From LOJBAN%CUVMB.BITNET@uga.cc.uga.edu Fri Nov 11 21:35:09 1994 Message-Id: <199411120235.AA25155@nfs2.digex.net> Date: Fri Nov 11 21:35:09 1994 From: ucleaar Subject: Re: "ro" doesn't imply +specific In-Reply-To: (Your message of Thu, 10 Nov 94 18:10:25 EST.) Status: RO John: > Such universal quantifications over finite sets can be +definite or -definite: > the 50 (not 51, And) states of the US can be +definite, but hardly the > zillion real-world rats; nobody even knows how many there are, never mind > knowing each rat in particular (urgh). For this and related reasons, > I remain skeptical about the utility of a +definite/-definite marker in > Lojban; if it existed, it would surely be a discursive. I absolutely agree +/-definite is the job of a discursive, but i think it might be useful, esp. with LE. If the discursive is "xo'i", then "xo'i le gerku" wd mean "a certain dog, & I reckon you know which dog I'm referring to". English, after all, appears to find marking definiteness rather useful. > Apropos counting {jecta}: most USAnians don't know how many provinces Canada > has, and I vaguely recall that England (not the U.K.) has 56 counties, but > I'm very prepared to be told I'm wrong. So 51 states isn't that bad. I've no idea how many counties England has, & even the people who count them don't agree on what counts as a county. (E.g. Rutland, which had a population of about two, got abolished by non-Rutlanders, but Rutland has never consented to its abolition.) --- And