From cbmvax!uunet!cuvma.bitnet!LOJBAN Sat Feb 8 03:29:10 1992 Return-Path: Received: by snark.thyrsus.com (/\==/\ Smail3.1.21.1 #21.19) id ; Sat, 8 Feb 92 03:29 EST Received: by cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com (5.57/UUCP-Project/Commodore 2/8/91) id AA22988; Sat, 8 Feb 92 00:15:20 EST Received: from rutgers.edu by relay1.UU.NET with SMTP (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA16912; Sat, 8 Feb 92 00:12:45 -0500 Received: from cbmvax.UUCP by rutgers.edu (5.59/SMI4.0/RU1.4/3.08) with UUCP id AA24972; Fri, 7 Feb 92 22:32:30 EST Received: by cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com (5.57/UUCP-Project/Commodore 2/8/91) id AA19318; Fri, 7 Feb 92 22:26:23 EST Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU (via uunet.UU.NET) by relay2.UU.NET with SMTP (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA25727; Fri, 7 Feb 92 21:08:56 -0500 Message-Id: <9202080208.AA25727@relay2.UU.NET> Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU by CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU (IBM VM SMTP R1.2.1) with BSMTP id 6908; Fri, 07 Feb 92 21:07:12 EST Received: by CUVMB (Mailer R2.07) id 7756; Fri, 07 Feb 92 21:06:48 EST Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1992 17:44:09 -0500 Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: baselines and semantics X-To: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: John Cowan Status: RO And writes: >What I find particularly odd is Lojban's conjunction of rigid baselines >on the one hand, and on the other hand leaving vast tracts of the >language to be determined by usage. For example, gismu place structures >are baselined, but the meaning of the gismu is merely vaguely indicated >by a keyword, and the Lojban community is left to negotiate the word >meanings among themselves. >We are told that Lojban users complain if the grammar changes, yet most >of it - the semantics - never will be baselined. >From what Lojbab has said to me, it seems that the policy is to >baseline as much as possible, except for the semantics, because Lojbab & >his colleagues haven't the time or (he claimed) competence to create the >semantics. Furthermore, I'll claim that NO ONE has the competence to define a prescriptive semantics, because there is no unambiguous mode of expression to communicate semantics. Hence we can only through induction come up with a model of semantics. I believe that that model, if created, would differ for every human being, since semantics is a function of personal idiolect, not of a language as a whole. (Translated to English, that means "words mean what I want them to mean" with "I" moving with each new speaker of the phrase.) There are some items of the semantics of the language that can be defined as part of defining each word, but that definition is untested by usage to see if it works and covers all cases. I won't pretend to be omniscient enough to cover all possible expressions of meaning. It is an untested assumption basic to the language that the claims of logicians to the effect that a predicate structure can handle all such expressions - therefore an unambiguous predicate structure that has unambiguous bells and whistles to simplify the most obvious usages of natural language is possible based on that assumption. >This vacuum where much of the semantics would be in a natural language >undermines the merits of the prescriptiveness of the rest of the grammar. The merits of prescriptiveness in Lojban phonology and grammar is that the language is unambiguous in those areas. I don't believe a completely unambiguous semantics is possible, and I don't believe that most Lojbanists want it - hence the ever-recurring concern with the ability to joke, write poetry, or express metonymy in the language. We don't yet even know for sure that the prescribed rather loose Lojban handling of sumti-raising can be taught because it is not a conscious process for most language speakers. Yet unambiguous sumti-raising would be a vital first step in a semantic prescription. >It would make more sense to: >(a) abandon all baselines, simply offering offering the fruits of the >Lojbanists' considerable linguafactive talents to the community to do >with what they will, In effect, that is what we plan to do, after using the prescriptive baseline as a crutch to give people confidence in stability - that the language will not change like sand beneath their feet to such a degree that they will have to relearn things with every new design iteration. The concept of baselines says that a later design change must not change a previously baselined feature for reasons short of being severely broken. Areas baselined early are areas that people learning the language have been burned before by having them changed underfoot. Even tough we do occasionally make a baseline change, it almost invariably has been in an area not yet written up fully, and not significantly learned yet, and even then is psychological recognized as an addition, rather than a change. This can't be implemented prior to the language being done, and having a large enough speaker base that we have an established norm that has some psychological manifestation rather than a paper one, such that we are no longer reliant on 1 or 2 (all too human and error prone) people to set the examples. At that point, the norm itself replaces the baseline. >(b) make a commitment to the eventual baselining of all the grammar, >including the semantics (and add a couple of decades or more to the >date for the final baseline). This inherently defines why we won't do it. I don't intend to spend that kind of time completing the design of Loglan. Even if I wanted to, I can't see the community (or Nora for my personal work) supporting a language they can't yet learn and use. I have spent longer than I intended as it is. Nor are there others who want the job to my knowledge - if there are, they of course have the option to pick up the language where we stop prescribing and spend those decades. I certainly won't stop them; that is why the language baseline is in the public domain - so I CAN'T. But people will be learning the language faster than it can be prescribed, so I view such an activity as a waste of time other than as a theoretical effort. The bulk of our prescription is being made to enable us to teach the language at a distance. I am not a prescriptivist at heart, only as a teacher (and I don;t claim to be a good one). Our emphasis must turn from inventing a language to teaching it. Colin and Nick and Mark, etc. are demonstrating with each new writing effort that there is something there we can call a language and that at least some people can learn it. So let's be done with it. lojbab