Message-Id: <9202112046.AA30079@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu>
Date:         Wed, 12 Feb 1992 08:44:04 GMT+1200
Reply-To: cbmvax!uunet!otago.ac.nz!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!chandley
Sender: Lojban list <cbmvax!uunet!CUVMA.BITNET!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!LOJBAN>
From: Chris Handley <cbmvax!uunet!GANDALF.OTAGO.AC.NZ!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!CHandley>
Subject:      Re: Semantics
To: John Cowan <cowan@SNARK.THYRSUS.COM>,
        Eric Raymond <eric@SNARK.THYRSUS.COM>,
        Eric Tiedemann <est@SNARK.THYRSUS.COM>
Status: RO

Mark:

>This is just the "color" argument in not-very new clothing.  To an
>English speaker, "green" and "blue" are as different as could be
>wished, but a language foo speaker might have the same word and not
>see the difference. Even so the distinction between "cold-water"
>and "hot-water" where English uses just "water".  *Any* language,
>and any conlang, has to draw its line, and that line will be
>arbitrary, and that's just the way it is.
>
There are, as you say, always going to be problems mapping semantic
spaces on to each other. English and Dutch have about 300 different
words for things that float on water and carry people and/or goods;
most other languages have fewer than a dozen.

What this means is that the foo/lojban/foo dictionary will have to
be produced by native foo speakers, who will have to decide how to
do the mapping in terms of foo.

Chris Handley                                     chandley@otago.ac.nz
Dept of Computer Science                       Ph     (+64) 3-479-8499
University of Otago                           Fax     (+64) 3-479-8577
Dunedin, NZ