Date:         Fri, 22 May 1998 20:36:14 -0400
Reply-To:     Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
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From:         Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
Subject:      Re: RV: properties again
To:           Multiple recipients of list LOJBAN <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
Message-ID: <895883832.1020201.0@listserv.cuny.edu>
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>But it is still a property, not something that can
>be a cause.

You are assuming your concusion - this is what we are arguing.
To me properties are often causes.

>{ka} gives you the relationship itself,

That is du'u - last I recalled, with sedu'u being the linguistic representation
of the relationship.

>That relationship cannot cause an event.

But since I don;t see ka as the relationship, but as the mass of aspects of the
relationship, I do not have this problem.

>I'm not sure
>what you mean by the nature of the relationship.

When I observe lo nu klama, i recognize that it is taking place by certain
properties.  I may observe a moving thing, but I cannot call it lo klama
without also recognizing le se klama le te klama le ve klama and le xe klama.
I observe all of these at once interacting - none of them exist on their own
independent of the others, or there is no nu klama.  Those interactions which
are common to all nu klama are the nature of the klama relationship, which I
call ka klama.  When you stick a ce'u in there you are focussing on this
abstraction from the point of view of the particular place that contains ce'u.

>Right, but it is the occurrence in time that can cause other events,
>not an abstract relationship by itself.

Again assuming your conclusion.  (I am not saying that I am any better - I
am essentially doing the same - so then we are arguing twoi possibly
incompatible assumptions as to what constitutes the meaning of ka.

Possibly because we haven;t established that our differences amount to anything
substantive.  I suspec that you could change my leka to lenu when you see it
and understand correctly.I may someday find THE example that shows the
difference between what I consider to be two different uses of lenu that
would result from this.
>> lenu talks about lo fasnu and
>>leka talks about lo selckaji.
>
>Of course. And lo selckaji doesn't cause events to occur.

Again proof by assertion.

>> These are so definitional to me that the
>>uses that you and Cowan have devised and documented in the Book are
>>secondary.  I don't find them troubling or conflicting, but I see them as
>>secondary.
>
>I don't follow your argument. How does that support the idea that a
>property (a selckaji) could cause anything to happen?


It just DOES.  That is how I happen to think of lo selckaji.  There is a
difference to me between lo fasnu causing something and lo selckaji causing
something, but I cannot describe it, nor come up with an example that does not
lead us in philsophical circles.

> > Events of weaknesses can cause events of cruelty.  But
>>weakness as a quality can more abstractly cause cruelty.
>
>Perhaps {le ka ruble cu rinka le ka kusru} can be forced to mean
>that having the first property causes one to have the second one.
>It would still be stretching the meaning of {rinka}. But mixing ka
>with nu is even stretchier.


Playing devil's advocate, xu leka ce'u ruble rinka leka ce'u kusru
ji leka kusru ce'u

or maybe that should be

xu leka ce'u ruble kei ji leka ruble ce'u cu rinka
leka ce'u kusru ji leka kusru ce'u

(please correct corresponding grammatical typos in the first one)

lojbab