From rob@twcny.rr.com Tue Aug 14 12:32:25 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: rob@telenet.net X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_3_1); 14 Aug 2001 19:32:25 -0000 Received: (qmail 95373 invoked from network); 14 Aug 2001 19:32:01 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by l7.egroups.com with QMQP; 14 Aug 2001 19:32:01 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO telenet.net) (204.97.152.225) by mta1 with SMTP; 14 Aug 2001 19:32:01 -0000 Received: from riff (ip-209-23-14-38.modem.logical.net [209.23.14.38]) by telenet.net (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id PAA06862 for ; Tue, 14 Aug 2001 15:31:59 -0400 Received: from rob by riff with local (Exim 3.22 #1 (Debian)) id 15Wjo7-0000Ns-00 for ; Tue, 14 Aug 2001 15:24:55 -0400 Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2001 15:24:54 -0400 To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Subject: [lojban] du, speed, units Message-ID: <20010814152454.A1415@twcny.rr.com> Reply-To: rob@twcny.rr.com References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.18i X-Is-It-Not-Nifty: www.sluggy.com Sender: Rob Speer From: Rob Speer X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 9617 On Tue, Aug 14, 2001 at 06:30:03PM +0000, Jorge Llambias wrote: > {junta} itself is one of those inexplicable gismu. > Why is there a gismu for weight, but none for height, > length, size, age, speed, beauty, and so many other > names of properties. > > >Sigh. Of course, I'm probably missing something. > > > >(I'll admit to not having any idea what good du would do as seltau, > >however.) > > How about {du karda} for "i.d. card"? These seemingly unrelated comments gave me an idea. One of the "holes" in Lojban's vocabulary thus far seems to be words for mixed units - we can describe something's length in meters or its duration in seconds, but we can't describe speed in meters per second. When we say "meters per second", we mean that for the speed in question a certain number of meters corresponds to a certain number of seconds. So how about "meters per second" -> {mitre du snidu} -> {tredubysnidu}? (Or {tredunsnidu} - is there a difference?) And then there's the question of multiplying units... I don't think simply running the rafsi for units together would work very well - perhaps they could be linked with {jol}. (Or {pi'i}, though that seems ugly to me.) And would {reltre} be a square meter? -- Rob Speer