegian fjords have been separated to form the new 'Slartiland'.\n*The former Yugoslav republics, with the exception of Macedonia, have now joined with Bulgaria to form a new Yugoslavia.\n*Slovenia has been acquired by Italy, although Sardinia has somehow been lost to North Africa.\n*Gibraltar, Morocco and Western Sahara have been merged into a united Gibraltar administration.\n*The Baltics (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and that annoying little exclave of Russia) have been inexplicably merged into 'Ironia'.\n*Turkey manages to let go of Cyprus to none other than Egypt, but in the process it gains Greece, Macedonia and Albania and restructures itself as 'Tureece'.\n*And yes, Ibiza has undergone a major relocation and expansion.\n*Most of Indonesia, as well as East Timor, Brunei and the surrounding part of Malaysia have been combined to form 'Zealand', while New Zealand has won over Australia.\n*The brush strokes were so big that Singapore could either be in Zealand or ~Indo-Tibet, or could have ceased to exist.\n*The biggest restructuring is undoubtedly that of China, which now includes the Philippines, the whole islands of New Guinea and Taiwan, as well as South //and// North Korea, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Georgia, the Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, part of Kazakhstan and the southernmost part of Russia. However it did cede its Altaic territories to the Mongolian Empire (not too willingly, but it did).\n\nIf you're interested in seeing more of my on-going sarcasm against "nationalistic fervour", then have a look at the text game, WorldConquest.

Dreamfall: The Longest Journey is an action-adventure computer game.\n*[[A 'wallpaper'|Images/DF.jpg]] that I made\n*[[Screensavers]] featuring the spinning "Balance" glyphs\n*[[Dreamrise]], a fictional and unofficial sequel in video form.\n\nYou might also be interested in [[the TLJ Wiki|http://tlj.wikia.com/wiki/TLJwiki]].

[>img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/BattleFreezeThumb.png][http://www.corfizz.com/Images/BattleFreeze.png]]Dreamrise is at once a Final Fantasy parody and an unofficial sequel to [[Dreamfall]]: The Longest Journey - i.e. a video of a fictional computer game in the style of another. There are, of course, extreme spoilers of Dreamfall.\n\nThere are two videos in this series so far. I can't guarantee that there will be any more, but I do have plans for what they would contain.\n\n[[See them on YouTube|http://www.youtube.com/user/Barentity]]. You can also [[download Dreamfall Fantasy|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Games/DreamFantasy.mp4]] from this site as well.\n\nThanks to this project, I have about 40GB of Dreamfall video on my hard disk now. [[And the computer has to work hard|http://www.corfizz.com/Images/AudioRendering.png]].

Getting data for the Muttersprache population is quite easy - it's about 420 million - but getting estimates for the number of non-native speakers is extremely difficult. The estimates vary wildly from about 300 to 1100 million. The above-mentioned general problems are all represented in English: lack of reliable, up-to-date information for non-native speakers, no way of knowing which varieties of English are included or should be included (most notably, Nigerian Pidgin English - include it, or not?), and no way of knowing just how well someone can speak the language. After all, a large number of people in tourist areas will have learnt some sort of tourist English that allows them to sell things, but these people might be out of their depth in a different situation. So should they be counted?\n\nAfter doing a lot of research, I think it's very likely that the total number of English speakers is at least in the region of 1000 million, but the uncertainties are great. In Africa, English may be the official language of several countries, but it's surprising how much the take-up of English varies. The literacy rates and school drop-out rates vary considerably, and a great number of creoles and pidgins complicate the matter entirely. The Eurobarometer survey reports that 38% of the ~EU25 region can speak English well enough to have a conversation (excluding the native speakers) - so that makes about 175 million, but it also says that 30% of respondents said that their knowledge of English was "basic". Obviously some people will have underestimated their own ability, and some of them may have overestimated their ability, so the water just gets muddier and muddier. A poster from the ~Goethe-Institut claims that 75% of the world speaks no English, so that would give 1675 million English speakers. Let's go with 1500 million and be done with it.

I actually enjoy writing essays. Here are some.\n\n*//[[Denying Individual Efficacy: Resolving the Problems of Freedom and Identity]]//\n*//[[Speaking Everyone's Language]]//\n*[[On h2g2|http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/MA234603?show=25&type=1]]\n\nAlso see the [[Article]] category of this website.

This is a short story which you can [[download here|PDFs/ExamWorld.pdf]] in PDF format.\n\nThe title is quite appropriate, so I don't think any further description is necessary.

