From LOJBAN@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU Sat Mar 6 22:53:52 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI Received: (qmail 16017 invoked from network); 25 Sep 1997 16:12:44 -0000 Received: from segate.sunet.se (192.36.125.6) by xiron.pc.helsinki.fi with SMTP; 25 Sep 1997 16:12:44 -0000 Received: from segate.sunet.se by SEGATE.SUNET.SE (LSMTP for OpenVMS v1.1a) with SMTP id <6.0F0610BB@SEGATE.SUNET.SE>; Thu, 25 Sep 1997 18:12:33 +0100 Date: Thu, 25 Sep 1997 16:19:30 GMT+0 Reply-To: And Rosta Sender: Lojban list From: And Rosta Organization: University of Central Lancashire Subject: Re: LE and VOI X-To: LOJBAN@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: Veijo Vilva Content-Length: 1248 Lines: 30 Message-ID: Jorge: > but I don't see any need to stress that we really are talking > about a real cat, since that will be the default assumption. > Context has to clearly indicate otherwise for {le mlatu} to > refer to something that is not a cat. I used to agree with that, but then came across a footnote in McCawley where he gives "the man standing over there drinking a martini is having an affair" said at a party by someone trying to point the man out to someone else. The speaker does not wish to assert that the man really is drinking a martini; if the man is not actually drinking a martini, but something else instead that just looks like martini, the speaker does not want the overall sentence to be false. Rather the "standing over there drinking a martini" bit is just used to guide the addressee in assigning reference. So the following combos are useful: 1 nonspecific, veridical 2 specific, veridical, "indefinite" (= referent not (necessarily) identifiable by addressee) 3 specific, nonveridical, "definite" (= referent not (necessarily) identifiable by addressee) Function 1 is performed by {lo}. Functions 2 & 3 are both performed by {le}. Both 2 & 3 are useful, & it wd be nice to think of an easy way to distinguish them. --And