From cbmvax!uunet!CUVMA.BITNET!LOJBAN Tue Mar 24 21:47:35 1992 Return-Path: Received: by snark.thyrsus.com (/\==/\ Smail3.1.21.1 #21.19) id ; Tue, 24 Mar 92 21:47 EST Received: by cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com (5.57/UUCP-Project/Commodore 2/8/91) id AA16023; Tue, 24 Mar 92 21:41:48 EST Received: from pucc.Princeton.EDU by relay1.UU.NET with SMTP (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA11197; Tue, 24 Mar 92 21:08:35 -0500 Message-Id: <9203250208.AA11197@relay1.UU.NET> Received: from PUCC.PRINCETON.EDU by pucc.Princeton.EDU (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 5439; Tue, 24 Mar 92 21:07:56 EST Received: by PUCC (Mailer R2.08 ptf012) id 2992; Tue, 24 Mar 92 21:07:37 EST Date: Tue, 24 Mar 1992 16:48:27 EST Reply-To: John Cowan Sender: Lojban list From: John Cowan Subject: Re: A fairy tale X-To: Lojban List To: John Cowan , Eric Raymond , Eric Tiedemann Status: RO la .iVAN. derdjimbab. cusku di'e > > > Er, I think {slabu} meant {to'e cnino}, not {to'e citno}. > > > > I hope you're wrong. > > Verdict, Messrs LeChevalier and Cowan? The place structures confirm that "slabu" and "cnino" are the parallel ones. A better gloss of "slabu" would be "familiar". Unfortunately, Bob has said repeatedly that "ni slabu" is "age" as in "length of life". I have complained about this almost as often but to no avail. To my way of thinking, the notion that length of life has something to do with old-ness is an un-thought-out reflex of the English idiom "He is six years old." This is very non-logical: in what sense is a person of six said to be "old" = "toe'rcitno"? > Well, actually, maybe I'm wrong. It seems to me that something can > only be called a {nazbi} if it is really a body part - a breathing > tool and organ of olfaction. If this is not the case, then I propose > the Slavic-inspired tanru {cucyza'u} for the heel part of the shoe. I don't have a problem with this lujvo: as soon as I looked up the unfamiliar rafsi I accepted it. In general, the body parts (like the chemical elements, the plants and animals, and other parts of the gismu list with which people often have trouble) are put in for use in true metaphor. The notion that a table has legs has been enshrined in Lojban/Loglan since the beginning. Likewise, it causes no problem to say that a clock has hands and a face. Bob has proposed "river-anus" for what in English is called a river mouth. -- cowan@snark.thyrsus.com ...!uunet!cbmvax!snark!cowan e'osai ko sarji la lojban