*Question: Where does the name [[Corfizz]] come from?\n*Answer: The word itself is something I made up, but the reason I made it up was so that it could go in the [[novel|Fiction]] I was writing at the time, which was about the fictional planet of Zirth. Corfizz was "like a global community brand name" for almost everything on Zirth - companies, services and agencies of the government. This was inspired by the Frobozz Company from the lore of Zork, a popular series of text adventures.\n\n*Question: Why do I have to pay for your novels, when everything else on this site is free and Creative Commons licensed?\n*Answer: The print-on-demand publisher, Lulu, charges for its books to cover its costs of printing them. I justify the small profit on the books by saying that I have spent a //very// long time writing and that it takes a great deal of mental and emotional effort. I think that if buying them from Lulu transpires not to be popular at all, then I may consider licensing them under CC, but I can't see the point at the moment, since if someone wanted to copy/redistribute/remix they need only contact me and I can give them permission on a case-by-case basis. For some reason though, there are some things I do very slowly, one stage at a time. For example, my novel, //To Play the World with Music// has been sitting on my computer, finished, at about 96 000 words, doing nothing, for two and a half years, and //nobody// has read it apart from me. I should fix that some time.\n\n*Question: What, are you suddenly some kind of selfish capitalist?\n*Answer: Well, no, but you should tell me if that ever happens.\n\n*Question: What, you've got something against capitalism?\n*Answer: Either that or I've got something against selfishness. Or both.\n\n*Question: So you're a Linux-using Communist hippy?\n*Answer: Not quite. I'm sure I don't fit the definition of a hippy, and my main computer is a Mac running OS X.\n\n*Question: But Windows is obviously the best OS. I mean, on Linux, as soon as you run into a problem, you have to go to about three different online forums to get the answer, but on Windows, you just press three buttons at the same time. No?\n*Answer: That was a statement cunningly disguised as a question by a terminal interrogative tag. The answer: yes.\n\n*Question: And Macs are clearly the epitome of trash - or rather, the epitome of the recycle bin if you have any substance. They're dumbed down to the point of childishness and you could get a room in the Emirates Palace for the same price as one. Surely you aren't stupid enough to need one, let alone selfishly capitalist enough to afford one - eh?\n*Answer: They don't, in fact, cost as much as you make out. And I dispute the idea that they are dumbed down. I for one am a regular user of the command line. Since OS X is based on Unix, I can use the Unix command prompt, which I find very powerful.\n\n*Question: But typing commands is for agèd bearded ancients who grew up with dinosaurs and/or DOS. Surely in this day and age it's absurd to resort to such primitive measures, now that we have flashy GUI loveliness and electric toothbrushes?\n*Answer: No, I don't agree. I think the command line is very powerful, as I say. Using ~ImageMagick, for example - a command line image processing tool - is very often much faster and more efficient, especially for operating on multiple files, than launching the GIMP.\n\n*Question: Yeah, but that's because the GIMP sucks.\n*Answer: No, it's because it doesn't support batch processing (as far as I know) and isn't a native Mac application, but I suspect the command line may even be more efficient in some cases than launching a big, expensive program like Photoshop.\n\n*Question: So why are you bothering with Macs? If you're into Communism and command lines, you clearly need to get BSD Unix.\n*Answer: I like my Mac in particular because of the ease of doing video editing. There are very few //stable// applications for other Unix-like operating systems that can do that. I have tried ~NetBSD, but only briefly.\n\n*Question: ~NetBSD? Doesn't that have a devil in its logo? Are you a Satanist?\n*Answer: No, I can't say I am, and I really don't think your logic was at all seamless.\n\n*Question: You're a Satanist? But Satan doesn't even exist! He's just a myth made up to stop people from getting out of line and keeping the Church powerful - right?\n*Answer: I'm not a Satanist.\n\n*Question: But Satan obviously exists! And He is clearly worthy of worship and praise, since humanity is inherently evil, and should therefore look to the embodiment of Evil itself for malignant guidance. All this airy-fairy God and goodness stuff and being nice to people is just for wimps who can't face up to facts, let alone the King of Fire and Brimstone Himself, who will surely smite them - right?\n*Answer: I disagree on most of your points there. I'm sure Satan would be only too happy to smite some non-believers, if he existed, and I don't really think he does. However I don't believe in God either.\n\n*Question: But God self-evidently exists! The Ontological Argument proves it! Didn't you know?\n*Answer: Yes I did know about the Ontological Argument, but I don't believe that it proves the existence of God. Although it is fallacious on a number of levels, I believe a key failure of the Argument is its assumption that a thing in reality is greater than a thing in the mind, which implicitly suggests that the mind is not part of reality. In addition, the Argument says that God is that than which nothing greater can be //conceived//, rather than that than which nothing greater exists.\n\n*Question: Stop your rambling, Corfizz: that was obviously a load of philosophical claptrap designed to pull the wool over the eyes of Those That Know The Truth, of which I am a self-proclaimed member, and a devout Christian. I agree that the Ontological Argument has some minor flaws, but belief in God is about faith, of which you clearly have none. You have not been blessed with a divine vision. Have you?\n*Answer: Unless I mistook it for something else, no.\n\n*Question: Belief in God isn't about faith - except for the blind believers who follow the crowd like sheep, of course. God has to exist because the world is so beautiful and perfect, which is an observational fact - right?\n*Answer: It sounds quite subjective to me.\n\n*Question: Corfizz is right: God doesn't exist, and all you religious people are crazy and old-fashioned. Believing in things you can't see or prove? And dancing around praising it like a deranged hippy on LSD? They should face up to reality, which is that religion is the biggest evil in society and was invented as an attempt to control people and stop them thinking for themselves so as to make them subservient. Religion should hence be stamped out - don't you agree?\n*Answer: Yes, I don't agree. Although I am an atheist, I actually believe that religion has a place in society, which is clearly already true, and that it should have a place in society, in some form or other, so long as its members do not misinterpret the useful things that their religion tries to teach them.\n\n*Question: You mean like being nice to people? But that's clearly rubbish. Science has proven that humans are inherently selfish, and only do things because they will ultimately bolster their chances of survival and of reproduction, which clearly means that we should all be as nasty as possible to each other, become cannibals, and generally kill anyone who gets in our way and rape our way to genetic domination. Surely you can't disagree with that?\n*Answer: Surely you can't be serious.\n\n*Question: But the previous questioner is clearly spouting capitalistic propaganda, to which you should pay no attention. What's more, he's advocating anarchy, which is obviously a Bad Thing, isn't it?\n*Answer: No. Anarchy does not necessarily have negative consequences, but there are so many different forms of anarchy that it is impossible to make general assertions.\n\n*Question: Oh you're an anarchist now are you? So you want everyone running around cutting each other's chickens' heads off just because they can, and generally bandying their freedom around in other people's faces? Society clearly needs rules, or there'd be chaos like that, wouldn't there?\n*Answer: I don't think that's necessarily true. For one thing, I don't believe freedom (specifically, personal freedom) exists, and so there are still controlling factors preventing people from dismembering their neighbours' livestock, a graphic picture of which you paint, even if these factors are not codified laws enforced by a pervasive bureaucracy. In addition...\n\n*Question: Cut the anarchist propaganda, Fizz - you've clearly stepped over the imaginary line in people's psyches that prevents them from tackling taboo subjects like the nature of control and the justification of government. Speaking of which, what the world really needs is a courageous leader figure a bit like Hitler to keep everyone in line and make them proud and hard-working again. Isn't that right?\n*Answer: Well, I'm not sure that would be...\n\n*Question: He's clearly just going to go off on a tirade about how free will is an illusion and we need to get rid of leader figures, which is obviously worthy of no attention whatsoever. Free will clearly exists because if I decide to say the word "Tizzy", as I just did, then I can.\n*Answer: But if you were to analyse...\n\n*Question: Stop him there. We don't need to be blinded with science. Next to religion, it's clearly science that is the root of all the world's current problems. If we only stopped thinking we could find the holy grail of 'objective truth', everything would be peachy. And besides, science doesn't provide answers - it's just a load of stuffy geeks clamouring for funding from corporations and governments who want them to tell them their product is best and that taxes should be raised, respectively, and want some dodgy statistics and so-called 'evidence' to back it up, to boot. Do you copy?\n*Answer: Let's not get back to the computer-related debates. I can understand some of your concern, but there's...\n\n*Question: Let's get back to the computer-related debates. I can't believe Microsoft hasn't been mentioned yet - although we came close back when we were discussing Satan. It's clearly the most corrupt organisation out, isn't it?\n*Answer: Well, you have to remember...\n\n*Question: Stop right there! Microsoft is a fine corporation, and I for one support their endeavours to make computers easier to use. Their enormous patent portfolio clearly proves their prodigious contribution to innovation and invention, and it's sickening that Apple always copies them - stealing their valuable IP.\n*Answer: But one could say...\n\n*Question: No one couldn't. Stealing IP? The only reason IP can be stolen is because someone stuck a label on it that said it was //Property// in the first place. Isn't that right?\n*Answer: Well for once...\n\n*Question: What a load of codswallop. IP should be treated as seriously as any other type of property. Music and video pirates should be imprisoned just as if they'd stolen ~TVs or chicken pens, and we should be able to own the words, phrases and expressions that we make up, as well as any of the ideas we come up with, because they're our personal inventions, and we should have the right to make money out of them - shouldn't we?\n*Answer: Well, now, just a moment...\n\n*Question: Phooey. IP law stifles creativity. Were the world as the previous questioner says, and it isn't far from the truth already, we would be living under constant threat of litigation. We would have to build defences just as if we were under threat of attack. The fact is, ideas are not one's personal property and can easily be thought up independently by someone who's never met you. Isn't that right?\n*Answer: I...\n\n*Question: Stop with your personal pronouns, Fizz - they're bad style, and you're the one who doesn't believe in individual efficacy, or whatever the hell you call it. The previous questioner obviously should have been abandoned at birth for having such outrageously liberal tendencies. Were the world as the previous questioner but one described it, innovation and creativity would flourish, and there would be extreme economic growth. True, one would need defences against lawsuits, just as you need defences against attack, but war is a good thing, after all, isn't it?\n*Answer: But...\n\n*Question: No buts. War is indeed the best answer to any problem. Clearly the world has good people and bad people, and as soon as you identify who the bad people are, all you need to do is eliminate them, and the problem is solved. And there's no better way to execute the aforesaid elimination than to drop a few bombs and shoot people, and if innocent civilians should happen to be caught in the way, well then it was all for the greater good, as per the marvellous doctrine that is utilitarianism. Aren't I right?\n*Answer: ...\n\n*Question: No he isn't. First, war is hell. We should all be pacifists. Second, utilitarianism is clearly an ethical theory designed for war-mongers, corporations and rational agents, as well as neo-fascists like scientists. None of whom should be allowed to exist. //Oder?//\n\n*Question: That's insane, and you should obviously not have been allowed so much time to play with your poster paints as a child. You should have been out working instead, learning that the world is about hard toil and aggressive behaviour - not pretty pictures and pacifism. ?\n\n*Interjection: What a fool you are then, and you clearly can't have any friends if you have an attitude like that. And your family must hate you too.\n\n*Interjection: Resorting to petty insults - you ignorant cur - is the lowest way to attempt to win an argument. Rascal!\n\n*Interjection: Rejoice in the Spirit of the Lord and you will all be saved from damnation!\n\n*Interjection: Don't be stupid, you foolish fundamentalist. Live free or die!\n\n*Interjection: Think different!\n\n*Interjection: Peace Be Upon Him! [Mohammed, Prophet of Allah, the One True God, that is].\n\n*Interjection: Shut up all of you and give me money!\n*Interjection: No! And the next person to boldly claim that God exists will be banned!\n*Interjection: If I was God, I'd smite you!\n*Interjection: Use the subjunctive, you grammatical delinquent! Let it be!\n*Interjection: Let the subjunctive die!\n*Interjection: Yes! But someone please shoot the one who said "to boldly claim" for splitting the infinitive!\n*Interjection: Down with such violence!\n*Interjection: Up with it!\n*Interjection: Down!\n*Interjection: Bad!\n*Interjection: Good!\n*Interjection: Neutral!\n

