From pycyn@aol.com Mon Jul 10 13:19:51 2000 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 17993 invoked from network); 10 Jul 2000 20:19:50 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.142) by m3.onelist.org with QMQP; 10 Jul 2000 20:19:50 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO imo-r12.mx.aol.com) (152.163.225.66) by mta1 with SMTP; 10 Jul 2000 20:19:50 -0000 Received: from Pycyn@aol.com by imo-r12.mx.aol.com (mail_out_v27.12.) id a.25.81bea42 (3959) for ; Mon, 10 Jul 2000 16:19:44 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: <25.81bea42.269b89df@aol.com> Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2000 16:19:43 EDT Subject: Lojban and English To: lojban@egroups.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 3.0 16-bit for Windows sub 41 From: pycyn@aol.com At least moderate cheers for xod and elrond, for reminding us that Lojban ain't English and shouldn't be made into English but rather should be explored in its own right. To be sure, we do want to know how to say in Lojban things that we say in English (etc.) but we should not expect that there is a perfect match nor should we try to force one on the language (especially when the match is with an ambiguous term or a vague one). we should rather see what Lojban offers that will do the important part of the job and then live with or work around the rest. Now, it is hard to know what Lojban offers sometimes, since we have no native speakers to grill, but we do have the Book which lays out a lot of parameters. Presumably, it something falls within those parameters, it is grammatically legitimate. It may, of course, be nonsense; but we should not rush to that judgment just because it seems like English (etc.) nonsense. It may be perfectly clear within a different -- maybe Lojbandish, for all we know -- frame of reference. So let it fly. If Lojbanders use it, it's Lojban and probably does something useful. For the moment, it looks like a bunch of Platonists are carving a niche in an Aristotelian language. Neat-o.