Received: from mail-wy0-f189.google.com ([74.125.82.189]:50868) by stodi.digitalkingdom.org with esmtps (TLSv1:RC4-SHA:128) (Exim 4.76) (envelope-from ) id 1RKBQ6-0005IR-KN; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:06:14 -0700 Received: by wyg24 with SMTP id 24sf8741140wyg.16 for ; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:59 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=googlegroups.com; s=beta; h=x-beenthere:received-spf:message-id:date:from:user-agent :mime-version:to:subject:references:in-reply-to:x-original-sender :x-original-authentication-results:reply-to:precedence:mailing-list :list-id:x-google-group-id:list-post:list-help:list-archive:sender :list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; bh=2h5gy22XYuA4jYnD3lBPQ/06pdkKG4lKfy7m49S817Q=; b=TvxassZNFTfFx+7cYf97hicHzehswHseu9dRHxr1vAL1OpN5fOq413aHZtkGIFAOv+ F8lwq6eo/Fg/XCwLXQ7xRXyey3+Oa4uqZ0gtNKkQA48l2zjFv4sDtgr4E6UA7pQl3ZBR bUY1wodZweJ/KIJ/qdOAitvMWq9KhGCw3i50g= Received: by 10.216.139.101 with SMTP id b79mr314643wej.76.1319904356469; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:56 -0700 (PDT) X-BeenThere: lojban@googlegroups.com Received: by 10.216.202.220 with SMTP id d70ls15895689weo.3.gmail; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:55 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.216.192.8 with SMTP id h8mr57968wen.9.1319904355276; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:55 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.216.192.8 with SMTP id h8mr57967wen.9.1319904355252; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:55 -0700 (PDT) Received: from mail-ww0-f49.google.com (mail-ww0-f49.google.com [74.125.82.49]) by gmr-mx.google.com with ESMTPS id fd1si6504950wbb.0.2011.10.29.09.05.55 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=OTHER); Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:55 -0700 (PDT) Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of and.rosta@gmail.com designates 74.125.82.49 as permitted sender) client-ip=74.125.82.49; Received: by wwe3 with SMTP id 3so247228wwe.18 for ; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:55 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.227.205.213 with SMTP id fr21mr9540070wbb.16.1319904355065; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:55 -0700 (PDT) Received: from [192.168.1.81] (87-194-76-177.bethere.co.uk. [87.194.76.177]) by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id fw16sm21914520wbb.13.2011.10.29.09.05.53 (version=SSLv3 cipher=OTHER); Sat, 29 Oct 2011 09:05:54 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <4EAC2461.4040307@gmail.com> Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2011 17:05:53 +0100 From: And Rosta User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.23) Gecko/20110920 Thunderbird/3.1.15 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: [lojban] {zo'e} as close-scope existentially quantified plural variable References: <4EA5ACD4.4030106@gmail.com> <20111024184651.GC3062@gonzales> <4EA5F890.6070501@gmail.com> <20111025002558.GA27114@gonzales> <4EA60BBC.1040707@gmail.com> <20111025021504.GB27114@gonzales> <4EA68224.1080406@gmail.com> <20111026033114.GB3119@gonzales> <4EA7BF06.5050103@gmail.com> <4EAA8AC9.2010000@gmail.com> <20111029001437.GA5535@gonzales> In-Reply-To: <20111029001437.GA5535@gonzales> X-Original-Sender: and.rosta@gmail.com X-Original-Authentication-Results: gmr-mx.google.com; spf=pass (google.com: domain of and.rosta@gmail.com designates 74.125.82.49 as permitted sender) smtp.mail=and.rosta@gmail.com; dkim=pass (test mode) header.i=@gmail.com Reply-To: lojban@googlegroups.com Precedence: list Mailing-list: list lojban@googlegroups.com; contact lojban+owners@googlegroups.com List-ID: X-Google-Group-Id: 1004133512417 List-Post: , List-Help: , List-Archive: Sender: lojban@googlegroups.com List-Subscribe: , List-Unsubscribe: , Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Spam-Score: -0.7 (/) X-Spam_score: -0.7 X-Spam_score_int: -6 X-Spam_bar: / Martin Bays, On 29/10/2011 01:14: > * Friday, 2011-10-28 at 11:58 +0100 - And Rosta: > >> Martin Bays, On 26/10/2011 04:31: >> > * Tuesday, 2011-10-25 at 10:32 +0100 - And Rosta>: >> >> Martin Bays, On 25/10/2011 03:15: >> >>> * Tuesday, 2011-10-25 at 02:07 +0100 - And Rosta>: >> >>> If Lion X is equal to Lion Y, then they satisfy the same predicat= es. So >> >>> if we can agree that Lion X is called Nigel while Lion Y is calle= d >> >>> Samantha, or if X likes to eat gazelles while Y prefers humans, t= hen we >> >>> must agree that there are at least two lions. Right? >> >> >> >> So not one lion that changes its name and dietary preferences? >> > >> > The use of the present tense was intended to rule that out. >> >> But you will presumably also say that the definition of {cinfo} also >> specified criteria for distinguishing between two stages of the same >> lion and stages of two different lions, and that the distinction >> cannot be left lingustically unencoded. > > I'm saying that the definition