Ferrous Ring is an exceptionally experimental text adventure which received mixed reviews in the 2007 IFComp.\n\nIt is unfortunate that in the process of fixing some bugs prior to the competition, I accidentally introduced new ones, and this contributed to the negative points levelled at the game, especially since it was not obvious that the bugs actually were bugs. In the process of fixing these bugs, I unfortunately broke the game completely - this being a result of how extremely cumbersome and complex the interface became - but I managed to salvage it and get a new version together. This latest version hasn't had any beta testing, so please contact me with bug reports if you play it; unfortunately, I'm a bit reluctant to tinker with it anymore!\n\n*[[Download latest version|http://www.corfizz.com/IF/FerrousRing2.zip]]\n*[[The competition version|http://wurb.com/if/game/3055]]\n\nThe game is strongly related to the content of my essay, [[Denying Individual Efficacy|Denying Individual Efficacy: Resolving the Problems of Freedom and Identity]], so if you're wondering what it all //means//, you might like to read it.

One day in 2001 I finished writing a novel for the first time. It was pretty terrible. But I stuck at it, and now have five completed books; here's a list of the latest three:\n\n*IntroducingZirth\n*ToPlayTheWorldWithMusic\n*TheMicrocosmOfParagon\n\n//Introducing Zirth// and //The Microcosm of Paragon// are [[now available for purchase|16 April 2008]], shockingly enough - close to 5 and 2 years respectively after I finished writing them.\n\nI have also started writing short stories, [[one of which is online now|Exam World]].

TheBibleRetold: a Christmas special! This interactive fiction game follows the classic stories of the birth of Jesus, and is currently still in development. Play a humble shepherd, who receives a visitation from angels telling him of the coming of the Saviour; and then play Balthasar, one of the Three Wise Men of the Orient, who has to ready the gifts for the newborn.\n\nWith massive thanks to [[Tim Simmons|http://timsimmons.com/ifartwork.php]] for the excellent artwork below.\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/BibleRetold/finalsmaller.jpg]]

French gets promoted from its rather shameful 14th-ish place going by native speakers, and arrives in the top 10 by total speakers by virtue of its second language speakers. Again, knowledge of French in African countries where it is an official language varies quite considerably, with Cameroon (~78%), Morocco and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (~24 million) being quite good, but Burkina Faso, Senegal and Guinea having pretty small numbers of Francophones, but it's still difficult to get reliable estimations for the usual reasons. Leclerc gives a rather ambiguous account of the situation in Côte d'Ivoire: "On estime qu'environ les deux tiers de la population âgée de six ans et plus pratique «une forme de français»." After all, Côte d'Ivoire's under-6 population cannot be ignored. Incidentally, it also appears that men are more likely to learn a colonial language as a vehicular tongue than women; Leclerc reports, for example, 15-20% of men in Senegal knowing French, but only 1-2% of women. Anyway, the 2006-07 estimate of the Haut Conseil de la Francophonie gives 200 million as the //total// number of French speakers, stating that this includes 72 million "francophones partiels", which seems to indicate French speakers with limited language skills. There also seems to be a vague estimate of "francisants et d’apprenants de français" in the region of 100 million. The Eurobarometer survey says that 14% of the ~EU25 - i.e. about 64 million people - know French well enough for a conversation (about what though? Nuclear physics?) and 46% said their knowledge of French was basic. Now, I'd sooner expect an overestimate from La Francophonie than an underestimate, but it seems that their figures are admirable for distinguishing between different classes of francophones, though this does make the task of selecting a definitive figure to be quite difficult. Let's just say 200 million and leave it at that.

Name that country.\n\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/PPT-065.png]]

To get started with this blank TiddlyWiki, you'll need to modify the following tiddlers:\n* SiteTitle & SiteSubtitle: The title and subtitle of the site, as shown above (after saving, they will also appear in the browser title bar)\n* MainMenu: The menu (usually on the left)\n* DefaultTiddlers: Contains the names of the tiddlers that you want to appear when the TiddlyWiki is opened\nYou'll also need to enter your username for signing your edits: <<option txtUserName>>.

Here's a handy directory of the most common Glulx interpreters, which can be used to play most text adventures or interactive fiction.\n*[[Windows|http://ifarchive.heanet.ie/if-archive/programming/glulx/interpreters/glulxe/WinGlulxeInstaller.exe]]\n*[[Linux/Windows|http://ccxvii.net/gargoyle/]]\n*[[Mac OS X|http://logicalshift.co.uk/unix/zoom/]]\n*[[Palm OS|http://cellardoor.sourceforge.net/]]\n*[[Others|http://ifarchive.heanet.ie/indexes/if-archiveXprogrammingXglulxXinterpreters.html]]

I have made some pocket-size 'emergency' grammar reference booklets, inspired by [[PagePacker|http://weblog.bignerdranch.com/?p=23]]. You should go to that web page to see how to fold and cut the page to make your booklet. It only requires a single side of A4! These booklets would only be useful for people who have already studied the grammar that it refers to; they can then use it simply as a handy, quick reference.\n\nBear in mind that I don't speak Turkish or Spanish (at least, not very well); I compiled all the information by researching various sources, including http://turkishlanguage.co.uk and http://www.cromwell-intl.com/turkish/nouns.html. I didn't copy anything - just read and absorbed the info and set it down in as compact and helpful a way as I could find. Needless to say, however, that there may be inaccuracies or omissions. If you notice any, please [[contact me|Corfizz]].\n\n*German\n**[[Ready-to-print PDF|Documents/PocketGermanGrammar.pdf]]\n**[[PDF|Documents/GermanGrammarRef.pdf]]\n*Spanish\n**[[Ready-to-print PDF|Documents/PocketSpanishGrammar.pdf]]\n**[[PDF|Documents/SpanishGrammarRef.pdf]]\n*Turkish\n**[[Ready-to-print PDF|Documents/PocketTurkishGrammar.pdf]]\n**[[PDF|Documents/TurkishGrammarRef.pdf]]\n

