Almost all Plattdeutsch speakers are also fluent in Hochdeutsch. Other significant dialects spoken by German populations are Allemannisch, Saxon, Swabian and Bavarian. German grammar is extremely methodical and employs a strict word order to minimize syntactical ambiguities. German is a vigorous compounder when a new word is needed. English, being a Germanic language, employs the same technique albeit in a more restrained manner, but frequently compounds with latinate words where German would not.
Numbers also appear very unwieldy to the English eye.
Some would claim that the orderly nature of German grammar, in which the verb is delayed until the end of the sentence, requires the thinker to compose in larger and more complex syntactical units than in English and that this leads to a more developed capability for abstract thought, which is evidenced in the fact that much of the world's most abstract philosophy is written in German. Some would counter that German merely lends itself to obscurity. Amongst them is Mark Twain, who wrote a famous essay about the German language. However there is significant resistance to the program, and recently some influential media in Germany, reflecting popular opinion, have rejected its dictates. This resistance is now casting doubts upon its ultimate success.