From LOJBAN%CUVMB.BITNET@uga.cc.uga.edu Sat Mar 6 23:00:55 2010 Received: from uga.cc.uga.edu by MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Thu, 24 Sep 1992 09:33:12 -0400 Received: from UGA.CC.UGA.EDU by uga.cc.uga.edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 7835; Thu, 24 Sep 92 09:31:56 EDT Received: by UGA (Mailer R2.08 PTF008) id 1637; Thu, 24 Sep 92 09:29:08 EDT Date: Thu, 24 Sep 1992 14:01:09 BST Reply-To: I.Alexander.bra0122@oasis.icl.co.uk Sender: Lojban list From: I.Alexander.bra0122@OASIS.ICL.CO.UK Subject: RE: TECH: Higley on "kau" + SEI X-To: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: Erik Rauch Status: RO X-Status: X-From-Space-Date: Thu Sep 24 09:33:14 1992 X-From-Space-Address: @uga.cc.uga.edu:LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET Message-ID: {kau} was the subject of the first comment I posted on the list. My interpretation of John Cowan's response is that {kau} isn't about _"knowledge"_, it's about _abstraction_, in particular, the _identity_ of the concept it's attached to. So {lekau prenu} is "the identity of the person". Since it's a UI, it can be attached to almost anything, to denote the identity of e.g. a logical connective. The current official position is that exactly _which_ member of the selma'o (or presumably, which gismu) is used is not important, although it might indicate something about the type of value expected. With this interpretation, {le pakau prenu} means "the number of people", i.e. essentially the same as {leni prenu}. In practice, it frequently occurs inside a {du'u} abstraction, with the side-effect of "inverting" the whole construct to refer to the identity of whatever is tagged, within the given context. To my mind, this means it changes the meaning of {du'u}. Further complications arise if the {du'u} is nested, in which case subscripts need to be used to indicate that the {kau} is relative to an outer {du'u}. Things might be simpler if a separate cmavo, say {xau}, in selma'o NU, was allocated for this usage, meaning "x1 is the identity of whatever is tagged with {kau} in [bridi]". Colin: > As I have said in a comment on somebody's cafe text, I don't believe that > "se'i" works like that at all. As things stand at present, all discursives, > like all attitudinals (other than "pei") strictly refer to the speaker's > intentions/quality of knowledge/attitude. I have on occasion wanted a way to > indicate somebody else's attitude etc., but I'm not convinced that it is > desirable. ("se'i" is about whether the speaker's attitude relates to vo'a, > not about whose attitude it is). As I understand it, the way to indicate someone else's attitude etc. is to use something like {sei [vo'a] jinvi}. Iain.