From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Sun Sep 14 11:58:18 2008 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:58:19 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1Kewna-0004Ru-Pj for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:58:18 -0700 Received: from py-out-1112.google.com ([64.233.166.177]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1KewnX-0004Rb-1e for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:58:18 -0700 Received: by py-out-1112.google.com with SMTP id z59so1262671pyg.30 for ; Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:58:14 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:received:received:message-id:date:from:to :subject:in-reply-to:mime-version:content-type:references; bh=fbpzyk+HuSkCPP6Qi9uomrxc2sWhNhjUUfKytKyn+m8=; b=w2XpNqQa+3lZzX2zYXfbk671mbKBM13zxbLjDNXNZ4jRvf2wzrMRgQ/lkNS9GlEd1V sHIyEFurZkYiEAuGB3X8uKysc2hpQ0NP3DOayqGEpW/XDKAicsFQ+1tLmrCD7QtFCUQC qYhD1KAcvUCMGITOPIBGzeAeokjwiLV8R1M1o= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=message-id:date:from:to:subject:in-reply-to:mime-version :content-type:references; b=qU5EmvH4fZtHtGlFfqeoGIb0CJs9mgIzPZOHxdV8JbAifL5GXdi7dAu6uH5xicFiFn KhpAj9e87RGNRJzVv/9AYnkb4JZlx8zWd4DyVInqZxr1cS2HxmEzQ5CUpoR96gLLB3sV yT+K7BZYX8wHnP1ZAiQEo1Sg9AFw+mw0XNWo0= Received: by 10.142.222.21 with SMTP id u21mr2349572wfg.318.1221418693780; Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:58:13 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.142.51.12 with HTTP; Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:58:13 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: Date: Sun, 14 Sep 2008 14:58:13 -0400 From: "Brett Williams" To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: PLace structure vs. cmavo? In-Reply-To: <292466.19611.qm@web30406.mail.mud.yahoo.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_Part_7664_14387017.1221418693778" References: <292466.19611.qm@web30406.mail.mud.yahoo.com> X-Spam-Score: 0.0 X-Spam-Score-Int: 0 X-Spam-Bar: / X-archive-position: 862 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: mungojelly@gmail.com Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-list: lojban-beginners ------=_Part_7664_14387017.1221418693778 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline On 9/14/08, Tom Gysel wrote: > > > And 'place structure': is it really more simple than using a cmavo for > 'to', 'from', 'by', ...etc? There's a lot of cmavo anyway in lojban, why > couldn't we use them, instead of place structure? Is memorizing 'place > structures' not much harder? (or maybe it is not that hard? I haven't got a > good overview in my mind of all the kinds of place structures there could be > in gismu) > I wasn't around when the structures were made, so I can't tell you why they're that way. But they do make sense to me. You have to have some basic semantic space somewhere-- you can indicate what a place means with BAI or "fi'o", but those still depend fundamentally on the semantics of particular gismu places. ("mi cadzu se ka'a le purdi", I walk with destination the garden-- the BAI "se ka'a" is just as vague about what a selklama is as the gismu itself.) Packing those semantic spaces together into five place gismu is arguably excessive, but it seems to work OK. Think about it this way: The numbered places are very strongly colored by each gismu that they appear in, so that it's hard to say that an x2 place means anything in particular at all. That means that the numbered places are very generic, and so it's not unlojbanic how variable their meanings are. If instead we had prepositions like "from", which also were colored by the gismu they related to (in a klama situation the "from" is the terklama, and in a benji situation the "from" is the velbenji, etc), then those prepositions would have a semantic suggestiveness, but not a semantic clarity. Their meaning would be very dependent on context. The meaning of fa/fe/fi/fo/fu is even more determined by context, of course, but it's SO determined by context that it becomes purely structural. mu'o mi'e se ckiku ------=_Part_7664_14387017.1221418693778 Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline
On 9/14/08, Tom Gysel <to_mu1975@yahoo.com> wrote:

And 'place structure': is it really more simple than using a cmavo for 'to', 'from', 'by', ...etc? There's a lot of cmavo anyway in lojban, why couldn't we use them, instead of place structure? Is memorizing 'place structures' not much harder? (or maybe it is not that hard? I haven't got a good overview in my mind of all the kinds of place structures there could be in gismu)


I wasn't around when the structures were made, so I can't tell you why they're that way.  But they do make sense to me.  You have to have some basic semantic space somewhere-- you can indicate what a place means with BAI or "fi'o", but those still depend fundamentally on the semantics of particular gismu places.  ("mi cadzu se ka'a le purdi", I walk with destination the garden-- the BAI "se ka'a" is just as vague about what a selklama is as the gismu itself.)  Packing those semantic spaces together into five place gismu is arguably excessive, but it seems to work OK. 
 
Think about it this way: The numbered places are very strongly colored by each gismu that they appear in, so that it's hard to say that an x2 place means anything in particular at all.  That means that the numbered places are very generic, and so it's not unlojbanic how variable their meanings are.  If instead we had prepositions like "from", which also were colored by the gismu they related to (in a klama situation the "from" is the terklama, and in a benji situation the "from" is the velbenji, etc), then those prepositions would have a semantic suggestiveness, but not a semantic clarity.  Their meaning would be very dependent on context.  The meaning of fa/fe/fi/fo/fu is even more determined by context, of course, but it's SO determined by context that it becomes purely structural.
 
mu'o mi'e se ckiku

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