From: Doug Ewell (dewell@adelphia.net)
Date: Tue Nov 11 2003 - 02:25:53 EST
I'm following this discussion with some interest, as an enthusiast of
alternative scripts for English (Deseret, Shavian) and inventor of one.
Some random thoughts:
I'm rather uncomfortable with labeling a script, or the usage of a
script, a cipher simply because it is used by a minority. How large
could such a "minority" become and still have its usage relegated to
"cipher" status? The secrecy criterion seems a little more on track.
I know there are other kinds of ciphers, but when I hear the term, I
think of one-to-one "substitution" ciphers. The Pigpen cipher is the
classic example, as someone pointed out, though it does come in
varieties.
I think such a collection of symbols A becomes a cipher for a true
script B when it replicates the usage of symbols in B, irregularities
and all. In the Pigpen cipher, there is a symbol for C and one for T
and one for H, and C+H and T+H are slapped together *exactly* as they
are in Latin to spell English words. In a substitution cipher, the word
"chime" is spelled with those five letters, c-h-i-m-e; they just look
different.
In both Deseret and Shavian, "chime" is spelled as three letters,
representing those alphabets' idea of three sounds: ch-i-m (Deseret
𐐽𐐨𐑋, Shavian 𐑗𐑲𐑥). There is no blind adherence to English
spelling principles, so not a cipher. In my invented alphabet, there
are five letters, but they don't correspond to the five Latin letters
(t-sh-a-y-m, or if you've got Code2000 installed). No separate
"c" and "h", and no silent "e". Therefore, not a cipher.
In Theban and Utopian, words are spelled exactly as they would be with
Latin letters. Only the shapes are different. To me, that's clearly a
cipher; there's nothing arbitrary or whimsical about it.
I was surprised and a bit dismayed to see Klingon dragged into this
thread. Klingon was rejected not because it's a cipher, but because
it's used only for decoration, not for communication.
-Doug Ewell
Fullerton, California
http://users.adelphia.net/~dewell/
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