From a.rosta@ntlworld.com Sat Mar 09 12:44:40 2002 Return-Path: X-Sender: a.rosta@ntlworld.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: unknown); 9 Mar 2002 20:44:40 -0000 Received: (qmail 95228 invoked from network); 9 Mar 2002 20:44:39 -0000 Received: from unknown (216.115.97.167) by m11.grp.snv.yahoo.com with QMQP; 9 Mar 2002 20:44:39 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mta07-svc.ntlworld.com) (62.253.162.47) by mta1.grp.snv.yahoo.com with SMTP; 9 Mar 2002 20:44:39 -0000 Received: from andrew ([62.255.41.167]) by mta07-svc.ntlworld.com (InterMail vM.4.01.03.27 201-229-121-127-20010626) with SMTP id <20020309204437.BMDA22101.mta07-svc.ntlworld.com@andrew> for ; Sat, 9 Mar 2002 20:44:37 +0000 To: Subject: RE: sets, masses, &c. (was: RE: [lojban] Re: [jboske] RE: Anything but tautol... Date: Sat, 9 Mar 2002 20:43:56 -0000 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Importance: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 In-Reply-To: From: "And Rosta" X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=77248971 X-Yahoo-Profile: andjamin X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 13588 Jorge: > >There are, though, still some problems. The first is that the > >category derived from subtracting the individuating properties > >from another category (as with mass nouns derived from > >counts), is not necessarily equivalent to material; one > >can massify immaterial things (e.g. misfortunes : misfortune). > > All right, but articles in Lojban are not used to change > categories. They provide different ways of referring to the > same category. We might need something other than {marji} > for categorical deindividuation, but I think it would > still have to be a brivla (or perhaps some other modifier, > something in NAhE?). {loi} only provides referential > deindividuation. I agree, sort of. It is not a job for gadri, but nor is it a job for brivla. That is, we need brivla meaning "is a unit of" and "is a mass of", but the second argument of these predicates would better be equivalent to "loi ka broda" than to "lo(i) broda". It's not really a fixable problem at this late stage in Lojban's development: any solution would be too cumbersome to be worth using. --And.