From robin@bilkent.edu.tr Thu Feb 10 01:12:07 2005 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Thu, 10 Feb 2005 01:12:07 -0800 (PST) Received: from manyas.bcc.bilkent.edu.tr ([139.179.30.24]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.34) id 1CzAMp-0003if-6Q for lojban-beginners@chain.digitalkingdom.org; Thu, 10 Feb 2005 01:12:07 -0800 Received: by manyas.bcc.bilkent.edu.tr (Postfix, from userid 72) id 524E132022; Thu, 10 Feb 2005 11:11:35 +0200 (EET) Received: from [139.179.97.195] (unknown [139.179.97.195]) by manyas.bcc.bilkent.edu.tr (Postfix) with ESMTP id 404C726F81 for ; Thu, 10 Feb 2005 11:11:35 +0200 (EET) Message-ID: <420B2496.7090408@bilkent.edu.tr> Date: Thu, 10 Feb 2005 11:08:38 +0200 From: robin User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.2) Gecko/20040804 MultiZilla/1.6.4.0b X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban-beginners@chain.digitalkingdom.org Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: "I understand Lojban" References: In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed X-archive-position: 1133 X-Approved-By: robin@bilkent.edu.tr X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@chain.digitalkingdom.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@chain.digitalkingdom.org X-original-sender: robin@bilkent.edu.tr Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@chain.digitalkingdom.org X-list: lojban-beginners Robert Griffin wrote: > Approaching this from an English-speaker's viewpoint, when I say that > I understand English, I don't mean to say that I understand ANYTHING > which is discussed in English. Thus, most English speakers don't > understand discussions of quantum mechanics. > Many people who are fluent in a language have little technical > knowledge of the grammatical principles. On the other hand, they > understand varying amounts of what is said or written. > Let's take 'Jabberwocky' as an example of where understanding a > language is clearly differentiated from lack of understanding. > "`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves > Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: > All mimsy were the borogoves, > And the mome raths outgrabe." > English speakers understand that the action takes place in the past, > and that some things referred to as slithy toves gyred and gimbled in > some place/time/manner/fashion. > We recognize nonsense verbs, nouns, and adjectives. > There have been attempts to 'translate' Jabberwocky into other > languages. Someone unfamiliar with the target language would be unable > to 'understand' any of the poem, nor recognize which words are > nonsense and which are actual parts of the language. > > We can understand a language when we read it, but not when we hear it, > or vice versa. > We can understand a language without being able to speak it. > > When my math teacher in secondary school required us to use Spanish to > express our need to sharpen our pencils, I understood that 'Puedo > sacarle punto al lapis' meant 'May I sharpen my pencil', but I > understood little beyond that, not even being taught that 'Puedo' > meant 'I can' (or 'Can I'). > > As far as I can tell, there is a certain type of neurological activity > when a person understands what is being read or heard, but does not > occur otherwise. This understanding is at two levels. The first > level is a general comprehension of the overall language/symbol system > being used. The second level is a more specific understanding of the > topic of the communication. The second level is what is apparently > addressed by Lojban. The first level is apparently unaddressed. > > When I watched 'The Passion' I understood about a quarter of the > Aramaic, as I can read Syriac Aramaic with a little fluency, and have > a little familiarity with Biblical and Rabbinic Aramaic. As the topics > were simple, I easily understood them, in a way that I wouldn't had > the actors been discussing obscure technical points of Rabbinic law > ('prosbul' for instance). > > In the 1980s I listened to a talk by Mar Babai Soro in Assyrian > Aramaic, of which I understood perhaps 1 word in ten, if that. > However, I was able to follow well enough to understand (2nd sense) > something of what he was talking about. On the other hand, a > discussion with a friend about string theory was barely comprehensible > in the 2nd sense while fully comprehensible in the 1st sense (all the > terms were common English). > > It appears we need a term to handle the first sense of > understanding--do I understand the words. The same term would be used > for understanding someone's handwriting, or someone's accent. > > "I understand Lojban words" - mi jimpe fi lo jbovla (Quantifiers can be added here to indicate how many words you understand - the previous sentence would be true if you knew only one word of Lojban.) If you want to refer to understanding the sense of something that is expressed in Lojban, you probably need to use "la'e". robin.tr -- "I think perhaps the most important problem is that we are trying to understand the fundamental workings of the universe via a language devised for telling one another where the best fruit is." -- Terry Pratchett Robin Turner IDMYO Bilkent Universitesi Ankara 06533 Turkey www.bilkent.edu.tr/~robin