From cbmvax!uunet!CUVMA.BITNET!LOJBAN Mon Oct 14 00:10:48 1991 Return-Path: Date: Mon Oct 14 00:10:48 1991 Message-Id: <9110140329.AA29991@relay1.UU.NET> Reply-To: cbmvax!uunet!MULLIAN.EE.MU.OZ.AU!pucc.PRINCETON.EDU!nsn Sender: Lojban list From: cbmvax!uunet!MULLIAN.EE.MU.OZ.AU!pucc.PRINCETON.EDU!nsn Subject: Forwarding for Mark Shoulson and his deranged mailer X-To: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu X-Cc: nsn@ee.mu.oz.au To: John Cowan , Eric Raymond , Eric Tiedemann Status: RO From: Mark E. Shoulson Date: Thu, 10 Oct 91 09:16:14 EDT To: nsn%MULLIAN.EE.MU.OZ.AU@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu In-Reply-To: nsn%MULLIAN.EE.MU.OZ.AU@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu's message of Thu, 10 Oct 1991 11:56:59 +1000 Subject: Miscellanea Another thing about John's discussion of Lojban possessives, and the possessive's in general: Although the typical example of an inalienable possessive is "le birka po'e mi" (the arm inalienably-possessed-by me), One should note that "birka", like most words which are likely to be subject to inalienable possession, has a place for the possessor, so I'd use "le birka be mi". Use the Place Structures, Luke ((tm) Lojbab). In fact, it's a rare word that I can find which is likely ever to need "po'e" (except perhaps in a hyperbolic sense) which doesn't already have a place. This doesn't mean we don't need po'e; things still do exist and will pop up. I, too, have trouble with the distiction between "sei" and "to", but I'm working on it. The real problem I have with the grammar involves all the connectives; I'm unsure as to how they all work. (I understand GIhA, A, JOI, and JA, but I'm not sure which forethoughts do what). And I still wonder why you can have "nagi'a" but not "naga" (or "nagi"). More on that when I've made sense of my questions. And a free bonus complaint: How come there's a gismu for "curse" (dapma), but not one for "bless"? Call me prejudiced, but I'd much rather see a gismu for "bless" and need to use "to'e" to get a "curse" selbri (cf. Esperanto "beni" vs. "malbeni"). Seems more natural to me. Any suggestions? ~mark