Date: Thu, 18 Dec 1997 08:35:27 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199712181335.IAA02142@locke.ccil.org> Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: Re: whether (was Re: ni, jei, perfectionism) X-To: a.rosta@UCLAN.AC.UK X-cc: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: John Cowan Status: OR X-Mozilla-Status: 0011 Content-Length: 1793 X-From-Space-Date: Thu Dec 18 08:35:32 1997 X-From-Space-Address: LOJBAN@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU >> >No. That's not how Lojban ka abstractions work. >--More-- >> >> That is how I use them, and how they have been used since they started. > >It is helpful, I think, to distinguish between one's own usage and >what is prescribed. Likewise, it is helpful to distinguish between >usage history and what is prescribed. For example, usage history >contains a lot of sumti-raising, but this runs contrary to the >prescription. > >I was reporting the prescription. > I'm sorry, but you will have to quote me chapter and verse if you want me to believe that the prescription says much of anything about this. The prescription as I read it says that ka bridi are elliptical, and that you can explicitly fill in ce'u when appropriate to clarify. There are places where the place structure demands a ka abstraction with a single place specified by ce'u, such as zmadu. But approval has no such implicature, so one would have trouble knwoing anything about the potential fill-in of ce'u without added context. Cowan has said that the normal default is to insert a ce'u in the first unfilled place. This is fine but there are times when normal defaults do not apply, and in any case this doesn't say anything about what goes in the other places - which could also be ce'u. But I am not sure that the Book even makes clear what he says he intends. lojbab ---- lojbab lojbab@access.digex.net Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc. 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273 Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: ftp.access.digex.net /pub/access/lojbab or see Lojban WWW Server: href="http://xiron.pc.helsinki.fi/lojban/" Order _The Complete Lojban Language_ - see our Web pages or ask me.