X-Digest-Num: 120
Message-ID: <44114.120.670.959273824@eGroups.com>
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 18:09:42 +0300
From: Robin Turner <robin@Bilkent.EDU.TR>
Subject: Re: Planned languages
X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 670
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coi kolin. .i do cusku di'e

>
> In fact it is one of the differences between Loglan and Lojban (unless
> Loglan has changed since I looked) that predicates with the first
> argument omitted have different meanings. In Loglan AFAIK they are
> imperatives, whereas Lojban requires an explicit pro-argument 'ko' to
> express that. Sentences lacking the first argument are grammatically
> 'observatives' in Lojban, glossed as 'Lo! Something blue!' and the like;
> but a number of writers (including myself) have taken the licence to
> omit the first arg as a generalisation of the licence to omit any other,
> and will happily use 'blanu' as a sentence in connected discourse to
> mean e.g. 'it was blue' - first arg omitted and understood just as any
> other can be.

AFAIK, this is part of the grammar anyway - Lojban can be seen as pro-drop e.g.

dunda ti mi
Someone gave this to me.

{blanu} can mean both "Lo! Something is blue" or "It is/was blue" depending on
the context.

co'o mi'e robin.