From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Sun Apr 22 18:27:22 2007 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Sun, 22 Apr 2007 18:27:22 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1HfnKr-0003Zb-KP for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Sun, 22 Apr 2007 18:27:22 -0700 Received: from smtp.mail.umich.edu ([141.211.93.161] helo=tombraider.mr.itd.umich.edu) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1HfnKm-0003ZR-QR for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Sun, 22 Apr 2007 18:27:21 -0700 Received: FROM [141.213.221.81] (bursley-221-81.reshall.umich.edu [141.213.221.81]) BY tombraider.mr.itd.umich.edu ID 462C0B35.DAEF8.12579 ; 22 Apr 2007 21:26:14 -0400 Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v752.3) In-Reply-To: References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed Message-Id: <6881F330-572F-44F5-ADA2-3C450794741A@umich.edu> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: Alex Martini Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: New lojbanist asking about "po'e" and "lo" Date: Sun, 22 Apr 2007 21:26:09 -0400 To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-Spam-Score: -2.6 X-Spam-Score-Int: -25 X-Spam-Bar: -- X-archive-position: 4369 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: alexjm@umich.edu Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-list: lojban-beginners On Apr 22, 2007, at 5:37 PM, Rob Hughes wrote: > Dear Lojbanists, > > I recently started learning Lojban, and I just joined the Lojban > beginners' list. I'm working through Robin Turner and Nick Nicholas's > _Lojban for Beginners_. May I ask a couple of questions about Lojban > grammar? > > First, I'm puzzled about the relationship between "po'e" and "po". I > understand that "po'e" can be used for unique inalienable possession. > My hands are only mine and can't stop being mine, so I say "lo xance > po'e mi". Is "po'e" used for inalienable possession that isn't > unique? My father can't stop being my father, but he's also my > sister's father. Can I say "lo patfu po'e mi", or should I say "lo > patfu pe me" (or "lo mi patfu")? After reading from The Complete Lojban Language chapter 8, section 3 & 7 to brush up... Quickly, any of these might be true in some circumstances, but {be} is the better way to do it. Saying {lo mi patfu} is the same as {lo patfu pe mi}. All three of {pe} {po} and {po'e} are true if you are an only child. The loosest is {pe}, which means that the father is in some way related to you -- he could be your biological father, which is most likely, but any association is good enough. Saying {po} or {po'e} asserts that he is "specific to you". The association that he has with you, he has only with you. If you're saying he's associated with you by being your biological father, then you must be the only person/thing that he's the biological father of. Using {po'e} goes even further to say that that association can't be broken. The example often given for unbreakable (inalienable) association is {my hand}. Even if it's cut off, it's still mine. The more correct way to say {my father} would be {lo patfu be mi}. The structure of {patfu} is {x1 is a father of x2; x1 begets/sires/ acts paternal towards x2; [not necessarily biological] }. We can make a sentence about my father: {ti patfu mi} = {this-person is-the- father-to me}. The second place is {mi}, which we want to keep in our noun (sumti) form. So we use {be}. The cmavo {be} is used for something called an internal argument (internal sumti). This basically lets us stick things inside {patfu}. From a different view, using {le} or {lo} means 'the thing that fills the x1 of the following'. So {lo patfu} is the thing that can be described as {ti patfu}. And {lo patfu be mi} can be described as {ti patfu mi}. Lojban for Beginners has more about this in Chapter 9. http:// www.tlg.uci.edu/~opoudjis/lojbanbrochure/lessons/less9.html > > Second, I saw some posts on the lojban.org front page suggesting that > the meaning of "lo" has changed. Is _Lojban for Beginners_ up to > date? If not, is there a summary of the change that a beginner would > understand? > > Thanks, > Rob Hughes I'm not quite sure on this, but I don't think that Lojban for Beginners is up to date with xorlo (the new definition for le and lo). You should look at the page on the Lojban wiki about it: http://www.lojban.org/tiki/tiki-index.php?page=How%20to%20use%20xorlo mu'o mi'e .aleks.