From pycyn@aol.com Tue Feb 26 16:56:39 2002 Return-Path: X-Sender: Pycyn@aol.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: unknown); 27 Feb 2002 00:56:38 -0000 Received: (qmail 7721 invoked from network); 27 Feb 2002 00:56:38 -0000 Received: from unknown (216.115.97.171) by m5.grp.snv.yahoo.com with QMQP; 27 Feb 2002 00:56:38 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO imo-m01.mx.aol.com) (64.12.136.4) by mta3.grp.snv.yahoo.com with SMTP; 27 Feb 2002 00:56:38 -0000 Received: from Pycyn@aol.com by imo-m01.mx.aol.com (mail_out_v32.5.) id r.1e.23d5e69c (17378) for ; Tue, 26 Feb 2002 19:56:33 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <1e.23d5e69c.29ad88c1@aol.com> Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 19:56:33 EST Subject: Re: [lojban] go'i: repeated referents or just sumti? To: lojban@yahoogroups.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="part1_1e.23d5e69c.29ad88c1_boundary" X-Mailer: AOL 7.0 for Windows US sub 118 From: pycyn@aol.com X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=2455001 X-Yahoo-Profile: kaliputra X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 13413 --part1_1e.23d5e69c.29ad88c1_boundary Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 2/26/2002 5:11:20 PM Central Standard Time, jjllambias@hotmail.com writes: > "all of all" does not add information, on the contrary, it loses > information, at least if you agree with me that "all" does not > have existential import. > Which hopefully nobody does (even you really). While "all" is arguable, "every," which is what {ro} means, clearly does have existential import. The question is "Of what?" When there is a variable present, on the range of the variables is guranteed non-empty, the restriction to a "subject term" does not guarantee that the subject term is non-empty. When there are no variables, then the subject term -- which now is part of the quantifier -- is guaranteed non-empty. The latter seems to be the case here. I know your counter argument involves moving negations back and forth over quantifiers, but from that point of view the quantifiers we have are seriously defective. The cheapest way to fix it would be to distinguish between quantifiers with and without variables, but in the natural way that leads to very odd things, like a free {da} without existential import -- or {lo} with the same problem. In any case, the basic idea is that negation transport changes from one class of quantifiers to the other. Since we have not distinguished (very throroughly), we could not specify the details before. --part1_1e.23d5e69c.29ad88c1_boundary Content-Type: text/html; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 2/26/2002 5:11:20 PM Central Standard Time, jjllambias@hotmail.com writes:


"all of all" does not add information, on the contrary, it loses
information, at least if you agree with me that "all" does not
have existential import.

Which hopefully nobody does (even you really).  While "all" is arguable, "every," which is what {ro} means, clearly does have existential import.  The question is "Of what?"  When there is a variable present, on the range of the variables is guranteed non-empty, the restriction to a "subject term" does not guarantee that the subject term is non-empty.  When  there are no variables, then the subject term -- which now is part of the quantifier -- is guaranteed non-empty.  The latter seems to be the case here.
I know your counter argument involves moving negations back and forth over quantifiers, but from that point of view the quantifiers we have are seriously defective. The cheapest way to fix it would be to distinguish between quantifiers with and without variables, but in the natural way that leads to very odd things, like a free {da} without existential import -- or {lo} with the same problem.  In any case, the basic idea is that negation transport changes from one class of quantifiers to the other. Since we have not distinguished (very throroughly), we could not specify the details before.
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