• Snot Flickerman
    link
    fedilink
    English
    73
    edit-2
    20 hours ago

    Poor Thai down there at the bottom, speaking slowly and transferring information slowly.

    Thai, the PNY USB stick of languages, apparently.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      10
      edit-2
      15 hours ago

      Actually fewer syllables per second is good, means you’re spending less effort speaking. It’s the ratio of information/syllables you want to maximize. Which means German/English/Mandarin/Vietnamese are roughly on par as the most “efficient” languages.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        211 hours ago

        Some languages have fewer vowel sounds while others have an insane number (in Europe that would be Danish).

        Thai has a lot, so speakers need to speak more slowly so the listener has time to distinguish words. But it also means that you can have more words per syllable.

        It’s not about efficiency per se - it’s data and error correction

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          210 hours ago

          Just to add - Thai has a tonal system and distinguishes rising, low, medium, high and falling tones. This requires a bit more time to say so that there is time for the tone to change (or not change).