From robin@xxxxxxx.xxx.xxx Sun Feb 21 10:01:25 1999 X-Digest-Num: 69 Message-ID: <44114.69.356.959273824@eGroups.com> Date: Sun, 21 Feb 1999 20:01:25 +0200 From: Robin Turner Sat, 20 Feb 1999, zo Robin Turner(robin@Bilkent.EDU.TR) cusku di'e > > Well, no one's been put off translating the Dao De Jing into just about every other language, so > > why should Lojbanists be so humble?! > > I know there's a nice translation in English, but it is still far from the > original one. Even the translation in modern Chinese is weird. :( Aesthetically I like Gia Fu Feng's best. Technically, I like for Zheng Manqing's commentary, based on the Han commentators', which is available in a rather prosaic English translation (I forget who translated it - one of Zheng's taijiquan students). The problem is that any translation is influenced by a particular school of Taoism (in the case of English translations, usually by Tang dynasty commentators, AFAIK). > > Also, as recent postings indicate, ther'es nothing to stop > > Lojban incorporating different logics, not just the "Greek" style. If Lojban were simply an > > attempt to put language into an Aristotelean straightjacket, I for one would never bother to > > learn it. > > I'm afraid that you may be wrong here. Since Lojban is firstly defined to > test the Sapir-Wholf theory, let's assume it be true first. Since Lojban is > based in predicate logic, it derives all limitation and implicities of it; > thus Lojbanists' way of thinking are limited by the logic. And the logic, > as implied by the word itself, is something invented by Greeks. I know that > Lojban's endless (:-)) gismu combination can partially solve the problem > (while adding some ability to be ambiguous at the same time), its structures > are still fixed. Don't be sad here. It's just that if the Sapir-Wholf is > right. The arbitrarity of language just cannot get itself out of the > language. > But ... (1) Predicate logic and its offshoots are a lot more flexible than Aristotelian logic. I would hope logicians have got to the point where they aren't just relexicalising Greek! (2) Lojban is more flexible than predicate logic. co'o mi'e robin.