Date: Wed, 25 Feb 1998 12:08:05 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199802251708.MAA16533@locke.ccil.org> Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: Re: Summary so far on DJUNO X-To: jorge@INTERMEDIA.COM.AR X-cc: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: John Cowan X-UIDL: b7cc625927636076eca215c54bf072f0 X-Mozilla-Status: 8011 X-From-Space-Date: Wed Feb 25 11:58:27 1998 X-From-Space-Address: - >So in your opinion, it would not make sense to have place structures like: >--More-- >"x1 asserts that x2 is true in metaphysics x3" mi na jinvi di'u We have a proposition x2. I can assert x2, which MEANS that I am saying it is true. It is the essence of assertion/xusra that it claims truth. there is no metaphysics involved here - it is the definition of "assert". To assert that x2 is true under metaphysics x3 is a partilcular kind of assertion (at least as I understand the English. You are saying that x2 is true under a particular metaphysics, perhaps as distinguished from some other metaphysics. You actually could express your 3-placer as x1 asserts le du'u x2 jetnu x3 as an exact equivalent. The metaphysics is tied only to the x2's truth and has nothing to do with the act of asserting itself. I can assert something you and I might consider false, but I am still asserting it AS true. xusra is more akin to cusku than it is to any discussion of truth. >"x1 thinks that x2 is true >of x3 >in metaphysics x5 based on grounds x4" Again, I don't agree. I can opine something as being true regardless of the metaphysics (or in spite of the metaphysics). Netaphysics determines whether it really IS truth and not necessarily how I think about truth ( indeed most people do not consider metaphysics at all when contemplating what is true and what is not). On the other hand, I can form an opinion as to whether x2 would be true under a particular metaphysics which I may or may not consider a valid metaphysics. THis is the sense I get out of your place structure - again it is equivalent to x1 jinvi ledu'u x2 jetnu x5 kei about x3 on grounds x4 The metaphysics has nothing to do with the act of opining. This then correlates back to true-djuno which I understand as being x1 djuno le du'u x2 jetnu metaphysics x5 kei about x3 under epistemology x4 >According to you, the metaphysics places there are redundant because >the one and only possible metaphysics to fill them is already a part of >the selbri? Thta would only be true if the metaphysics was that which determines the truth of the relationship xusra or jinvi (or mlatu), which could be totally independent of the metaphysics involved in the truth of the assertion or the opinion. >And yet it is perfectly possible to assert or opine that >something >is true in one metaphysics and false in another, isn't it? How do you >reconcile those two positions? I can also assert that something is truth-in-the-absolute (i.e. fact). Or I can assert something is true under metaphysics m1, but whether the is assertion is true or not might me evluated using metaphysics m2. >>kanxe, and other words pertaining to logical operations are presumed to >>have be associated with logical epistemologies/metaphysics. > >Really? So you cannot say something like: > > le du'u la cev cu vrude gi'e cimni cu kanxe > le du'u la cev cu vrude kei le du'u la cev cu cimni > "God is good and infinite" is a conjunction stating that > both "God is good" and "God is infinite" are true. > >Are the claims there associated with logical epistemologies/metaphysics? >--More-- >Or is that an improper use of {kanxe}? It is the nature of le ka kanxe that x1 is a conjunction of x2 and x3, and that nature is totally independent of whether or not x2 and x3 are really true or whether x1 is true for that matter. A logician might say that kanxe should have been defined as x1 is a conjunction composed of x2 and x3 which is true if x2 and x3 are both true or something like that. But lay people might not understand and get confused by a repetition of x2 and x3. Again, kanxe is about conjunction, and not about truth. >Then we agree. When you say {ko'a djuno ko'e} you are making >(among others) assertion ko'e without any consideration of the >metaphysics involved. "I" am making no such assertion, because djuno is not about MY consideration of truth; it is only about x1's concept of truth and x1's use of epistemology x4. *I* am not asserting x2; I am asserting something about the relationship between x2 and x1, x3, and x4. That which I am asserting is NOT that x2 is "true", but that x2 is "known as true". Like4wise, if I talk about what George asserts using xusra, I am talking not about what is true, but about what is *asserted as true*. Surely I can say that la djef cu xusra le du'u mi patfu voda Jeff asserts that I am the father of 4. which I know to be a falsehood. Whether he asserts it has nothing to do with metaphysics, and the fact that he asserts probably does not lead me to be concerned about what metaphysics he might be operating under. If I was concerned, we could create a lujvo to talk about said metaphysics, but that would be something different. Likewise to talk about the truth value of a bit of knowledge might involve bringing in metaphysics, but then we are talking about truth and not about the knower/knowledge relationship. >>It still remains an assertion. Whether that >>assertion is ACTUALLY true may depend on the metaphysics. >--More-- > >Right. Exactly the same thing applies to {djuno} as I understand it. That is not what I have understood you to say. If indeed he made such an assertion, then it is valid to say la djef cu xusra le du'u mi patfu voda Jeff asserts that I am the father of 4. whether or not the x2 is true (to me). Likewise la djef cu djuno le du'u mi patfu voda Jeff knows that I am the father of 4. Whether the djuno proposition is true or not does not depend on the truth of the x2 proposition (to me who states the bridi) lojbab