From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Mon Apr 23 09:25:32 2007 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Mon, 23 Apr 2007 09:25:32 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1Hg1Ly-0001Kr-GI for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Mon, 23 Apr 2007 09:25:26 -0700 Received: from web88008.mail.re2.yahoo.com ([206.190.37.195]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with smtp (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1Hg1Ls-0001KU-T8 for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Mon, 23 Apr 2007 09:25:26 -0700 Received: (qmail 41649 invoked by uid 60001); 23 Apr 2007 16:25:13 -0000 DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=s1024; d=rogers.com; h=X-YMail-OSG:Received:X-Mailer:Date:From:Subject:To:MIME-Version:Content-Type:Content-Transfer-Encoding:Message-ID; b=iq6E1aevipC6hZUBO1LuliHP8ow0bdde1ALqu06IZDoCpTyChgw/Z4iMMzQm++8W/eiKiVdVz8nPVF6NP4wWA99fwa3ja2JbRpm7QFSjZ30QPA6cNIvcM0Iqv/bdiCc9mosahlfR4SsyEEStqc3fzEEfCdzQp//6k11h2PJFTYY=; X-YMail-OSG: vywMHvwVM1k45iTRANin8QGt5YcCZQwKmgSIaCZovqgNZvkZ Received: from [74.96.97.233] by web88008.mail.re2.yahoo.com via HTTP; Mon, 23 Apr 2007 09:25:13 PDT Date: Mon, 23 Apr 2007 09:25:13 -0700 (PDT) From: ANDREW PIEKARSKI Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: Please review #002 To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by Ecartis Message-ID: <330291.41469.qm@web88008.mail.re2.yahoo.com> X-Spam-Score: -0.8 X-Spam-Score-Int: -7 X-Spam-Bar: / X-archive-position: 4380 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: totus@rogers.com Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-list: lojban-beginners > But be careful, "real" has nothing to do with it. "Literal" would be a better word. You've got me again! What do you mean by "literal" in this context? mu'o mi'e .andrus. ----- Original Message ---- From: Jorge Llambías To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org Sent: Saturday, April 21, 2007 12:02:58 PM Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: Please review #002 On 4/21/07, ANDREW PIEKARSKI wrote: > > There seem to be two variables to consider: > 1) is this something specific I have in mind (a), or is it general > (as in English "the" or "a/some" (b)? That's the main thing, yes, with the caveat that {lo} can also be used for something specific if you don't care to emphasize the specificity. This is unlike English "the", which is obligatory. You can't really say "a mother of mine" in English when you have only one mother and so you must be referring to her, but {lo mamta be mi} is perfectly fine in Lojban to refer to your one and only mother. {lo} does _not_ indicate non-specificity. It just doesn't bring specificity into it. > 2) is it real (c) or, is it something that may or may not be real (d)? I suggest you don't concentrate too much on this. Yes, {le} allows you to use a predicate suggestively rather than literally, but this is rarely what it is used for. > That gives four possible combinations of article: ac, ad, bc, bd > > Now "le" seems to correspond to ad and "lo" seems to correspond to bc. {le} would be for ac/ad and {lo} would be for ac/bc. But be careful, "real" has nothing to do with it. "Literal" would be a better word. "literally a unicorn", "literally an event of pigs flying", etc. are perfectly fine for {lo}, even though unicorns and events of pigs flying are not real. If what you are referring to is to just that, and not to something else that you choose to describe as that, then {lo} is fine: lo nu viska lo cribe cu se terpa Seeing a bear is scary. That refers to events of seeing a bear, not necessarily to any actually ocurring such event, but yes literally to such events. mu'o mi'e xorxes