From @YaleVM.YCC.YALE.EDU:LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET Tue Feb 2 12:03:35 1993 Received: from YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU by MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Tue, 2 Feb 1993 17:34:23 -0500 Received: from CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU by YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 4024; Tue, 02 Feb 93 17:32:54 EST Received: from CUVMB.BITNET by CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Mailer R2.07) with BSMTP id 7210; Tue, 02 Feb 93 17:30:04 EST Date: Tue, 2 Feb 1993 17:03:35 -0500 Reply-To: John Cowan Sender: Lojban list From: John Cowan Subject: Re: Goats' legs and counting X-To: Lojban List To: Erik Rauch In-Reply-To: <9211031338.AA23680@relay2.UU.NET> from "Mark E. Shoulson" at Nov 3, 92 08:32:29 am Status: RO X-Status: Message-ID: <0MdGOSzcDVK.A.JHE.St0kLB@chain.digitalkingdom.org> la mark. clsn. cusku di'e > I've been mulling over John's comments about how in Lojban something like > {lo'e remna cu se tuple reda} has to be a complete enumeration. Something > about it didn't sit right with me, and I think I have some worthwhile > comments on it. > > John says the enumeration must be complete, that is, you can't say that a > goat has two legs, even though it has, because to speak completely, you > have to say it has four. I say that if and only if you use an exact numeral. Of course you can say it has at-least-two legs with no problem. > Well, let's play with some other expressions: > > "He has small hands" can be expressed prettily and lojbanically as {ko'a se > xance lo cmalu} (I will not be forced to say {lo xance be ko'a cu cmalu}). > What if I want to say "He has one blue eye"? John will forbid me from > saying {ko'a se kanla pa blanu} if in fact he has more than one eye. I finally grasp what's going on here, after talking with lojbab and pc and reading a book or two on logic. No, I don't forbid that, and here's the explanation: ko'a se kanla pa blanu -> ko'a se kanla pa lo blanu -> ko'a se kanla pa da poi blanu -> pa da poi blanu zo'u ko'a se kanla da which reads: "There is exactly one X, where X is restricted to blue things, such that he1 has-as-eye X." So if he has two blue eyes, then you are wrong; but if he has a blue eye and any number of not-blue eyes (including zero), then all is well. > And don't start telling me it's only with {da}-series words. Would John > permit me to say {lo'e kanba cu se tuple re tuple}? I doubt it; it's > incomplete. (I suppose I shouldn't have use {re tuple}, given my > discussion above; how about {re datci}). zo datci cu se basti .ei zo dacti I would reject this, based on the same reasoning: lo'e kanba cu se tuple re da poi tuple -> re da poi tuple zo'u lo'e kanba cu se tuple da which reads "There are exactly two Xes, where Xes are restricted to being legs, such that the-typical goat is-be-legged-by Xes." Obviously false. > Nor will I accept that it only works with numerals. For one thing, that > breaks a lot of the Lojban model, and for another, everything is implicitly > quantified anyway. True, but the implicit quantifications are things like "su'o" and "pisu'o" for exactly that reason -- so that you don't wind up making claims about number which are required to be correct. If you introduce a number into a bridi, however, you had better mean it. > Besides, what about "There were many things on the > floor, among them my foot (one of my feet)": {so'ida cpana le loldi .ije > pada jamfu mi}. I'm told the ijek doesn't reset {da}'s, so this should be > right. This is okay, because the first use of "da" binds it, whereas in the second use it is already bound and "pada" means "one of the Xes". > This seems to be another incarnation of the "only" discussion we had a > while back, with our different translations of "only". John would have me > believe that {ko'a se kanla pa blanu} means "he has one blue eye *only*", > and that just doesn't seem to work for me. No, it means "he has only one blue eye." As explained, he may be be-eyed (urgh) by any number of other things that are not (contradictory negation) blue. -- John Cowan cowan@snark.thyrsus.com ...!uunet!cbmvax!snark!cowan e'osai ko sarji la lojban.