Message-Id: <199602220145.UAA03828@locke.ccil.org>
Date:         Wed, 21 Feb 1996 18:07:33 +0000
Reply-To: ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>
Sender: Lojban list <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
From: ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>
Subject:      Re: *old response to And on fuzzy proposals
To:         lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu
Content-Length: 2600

> >> Metalinguistic bridi can override ANYTHING.  The classic example is
> >> "sei ti jitfa" embedded in a sentence (this sentence is a lie).
> >where {ti} refers to {dei}, I presume.
> Correct.  Late nite "brain fart".
> Clarifying on the "brain fart", "ti" was wrong, not sloppy in the sei
> statement.

I think calling it "wrong" is a bit extreme. Misleading, maybe. Glico,
yes. Malglico, maybe.

> >At any rate, you are completely mistaken about metalinguistics. They
> >cannot override everything. For example, {do jinvi kuau la djan cu
> >sei dei/ti jitfa seu gerku} does not mean {you believe that John
> >is not a dog}. To say that, you use {na}.
> kuauau? Oh yeah that is "lenu or is it lonu? or lesedu'u  Whatever.  i
> think I know what you mean.

{kuau} takes a bridi and yields a sumti. It is equivalent to "le du'u",
etc.

> It means "it is false that {You believe that John is a dog}

Well - rather, it means "You believe that John is a dog. What I just
said is untrue." - that gets the meaning better. Consider
{ko jinvi kuau la djan cu sei dei jitfa seu gerku}. That does not
mean "Make it false that you believe that John is a dog" or "It
is false that I command you to believe that J is a dog". It means
"Believe J is a dog (- it so happens that you don't believe he is a
dog)".

> It also happens that
> do na jinvi kuau la djan cu gerku
> also has the same English translation.

No. Well - at a push maybe, but it would be a crappy translation. You
wouldn't catch a subtilist like Jorge making them translation equivalents.

> I do not know whether they are semantically identical - just
> indistingushable in English, hence I do not know how to talk about any
> potential differences.

The trick is to discuss non main clause declarative bridi. That brings
differences out. Also, {go.i} anaphora: it picks up {na} but not
{sei dei jitfa}. So {ti na broda i ta go,i} means {... i ta na broda},
while {ti broda sei dei jitfa i ta go,i} means {... i ta broda}.

> >> >They (the ones I understand) are of no use.
> >> Any comments on the truth or falsity of the currnet bridi or components
> >> therof areexactly what we had in mind for metaplingusitics.
> >Fair enough. But we are seeking ways to do fuzzy "negation", not
> >ways to comment on the truth of the current bridi.
> Thus you appear to claim that begation is something other than a comment
> on the truth of the current bridi.  I do not see any difference.

I hope you will now. It's important to see the difference, in order to
prevent discursive abuse [misuse of discursives, not insulting discussions].

coo, mie and