From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Thu May 04 16:43:44 2006 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Thu, 04 May 2006 16:43:45 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.61) (envelope-from ) id 1FbnTh-00032f-Qv for lojban-list-real@lojban.org; Thu, 04 May 2006 16:43:25 -0700 Received: from wr-out-0506.google.com ([64.233.184.235]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.61) (envelope-from ) id 1FbnTc-00032T-Vx for lojban-list@lojban.org; Thu, 04 May 2006 16:43:25 -0700 Received: by wr-out-0506.google.com with SMTP id i13so493024wra for ; Thu, 04 May 2006 16:43:20 -0700 (PDT) DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=beta; d=gmail.com; h=received:message-id:date:from:to:subject:in-reply-to:mime-version:content-type:content-transfer-encoding:content-disposition:references; b=ly9qXM0vUVrjMQFK8r3pCHAwZzHDI4FaRFKG0KWV+FunPKReP7uP72VhA9IyMJ7GxeFwDb1ihoBSMSATl+Oorcqij+xXgIxSmCv9ARiSOY3s3TrFT8/XK4VyqtVvkorPTfGv6ONEasBLxi8XuCchvqJHRX65xYOG6Pg7prqv+/w= Received: by 10.54.96.20 with SMTP id t20mr350563wrb; Thu, 04 May 2006 16:43:19 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.54.126.18 with HTTP; Thu, 4 May 2006 16:43:19 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <925d17560605041643p201da7e1rdc57bb7f1339e9ed@mail.gmail.com> Date: Thu, 4 May 2006 20:43:19 -0300 From: "=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jorge_Llamb=EDas?=" To: lojban-list@lojban.org Subject: [lojban] Re: Usage of lo and le In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by Ecartis Content-Disposition: inline References: <925d17560605031836w12547ba3n87934504df64c309@mail.gmail.com> <925d17560605040604s4366e278h5385c63dc7c0aacc@mail.gmail.com> X-Spam-Score: -2.6 (--) X-archive-position: 11378 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: jjllambias@gmail.com Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-list@lojban.org X-list: lojban-list On 5/4/06, Maxim Katcharov wrote: > What does it mean to have the > bear "in mind"? Is it opposed to, say, "any bear", or "bears in > general", or "bearness", or "all bears typically"? Yes. (Except for "bearness", because lo cribe has to be something that does cribe, and bearness doesn't.) Because (unless I'm > mistaken) Lojban handles those cases in other ways. Not in all cases, but even if it did, {lo} encompasses them all, in the sense that an untensed selbri encompasses all tenses, or that a sumti not marked for number encompasses plural and singular. {lo cribe} simply does not distinguish between "any bear", "bears in general", "all bears typically", "a certain bear", "certain bears", "some bears", "most bears", etc. {lo} might as well not be there, if it weren't for the purely syntactic need to convert a selbri into a sumti. It adds no semantic content. {lo} is similar to {cu}, nothing but a pure structure word. {le} is more like {ca} or {pu}, it does add something of its own in addition to doing the same structural job of the empty {lo}. > {le cribe cu citka le jbari} suggests that I'm focusing on the unique > thing, to say something about it. Well, it could be several bears too, but your point stands. It is about a certain bear or certain bears in particular that I am saying something about. > {lo cribe cu citka le jbari} suggests that I'm focusing on bears in > general, to say something about them. Among other possibilitties, yes. It's too vague without more context. Just as you have to guess the time this is describing. If I was given that sentence out of context, my interpretation might be "bears ate the berries" (as opposed to dogs or racoons). I would not take it as a general statement describing what bears usually do because they are unlikely to be so related to some particular berries I have in mind. > Let's say that a girl runs her car into something. This was witnessed > by the girl's father, and by a bigot. The girls father says "THAT girl > can't drive" (le), the bigot says "that GIRL can't drive" (lo). > > Is this an accurate demonstration? (I prepare for the response "no, > both should use 'le', because they have a specific woman in mind" - in > which case I would ask "so le is used when you have actually > _encountered_ the certain thing?") Both could use {lo} or {le} in that case. {lo} because it is indeed a girl and that is all that {lo} requires. The more informative {le} is also possible if they are saying something about the particular girl in question. If the bigot wants to make a statement concluding something about girls in general, {le} would not work. > I would like to have what "in mind" means explained. I think {le} indeed serves to preclude the "any" or "in general" interpretation that {lo} does not preclude. mu'o mi'e xorxes To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.