Message-Id: <m0rF9ko-00007GC@xiron.pc.helsinki.fi>
Date:         Tue, 6 Dec 1994 23:43:18 GMT
Reply-To:     ia@stryx.demon.co.uk
Sender:       Lojban list <LOJBAN%CUVMB.bitnet@FINHUTC.hut.fi>
From:         Iain Alexander <ia@STRYX.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject:      Re: TECH:  existential quantification
To:           Veijo Vilva <veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI>
Content-Length: 1307
Lines: 26

la djan. kau,n. cusku di'e sa'ecu'i
> I think this statement evinces a confusion beween "nu" and "mu'e", between
> events and point-events.  In Lojban, a state is a kind of event.  You may
> say that a state is made up of a welding-together of many point-events,
> provided you quantize time (and we don't have to), but nothing can be done
> with states that can't be done with (generalized, {nu}) events.

I'm not quite sure what point you're trying to make here.
I may well be misinterpreting the word "state" in the description
of {za'i}.  However one of it's connotations in English is
state-of-affairs, which is a generalised situation as distinct
from any particular event(s), and bears a close family relationship
with "properties".  Some of us tend to think of {nu} as describing
a discrete event, and we need some way of talking about the
more abstract concept.  In particular, there's a danger that
in bridi like {mi djica lo nu broda}, we come up against the
same old transparency/opacity problem w.r.t the event itself
that we get with a more concrete object (e.g. {mi djica [tu'a]
lo plise}), leading to a potentially infinite regress.

It may well be that <{nu} vs. {za'i}> is not the answer to
this one, but I'd like to know what is.

co'o mi'e .i,n.
--
Iain Alexander (ia@stryx.demon.co.uk)