I can't find the "abo= ut" part; what was that about (srana?, third places of things like tavla? .= ..)?

From: Jonathan Jones <eyeonus@gma= il.com>
To: lojban@= googlegroups.com
Sent: Friday, December 7, 2012 12:13 AM
Subject: "Abstactors/Subordinators" was: Re: [lojban] Re: [lo= jban-beginners] Re: Why no "about" brivla?

Just because the nu/du'u discussion being held he= rein is a different subject to the original posy (the whole "about" thing),= I thought it'd be a good idea to give it its own thread.

On Thu, Dec 6, 2012 at 10:24 PM, la gleki <gleki.is.my.name@gmail.com>= wrote:
If there are brivla having abstraction places where changing nu to du'u can= change the meaning then I'll change my mind.
Examples?

On Friday, December 7, 2012 12:25:18 AM UTC+4, = clifford wrote:

I meant only that, for economic reasons, 'nu' is a b= etter (shorter) word than 'du'u' and that, if we get down to just propositi= ons and properties (propositions with holes), then it would be better to us= e 'nu' for propositions than continue with 'du'u'. Of course, proposi= tions would do the work of events as well and so would already we up for 'n= u' in those cases. If you mean there is a sharp distinction between proposi= tions and events, not really: an event is just a proposition being true and= an proposition is just that an event occurs. Minor adjustments in th= e dictionary collapse them completely (and it is much more plausible that a= ll propositions are than that all events are).

From: Ian Johnson <blindb...@= gmail.com>
To: <= a href=3D"" rel=3D"nofollow">loj...@googlegroups.com

Sent:<= /span> Thursday, December 6, 2012 1:22 AM
Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: [lojban-beginners] Re: Why= no "about" brivla?

Events in Lojban are indeed strange (in= particular naive quantification over events *completely* breaks, which is = annoying for a variety of reasons) but I definitely think there is a sharp = distinction between du'u and nu.

mu'o mi'e la latro'a

O= n Wed, Dec 5, 2012 at 3:44 PM, John E Clifford <kali9...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Redundancy is g= ood, but it is nice to look at the basics. I think it can be shown th= at all that is needed are propositions and propositional functions, du'u (w= hich should probably be nu) and ka (propositions with holes in them). = Events in Lojban are strange, because they all exist (or, at least, = are) but we seldom talk about their being realized or any of the usual abst= raction talk. The other abstractors are even harder. They invol= ve two factors: intensional contexts (or, at least, marking places where so= me normal rules don't apply) and indirect discourse (which-- like direct qu= otes -- are intensional). Some of them are of rather limited familiar= ity: the sensual ones, say, which are not quite sense data nor even hallucinations, or the representational ones. The notion of a genera= l abstraction is basically unintelligible and seems to be there for "complet= eness". Most abstractions abstract in a particular way (see the functions o= n worlds reading for some) and most intensional contexts are generated by p= redicates that allow such contexts (and occasionally require them).

From: Ian Johnson <blindb...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@= googlegroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, December = 5, 2012 2:03 PM
Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: [lojban-beginners] Re: Why no "about" brivla?

I don't think the distinction between z= a'i/zu'o/pu'u can be straightforwardly achieved from inside, and at any rat= e trying to make Lojban non-redundant is a counterproductive effort. Lojban= is deliberately redundant.

mu'o mi'e la latro'a

On Wed, Dec 5, 2012 at 12:23 PM, la gleki <gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:

On W= ednesday, December 5, 2012 7:50:20 PM UTC+4, aionys wrote:

It took me a bit of searching to find this, but I did manage to find a= discussion that corroborates my statement. The following post is by .xorxe= s.:

Subject: [lojban-beginners] How versatile is "nu"?

On Sat, Mar 13, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Jorge Llamb=C3=ADas <= jjlla...@gmail.com> wrote:
=

On Sat, Mar 13, 2010 at 9:52 AM, tijlan &= lt;jbot...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Officially, the most generic/nonspecific of NU is "su'u";= but people
> seem to use "nu" more often for the purpose of general abstraction.

The first thing I find odd about NU's is that they are c= alled
"abstractors" instead of something more acurate like "subordinators".
What NU does is take a bridi and convert it into a selbri, so = that it
will not be used as the main proposition but as a subordinate one.
It's true that properties and propositions are abstract object= s (as
are numbers), but for me there is nothing abstract about event= s.
Something that can be seen cannot be very abstract.

