Message-Id: <199501242143.AA28233@nfs2.digex.net>
Date:         Tue, 24 Jan 1995 21:02:07 +0000
Reply-To: ucleaar <ucleaar@ucl.ac.uk>
Sender: Lojban list <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
From: ucleaar <ucleaar@ucl.ac.uk>
Subject:      Re: replies re. ka & mamta be ma
To: Bob LeChevalier <lojbab@access.digex.net>
In-Reply-To:  (Your message of Mon, 23 Jan 95 18:08:33 EST.)
Status: RO

Jorge:
> > I could change the example to "siblings of Jorge and And" (nonspecific
> > "siblings") to make the point that the problem remains (not that you
> > suggested otherwise).
> If you want some of them, but making sure that there is at least one of
> yours and one of mine, then I don't think you can do it with a single
> "tunba", but neither does your xo'u solve that "problem".

I am claiming that

  I met some sibling(s) of Xorxes and I met some sibling(s) of And

is equivalent to

  Ax, x is a member of {Xorxes, And}, Ey, y is sibling of x: I met y

which translates (without loss of precision) as:

  I met lo sibling be ro luha luhi la xorxes ce la and

So, if my claim is correct, the problem of having to expand coordination
is solved.

> > > What I had understood before was that {xo'u} lets you jump from one
> > > prenex (the one in the embedded clause) to another (the one in the
> > > outside clause).
> > Well if that were the case, the issue would still arise of where in the
> > higher prenex you jump to - the start of the prenex so far, or the end
> > of the prenex so far. My version - "jump to the start of the highest
> > prenex" generalizes one of those two solutions.
> Well, I think that the normal thing would be to the end of the higher
> prenex so far. (Next outer prenex or outermost? I think next outer makes
> more sense, but since I'm really not in favour of xo'u I don't care much.)

The case that motivated pc to propose xohu (or something resembling it)
is "Pick a card" meaning "There is a card I command you to pick", and
NOT "I command you to make it the case that there is a card that you
pick". Without xohu that is unsayable.

I suggest that the simplest rule for interpreting xohu is "the following
sumti has scope over everthing said so far in this sentence".

> "Jump to the start of the highest prenex" has undesirable effects.
> For example:
>        ro prenu cu djuno le du'u da prami py
>        Every person knows that someone loves them.
>        (But they may not know who that someone is.)
>
>        ro prenu cu djuno le du'u xo'u da prami py
>        For every person, there is somone that they know loves them.
>
> But you want it to mean:
>
>        There is someone such that every person knows that they
>        are loved by that someone.
>
> I find the first interpretation much more coherent with how
> quantification works in general.

Why? As far as I'm aware, the default is that something has scope
over what it precedes. I don't see that this is more or less coherent
with either rule for the scope of something flagged by xohu.

Broadly speaking, I think that my suggestion is preferable only
because the rule for it is simpler. But if we're taking into account
intuitions of naturalness, consider (1). This has the interpretations
in (2a-d), (2a) being the one we gett where scope follows linear
precedence. If the scope of "a book" is altered by xohu according
to your proposals, we get (2b), while under mine we get (2c).

(1)  Every man promised each of their friends to give me a book.
(2a)  Ax, man(x), Ay woman(y): x promised y that Ez, book(z) and
      x give me z.
(2b)  Ax, man(x), Ay friend(y,x), Ez, book(z): x promised y that
      x give me z.
(2c)  Ez, book(z), Ax, man(x), Ay friend(y,x): x promised y that
      x give me z.
(2d)  Ax, man(x), Ez, book(z), Ay friend(y,x): x promised y that
      x give me z.

I find all of these readings possible, but (2b) the least obvious.
(2d) is the most obvious. Mind you, speakers' intuitions about
quantifier scope are notoriously shaky.

> I don't even want to consider what rules to use when a second xo'u
> appears.

Use the same rule, whether yours or mine.

> > "I like the house having a colour". The solution
> > could simply be to make x2 of skari specific. Use {keha} or {le cohe}
> > or something:
> >   mi se pluka le nu le zdani cu skari le cohe
> >   mi se pluka le ka keha skari le cohe kei be le zdani
> > "I like it that the house has that colour".
> That works only because the se pluka coincides with the speaker. Let me
> change to "she likes what colour the house has", which would be
> {ko'a se pluka le nu le zdani cu skari makau}. The speaker doesn't
> know the colour of the house, so I don't think {le co'e} would be right
> there.

You're right. Let me try another tack:
Say I know the house is blue: then I could say "She likes it that the
house is blue". But if I don't know what colour the house is then I
can say "She likes it that the house is the colour it is", or "She
likes the fact that the house is the colour it is". How to render this
into Lojban? Pred calc first:

  Ex, x is the colour of the house & she likes the fact that x is the
  colour of the house

That goes straightforwardly into Lojban. Furthermore - dare I say it? -
it seems that xohu will make this less cumbersome:

   koha prami lo nu le zdani cu skari xohu da
   Ex, koha likes the fact that x is the colour of the house.

Okay. If you accept that, then your beautiful example doesn't need
makau. However, let's go back to makau in the frica example, since
I have at long last understood adequately (I hope) what you intend.

  koha kohe frica le ka keha se skari makau

  Koha and kohe differ in terms of the colour they are.
  Koha and kohe differ by virtue of the fact that they are the colour
    they are.

  ro da, da is member of {koha, kohe}, ro de, da skari de:
     koha kohe frica le nu da skari de

There's an ugly repetition of {skari}, but it is sayable.

Do you buy that?

----
And