From lojbab@GREBYN.COM Ukn Aug 3 00:33:13 1993 Received: from YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU by MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Tue, 3 Aug 1993 00:33:11 -0400 Received: from CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU by YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 4861; Tue, 03 Aug 93 00:32:05 EDT Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU by CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Mailer R2.07) with BSMTP id 0417; Tue, 03 Aug 93 00:33:39 EDT Date: Tue, 3 Aug 1993 00:31:30 EDT Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: Re: TECH: A pragmatics sampler X-To: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: Erik Rauch Status: RO X-Status: Message-ID: I find your examples here a bit unintelligible, partlyu becaus e they don't have parallel structure, oe of them has two "fo"s and both use ke'a in a way that mean nothing to me. So I fall back on your English (and reference to Russian) and think I understand your qeustion: mi cpedu fi ko'a fe le krinu be lenu leko'a xance cu desku I asked of him the reason for the event of his hands shaking. The Lojban is tenseless and thus totally pragmatics driven as to whether the shaking was in the past present or future of the asking. The Lojban SHOULD be tenseless unless the speaker wishes to make clear that one happened before, at the same time as, or after the other, in which case I would replace the "cu" with the appropriate pu/ca/ba (or maybe even a ZAhO %^) I will let others who can understand your examples better try to answer in terms of them if this is appropriate. I have to admit that I don't understand what "kau" has to do with this translation problem, other than that there is a question in there that might have to be made indirect: mi cpedu cusku fi ko'a fe lesedu'u ki'umakau l eko'a xance cu desku and this form still has tenselessness, or an optional clarifying tense on desk u. lojbab