Message-Id: <199602121558.KAA27495@locke.ccil.org>
Date:         Sun, 11 Feb 1996 15:00:17 +0000
Reply-To: ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>
Sender: Lojban list <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
From: ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>
Subject:      Re: tech: logic matters
To: John Cowan <cowan@LOCKE.CCIL.ORG>
Status: OR
Content-Length: 2540

> >> pc: Again, I am not sure what the choice here is.  I guess it is what _ro
> >> broda cu brode _ is an abbreviation for.  I do not know what the
> >> official line is on that at the moment: is it as xorxes gives it or is
> >> it _ro da poi broda cu brode_?
> >The official line is that it = {ro da poi}. But {ro da poi} has been
> >being understood as equivalent to {ro da ganai ... gi}. That, I learn
> >from you, is wrong. So now I think it should be equivalent to
> >{ro da ganai ... gi}. Nothing is shorthand for {ro da poi}.
> I *think* that the status quo is that "ro broda" is rather uncertain in
> definition. Cowan has proposed a change, I think to ro da poi from ro lo.

I thought we had reached agreement that {ro broda} = {ro da poi kea broda}.
Also, {ro lo broda} = {ro da poi kea broda}. I am seeking to get that
altered, as in the quote above.

> I am uncertain - my leanings were the other way - to "ro le". "ro broda"
> in my mind is NOT part of the logical expressioj of the language - it is
> a fuzzy-semantics-naturalistic-shortcut.  You should NOT use it if you
> want to be logically exact.

I don't see what your policy gains, bar confusion.

> ro da poi da broda is I THINK a claim that broda's exist if I understand
> pc, and I have no problem with this

right

> unless there is some marking of hypotheticalness. If I recall previous pc
> pronouncements, unicorns exist by the fact that we talk about them from a
> logical standpoint, so the "universe of discourse" has nothing to do with
> the real world.  (If I have pc wrong on this, it is undoubtedly my fuzzy
> memory/understanding.)

Let's for the time being not restart that unresolved modal logic thread...

> I believe that >I< have assumed that ro lo broda is close to equivalent
> to ro da ganai ... gi.

Why only close to?

> But that is the "lo" that brings in the conditional existence.

I see no sense to that.

> >What I do care about is that {ro (lo) broda} should be equiv to {ro da
> >ganai broda gi}.
> I think that with the "lo" there, it is the case, as I just said.

You said "close", not "equivalent".

> Without the "lo", it may no longer be the same as with the "lo".

It's not. Well - with {ro} it comes to the same thing, but if you change
{ro} to {ci} then it makes a difference. {ci broda cu brode} means
{da poi kea ci mei zou ro de na ku ge de cmima da gi na ku brode},
while if you change it to {ci lo broda cu brode} the effect is as if
you lifted that {da poi kea ci mei} up to the start of the highest
prenex.

coo, mie and