I have an incomplete list of my projects here in a variety of categories. Most of it has been available online at some time or another, but revamps of this website have made everything difficult to keep track of. As I resurrect projects, this should hopefully get a bit tidier and you will find fewer bugs, broken links, absent links and general misinformation. If you are particularly interested in a particular project and need more information, please e-mail me.\n\nThe interface here is [[TiddlyWiki|http://www.tiddlywiki.com]], an innovative little wiki system that doesn't require any server-side coding.\n\nAbsquatulate thee not! You may well find something entertaining and/or useful here. I have [[Video]]s, [[music|Audio]], [[Essays]], [[Fiction]], even [[grammar references|GrammarRefs]] and more besides...\n\n...But no blog! Accordingly, if you want to find out what's new on this site, click on the link on the right-hand side that says "Tags and tiddlers". A timeline should pop up, showing when each page was last updated. Therefrom I sense niftiness!

The complication here is already apparent by the section title. Hindi and Urdu are the same language at their core, but there are a few distinctions: (i) in higher registers, Hindi borrows terminology mainly from Sanskrit; Urdu, from Persian/Arabic, (ii) Hindi is written in the Devanagari script; Urdu, in the ~Perso-Arabic script, (iii) Hindi is used chiefly by Hindus; Urdu, by Muslims, (iv) they have a different name. But the problems don't end there, because there is also a problem with dialects of Hindi, some of them being wildly different from standard Hindi. The problem is probably worse than with other cases of this because the number of people speaking a particular dialect is usually huge, so its inclusion or exclusion does have a significant effect on the final figure. The Census of India, although commendable for its delightful inclusion of a state-by-state breakdown of the number of people who speak a given language, still lumps together quite a lot of Hindi dialects - notably Rajasthani dialects and Bihari dialects, which are purportedly very different. This is compounded, however, by the fact that many people in Rajasthan, Bihar and elsewhere are bilingual in their native dialect and in standard Hindi (diglossia again). Now, going by the wonderful census, it seems that Urdu is used by Muslims all over India, but Urdu is mostly recognised as the language of Pakistan, and here we come to another complication, because it turns out that Urdu is a //minority// Muttersprache in Pakistan (Punjabi being the largest Muttersprache [45%]), but it is known as a second language. But how many people know it as a second language? Such information is very difficult to obtain, and the answer could be quite crucial, since Pakistan's population is enormous.\n\nAnd the number we'll use? Well, the Indian census of 2001 reported 422 million Hindi speakers and 51.6 million Urdu speakers. It seems that Rajasthani and Bihari account for around 90 million of the 422 million, but let's assume that they all speak Hindi as a second language anyway. Ethnologue does estimate 120 million second language speakers, citing the 1999 World Almanac. The Encarta 1998 estimate for native Hindi speakers is 333 million, which probably fits, and the total speaker estimates for Hindi and Urdu in the 1989 source are 352 and 92 million respectively. Strangely, in 1997, Weber gives a combined estimate of 250 million Hindi and Urdu speakers and simply doesn't know how many second language speakers there are. If we take 90 million away from 422 and then add on 120, assuming that the Bihari and Rajasthani bilinguals are therein included, and then add on a very conservative 100 for Urdu (given the population growth), we come to 552 million, so let's round that up to 560 million and call it a day.

It is true that with 2000 languages in its area, you don't have to go far to be within the zone of a different language. And in the cities, numerous ethnic and linguistic groups have converged, so that you might well hear several different languages down a single street. But many people conflate these facts into a sense that Africans are so insular and tribal that they cannot communicate with anyone outside their village or family. In his book, the polyglot Barry Farber even makes statements like "//Without English, not only could Nigeria not talk to the world, Nigerians couldn’t even talk to each other//" and "//Africans and Asians may not have rejoiced at being forcibly incorporated into the British Empire, but they recognised that the English language, if learned by all, was a unifying tool that enabled different tribes who lived five miles apart to communicate for the first time, in a language brought down upon them from thousands of miles away.//" This attitude is simply false.\n\nHave a look now at my [[linguistic maps of Africa|AfricanLanguages]]. You will see that there is indeed an enormous number of languages in the left-hand map; fewer languages in the middle map; and fewer languages still in the right-hand map. If I could fit them all on, the left-hand map would ideally show the 2000 local languages, but instead it only shows those with a large number of speakers (more than 1.5 million or so). The middle map is the most important: it shows //vehicular// languages - languages that the populace uses to communicate between different ethnic groups in the country. Some countries do indeed use the colonial language for this function (Portuguese in Angola and French in Cameroon being notable in this regard), but it seems that the majority of countries use either a prominent //indigenous// language for this purpose, or a pidgin or creole language. What's more, these vehicular languages are not just for communicating with people in the same country: as you can see, many of them cross borders - Swahili, Hausa, Lingala and Bambara for example. Thus, contrary to Farber, not only can Nigerians communicate with each other, a lot of them can also communicate with the Nigerois from Niger.\n\nBut that's not all. The use of vehicular languages necessarily means people are bilingual: they speak their local language 'at home' and the vehicular language elsewhere. But bilingualism is nothing. [[Multilingualism in Africa|[url=http://www.up.ac.za/academic/libarts/crpl/1998-03-05-Wolff.pdf]] is really strong. It is quite common for people to know as many as four languages: their home language, the home language of a neighbouring people, the indigenous trade language //and// the official language; alternatively, they might know their home language, a pidgin, a vehicular language and the official language. In Mali, for example, it is conceivable to speak Senoufo as one's home language, then a local Fulfulde language which is spoken in a reasonably large area nearby, then to learn Bambara (the regional vehicular language) and then get taught French in school as your fourth language. (Many people in Africa don't receive a good education, however, and so they might not get as far as learning the official language, but as long as they know the vehicular language, communication is not a problem.) In Burkina Faso, with the lowest literacy rate in the world, many people are bilingual in Jula, which is a form of Bambara. In Botswana, practically everyone speaks Setswana; if it's not your native tongue, it's your second language, and English is then your third language. In Nigeria, it's quite conceivable that you might be native in Aduge and Igbo, then pick up Nigerian Pidgin and then learn English in school. Four languages for four different spheres of activity.\n\nTrilingualism is probably the most common (that's just my guess). In the East African countries, for example, it's something-~Swahili-English. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo it might be something-~Lingala-French.\n\nPeople in the English-speaking world are so used to being monolingual that when they hear that there are 2000 languages spoken in Africa they immediately imagine that Africans can't talk to many people at all. But the truth is that this patchwork of diversity is superimposed by various layers of unity, threaded together with a healthy multilingualism.

About 2000. Many are dying out.

[[The Interactive Fiction Competition|http://www.ifcomp.org]] is a competition for interactive fiction, surprisingly enough; with Celestianpower, I entered [[The Bible Retold|TheBreadAndTheFishes]] in 2006, which came 21st (out of 43). I also entered FerrousRing in 2007, which came 11th.