As for "su'u" as general subordinator, it was never used that way,
whatever its definition says. We can only speculate as to the reasons.
One reason could be that Loglan had the equivalents of nu/ka/n= i but
nothing like "su'u", and people just went on with that. Also, "nu" and
"ka" being just one syllable, and with such distinct functions, there
wasn't much incentive to merge them. CLL lists "su'u" among the "minor
abstraction types", which already suggests it was never though= t of as
the "general abstractor".

> Personally, I wouldn't find it particularly odd if someone use "= nu"
> for a terbri which the gimste defines as "du'u" or other specific
> types of abstraction. For example:
>
> mi jinvi lo du'u broda (I think that the proposition "broda" is = true)
> mi jinvi lo nu broda (I think that the event "broda= " is true)
>
> "jinvi"s x2 is officially to take "du'u". Is "nu" for suc= h objects of
> mental activity / logical operation discouraged? If so, why?

I suppose it's mainly tradition. One subordinator would probably be all that is needed, but the nu/ka/du'u split is very entrenche= d. "ka"
is used for incomplete propositions, where you need to keep one (and
in a couple of cases more than one) argument slot open. "du'u" is used
mainly with propositional attitude predicates. It's a relatively short
list, maybe twenty or so gismu. In most other cases you can use "nu".

Notice that the choice between nu/ka/du'u is dictated by the o= uter
bridi, the one that contains this one as an argument, whereas the
choice between the four types of nu: za'i/pu'u/zu'o/mu'e is di= ctated
by the subordinate bridi itself.
<= div>
This part makes perfect sense.
du'u/nu distinc= tion is dictated by the outer bridi.
But za'i/pu'u/zu'= o/mu'e distinction can be achieved using other methods inside the inner bri= di

(e.g. {mu'e =3D nu co'i} as tsani said in one of his audio lessons).
This completely ruins the idea of the necessity of du'u/nu distinc= tion (after all many languages including even guaspi don't have such distin= ction).

mu'o mi'e xorxes

On Wed, Dec 5, 2012 at 8:31= AM, Jonathan Jones <eye= ...@gmail.com> wrote:

On Wed, Dec 5, 2012 at 7:13 AM, selpa'i &l= t;m...@plasmatix.com> wrote:
la'o gy. Jonathan Jones .gy cu cusku di'e

Hey, I'm just telling you how it is. I'm not saying that {nu} should be
the default, it just happens to be that it IS.

No, it's not. You're wrong. Why can't you accept that even after several pe= ople have shown you that you're wrong? You're providing the beginners that = this list is dedicated to with misinformation.

{nu} is not the default, so it's *not* always right. You can't djuno a nu, = nor can you zenba a nu.

As I said, I'm not s= aying that I agree with it, nor am I saying I think it's correct. What I AM= saying is that that is how it is, regardless of whether it makes sense, re= gardless of what the definitions of the various NU are, and regardless of w= hether it should be something else.

That said, I do happen to agree with you. That, however, is not my poin= t. This is not my opinion, it is the current state of the language. And I a= m not the first nor the last to find things about this language that could = - or indeed, should- be changed for the better.

mu'o mi'e la selpa'i

--
pilno zo le xu .i lo dei bangu cu se cmene zo lojbo je nai zo lejbo

do=E1=BB=8B m=C3=A8lbi mlen=C3=AC'u
.i do c=C3=A0tlu ki'u
ma fe la x=C3=A0mpre =C5=ADu
.i do t=C3=ACnsa c=C3=A0rmi
gi je s=C3=ACrji se t=C3=A0rmi
.i ta=E1=BB=8B bo da'i pu c=C3=ACtka lo gr=C3=A0na ku

.

.

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=

--
mu'o mi'e .aionys.

.i.e'ucai ko cmima lo pilno be de= npa bu .i doi.luk. mi patfu do zo'o
(Come to the Dot Side! Luke, I am yo= ur father. :D )

--
= mu'o mi'e .aionys.

.i.e'ucai ko cmima lo pilno be denpa bu .i doi.lu= k. mi patfu do zo'o
(Come to the Dot Side! Luke, I am your father. :D )<= br>

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