Received-SPF: neutral (google.com: 68.230.241.215 is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of lojbab@lojban.org) client-ip=68.230.241.215;
Message-ID: <51A8F326.2020901@lojban.org>
Date: Fri, 31 May 2013 14:59:50 -0400
From: Robert LeChevalier <lojbab@lojban.org>
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1; rv:13.0) Gecko/20120614 Thunderbird/13.0.1
MIME-Version: 1.0
To: lojban@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [lojban] cmevla as a class of brivla
References: <CAHxnAmJvBZ1_4S1OF45n3dd5g2iQmFEGiQbsyBTN6PwybsNkrA@mail.gmail.com> <51A379EF.3020803@gmx.de> <CAHxnAm+HZGvy=Ck9nvogsR_uHL=+BYPho6vDKe8WGp-H4xKmEA@mail.gmail.com> <51A6685C.3010505@lojban.org> <CAMKwHj3gpou-t-6wPOLP7TCXdGhVGU2z+H-z4g=yGJK8Yg2gEg@mail.gmail.com> <51A8680E.7040103@lojban.org> <CAMKwHj3+aWwW0E3QP271aRNP8oKMy9hNDipjypX6hhJkauM+_A@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <CAMKwHj3+aWwW0E3QP271aRNP8oKMy9hNDipjypX6hhJkauM+_A@mail.gmail.com>
Reply-To: lojban@googlegroups.com
Precedence: list
Mailing-list: list lojban@googlegroups.com; contact lojban+owners@googlegroups.com
Sender: lojban@googlegroups.com
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
X-Spam_score: 0.0
X-Spam_score_int: 0
X-Spam_bar: /

Jonathan Jones wrote:
>     One is a cmene, and the other is a brivla being used to call someone
>     by description.  "cmevla" means nothing to me as a concept.
>
>
>         What about the dog named Bear? Would calling him la cribe when
>         speaking
>         in Lojban not be calling him by name, but by nickname? We have
>         to call
>         him la.cribes. to call him by name?
>
>
>     If you are translating the English word "Bear", you might very well
>     call him "cribe", but categorically, doing so is translating the
>     English rather than giving him a Lojban name.
>
>
> I was thinking of the dog I've read about in some Lojban texts who was
> called {la cribe} because his English name was "Bear", and his English
> name was "Bear" due to his owner thinking he bore a striking resemblance
> to one. I would assume had this jbopre been a native speaker of Lojban,
> this resemblance would have caused the dog to be named {la cribe} by his
> owner directly, and not merely as a translation of the English.

When I created the place structures, I specifically included 
metaphorical meanings which would support this sort of thing (calling a 
dog "cribe"), see "balji" and "besna" and "solji" for three of the many 
that call out a metaphor.  But by and large people did not like that 
sort of metaphorical extension of meaning, and I was strongly 
criticized.  (But no one ever explicitly proposed removing them).  So I 
believe that the presumption came to be that something could not be 
described using besna unless it had correspondences for both x1 and x2.

>     This whole cmevla->brivla push seems to me to be an effort to make cmene
>     less outcast, more useful.

I should note that cmene are supposed to be outcast in a way.  People 
talk about type 3 and type 4 fu'ivla, with the latter being thought by 
some to be the most Lojbanic/least borrowed in having cut itself off 
from the word it was borrowed from.  Meanwhile cmene were type 2 fu'ivla 
- not even as Lojbanic as a type 3 borrowing. (Type 1 borrowings 
special-quoted non-Lojban text names).

Names do have a role in language, so no one would try to eliminate them. 
  But since they aren't predicates, they are less Lojbanic.

> With the default place structure, I don't see any real "meaningful" use,
> other than to remove to words {me la} from bridi in which they are used.
> IIRC, however, the proposal allows for defining a unique place
> structure, in much the way lujvo and fu'ivla are, and that obviously
> would make those cmene which are meaningful use- although I do see it as
> a potential for lazy word-crafting, since why would anyone define a
> lujvo/fu'ivla for "unicorn" when they could just say {.unicorn.} and
> give /it/ the place structure of {pavyseljirna}?

I have used "me la iunikorn", but never to my knowledge without the mela 
which is to me something essential to the "logicalness" of Lojban.

There was a debate in the early Loglan years about the phrase "Chrysler 
car", which in fact led to the invention of "me" (which has the same 
meaning in TLI Loglan as in Lojban).  "me la kraislr. karce" is a 
historically noteworthy phrase.  (pc/John Clifford may have more 
edifying stories about usage of early names, since this invention was 
really before my time)

>     "la jbogu'e" still has that place structure, as does la tsani have
>     its own.  Lojban simply doesn't work without place structures.
>
> Yes of course, and I don't use {la jbogu'e} with the intent of removing
> those implicit places. The fact that when I say {la jbogu'e} without
> them does not mean I am not aware that I implicitly filling them with
> {zo'e}.

Good.  But compare this with selpa'i's response to me today where he 
says that his name is "selpa'i" and NOT "selpa'i be X2", which is 
non-Lojbanic if not anti-Lojbanic.

That dog named cribe has to allow for the implicit places to be part of 
the name.  Lojban is more than an aesthetic collection of sounds (I 
hope, especially since I long ago decided that some aspects of the 
language sound were aesthetically displeasing to me - especially that 
dominance of fricatives that makes speaking Lojban quickly a little like 
pronouncing "she sells seashells by the seashore" for me, and I am 
especially poor at those sorts of tonguetwisters)

>     I've thought of the Lojbanic "cmevla" as you call them as being
>     somewhat akin to Internet handles, which are sometimes identifying,
>     but as often as not are obscuring of the real identity.  I didn't
>     choose to call myself "lojbab".  People started calling me that, and
>     they weren't Lojbanists, and it became how I was most commonly
>     known.  It was also useful because at the time there were more than
>     one "Bob" active in the community. But there is no real meaning, and
>     hence no predication, and thus I can have all kinds of fun with the
>     fact that I have nothing to do with logical-soap, whatever that
>     would be.
>
>
>         I mean, what would be the cmene for {la dansu kansa be lo labno}?
>
>
>     That would in fact be an example of a description being used
>     legitimately as a name (not having seen the movie, so I don't know
>     how well it applies), since it invokes a predication, which can be
>     manipulated linguistically using the tools of Lojban as can any
>     predication.
>
>
> Let me make sure I'm understanding this correctly. What you're saying
> is, if a person was named something like the above, you would consider
> it a name, even though it is not a cmene?

I would consider it a description, which if marked with "la" makes it a 
explicitly a name.  What semantic distinctions arise from identifying 
something as a name as opposed to a normal description, I am not sure 
(but it would surely encompass the relevant place structures).  But then 
I was always trying to be as noncommittal as possible with respect to 
semantics in designing the language.

lojbab


-- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "lojban" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban?hl=en.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.