From: cbmvax!uunet!mullian.ee.mu.OZ.AU!nsn
Message-Id: <9105150157.23130@mullian.ee.mu.OZ.AU>
To: lojban-list@snark.thyrsus.com
Cc: nsn@mullian.ee.mu.oz.au
Subject: More Chemelem stuff
Organisation: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Melbourne
Smiley-Convention: %From cbmvax!uunet!mullian.ee.mu.OZ.AU!nsn Tue May 14 23:30:44 1991
From: cbmvax!uunet!mullian.ee.mu.OZ.AU!nsn
Message-Id: <9105150209.23712@mullian.ee.mu.OZ.AU>
To: lojban-list@snark.thyrsus.com
Cc: nsn@mullian.ee.mu.oz.au
Subject: Gismu list on-line
Organisation: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Melbourne
Smiley-Convention: %^)
Date: Wed, 15 May 91 12:09:40 +1000
Status: RO

In case you didn't know, the Published gismu lists are available on-line
from the Planned Languages Server, langserv@ivory.cc.columbia.edu
The format of requests is to mail the command "send [archive] [file]"
and/or "index [archive]", the relevant archive name being lojban. Jimc's
Welding Shop is also on there, and if policy gets passed, so will a lot of
LLG stuff in the near future.

^)
Date: Wed, 15 May 91 11:57:09 +1000


la djan. kau,n. pu cusku

>When I posted my list of names and le'avla for the chemical elements,
>I posted the existing chemical element gismu without comment, accepting
>them as a fait accompli.  Since then, there has been plenty of complaint,
>notably from la djim. kartr. (who proposes adding some and dropping others)
>and la .iVAN. and la nitcion. (who don't like any of them).

We've just started, mate %^) Anyway, after lojbab's recent "History of 
le'avla", I think this is all much ado about nothing: this is not a question
of gismu versus le'avla (just as well, because justifying these elems as
gismu has led to the world-be metaphorism we have both critisised; the question
is thus no longer semantic), but between Type 3 and Type 4 lea'vla.

What I would like (and what would finally put the MFC/Chemelem/flora/fauna 
dispute to rest) is for these items to leave the gismu list and be recognised
as our first official Type 4 le'avla. The semantic silliness we've con-
structed around them would die off, and given that all le'avla can be used as
rafsi and modifiers, the criterion for Type 4 vs. Type 3 usage becomes simply
one of Zipfism or neutrality, rather than semantics. This changes only the
clasification of words, not necessarily the words themselves; so such a change
need not be unnecessarily disruptive (as outright zapping the words' current
forms might be). As a byproduct, the gismu move much closer to being a set
of semantic primitives.

The criterion for Type 4 vs. Type 3 is tricky, and I'd go for freuqency of
use in lay conversation, rather than internationality. Indeed, I have this
nagging suspicion that numbering the damn things will do just find (the
one-eight-chemical-primitive, rather than "Argon"). Have we given this any
consideration?

Re other things: the diklujvo po'e la djim. are a start for discussion, but
not the solution for lojban, of course. His first class is impossible in
lojban: a lujvo MUST have the place structure of its last rafsi (we shouldn't
be playing games with place structures like that). It is not essential to
resolve between parallel and transitive, or place structure - leave it to
context. that's what we have {ki'a} for. But will lojbo be happy with just
those two analyses? How to diklujvo something like {fonxa tavla}? This really
corresponds to {lenu tavla vecu'u lo fonxa}. Is it acceptable to have the
lo'opli guess the BAI lexeme linking the two? Hm - maybe context isn't that
good after all...