From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Sat Sep 20 03:32:17 2008 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Sat, 20 Sep 2008 03:32:17 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1KgzlB-0002gt-8d for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Sat, 20 Sep 2008 03:32:17 -0700 Received: from web30405.mail.mud.yahoo.com ([68.142.200.108]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with smtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1Kgzl7-0002gV-Qb for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Sat, 20 Sep 2008 03:32:17 -0700 Received: (qmail 23037 invoked by uid 60001); 20 Sep 2008 10:25:28 -0000 DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=s1024; d=yahoo.com; h=X-YMail-OSG:Received:X-Mailer:Date:From:Reply-To:Subject:To:In-Reply-To:MIME-Version:Content-Type:Message-ID; b=Iu5YGAxhnM5rvBIPQ+i1wVGzcU9hUll2ekii6/iD0qo8nGpKtjyQxVyIMnH5hLJ1NH/19sBKN9wAE2F5Ts/hn6+GBStGa2XfbRigeZD0FU5OdWsK5wsq2K9B+pxAa+I7HMmz0Esq9usw0xD0/TzcKFs0SQTFo1OtKycZ92VlRJo=; X-YMail-OSG: TADMXjgVM1k5noXDi9VXbnAL90YvYg348dP5dcYYjo6YraW4cNVnC0h5IzxPAW6YRF.W2iAXBkTXfnOHEOlu_6.f5ZR6X4vtq0MS1Z7YuD.h1h0HGsZxu.kLD7MLsXsgi3TqM_rIjxmoPJpPsBUI0OibSFziuJNBBVz_XHr82PWQXhny9ijn Received: from [84.195.56.196] by web30405.mail.mud.yahoo.com via HTTP; Sat, 20 Sep 2008 03:25:28 PDT Date: Sat, 20 Sep 2008 03:25:28 -0700 (PDT) From: Tom Gysel Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: PLace structure vs. cmavo? To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="0-2026290979-1221906328=:22571" Message-ID: <66950.22571.qm@web30405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> X-Spam-Score: 0.0 X-Spam-Score-Int: 0 X-Spam-Bar: / X-archive-position: 863 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: to_mu1975@yahoo.com Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-list: lojban-beginners --0-2026290979-1221906328=:22571 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Thanks Brett, Do you (or anyone else) know if there is a way of classifying gismu, as in:= these types of gismu have this kind of place structure, and this sort has = this structure... ? To memorize them with much more ease? Thank you, Tom=20 --- On Sun, 9/14/08, Brett Williams wrote: From: Brett Williams Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: PLace structure vs. cmavo? To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org Date: Sunday, September 14, 2008, 8:58 PM 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 over= view in my mind of all the kinds of place structures there could be in gism= u) I wasn't around when the structures were made, so I can't tell you why they= 're that way. =A0But they do make sense to me. =A0You have to have some bas= ic semantic space somewhere-- you can indicate what a place means with BAI = or "fi'o", but those=A0still depend fundamentally on the semantics of parti= cular gismu places. =A0("mi cadzu se ka'a le purdi", I walk with destinatio= n the garden--=A0the=A0BAI "se ka'a" is just as vague about what a selklama= is as the gismu itself.)=A0=A0Packing=A0those=A0semantic spaces together= =A0into=A0five place gismu=A0is=A0arguably excessive,=A0but=A0it seems=A0to= =A0work=A0OK.=A0 =A0 Think about it this way: The numbered places are very strongly colored by e= ach gismu that they appear in, so that it's hard to say that an x2 place me= ans anything in particular at all. =A0That means that the numbered places a= re very generic, and so it's not unlojbanic how variable their meanings are= . =A0If 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 pre= positions would have a semantic suggestiveness, but not a semantic clarity.= =A0Their meaning would be very dependent on context. =A0The meaning of fa/= fe/fi/fo/fu is even more determined by context, of course, but it's SO dete= rmined by context that it becomes purely structural.=20 =A0 mu'o mi'e se ckiku=20 =0A=0A=0A --0-2026290979-1221906328=:22571 Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii
Thanks Brett,

Do you (or anyone else) know if there is a way of classifying gismu, as in: these types of gismu have this kind of place structure, and this sort has this structure... ? To memorize them with much more ease?

Thank you,
Tom

--- On Sun, 9/14/08, Brett Williams <mungojelly@gmail.com> wrote:
From: Brett Williams <mungojelly@gmail.com>
Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: PLace structure vs. cmavo?
To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org
Date: Sunday, September 14, 2008, 8:58 PM


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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