From @YaleVM.YCC.YALE.EDU:LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET Wed Aug 4 19:40:05 1993 Received: from MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU by NEBULA.SYSTEMSZ.CS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Wed, 4 Aug 1993 23:41:02 -0400 Received: from YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU by MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Wed, 4 Aug 1993 23:40:59 -0400 Message-Id: <199308050340.AA14438@MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU> Received: from CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU by YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 5188; Wed, 04 Aug 93 23:39:51 EDT Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU by CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Mailer R2.07) with BSMTP id 3168; Wed, 04 Aug 93 23:41:23 EDT Date: Wed, 4 Aug 1993 23:40:05 EDT Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: Re: TECH: query re. selcmavo NU X-To: snark!cowan@GVLS1.VFL.PARAMAX.COM X-Cc: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: Erik Rauch Status: O X-Status: John Cowan replies to And JC> > I am an event in the Lojban sense - I have duration, and can be JC> > located in time. So "mi nu prenu" would seem to be true, and, JC> > for that matter, the "nu" seems redundant, since every person JC> > is an event. JC> JC> Well, if so, then every predication whatsoever is an event. All I can JC> say is that "mi" is -ABSTRACT, whereas "le nu ..." is +ABSTRACT, and JC> that this is a mandatory category of Lojban. You are not an event. Actually, I think the ZAhO tenses in effect make it a truism that any predication in Lojban may be considered as an event. I think I agree with John that prgamatics will cause the use of -ABSTRACT where +ABSTRACT is expected to at least cause a double-take, and might, even if we would rather otherwise, cause one to presume that the speaker really intends "tu'a X" where X is the -ABSTRACT sumti. Any such case of pragmatics overriding the clear grammar is a BAD THING (tm), since it stands in the way of Lojban being usable to express nonsense clearly when appropriate, which is essential in a logical language according to JCB's assumptions (and mine). Thus we must discourage -ABSTRACT being used lightly when the +ABSTRACT is more accurate, so that -ABSTRACT will be taken literally when it really is the correct value for the sumti. lojbab