re: #208 SteveMcGaziBolaGate

No, haven’t seen that since second grade. By reading the letters, I am able to read words that I have heard but never seen. If there were only a character, I would have no shot at understanding something I see for the first time.

Well, of course you know the values of the letters, which would allow you to “decipher” the pronunciation of a new word the first time you see it*—in Chinese there’s no such mechanism. So alphabetic writing is great. I wasn’t attacking alphabetic writing.

But that’s all you’re doing is deciphering, until you’ve learned to absorb that new word as a unit. Then you can read it, not just decipher it.

*Of course in English you’d frequently be misled.