From: nsn@speech.language.unimelb.edu.au (Nick Legend Nicholas)
Message-Id: <9412190458.988@speech.language.unimelb.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Q-kau
To: lojbab@access.digex.net
Date: Mon, 19 Dec 1994 15:58:16 +1100 (EST)
Cc: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu (Lojban Mailing List)
In-Reply-To: <no.id> from "Logical Language Group" at Dec 15, 94 01:34:34 am
Content-Type: text
Content-Length:       2122
Status: RO

Hu'tegh! nuq ja' Logical Language Group jay'?

=BTW, I am also interested in how a language with totally free word order
=handles the quantificational problems.  Esperanto claims to have totally free
=word order - how does it deal with "Everybody loves somebody" with object
=first?  Any other order-free languages provide insights?

Esperanto, do something non-ropno? Come on! :)

Both Esperanto and Modern Greek yield no surprises when it comes to
quantification:

Modern Greek:

Oli        tus     aghapane  kapion
all (nom.) of them they love somebody (acc.)
All of them love somebody (\A x \E y)

Kapion aghapane oli tus
Somebody is loved by all of them (\E y \A x) --- defeasible, I think. (i.e.
context can force the other reading)

Kapios          aghapiete ap' olus tus
somebody (nom.) is loved  by  all  of them
Somebody is loved by all of them (\E y \A x)

Esperanto (the Full Analytic Grammar doesn't bother to investigate this
behaviour):

Cxiu             amas iun
everybody (nom.) love somebody (acc.)
All of them love somebody (\A x \E y)

Iun amas cxiu
Probably same story as with Greek.

Iu              estas amata de cxiu
somebody (nom.) is    loved by everybody
Somebody is loved by all of them (\E y \A x)

Of course, the best place to ask is something like the massively 
non-configurational (i.e. anything goes in word order) Australian languages.

Btw, yes, I'm still here. It's been a very hectic month with my thesis,
and it will be another couple of hectic months programming at Microsoft
coming up. But when all is done, I think I'll have a couple of tidbits from
Greek to report, concerning the veriidicality and presuppositions with
lonu vs. lenu...
-- 
 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @
 Nick Nicholas. Melbourne University, Aus. nsn@speech.language.unimelb.edu.au
                                    ---
"Some of the English might say that the Irish orthography is very Irish.
Personally, I have a lot of respect for a people who can create something so
grotesque."
-- Andrew Rosta <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>, <9307262008.AA95951@link-1.ts.bcc.ac.uk>