From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Thu Oct 25 14:39:47 2007 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Thu, 25 Oct 2007 14:39:47 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.67) (envelope-from ) id 1IlAQc-0005ZQ-Jk for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Thu, 25 Oct 2007 14:39:46 -0700 Received: from eastrmmtao101.cox.net ([68.230.240.7]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.67) (envelope-from ) id 1IlAQV-0005Z0-AK for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Thu, 25 Oct 2007 14:39:46 -0700 Received: from eastrmimpo02.cox.net ([68.1.16.120]) by eastrmmtao101.cox.net (InterMail vM.7.08.02.01 201-2186-121-102-20070209) with ESMTP id <20071025213933.ENLH1395.eastrmmtao101.cox.net@eastrmimpo02.cox.net> for ; Thu, 25 Oct 2007 17:39:33 -0400 Received: from [127.0.0.1] ([72.192.234.183]) by eastrmimpo02.cox.net with bizsmtp id 4lfL1Y0063y5FKc0000000; Thu, 25 Oct 2007 17:39:27 -0400 Message-ID: <47210CF9.9010906@lojban.org> Date: Thu, 25 Oct 2007 17:39:05 -0400 From: Robert LeChevalier User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.7 (Windows/20050923) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: geodesic dome References: <821531.97363.qm@web27709.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> <2204fa080710250218g1d01c396gc2cffe2594094d0a@mail.gmail.com> <47209CB8.8070703@lojban.org> <975a94850710250956t2cd0e855ncce7c1681ff719e2@mail.gmail.com> <4720DEC4.3040806@lojban.org> <975a94850710251146g2f1cb00eka98d0ec87c02ae3b@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <975a94850710251146g2f1cb00eka98d0ec87c02ae3b@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Spam-Score: 0.0 X-Spam-Score-Int: 0 X-Spam-Bar: / X-archive-position: 5650 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: lojbab@lojban.org Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-list: lojban-beginners Joel Shellman wrote: >>>I would think one of the wonderful benefits of lojban is that you can >>>do this--create a word that is very precise in what you mean. Granted, >>>that would mean an enormous vocabulary, thus my question--can someone >>>decompose a word they've never seen before and most likely understand >>>what it should mean? >> >>I would say that there are many who could get the approximate meaning. >>Getting a place structure identical to that which the originator might >>have intended is a bit harder, especially without several places filled in. > > Could you explain what you mean about getting the place structure > identical--what do you mean? > > Looking at: > > rekyboldi'u > > for example, are there multiple ways that can be decomposed? Or do the > rules preclude that? It can only be decomposed one way, but that only gives the etymology, not the meaning. etymology is more effective in Lojban than in English, but does not give the complete picture. What is the predicate place structure of rekyboldi'u? > put in rekyboldi'u and it gives: frame-ish-sphere-ish-building(s) That is more or less an etymological definition. But what kind of building is it really? Nuclear containment structures, radar domes, and astronomical observatory domes might also fit the description even if not geodesic. Now for the places: if one looks at the 3 source gismu, then one sees places for a building purpose, a material that the sphere is made of, and depending on interpretation, the nature of the structure. Some have attempted to devise conventions for predicting the place structures (jvojva), but those conventions are not fully deterministic, and there is no requirement that someone follow them anyway. Knowing that we want the word to mean "geodesic dome", we might get the following place structure for rekyboldi'u: x1 is a geodesic (semi-spherical) dome for purpose x2, of material x3, using polygon forms x4 But the strict jvojva rules might predict a different order than I gave, and some Lojbanists might omit one or more of the places as being unimportant to the concept. Place structure determination is something you get down only with practice, ideally checking by using that place structure and seeing if others understand you. We don't know how to teach this - only using the language allows you to get it down. Some people avoid the problem by using tanru and not making lujvo - the rules for place structures of tanru are completely deterministic. But fluent Lojban will make use of lujvo. lojbab