Received: from uga.cc.uga.edu (uga.cc.uga.edu [128.192.1.5]) by locke.ccil.org (8.6.9/8.6.10) with SMTP id XAA05641 for ; Thu, 14 Sep 1995 23:47:50 -0400 Message-Id: <199509150347.XAA05641@locke.ccil.org> Received: from UGA.CC.UGA.EDU by uga.cc.uga.edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R3) with BSMTP id 9771; Thu, 14 Sep 95 23:32:23 EDT Received: from UGA.CC.UGA.EDU (NJE origin LISTSERV@UGA) by UGA.CC.UGA.EDU (LMail V1.2a/1.8a) with BSMTP id 3884; Thu, 14 Sep 1995 23:31:24 -0400 Date: Thu, 14 Sep 1995 23:30:50 -0400 Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: Re: afterthought conn within NU? X-To: veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI X-cc: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: John Cowan Status: OR X-From-Space-Date: Thu Sep 14 23:47:52 1995 X-From-Space-Address: <@uga.cc.uga.edu:LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET> Problems with after thought - well probably because the design for the connectives has been mostly an afterthought in the language design. JCB did a lot of work on forethought and afterthought connectives betweeen sentences and sumti, and a lesser amount on selbri connection. Abstract sentences themselves were only half-designed by JCB - the current flowering of their system did not emerge till 1989 when i was writing lesson 3 of the first textbook draft. Most other things in the language that can be connected, and all non logical connectives, were not designed until even later, and certainly not tested for robustness. The priority was always placed on making sure everything was sayable in forethought, because it was recognized that scope in afterthought was a probable too-hard-to-solve problem if analyzed to the fullest extent. Thus, most complex expressions have to be stated in forethought, and we have added in afterthought connectives whenever we could make them work within the YACC grammar, and then only to the extent that they fell out of the design easily. lojbab