[img[Icelandic Conquest game|http://www.corfizz.com/IF/IC%20shot.png]]

According to the Francophonie, 24 million... er, Democratic Congolese? speak French, which is a good 38% of the population. Beyond this, the principal vehicular languages are Swahili, in the east; Lingala, in the northwest; Tshiluba, in the south; and Kikongo in the southwest.

This one doesn't appear in top 10s or even in top 20s if they're going by native speakers, because we have another instance of diglossia. But the extent to which people are //native// in Indonesian or natively bilingual and the extent to which it is their Zweitsprache is contestable, if you're growing up in a bilingual environment. There is no definitive source for the information, but it seems that just about everyone in Indonesia does speak the language, which is, as it happens, practically the same as the Malay language. Going by CIA 2008 estimates again, Indonesia has a population of 237.5 million; Malaysia, 25 million; Brunei, 0.38mil; and there are 0.65 million Malay speakers in Singapore. If we assume that they all know Malay/Indonesian, this makes about 263 million. Let's round that down to 250 million, since it's probably an overestimate.

This is a soft sci-fi novel, about 92 000 words long, involving higher-dimensional people and a supposedly Utopian alien planet called Zirth. I originally wrote the story in 2003, but, although better than my first two completed novels, it was still a little immature. I revamped it in 2005, adding nearly 20 000 words to its length in the process. It's in a much better state, but I still think it could be better.\n\n[[Read a preview and description|http://www.lulu.com/content/311878]]\n\n[img[http://www.lulu.com/images/services/buy_now_buttons/uk/gray.gif][http://www.lulu.com/commerce/index.php?fBuyContent=311878]]\n\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Books/IntroducingZirthBook.jpg]]

*Some [[Language Maps]].\n*[[Pocket-size grammar references|GrammarRefs]].\n*[[Speaking Everyone's Language]], a language-related essay.\n*[[Bilden]] - A simple flashcard program.\n*[[Linguistic Conquest|WorldConquest]], a language-focused text game.\n*[[Top 10 Languages]], a little article on the top 10 language by number of //total// speakers.

*[[A graphic showing the top 25 world languages.|TwentyWorldLangs.png]]\n*[[A graphic showing 42 top languages of Europe.|EuropeLangs42.png]]\n*[[A map of the states of India, showing their main languages|India.png]] - as used as a reference map in my game, WorldConquest. Based on [[this|http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:India-states-numbered.svg]]. Note: I have fixed some mistakes that you might have previously seen.\n*[[Languages of Africa|AfricaTest]]\n\nStatistics are by no means definitive. Definitions and numbers vary considerably between sources and years.\n

Erstwhile name of [[Lost in Translation]], one of the parts of my WorldConquest text game.

My other presences on the net:\n* [[Wikipedia user page|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Baryonic_Being]]\n* [[h2g2 articles|http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/MA234603?show=25&type=1]]\n* [[Humorix|http://humorix.org/people/#Justin-Morgan]]\n* [[Some of my photographs at Wikimedia Commons|http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?limit=50&title=Special%3AContributions&contribs=user&target=Baryonic+Being&namespace=6&year=&month=-1]] ([[user page|http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Baryonic_Being]])\n* [[Scribd|http://www.scribd.com/people/view/329775-justin-morgan]]\n* [[Lulu Storefront|http://stores.lulu.com/corfizz]]\n* [[YouTube|http://www.youtube.com/user/Barentity]]\n* [[Delicious bookmarks|http://del.icio.us/Baryon]]\n\n* [[The new world|http://www.corfizz.com/world.html]] ([[explanation|DividedWorld]])\n\n\n

See WorldConquest. Version 2 is now available! It fixes a lot of bugs and has many exciting new features, not least the addition of over 130 new languages!\n\n[img[Linguistic Conquest game|http://www.corfizz.com/IF/Ling%20shot.png]]\n\nIf you want to get an idea of how buggy the game once was, please note that the following bug has already been fixed:\n[img[Slovak bug|http://www.corfizz.com/IF/Slovak.png]]\nAnd this is one bug that I introduced in version 2, which I've also fixed:\n[img[Minigame bug|http://www.corfizz.com/IF/Croissant.png]]\n

[[Hello]]\n\n[[Software]]\n[[Video]]\n[[Fiction]]\n[[Essays]]\n[[Audio]]\n[[Language]]\n[[FAQ]]\n[[Links]]

The problem here is similar. We must realise that "Chinese" refers to a so-called "macrolanguage" - that is to say, a family of languages descended from one earlier language. One of these languages is Mandarin Chinese, and it happens to be the largest and most prestigious of the Chinese languages, although it is by no means true that everyone in China speaks it. The Chinese languages are also not the only languages of China - others, such as Zhuang, Hmong, Yi, Uyghur and Mongolian, exist - but Chinese languages do form a majority. Anyway, we must be sure only to accept estimates that refer to Mandarin, and not to "Chinese", which is ambiguous.\n\nAs for the figure that we're actually going to use, we can observe that the number of speakers will certainly be more than the 885 million given in the Crystal estimate above. The population of China according to the CIA July 2008 estimate is 1330 million. The Singapore, Taiwan and diaspora populations are probably not likely to have a big impact on the final number. Weber claims 1.1 billion first language and 20 million second language speakers, roughly corroborated by [[this|http://www.krysstal.com/spoken.html]], but that doesn't have a definitive date for the estimate. But if Weber's estimate is for 1997, it's only 210 million short of the 2008 estimate for the total population of China, which seems a bit suspect. Even so, let's go for a figure of 1100 million.

Matthew Tisot, friend and comrade of mine, is the director of the indie film, TheCamelOnWheels, which I edited. We are now working on his next feature, //Un Homme, Une Femme, Leur Chameau et L'Angleterre//. (Note that Matthew is not French. He isn't Jewish either.) Read [[his blog|http://contoria.blogspot.com]] for more.

These interface options for customising ~TiddlyWiki are saved in your browser.\n\nYour username for signing your edits. Write it as a ~WikiWord (eg ~JoeBloggs)\n\n<<option txtUserName>>\n<<option chkSaveBackups>> Save backups\n<<option chkAutoSave>> Auto-save\n<<option chkRegExpSearch>> Reg Exp Search\n<<option chkCaseSensitiveSearch>> Case Sensitive Search\n<<option chkAnimate>> Enable Animations\n\n----\nAdvancedOptions\nPluginManager\nImportTiddlers\n\n[img[Creative Commons Licence|http://i.creativecommons.org/l/by/3.0/88x31.png][http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/]]

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The only slight complication here is the presence of Portuguese-based creoles, such as Crioulo spoken in ~Guinea-Bissau, but with a total population of about 1.5 million, it's hardly going to make a big difference. As it stands, Brazil is the major contributor to the figure for Portuguese (or maybe we should start calling it Brazilian?!), but, together, Portugal, Angola and Mozambique do make a sizeable contribution, while ~Guinea-Bissau, São Tomé e Príncipe, Cape Verde and East Timor are possibly not worth counting. [[This site|http://www.brazzilmag.com/content/view/9689/1/]] is not alone in quoting 240 million as the total figure. However, if we add up the //total// populations for Brazil, Portugal, Angola, Mozambique and ~Guinea-Bissau, going by the CIA 2008 estimates, we get to around 240 million, but this is an overestimate; yes, Portuguese accounts for practically 100% in the first two, and very, very high in Angola, but I've seen estimates of 27% (CIA) and 40% (National Institute of Statistics, via Wikipedia) for Mozambique, and 10% (Leclerc) for ~Guinea-Bissau. But the estimates from Ethnologue, Encarta 1998 and Weber are all below the current population of Brazil, so we can't use them reliably at all. Eurobarometer gives us 0% for knowledge of Portuguese amongst non-natives in ~EU25, and I don't think Galician is included somehow. The result of this debate is crucial, of course, because if we use 240 million, then Portuguese just about wins over Bengali. If we go by the population data and use 40% for Mozambique, then we get to about 230 million, so let's use that for now.

