From araizen@newmail.net Fri Oct 20 07:23:14 2000 Return-Path: X-Sender: araizen@newmail.net X-Apparently-To: lojban@egroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-6_1_0); 20 Oct 2000 14:23:13 -0000 Received: (qmail 9256 invoked from network); 20 Oct 2000 14:23:13 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by m3.onelist.org with QMQP; 20 Oct 2000 14:23:13 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO out.newmail.net) (212.150.51.26) by mta1 with SMTP; 20 Oct 2000 14:23:12 -0000 Received: from default ([62.0.180.170]) by out.newmail.net ; Fri, 20 Oct 2000 16:24:37 +00:00 To: lojban@egroups.com Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2000 16:22:53 +0200 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: literalism [was: Re: Re: looking at arjlujv.txt Reply-to: araizen@newmail.net Priority: normal In-reply-to: <972008289.16093@egroups.com> X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.11) Message-ID: <97208427801@out.newmail.net> From: "Adam Raizen" X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 4618 la pycyn cusku di'e > << words that don't mean what they're supposed to mean. >> > Whence this "supposed"? That is literalism at its worst. Words we construct > mean what we construct them to mean and *that* is what they are *supposed* to > do. To be sure, when they are constructed out of pre-existing pieces, we > have some obligation to leave a trail from the parts to the whole, but there > is not obligation to make that path fit someone's a priori rules about how > that path should run. The scenic route often has a lot to say for it over a > route along the section lines. > Of course, someone also has to memorize the words in order to use them. (Or at least be able to guess what they mean.) If there's only a hint as to what the word means from its constituent, it becomes hard to guess what it means in general and near impossible to use any of its places (because no one knows what they are.) The reason that lujvo and tanru are considered "metaphors" historically is because in loglan they've always considered them unanalyzable (at least that's the sense I got from what I read on the book on the loglan website.) Lojban officially analyzes its lujvo and tanru, so the meanings should follow the prescription. There's a problem in general with coming up with lujvo and tanru to fit an English word. Lujvo and tanru should be taken to mean exactly what their components mean, even if this is slightly different from what the English is. (It's more lojbanic and its easier to use.) I don't have a problem with "mucti minji", but it would be a problem if we said it means "software" and anything which is not software is not a mucti minji. "mucti minji" is legitimately applied to anything which is both mucti and a minji. (Maybe "mucti minji" could apply to a thought experiment, for example.) Huge lujvo which are exact definitions of English words aren't going to come into use, because they're hard to use, but sometimes its still useful to add another rafsi to show the structure of the lujvo, so that everyone can understand. co'o mi'e adam