On the subject of Beirut today, which was once home to the Phoenicians who came up with the idea of using an alphabet, let's remember that we could make the alphabet more useful by making each letter a shape or form that is commonly referred to. There could be a "Mechanical Alphabet" that exists alongside the conventional alphabet, and each letter of the alphabet would have both a mechanical and conventional form. But the mechanical letters would each be of a useful descriptive form. Maybe the conventional letters, a, b, c, ... could gradually be phased out.
Another thing that we could be doing is making use of geography. It is difficult to describe an odd shape with words, without using an illustration or photo. Geographical entities, countries, states and, provinces, come in all manner of different shapes. This gives us a ready vocabulary of two-dimensional forms, just choosing the geographical form that comes closest. Something might be described as "Kentucky-shaped". If the object is three-dimensional it can be described with two or three such forms.
Here is a link to the posting, "The Alphabet As Symbols":
www.markmeekprogress.blogspot.com/2009/06/alphabet-as-symbols.html?m=0
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