It's not too difficult to count the number of Russian speakers in the region that was formerly the USSR. There are some speakers outside this region, and that's where the problems start, although they are not too significant. Russian speakers are apparently declining overall, even in Russia (which has a shrinking population).\n\nWeber gives 160 million native speakers and 125 million second language speakers. The 1989 source gives 293 million total, which is OK, because we expect a decline since the Union's collapse. [[This article|http://eng.expert.ru/printissues/countries/2006/09/russkiy_yazyk_v_blizhayshem_zarubezhe/]] gives 163.8 native and 114 million second, which makes 277.8 million, so let's say 275 million and call it quits.

[[Saving The World|http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Games/Save.mp4]], with clips from:\n*Zeitgeist\n*Beyond Good and Evil TV advertisement\n*Psychonauts\n*Tomb Raider Underworld\n*Little Big Adventure (and ~LBA2)\n*Zork Grand Inquisitor\n*Final Fantasies VI, VII, X and XII\n*Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars\n*Day of the Tentacle\n*The Legend of Kyrandia\n*The Longest Journey\n*[[Dreamfall]]: The Longest Journey\n\nI used clips from the Zeitgeist movies only because I knew that they contained appropriate footage; I am not affiliated with them and this isn't an advert for them.\n\n

Dreamfall "Spinning Glyphs" screensavers for Windows:\n*[[Blue|Screensavers/Dreamfall Spin.scr]]\n*[[Pink|Screensavers/DF Spin Pink.scr]]\n*[[Purple with border|Screensavers/DF Spin Purple.scr]]\n*[[Blue tunnel|Screensavers/DF Spin Concentric.scr]]

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\n<<slider showTabs TheTabs 'tags and tiddlers »'>>

@@display:none;Corfizz@@[img[Corfizz|Logob.png][http://www.corfizz.com]]

Here are some of my programming projects:\n\n* WorldConquest - two games in one, played on a political map of the world\n* FerrousRing - a very experimental text adventure\n* [[The Bible Retold 1|TheBreadAndTheFishes]] - a text adventure that came 21st in 2006's IFComp\n* [[Guide Dog for OpenOffice|http://sf.net/projects/gd4oo]]\n* [[KMathsTest|http://www.kde-apps.org/content/show.php?content=15495]]\n* [[iXML]]\n* [[Elements Interface|http://www.corfizz.com/Elementary]]\n* [[Bilden]] - a flashcard program in Glulx!

Again, Spain is very much overshadowed by Hispanic non-Spain in terms of population. When it comes to it, however, there are few complications here, but the numbers still vary. The 1989 total estimate is 341 million; Encarta 1998 gives 332 million for native speakers; Weber gives 300 million and another 20 million second. At first, it's tempting to think that all of South and Central America except for Brazil is Spanish-speaking, but actually there's French Guiana, Guyana (English), Belize (slight English majority over Spanish) and Suriname (no majority really) and Leclerc cites 1992 statistics purporting that only 55.2% of Paraguay speaks Spanish at all. The situation in Bolivia is not clear, but it does have sizeable Quechua and Aymara populations. There are also about 30 million Spanish speakers in the USA, and Eurobarometer thinks about 30 million able-to-hold-a-conversation-ers in the EU, which leads me to think that we are looking at at least 400 million total speakers nowadays. [[This article from 2007|http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:0i7Y43lUanEJ:www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2007/04/26/cultura/1177610767.html+%22Instituto+Cervantes%22%22los+actuales+500+milliones+de+hispanohablantes+en+Latinoamérica+y+España%22&hl=es&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=es]] even goes as far as to say "...dentro de diez años serán más de 30 millones de brasileños los que hablen español y se sumen así a los actuales 500 millones de hispanohablantes en Latinoamérica y España. Lo cual lo que lo sitúa como cuarta lengua del mundo después del chino, el inglés y el indio." So let's welcome Brazilian Hispanophones to the party and call it 430 million.

Abstract:\n//Although English has emerged as the lingua franca of business and commerce, vast human populations remain cut off from each other by the language barrier. The real problem is not to make everyone speak the same language, but to speak everyone's language – and to unify the languages of the world the same way that they have unified historically, by the natural unifications of people. Whereas previously a migration to unknown territory cut one's tribe off from the language and culture of one's forebears forever, technology now connects the whole globe together, making the ideals of human culture and language possible.//\n\n[[Download the essay|http://www.corfizz.com/Essays/SEL.pdf]].\n

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The swooshing sound effect heard in //The Learning Curve// and in //Drop Down// is a modified version of the effect heard by users of the brushed metal theme in release 16 of the Enlightenment window manager for X11, which I hope and presume is under the BSD licence.\n\nIf you actually understood all that, well done!

<<timeline>>

The Epsilon Essays are a series of essays that begins with [[Denying Individual Efficacy: Resolving the Problems of Freedom and Identity]]. The others aren't quite ready.

