Received: from mail-vx0-f189.google.com ([209.85.220.189]:65256) by stodi.digitalkingdom.org with esmtps (TLSv1:RC4-SHA:128) (Exim 4.76) (envelope-from ) id 1RRA3L-00011t-Ay; Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:03:32 -0800 Received: by vcbfk1 with SMTP id fk1sf839325vcb.16 for ; Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:03:20 -0800 (PST) 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=eaTpUrHqo0Aw8JY9HqY+3ZSzkFb03F4L6v9C6jHQ/tk=; b=MIHUiK/9HuLAt/Fo7g/OAJ/BTEo8C6tfrq1WJ6m35lHx+DrSmqKuU9YI7wAcYWHFzS ofZBepatLiwLUjgwWe9jFbn78Z6eRc0m7cdT0P2S3ZruIEgWme2dR0kuaEjEDeHMCsMG geqFmAtJH8VWck0I43eEu5udFjcirXYsesl84= Received: by 10.52.173.110 with SMTP id bj14mr226130vdc.3.1321567398202; Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:03:18 -0800 (PST) X-BeenThere: lojban@googlegroups.com Received: by 10.220.152.75 with SMTP id f11ls2668924vcw.3.gmail; Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:03:16 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.52.38.198 with SMTP id i6mr928916vdk.2.1321567396599; Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:03:16 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.52.38.198 with SMTP id i6mr928915vdk.2.1321567396589; Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:03:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from pi.meson.org (pi.meson.org. [96.56.207.26]) by gmr-mx.google.com with SMTP id bu17si15869646vdc.0.2011.11.17.14.03.16; Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:03:16 -0800 (PST) Received-SPF: neutral (google.com: 96.56.207.26 is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of mark@kli.org) client-ip=96.56.207.26; Received: (qmail 25704 invoked from network); 17 Nov 2011 22:03:15 -0000 Received: from nagas.meson.org (192.168.1.101) by pi.meson.org with SMTP; 17 Nov 2011 22:03:15 -0000 Message-ID: <4EC584A3.6050401@kli.org> Date: Thu, 17 Nov 2011 17:03:15 -0500 From: "Mark E. Shoulson" User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:7.0) Gecko/20110927 Thunderbird/7.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: New PA-proposal References: <20b482a7-b58a-4e4a-a3f7-27b49ba861c0@p9g2000vbb.googlegroups.com> <201111171409.08825.phma@phma.optus.nu> <4d00e419-9ede-42cf-963e-7a394bcbed13@d17g2000yql.googlegroups.com> In-Reply-To: <4d00e419-9ede-42cf-963e-7a394bcbed13@d17g2000yql.googlegroups.com> X-Original-Sender: mark@kli.org X-Original-Authentication-Results: gmr-mx.google.com; spf=neutral (google.com: 96.56.207.26 is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of mark@kli.org) smtp.mail=mark@kli.org 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-8859-7; 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: / The situation in PA seems to be sort of a cop-out: "Whatever, look, it's=20 a bag of words, let the higher level (semantics) sort it out." We could=20 have done the same with the grammar as a whole, probably, but what would=20 that have accomplished? Thus klaku, from the proposal: > 2) How does PA6 work with PA5? > a) {ji'i} works with all numbers. {pi te'o} is "0.271828...", similar > with {pai}. {ra'e} is not defined with any number from PA6. So this defines {pai} and {te'o} in terms of their radix expansions. {pi=20 pai} is {pai}/10, and if we were working in another base, it would be=20 {pai}/B (for base B). I started writing this to say this is a terrible=20 idea, but there is some consistency to it: {pi re} is {re}/10, etc.=20 Whenever you move the {pi} around, you multiply/divide by the radix.=20 Now, this reasoning would also lead to {pai no} equalling 10=F0 and so on,= =20 where you would probably rightly say they can't join this way. (which=20 makes me start thinking of having cmavo defined purely in terms of=20 moving the radix point... You don't need one for moving it to the left,=20 because numbers can't be infinite to the left and we can say {pi no no=20 pai} and so on for moving it more places, but you'd need one for the=20 right... Yeah, we could speak in terms of explicitly exponentiating the=20 radix... OK, yeah, I know, I'm rambling and these aren't good ideas.=20 Just stuff that hit me when trying to say this was a bad idea and=20 discovering it might not be.) > a) All number strings then refer to the same number, describing it in > different ways. This means you can say something wrong. ({li pai su'o > vo} refers to "pi, which is more than 4", for instance.) I think this is likely a bad idea, and will lead to trouble. Might=20 prefer to just forbid more than one "number string" per number, or else=20 come up with... a better meaning for it. We already have (enough) ways=20 to indicate incidental relative clauses, etc. Maybe adjacent number=20 strings have explicit multiplication between them, like in ordinary math=20 notation (bad idea). Or maybe PA1 are really complete number strings,=20 and for number strings x and y, {x y} means "x times the radix, plus y."=20 That would yield a nice consistent meaning for how PA1 works as well as=20 a meaning for other adjacent number strings--albeit a fairly useless=20 meaning. Not a great solution either. I'm not sure how happy I'd be with "messin' with th' established order=20 o' things," especially considering the usage breakage involved. But=20 that's another matter, and I could be convinced; I'm just looking at the=20 idea on its own. ~mark --=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.