In case this statement sounds absurd, my mother grew up speaking five languages concurrently and learned her last, English, starting at 12. Even now in her 80s she retains and uses multiple languages. But she grew up in an environment, Malaya of the 1930s and 1940s where being such a polyglot was not only unremarkable but would not have been considered any sort of achievement worth mentioning. I have one uncle there whose FB posts always mix two or three languages (one he learned after marriage, in his late 20s), as do his friends when commenting.

What I find sad is that though over the years I have learned and used languages with reasonable fluency, nowadays I pick up a book or hear something on the radio and I struggle to understand it. I'm stuck to the same languages I use every day. Those languages have still influenced my view of the world and understanding of the languages I do use but it still feels like a loss.

That's a curious analogy.

I remember reading the intro to a Berlitz language course written by Charles Berlitz himself (a polyglot master of a dozen or more languages, if I remember correctly). He made the statement that speaking two or more languages is seen as evidence of higher intellect. They went on to assert that it is actually quite easy to learn a language. In fact, anyone who is not an imbecile can do so, but learning a second language -- ah, now there is the rub. It's difficult, typically, because of the incorrect approach and the lack of integration. In order to learn a language, one must speak and hear it. It is insufficient to merely read it or "speak" it silently, in one's mind.

getting back to your analogy: I will quibble with a fine point. It is unfortunately incredibly simply to have a child. Even those imbeciles from the former example seem capable (even rather proficient!) at having many. The difficulty comes in raising a child well. And I think that was what you were getting at. :) That is no simple task. But after one or two the parents learn the necessary skills.

Berlitz also makes the observation that learning a third language is easier than the second, as one is now finding patterns and building on those similarities rather than focusing on differences.

Your logic is in good company.

You are right about the analogy, I guess I should have said raising kids.

I will point out that children who are exposed to two languages quite naturally learn both of them with only a slight delay over learning a single one.

>Its like having kids

I have 2 kids. Everyone I've spoke to who has 3 or more has said that the jump from 2 to 3 is as big as the jump from 0 to 1.

I have three kids. When I am working one on one or even one on two, it's noticeably easier than when I have all three with me and am trying to assist them all with their needs. You play zone defense rather than man on man and as a result you are always stretched a little thin.

Ages matter. If the oldest can help out, it scales better.

But all pretense of democratic rule must be jettisoned once the kids outnumber the parents.

I agree, and watching larger families in my community (where my three kids is a "small" family), it's obvious that older siblings take a significant role in helping the younger. That said, the demeanor of kids matters a lot, as my oldest (teenager) is significantly more of a challenge than my other two. She by herself takes more energy than the other two combined.

Okay, you're our expert on this thread.

But note that the question is not if 3 kids are harder. They're obviously harder than 2.

The question is (for the sake of the analogy), if going from 2 to 3 is harder than going from 1 to 2 or 0 to 1.

We are talking strictly about incremental difficulty here.

Kids and languages aren't a reasonable comparison. None of us are born with children, but we are all born with language (of a sort, and yes I understand that opens the door to debate). On the topic of kids, going from 2 to 3 is significantly harder than going from 0-1 or 1-2, so much so that I'd say it was an unspoken factor in my divorce.

Without providing any hard research to back my thoughts, I'd also surmise that it is difficult to transfer this onto the difficulty of learning a language. My thinking on this is that if for example you are learning another language within the same family, that is a different level of difficulty than learning a language in a new-to-you language family. As a German speaker, there are other Germanic languages that look very familiar to me, where I could take a reasonable guess at the meaning. On the other hand if I were to learn Mandarin or Russian, it would be a significantly larger task.

I have 4. Less then 5 years between the first and fourth.

From 2 to >2 was the biggest hurdle and the reason is simple: you have 2 hands with which you can totally control 2 kids. With >2 you need to master a different technic to control (read: keep 'm safe) under the most unexpected circumstances.

Edit: and we speak 2 native languages, our kids have grownup in 2 different countries. Sofar they pick up languages pretty easy and I attribute that mainly to not being afraid to learn & make mistakes.

Huh, interesting. This is tangential to the main thread, but I had the exact opposite experience - 0 to 1 was impossible, 1 to 2 was overwhelming, and 2 to 3 was merely difficult.

For me, 0-1 was difficult, 1-2 was barely noticeable, all the lifestyle changes had already been made, and there were no longer any surprises. When thinking about having a 3rd, everyone I've talked to has said it's an enormous jump.