Consider the following mathematical problem.\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/rects.png]]\nFor the two rectangles as shown, you are given the following:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/ab.png]]\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/xy.png]]\nYou are given also that the length of the diagonal, d, of the two rectangles is the same. The question is, which of the rectangles has the larger area?\n\nBy Pythagoras,\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/pyth.png]] (1)\nSubstituting\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/ainb.png]]\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/xiny.png]]\ninto (1), we get:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/eqyb.png]]\nSquare-rooting and putting in terms of b:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/biny.png]] (2)\nNow we substitute:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/yinxbina.png]]\ninto (1), obtaining:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/eqxa.png]]\nSquare-rooting and putting in terms of a:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/ainx.png]] (3)\nCombining (2) and (3), we can obtain //ab// (the area of the 4:3 rectangle) in terms of x and y:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/abinxy.png]]\nThus, the area of a 4:3 rectangle with diagonal length //d// is always 17/250 (about 7%) larger than a 16:10 rectangle of the same diagonal length //d//. In other words, an //x//" widescreen screen is //always// smaller than an //x//" non-widescreen screen.\n\nThis, of course, allows laptop manufacturers to cut the cost of the LCD screen while making it //sound// as though there is no loss to the consumer because the diagonal length is the same. In fact, it might even sound //better// to the consumer because of the chic factor associated with the word 'widescreen', attributable to its use in modern cinema.\n\n(Some screens have an aspect ratio of 16:9. For a given diagonal, they have an area 12% lower than their 4:3 counterparts.)\n\nBut this is not the only issue here. With a net loss of area for a given diagonal, widescreens give you slightly more width at the expense of height. Having used a widescreen monitor on my 17" iMac for some time now, I consider this to be less inefficient for many purposes. This website, like most websites, for example, is designed to be viewed as a vertical column. In fact, all printed written documents are designed as vertical columns. Imagine a block of text that stretches across a widescreen or a landscape piece of paper: when you get to the end of a line you'd have to move your gaze a long distance to get right the way back to the beginning of the next line, and it wouldn't be particularly comfortable. Indeed, I have noticed that when viewing web pages or documents on my widescreen, the content is in a strip in the middle and a large amount of the screen (often 60% or more) is utterly wasted, and you have to scroll down more often. Anything involving the reading or writing of textual content - web browsing, e-mails, word-processing, programming etc. - will be better off with a smaller width and a bigger height, so widescreen screens aren't as good for these purposes.\n\nThe main reason I got the iMac was to do video editing. Since video editing software has a horizontal timeline, and since video nowadays is often shot in a widescreen format, widescreen is arguably more useful. And obviously widescreens are better for watching widescreen movies.\n\nFor any other purposes, such as image manipulation, desktop publishing, gaming, spreadsheets etc. it would appear (from scanning [[various|http://www.miketaber.net/2007/04/04/widescreenlaptopconspiracy]] blog/forum posts, if you want to be specific) that opinions differ. Some people prefer widescreen and some people don't. Some people point out that widescreen laptops have a larger footprint, and may be less comfortable on one's lap.\n\nWhat is the Great Widescreen Swindle? It is the fact that, flying in the face of the foregoing, every single model of laptop nowadays is widescreen. Non-widescreen laptops have been //completely// phased out. I would have expected there to be a choice - you know, "consumer choice" - between wide and non-wide, based on the kind of usage considerations outlined above. But no - by using marketing ploys suggesting that widescreen is bigger and better, they have managed to cut their costs across the board and eliminate one aspect (get it?) of genuine choice.\n\nThe situation becomes almost laughable when you look at the situation with so-called [[netbooks|http://www.asuslaptop.co.uk/categories.php?cat=45]]. The name netbook suggests that their primary use is supposed to be for browsing the net. So, widescreen [[isn't|http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/11/29/three-reasons-why-netbooks-just-arent-good-enough/]] really suitable is it? But again, we find that there is currently no netbook on the market that isn't widescreen ([[this one|http://reviews.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/notebooks/0,1000000333,39116901,00.htm]] having been discontinued). The funny thing is - as could have been expected - people were very sceptical about the usability of the first wave of 7" netbooks, championed by the Asus Eee PC. Netbook makers responded by releasing ones with bigger screens - 9" and 10". I speculate that if they had merely made a 4:3 screen of 7" then the usability would have been much better received, and, ironically enough, they would have saved money!\n\nHere's an example of a marketing statement I saw in relation to a widescreen Acer laptop:\n//"A wide-aspect 15.4" screen provides 30 percent more viewing area than traditional 4:3 XGA displays, for additional space and more windows"//\nThis statement is technically true, but only because they specify that the 4:3 display they are comparing with is XGA. XGA refers to the screen resolution: 1024x768, and indeed, the widescreen version of XGA called WXGA has a resolution roughly 30% greater than 1024x768. So: although a 15.4" widescreen screen is actually smaller than a 4:3 one, it can give you greater space //if// they use a higher resolution. But equally, they could just use a higher resolution on a 4:3 screen too.\n\n[In the past, 15" screens on laptops did have 1024x768 resolutions, but then they started using resolutions of 1400x1050 and even 1600x1200 at the more expensive end of the spectrum. So, these older laptops often had higher resolutions than the newer ones, for which 1280x800 seems to be the most popular. In fact, 1280x800 seems to be the most popular resolution for screens sizes of 13.3", 14", 15" and even 16". Some 15" laptops nowadays sport a resolution of 1366x768 (which is an aspect ratio of 16:9) and some have a resolution of 1440x900. 17" laptops tend to have a resolution of 1440x900 at the cheaper end and 1920x1200 at the most expensive end. Let's compare the areas. The following chart shows the percentage area difference relative to the widescreen formats:\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/Images/ws/Resolution comparison.png]]\nAs we can see, the 4:3 resolution of 1600x1200 is more spacious than all but the most expensive widescreen resolution, which is only available on (heavier) 17" models, whereas 1600x1200 used to be available on 15" screens.]

A series of text adventures based on classic Bible stories and written in a light-hearted but non-offensive manner. Made in collaboration with "Celestianpower".\n\n*TheBreadAndTheFishes\n*FollowingAStar

The first in TheBibleRetold series of text adventures, in which the player must gather the five loaves of bread and two fishes needed to feed a crowd of 5000 people. The game came 21st of 43 in IF Comp 2006 and was a finalist for Best Individual NPC in the 2006 XYZZY Awards (for God)!\n\nDownload:\n*The [[latest version|http://www.corfizz.com/BibleRetold/BibleRetold1.z5]] in Z-code format\n*The [[Inform source code|http://www.corfizz.com/BibleRetold/GameOneSource.inf]]\n*A [[walkthrough|http://www.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/competition2006/zcode/bibleretold/baf_walkthrough.txt]]\n\nSee also [[its entry on the IFWiki|http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/The_Bible_Retold]].

The Camel on Wheels, the first film from [[Matthew Tisot]] (unless you count //Wycliffe: The Play Within the Film//), is an ultra-low-budget comedy largely in the form of a sketch show. It's not currently available on the internet, but it may be soon.\n[img[http://www.corfizz.com/CamelInTractor.png]]\n(I could have sworn I got the camel from [[the Open Clip Art Library|http://openclipart.org]], but I can't seem to find it now; it was called ~Machovka_Camel.svg.)

This is a soft sci-fi novel, about 130 000 words long, and my latest completed work (and therefore my best). It's about the project of an eccentric polymath, Reginald Dickens, which he invites six randomly-selected people to participate in. But the purpose of the project is very mysterious, and it's easy to suspect a hoax. The book is humorous in places, and - be warned - contains graphic descriptions of the destruction of banknotes.\n\n[[Read a preview and description|http://www.lulu.com/content/2373452]]\n\n[img[http://www.lulu.com/images/services/buy_now_buttons/uk/gray.gif][http://www.lulu.com/commerce/index.php?fBuyContent=2373452]]

<<tabs txtMainTab Timeline Timeline TabTimeline All 'All tiddlers' TabAll Tags 'All tags' TabTags More 'More lists' TabMore>>

//To Play The World With Music// may be available in the future, after I've sorted out a few problems, and, probably, changed its title to something a little less wordy. I was thinking, //Music Theory//, but that would make it sound like a textbook.\n\nThe most interesting thing about this book is that it is written wholly in the second person, emulating the style of interactive fiction or text adventures. This also makes it more of a novel//ty// than a novel!