of {cinfo} is > "x1 is a lion/[lioness] of species/breed x2", and that I wouldn't want > to change this. We're all saying this much. We disagree on whether the definition of lionho= od excludes certain individuative criteria. =20 > If I understand you correctly, that does mean that I am saying what you > say I'm saying. I was making a sincere attempt to attribute to you a view I believe you do = hold, but I don't think it follows from your belief that {cinfo} means"x1 i= s a lion/[lioness] of species/breed x2". >> > OK. So in John's lion-hunting context, after his having shot the le= ft >> > lion, you'd say "lo pa cinfo noi zu'a se cmene zo samantas.uu cu zu= 'a >> > morsi gi'e ku'i ri'u pu'o zi gunta .ii mi'o"? >> > >> > I can see that John might be dangerously confused. Perhaps there ar= e >> > sound evolutionary reasons for natural language making sharper >> > distinctions between lions and Lion than you seem to want lojban to= ? >> >> Speakers should make the distinctions when necessary, using the >> resources of the language. When being approached by lions, it is >> especially important to know their spetial distribution. In other >> contexts, such as the daily lion, there is no such need to agonize >> over whether they're all the same lion. For other predicates, e.g. >> Barbie ("We both got given Barbie for Christmas") and Father Christmas >> ("F. C. has a white beard"), identity criteria are more insensitive to >> spatial distribution. > > I still don't think I understand your setup. Do you have different > entities to handle these different cases? e.g. would you actually use > multiple lions in the lion-hunting example, rather than Lion doing > different things in different places? But use Lion for the daily lion? Yes. For Gricean reasons, rather than truth-conditional necessity. =20 > If so, that is sounding closer to my understanding of xorxes' setup. Good. =20 >> > Is it arbitrary to treat Obama as a single entity but lions as mult= iple >> > entities? Does it involve treating time differently from space? To = an >> > extent, I suppose it does - at least, I don't see a wholly coherent= way >> > to rationalise the counting by reference to just the topology of th= e >> > subset of space-time at which there is Obama or Lion or whatever. B= ut in >> > a language that's meant to be speakable by humans, I don't find tim= e vs >> > space asymmetry too objectionable. >> >> Rather than "speakable by humans" I think you mean "speakable by >> Martin". But anyway, I think that when one thinks about how to >> implement your vision of lojban, assuming it's agreed that it should >> be able to express world-vviews other than your own, the solution >> would accommodate equally well the views of all participants in this >> discussion. For every current predicate with X places, there will be >> X * Y new predicates, where Y is the number of sets of criteria for >> discriminating between individuals (i.e. for deciding, given F(a) and >> F(b), whether or not a=3Db). Now it's hard to see how these extra >> predicates could be achieved other than by the use of appropriate >> cmavo dedicated to the purpose. And in that case, the way of both >> lojban and common sense would be to stipulate that when the >> individuative cmavo are omitted, the semantic criteria for >> individuating are unexpressed. Thus, the version with individuative >> cmavo used would allow you to express what you want to express, >> while the version witouth individuative cmavo used would express how >> things are in me and xorxes's vision. > > So your individuative cmavo would be something like classifiers? I guess so, but I hesitate to venture to delineate a scheme whose primary p= urpose is to satisfy your requirements, given that you have a better unders= tanding of your requirements than I do. > Those would certainly be helpful if we're to have kinds in the language. > > But really, it seems that we are literally disagreeing on the meaning of > {cinfo} - whether it means "is a lion", or "is Lion", or is ambiguous > between the two. So wouldn't the most natural and lojbanic solution be > to decide on one of the two as the meaning of {cinfo}, and have > a tanru/lujvo ({cinfo pavrolza'i} or {cinfo dacti}, perhaps) for the > other? But {cinfo} was a mere example. We have the same disagreement over every pl= ace of every predicate. The disagreement can be resolved by multiplying the= number of predicates, but it would be crazy to attempt to do that haphazar= dly and unsystematically. This is what I'm saying in my quoted para above. =20 > Whichever were chosen for {cinfo} itself, it would still be possible to > declare that {lo cinfo} explicitly selects one or the other, or is > ambiguous between the two, as preferred. Yes. I say that above too -- {lo cinfo} would be ambiguous. --And. --=20 You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "= lojban" group. To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegrou= ps.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban= ?hl=3Den.