Subject: Re: [lojban] Vocabulary

From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 30 Jun 2000 06:45:53 -0400

At 01:47 AM 06/30/2000 +0200, Elrond wrote:
>First, I needed a tanru/lujvo for role-playing games. There are many lujvo
>out there that are related to role-playing, but there exist none to cover
>the global concept itself. I was thinking of
> xarpre nunkeici'e
>but it does not cover the whole meaning....

Unfortunately, I have no idea how to discuss this, since the "whole 
meaning" is something that is a very controversial topic within the role 
playing game community. Your lujvo focusses on the fantasy character 
aspect (not absolutely necessary - some people "role-play" themselves in a 
fantasy, or perhaps science fictional or even historical environment, and 
it also emphasizes a system, whereas there are forms of roleplaying which 
are freeform.

In the broadest sense, "keldraci" should cover it, with several of the 
places of that lujvo handling some of the key related concepts (like 
"gamer" x5 of draci, gamemaster x3 of draci, etc.)

>Next, I need something for "heroic fantasy". Unfortunately, there are
>*lots* of meanings hidden behind these two english words, which thus
>frightened me and caused me to get stuck in the process of translating
>them. If anyone with better analysis skills than I have could help me
>with tackling this, I'd be very glad.

What makes heroic fantasy heroic is not the heroes, but the grand scale of 
the conflicts, epic nature of the stories, and often the cataclysmic stakes 
to the world. Again, I would keep it simple and use "rambalfi'a" for a 
broad concept that may be a little too broad, and add in modifiers to 
indicate some particular kind of heroic fantasy. If you think that it does 
need "heroes", make that "rambalprefi'a".

>Next, I am speaking about "a set of phonemic signs". I was thinking about
> lo'i selmorna be lo sance lerfu bo selzbasu
>however I'm not sure about it. Any comments ?

A phoneme to me would be a snajmika'u, and you are talking about the x2 of
snajmika'u le'ucmi

>Now, if I want to speak about "language requirements" in the sense of
>"what they impose on their writing system to be easily used by their
>speakers", is it acceptable to use
> le ciska stura selnitcu be le bangu
>? (I mean, can a "bangu" actually "nitcu" anything ?)

Not "need", but it can make things necessary (sarcu), but the language 
itself would be a sumti-raised place from the abstraction that actually 
requires it.

>I also want to have a discursive
> ko'a ",incidentally along with A,B,C," cu broda
>I feel I should use a combination of "noi", "ce" or "le'i", but I just
>cannot figure out how, nor can see where this is covered in the Book.

Depends on what you mean by incidentally here. noi is used to subordinate 
a second selbri which is incidental to the main selbri, but the English 
word "incidentally" is usually not used to indicate such an incidental 
claim. Likely it is important that people know that A,B,C also broda, and 
you are perhaps indicating that this is true, but that it was accidental, 
unplanned, merely convenient to the story that they happened to do so.

This is a stylistic question, but I would be inclined to use two separate 
sentences. ko'a broda .iji'a A je B je C go'i

Now if "with" (accompanying) is to be taken more literally, this could 
change the method, though it could merely be ".iji'aviku in the above 
sentence. You might on the other hand need to make kansa the main selbri 
or put it in a noi clause

>And finally, I'd like a clarification of what can fill the places of "for
>purpose X", "under conditions/circumstances Y" and most especially "by
>standard Z" in gismu place structures.

These will usually either be abstractions, or more often metonynmy for some 
unspecified abstraction. Purpose relates to mukti/zukte, why some agent is 
doing something. Conditions are the restrictive circumstances under which 
you wish to claim the selbri true (sarcu); a standard (manri) is usually 
either a scale (ckilu) or some basis of comparison (zmadu, mleca) or a set 
of prototypes (described as a set or enumerated), but you can also just say 
"tu'a mi" (by my standard) leaving it totally unspecified just what that 
standard actually is.

>I believe (but am not sure) that "le" events suit the Y use:
> "it is easy for you to use letters when it comes to writing"
> le nu pilno le'i lerfu cu frili do le nu ciska
>
>and that "lo" or "le" events suit the X use:
> "you use letters for writing purposes"
> do pilno le'i lerfu lo nu ciska

I'm not sure what you are saying here - I can see le or lo in either 
sentence, though I would use "loi nu" based on your English in each 
case. A purpose might be specific or it might be general, and the place 
structure does not specify just how broad your goal must be: (I eat in 
order to stop my hunger. I eat in order to fill my stomach. I eat in 
order to meet my body's nutritional needs. I eat in order to stay 
alive. I eat in order to maintain my genes' competitiveness in long term 
natural selection. are probably all true at once, but the ones(s) that are 
in your mental state are the ones you will typically use for a "goal or 
purpose"

>but I just cannot figure out what can stand in a "by standard" place.

You are a skilled Lojbanist by standard (having read the book and being 
able to construct grammatical and understandable text).
You are a skilled Lojbanist by standard (better than Pierre) [not making 
any actual judgements here %^)]
You are a skilled Lojbanist by standard (the official scale of Lojban 
proficiency that LLG has never issued)
You are a skilled Lojbanist by standard ({Jorge, Helsem, ---, ---, rock} 
are a descending scale)
You are a skilled Lojbanist by standard (the typical poster to Lojban List)
(note this one is vague - I could be comparing you to the typical poster, 
or I could be saying that the typical poster would judge you skilled - this 
is always a consideration in sumti raising)

lojbab
--
lojbab [email-masked]
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org