Message-Id: <m0qx9P8-00006SC@xiron.pc.helsinki.fi>
Date:         Tue, 18 Oct 1994 08:56:25 BST
Reply-To:     i.alexander.bra0125@oasis.icl.co.uk
Sender:       Lojban list <LOJBAN%CUVMB.bitnet@FINHUTC.hut.fi>
From:         i.alexander.bra0125@OASIS.ICL.CO.UK
Subject:      Re: 'any' as discursive
To:           Veijo Vilva <veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI>
Content-Length: 2608
Lines: 67

cu'u pycy
>         Veion's idea is a good one, IF he can find a case.  But IMHO
> 'any' ain't gonna provide any.

"I will eat any apple" may not be the right example, but I had this
idea as well, and I still think it's right.
The examples that come to mind are imperatives, e.g. "Pick a card,
any card" - "Let there be a card such that you choose it" -
"Make it such that there is a card which you have chosen".
These are also effectively opaque, but there doesn't seem to me
to be any universal quantification going on.

I'm not entirely sure that there is a universal quantification
in Veijo's example either.  There is, I agree, such a quantification
implied by some instances of "any", but "I will eat any
apple you choose" certainly doesn't mean-to-me "For any x,
x an apple, I will eat x", which would be "I will eat
all the apples you choose".  It's more like "I permit
you to choose an apple, which I will then eat" -

    curmi le nu pa plise poi se cuxna do cu se citka mi
    curmi le nu do cuxna gi'e mi citka vau pa plise

(This isn't quite right yet - more later.)

This doesn't tell the whole story, of course.  We frequently
find hidden assumptions in everyday discourse.  This says
what is permitted, but not what is forbidden.

cu'u la djer.
>                 2. It is a typical apple. No outliers are under
>                 consideration.

This isn't so much part of the meaning of the single word
"any", as a much broader-based part of the extra-linguistic
context.  You have no right to require me to perform any
particular action, such as eating a particular apple, but
we don't say this explicitly.  There is in general no
economical way to make such things explicit - they have
to be left to common sense.  I explicitly allow you to
choose an apple, within certain common-sense limitations,
which I then offer to eat - I may or may not be amenable
to eating more than one chosen-by-you apples, and you must
use your common sense to imagine what the limits might be
on the number as well as the quality.

This intensional (or do I mean intentional) stuff is tricky.
I'm not sure my earlier Lojban example is entirely accurate.

    curmi le nu do cuxna pa plise, noi mi citka

That non-restrictive qualification feels right, although
I'm not entirely what the distinction means in Predicate
Calculus terms.

    curmi le nu mi citka pa plise poi do cuxna

is wrong - it means I'll eat one of the apples you choose.

    curmi le nu do cuxna pa plise poi mi citka

is better - I may eat other apples as well, but this only allows
you to choose one of them.

ca banzu

mu'o mi'e .i,n.