Note: Changed my mind but preserved initial reaction:

No. Read the book. Other languages had their massive shifts before or after the printing press. English evolved at roughly the same time. That caused chaos. While other languages solidified in advance, and others solidified after, the english language was evolving at the same time that rules were written. It's a perfect disaster (those who know, know. great song. great album).

Not direct support for my argument, just context:

The standardization of English spelling began in the 15th and 16th centuries; the Great Vowel Shift is the major reason English spellings now often deviate considerably from how they represent pronunciations.

Back to commenter (so it doesn't look like I'm joining different quotes):

Germany even had an official spelling reform in the 1990s.

I've never heard of this, so maybe I'm wrong / uninformed. ~~I'll look into it because I truly believe that language shapes thought and this is interesting to me.~~

The German orthography reform of 1996 (Reform der deutschen Rechtschreibung von 1996) was a change to German spelling and punctuation that was intended to simplify German orthography, thereby making it easier to learn,[1] without substantially changing the rules familiar to users of the language.

Wow. That's so incredible and impossible where I live (USA) that I'm dumbstruck at the pragmatism of it. I was wrong. Fuck England and the USA (as always!).

"German orthography reform of 1996"[1]

0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Vowel_Shift

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_orthography_reform_of_1996