Date: Wed, 13 Jul 1994 15:28:00 -0400
From: Logical Language Group <lojbab>
Message-Id: <199407131928.AA15695@access1.digex.net>
To: nsn@vis.mu.oz.au
Subject: Re: New to Lojban
Cc: lojbab@access.digex.net, lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu
Status: RO
X-From-Space-Date: Wed Jul 13 15:28:11 1994
X-From-Space-Address: lojbab

NS> =BO> 1) Though lojban is more a linguistic exercise than a tongue intended 
NS> =BO> everyday speech, is there a "Conversational Lojban" primer.  
NS> =Well, I wouldn't call it just a linguistic exercise - sounds too much like
NS> =we don't intend that anyone ever actualy USE the thing.  In order to be
NS> =useful for linguistics research (at least for the linguists to accept it a
NS> =such) it BY DEFINITION has to be used/useful for everyday speech.
NS> 
NS> I heartily agree. It is the wrong attitude to take, to think that Lojban
NS> --More--
NS> can't do all the shitwork of everyday conversation. The funny thing is,
NS> I've shifted over the years from being a formalist, fascinated by what
NS> Lojban can do (and there is a beauty to that), to being a functionalist,
NS> fascinated  by what it isn't *designed* to do (non-formal semantics
NS> (cognitive, prototype, etc.), pragmatics, discourse structure), and seeing
NS> how people get around  *that*. 
NS> 
NS> In fact, given how much Lojban is committed to formal semantics, I think
NS> the  most important lesson it has to teach us is not how formal semantics
NS> describes  language, but how it fails to. As I've maintained ever since I
NS> learnt the  language (must be three years now. And it made a linguist out
NS> of me. Wow...), in many of its avowed aims, Lojban will probably fail. And
NS> therein will lie  its greatest success.
NS> 
NS> That's just me, of course. The community as a whole seems to me friendlier
NS> towards formal approaches.

I'd like to see you expound about this more sometime, especially your
thoughts about what Lojban is and isn't designed to do and what you have
observed as a result.  I think this may be the basis for a "lessons learned"
paper:  what happens to pragmatics in Lojban (to the extent this is
determinable)?  What in particular does Lojban tell us about formal
semantics?

I don't hink Lojban is all that formal in its semantics - you certainly pushed
things that direction with your lujvo paper, and the trend is continuing, but
in terms of formality, we are nowhere near the level that we are in the
formalism of the grammar.

Here's your chance to get Lojban published academically!  See any possibilities?

lojbab