On Thursday, June 25, 2020 at 12:33:14 PM UTC-4, Gleki Arxokuna wrote:
No. Precisely zi'o since the place structure would be different changing semantics
This doesn't follow. The presence of a {zo'e} in a bridi does not imply the existence of an entity for which the bridi holds if the {zo'e} is substituted for that entity. That's {da}. As an elliptical, {zo'e} assumes the value of whatever sumti is contextually implied... and if context implies that nothing fits in that place, that sumti is {zi'o}. {zi'o} is a way of explicitly expressing that that particular place is inapplicable in the current context, but {zo'e} is not an explicit way of expressing that it is; it's a way of skipping a place and leaving its value implied.
That's wrong about {zo'e} and about {zi'o}. {zo'e} absolutely does imply the existence of an entity that satisfies the bridi. The way in which it's different from {da} is that it also makes a claim about what that entity is (specifically, that its value can be inferred from context, or that its particular value isn't important in this context). {mi patfu zo'e} implies {mi patfu da} every bit as much as {mi patfu do} does.
{zi'o},
on the other hand, doesn't say anything at all about what can or can't
fill that place. All it does is create a new predicate that doesn't
include that place. Now, as a practical matter, it's relatively rare to
assert a predicate that explicitly removes a place unless you want to
imply that the predicate with that place wouldn't also hold, but that's
by no means necessary. The empty set satisfies {zilcmi} ({se cmima be
zi'o}, but so do all other sets. The members place is removed, but
there's no implication that it's necessarily unfillable.
By
the book, I suppose you're right: the book gives {loi jmive cu se zbasu
fi loi selci} as incorrect because "We do not generally suppose ...
that someone
'makes'
living things from cells."
But I would contest that this a
problem with {zo'e}: if we don't generally suppose that, then context
would imply that {lo zbasu} here is equal to {zi'o} if not for the fact
that {zi'o} is a special case among sumti in that it cannot be elliptically
implied. Requiring an explicit {zi'o} in such a context
violates the principle of least effort. It also means, as Gleki points
out, that
any change at all to the place structure of any bridi
is liable to break older texts. Yet as the book points out, that very
sort of change is inevitable. Allowing the elliptical implication of
{zi'o} would fix this problem: the fact that those texts are older is
the context that implies the existence of a {zi'o}.
On Friday, June 26, 2020 at 8:59:00 AM UTC-4 gleki.is...@gmail.com wrote:
You
are changing the definition of gismu. This means old texts will break.
You told it yourself, I'm just commenting on that. The current official
definition of kelci has the concept of game inapplicable. That's why you
have to use zi'o to fix old texts. If Alice uses non-standard meaning
of kelci then the text has to be fixed.
E.g. pleci = x1 plays game x2 (property of x1)
Take that up with xorxes if you want: he does translate the English words "the game began" as {lo nu kelci cu cfari} and "the players" as {lo kelci}. Both of those English phrases indicate that a game is being played. I take this as evidence that the word as used has semantic content related to games or gaming, regardless of how it is officially defined. {samselkei} and {dracyselkei} (which, again, by official definitions, literally mean "computer toy" and "roleplaying toy") also indicate that this is how people are trying to use the word. Taking this into account, an additional {kelci} place to accommodate the game being played would be a strict improvement of the word itself, and I think, would alter the semantics of most existing texts far less than you seem to fear: no text where {kelci} is used in a sense expressing the playing of games would be at all harmed.
Alternatively, we could define {lo te kelci} as "a game or playful activity". A bridi to express that a kid is playing with a basketball by dribbling it might then be {lo verba cu kelci lo lankyboi lo nu mirjalgau}, even though in English we would not usually call dribbling a game. This way, even if the value of a {zo'e} can never, ever, ever be {zi'o}, no existing usage of {kelci} would be semantically altered in any meaningful way, because {ko'a kelci} already implies that some playful activity is taking place.