From LOJBAN%CUVMB.BITNET@uga.cc.uga.edu Sat Mar 6 23:00:36 2010 Received: from uga.cc.uga.edu by MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Mon, 7 Dec 1992 04:19:59 -0500 Received: from UGA.CC.UGA.EDU by uga.cc.uga.edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 3983; Mon, 07 Dec 92 04:16:26 EST Received: from UGA.BITNET by UGA.CC.UGA.EDU (Mailer R2.08 PTF008) with BSMTP id 0443; Mon, 07 Dec 92 04:16:26 EST Date: Mon, 7 Dec 1992 09:10:22 GMT Reply-To: I.Alexander.bra0125@oasis.icl.co.uk Sender: Lojban list From: I.Alexander.bra0125@OASIS.ICL.CO.UK Subject: TECH RE: The Distribution Problem: An Ambiguity? X-To: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: Erik Rauch Status: RO X-Status: X-From-Space-Date: Mon Dec 7 09:10:22 1992 X-From-Space-Address: @uga.cc.uga.edu:LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET Message-ID: doi kolin. > 2) ... selgadri are not particularly relevant to the issue. You mentioned them, which meant they were in my mind while considering the distribution problem, and led to me drawing the analogy I did. The point of this analogy was simply to emphasise, by means of a specific example, the problems, not to say absurdities, which would be caused by arbitrarily mandating that tanru modification should be allowed to distribute over connectives. I agree that this example only works because of the specific nature of the tanru modification, but then I was choosing an extreme case to show that distributivity wouldn't work as a general principle. > ... nothing to do with jeks: it applies just as much with giheks. ?!? Of course it does. Why should they be any different. They're basically just syntactic variants of the same logical connective, along with eks and guheks and geks. > lo nixli gi'a nanla cu broda isn't grammatical: da poi nixli gi'a nanla cu broda I think we're basically in agreement here on the essential point. I was just trying to reinforce it by putting a different slant on it. doi kau,n. I think my instincts about the difficulty of defining {xai} may have been wrong. It has to modify the logical connective itself, otherwise we're no better off than before - Colin's analysis still applies. And (let's assume it has the syntax of a UI) {broda jexai brode} on it's own wouldn't have any meaning that was easy to describe. But I've more or less convinced myself that it _can_ be defined to have the right properties when used as a seltanru, i.e. {broda jexai brode brodu} is by definition the same as {broda bo brodu je brode bo brodu}. I don't see any reason whatsoever why the two tanru modifications shouldn't be of completely different kinds, unlike Colin. This isn't _quite_ as general as my proposal, but it certainly seems to satisfy the important requirement, and looks as if it will be simpler to understand intuitively. mi'e .i,n.