Date: Sun, 9 Nov 1997 12:01:28 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199711091701.MAA07681@locke.ccil.org> Reply-To: JORGE JOAQUIN LLAMBIAS Sender: Lojban list From: JORGE JOAQUIN LLAMBIAS Subject: Re: mukti / djica X-To: lojban To: John Cowan Status: OR X-Mozilla-Status: 0011 Content-Length: 6202 X-From-Space-Date: Sun Nov 9 12:01:29 1997 X-From-Space-Address: LOJBAN@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU cu'u la veion > I don't think it is only a matter of tense. A state of emergency > might motivate you to behave in a certain way without a purpose > connected with the state of emergency per se. Yes, I see your point. I could say: le nu le zdani cu jelca cu mukti le nu barkla kei mi The house burning motivates me to come out. But I could not use {le nu le zdani cu jelca} as a te djica. >Also some state > which will prevail tomorrow might motivate you to behave in a > certain way today: if you know the shops will be closed tomorrow, > you are motivated to do your shopping today. Here I'm not so sure. The motivation is your knowledge, not the shops being closed itself. Suppose you go and do your shopping today, but then it turns out that tomorrow the shops will open after all. Does that mean that your action was unmotivated? No, you still were motivated by your anticipation that the shops would be closed. > I think {le te djica} explains the utility of {le se djica}, > {le mukti} the motivation for {le se mukti}. {le te djica} seems to be something like an ulterior motive. I say that I want X, but that X will cause or allow Y to happen, which is what I really want. For example, lojbab says: mi djica le nu da dunda lo megru'u mi kei le nu mu'erfaigau loi jbocku I want that someone give me a million dollar in order to spread Lojban books around the world. so what he really wants is to spread the books, not just that someone give him the million dollars. > At least some > component of {le se djica} is involved in {le te djica} (the > whole of {le se djica} might be agentive in {le te djica}) > whereas no part of {le se mukti} needs to be involved in > {le mukti}. Well, what do you mean by "involved"? What part of {da dunda lo megru'u mi} is involved in {le nu mu'erfaigau loi jbocku}? If you mean "mi", then I can rephrase it as: mi djica le nu da dunda lo megru'u mi kei le nu loi jbocku cu mu'erfai I want that someone give me a million dollar in order that Lojban books be spread around the world. I think that the connection is that {le se djica} may cause {le te djica}, or it simply may allow it to happen. But why stop there? Maybe djica has an indefinite number of places. For example: mi djica le nu da dunda lo megru'u mi kei le nu mu'erfaigau loi jbocku kei le nu so'i prenu cu tavla bau la lojban I want that someone give me a million dollar in order to spread Lojban books around the world so that many people can speak in Lojban. It seems arbitrary to allow only the first direct ulterior motive. > Sometimes {le te djica} would be the achievement > of the negation of {le mukti}: the noise coming from the outside > motivates me to close the window/I want to close the window > to shut out the noise from the outside. Yes, but rather than the negation I would say the cessation, because to be a motive it must be preexistent. So: le nu sance le bartu cu mukti le nu ga'orgau le canko kei mi The noise coming from the outside motivates me to close the window. mi djica le nu ga'orgau le canko kei le nu co'u sance le bertu I want to close the window so that there ceases to come noise from the outside. > There also seems to be a difference between {le se djica} and > {le se mukti}. {le se djica} is something {le djica} wants to > happen, {le se mukti} may already have happened by volition of > {le te mukti}. Rather, at the time in which {le nu djica} happens, {le se djica} has yet to happen. At the time in which {le nu mukti} happens, {le se mukti} may already be happening. I don't think it can already have happened, could you give an example? You can't say: le nu sance le bartu cu ca mukti le nu pu ga'orgau le canko kei mi The noise coming from the outside now motivates me to having closed the window. or can you? > I think they leave too much room for interpretation > >> i le nu ba'o xagji cu te djica le nu te vecnu le nanba kei mi > > e.g. having been hungry but not anymore ... Well, but my point was that {djica} already includes the notion that {le te djica} happens after (or at most simultaneously with) {le se djica}, so that you should understand it as {le nu ba ba'o xagji}. The same room for interpretation is left by your example: le nu citka cu te djica le nu te vecnu le nanba kei mi e.g. having eaten in the past ... >> >>If so, why do we need two words, >> >>can't we just use the tenses to show the sequence? > > See above. Of course, combining e.g. rinka and djica we might get > away without mukti, but then again, the gismu list wasn't built > this kind of minimalism in mind. Of course. Perhaps I was exaggerating. But that's the best way to elicit responses. :) >> In summary, we have identified two differences between djica and >> mukti: >> >> 1- {le te mukti} must be the agent of {le se mukti}, whereas there >> need not be any such relation between {le djica} and {le se djica}. >> > The definition of {mukti} only speaks about the volition of > {le te mukti}. Would the following be possible? > > le fagri cu mukti le nu do bartu klama kei mi I think {tu'a le fagri} is more appropriate, but that's irrelevant to your point. Other than that, I would understand that sentence as: [tu'a] le fagri cu mukti le nu do bartu klama gau mi kei mi The fire motivates me to make you come out. {le te mukti} is always the agent of {le se mukti}, implicit or explicitly. >> 2- {le mukti} happens before {le se mukti}, but {le te djica} happens >> after {le se djica}. > > {le mukti} hasn't necessarily any temporal relationship with {le se > mukti} Since there is a causal relationship, there must be a temporal one as well. In your example of the closing of the shops, I think it's your anticipation of the closing rather than the closing itself that motivates the action. If the closing does not happen, your action was still motivated by their "going to close at the time". The motive is {le nu capu'o ganlo} rather than {le nu baca'o ganlo}. co'o mi'e xorxes