There seems to be quite a lot of demand for a list of the top 10 languages of the world, but in scouring the internet I have discovered that such top 10 lists are wont to disagree on the precise rankings, although they generally agree on which languages should be included. Aside from the internet I did find one top 10 list in something called a book which I found in my bookcase: The Cambridge Factfinder, edited by the well-respected linguist David Crystal, of which my //im Jahre 2000 erschienene// 4th Edition gives mother tongue speakers in millions from the "early 1990s" as follows:\n# Mandarin Chinese 885\n# English 400\n# Spanish 332\n# Hindi 180 (with Urdu, 236)\n# Arabic 200\n# Portuguese 175\n# Bengali 168\n# Russian 170\n# Japanese 125\n# German 100\nHowever, I think it's far more useful and interesting to look at the //total// number of speakers, rather than just the mother tongue (//Muttersprache//) speakers, since it gives you a better idea of the number of people you could potentially talk to in a particular language. However, there are several general problems with compiling such a list, many of which also apply to Muttersprache numbers:\n*Most countries do not collect data on second languages (//Zweitsprachen//) in their censuses.\n*Countries don't do their censuses at the same time, so the real data can't always be compared directly.\n*The most recent census might have been quite some time ago.\n*Censuses depend on self-reporting, which means if someone says that they speak language X, we don't really know how well they speak it, or if they have a completely different idea of what language X is.\n*The Ethnologue, a widely-cited source of language data (owing to its extreme accessibility and comprehensiveness) is also widely criticised for using out-of-date information and for classifying languages ridiculously, amongst other errors.\nThese problems can be summarised as follows:\n*Lack of a consensus on what constitutes a language.\n*Lack of a consensus on the proficiency one ought to have in a language in order to be counted.\n*Lack of reliable data.\n*Tendency of the data to go out-of-date very quickly. If not immediately.\nSome of this can, of course, be ironed out by using data on population growth rates, but actually, some languages are getting more and more popular while the use of other languages is declining, and so you are on shaky ground if you resort to this measure.\n\nBelow is my own top 10 list, with links to comments about how I arrived at the value (which is in millions). I have consulted a number of sources. When I refer to "Weber", I mean George Weber's article on the 10 Most Influential Languages from 1997. This, as well as the Encarta 1998 data that I refer to, can be found [[on this nice little page|http://www2.ignatius.edu/faculty/turner/languages.htm]]. When I refer to "Leclerc", I mean [[Jacques Leclerc's website|http://www.tlfq.ulaval.ca/axl/]], which I have found very useful. I have also used data from [[the CIA World Factbook|https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/]]. When I refer to the "1989 source", I mean a list that appears near the end of [[this book by Barry Farber|http://www.scribd.com/doc/89770/How-to-Learn-Any-Language-Quickly-Easily-Inexpensively-Enjoyably-and-on-Your-Own-by-Barry-Farber]]. I also make reference to the [[Eurobarometer survey|http://ec.europa.eu/education/languages/archive/languages/eurobarometer06_en.html]] on the language skills of people in the EU.\n\n# [[English]] 1500\n# [[Mandarin Chinese]] 1100\n# [[Hindi/Urdu]] 560\n# [[Spanish]] 430\n# [[Russian]] 275\n# [[Indonesian/Malay]] 250\n# [[Arabic]] 230\n# [[Portuguese]] 230\n# [[Bengali]] 230\n# [[French]] 200\n\nI have put Arabic, Bengali and Portuguese in that order because that's the order they were in in the list by native speaker populations.\n\nGerman and Japanese would come next, but I'm not sure which has the higher figure out of these two! I will leave that as an exercise for the reader.

If you want to find out what's new on this site, click on the link on the right-hand side that says "Tags and tiddlers". A timeline should pop up, showing when each page was last updated. Therefrom I sense niftiness!\n\nOr you can subscribe to the [[RSS feed|http://www.corfizz.com/index.xml]].

I do a lot of video editing, and I'm using Final Cut Studio. Don't think that means the videos are going to be good; it still depends on how the user uses the software, rather than the software itself.\n\n* [[Physics Lightning Tour|http://www.corfizz.com/Physics]] - This video is far better than the maths one below.\n* [[Mathematics: Beyond Reality|http://www.corfizz.com/Mathematics]] - This video is embarrassing. So laugh! Or just use it as a Final Cut Studio demo.\n* SavingTheWorld\n* [[Dreamrise]]\n** [[See YouTube|http://www.youtube.com/user/Barentity]].\n* A [[Montage of Video Games|http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydUcMMuLblE]] - OK. So I'm not afraid to admit that I like [[computer games]]. But I do have high standards. Clips of some of my favourite games are in that video, but there are also clips from games I've never played but which I consider to have a good reputation.\n* The [[Corfizz Bubble Logo|http://www.corfizz.com/Small Bubble Logo.mov]].\n* The [[Corfizz Space Logo|http://www.corfizz.com/Fuller Space Logo.mov]] (made with lots of stock Motion objects - except Jupiter and the logo itself).\n*Editing for [[Matthew Tisot]]:\n**Wycliffe: The Play Within the Film\n**TheCamelOnWheels\n**GeographyChallenge\n\n\n[img[http://www.corfizz.plus.com/Media%20Offline.png]]

~Niger-Congo. And what's more, all of the major languages from the Democratic Republic of the Congo southwards, except for Afrikaans, belong to the Bantu branch of ~Niger-Congo.

The official language is French but more people speak Bambara (or Bamanankan).

Amharic is the only official language, but there are actually more speakers of Oromo. Somali also has a sizable population (almost 5 million spread over a large area in the southeast), as well as Tigrinya, the language of neighbouring Eritrea.

World Conquest contains two games in one, both played on a political map of the world:\n*''[[Icelandic Conquest]]'' is a crazy game, in which you have to build an empire for Iceland - not with military might (Iceland has none), but with flags. You gain flags by making deliveries all over the world; the shorter the route you take to get to the destination country, the more flags you'll get. At the same time, another randomly selected country is building an empire, and will start claiming countries for itself. You have to remove their flags or replace them with your own, and ultimately, you must take over the world. To top things off, you find various cultural items lying around which can get you extra points if returned to their country of origin. This includes lemurs from Madagascar.\n\n*''[[Lost in Translation]]'', now at version 2, has you translating documents from one language to another. To do this, you just walk into a country that speaks that language. But this time, it's not about finding the shortest route - it's the shortest //linguistic// route you want. It's no good going through Hungary, Austria and Germany to get to France from Romania; far better to head for Italy, since it's a related language. Making efficient translations gets you skill points, which you can spend on actually learning languages, which allows you to make even more efficient translations. Learning every language of the world, though, is only part of the attraction...\n\nIt would be helpful if you could send bug reports, if indeed you happen to fall into one of its exceptionally niche audiences! I have alpha-tested version 2 quite thoroughly, but I still recommend saving regularly - just in case. ''Update:'' There was originally a bug that affected time travelling when one of the hypotheses has been enabled; this should be fixed in this version.\n\n[[Download the game here|http://www.corfizz.com/IF/WorldConquest2.blb]]\n\nYou will need a [[Glulx interpreter]] in order to run it.

That's right. Here's a list of the games that appear in my [[Montage of Video Games|http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydUcMMuLblE]], in order of appearance:\n*Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars\n*[[Dreamfall]]: The Longest Journey\n*Beyond Good and Evil (which I haven't played)\n*Flight of the Amazon Queen\n*Beneath a Steel Sky\n*Broken Sword II: The Smoking Mirror\n*Myst IV: Revelaton\n*Full Throttle (which I haven't played)\n*Loom\n*The Longest Journey\n*Myst III: Exile\n*Psychonauts\n*Riven\n*Final Fantasy X (which I haven't played)\n*Syberia (which I haven't played)\n*Day of the Tentacle\n*Sam and Max Episode 4\n*Grim Fandango (which I haven't played... yet)\n*Photopia\n*Worlds Apart\n*Secret of Monkey Island

iXML is something I was working on quite a while ago, but which I have now abandoned. It was a way of using XSLT to make easy requests for factual information in documents (or it could have been). If you want to know how far I got, [[refer to this page|http://www.corfizz.com/Fizz/iXML.html]]. It might be possible to make a plugin for it for ~OpenOffice, so that you could easily fetch data into your documents. Make of it what you will.