From lojban-out@lojban.org Wed Oct 08 12:19:39 2003 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (qmail 35717 invoked from network); 8 Oct 2003 19:19:38 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.167) by m3.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 8 Oct 2003 19:19:38 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO chain.digitalkingdom.org) (64.81.49.134) by mta6.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 8 Oct 2003 19:19:38 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.22) id 1A7JqT-0004yD-77 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Wed, 08 Oct 2003 12:19:37 -0700 Received: from chain.digitalkingdom.org ([64.81.49.134]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.22) id 1A7Jpt-0004xS-F3; Wed, 08 Oct 2003 12:19:01 -0700 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Wed, 08 Oct 2003 12:18:49 -0700 (PDT) Received: from tmailb1.svr.pol.co.uk ([195.92.168.141]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.22) id 1A7JpN-0004x0-JA for lojban-list@lojban.org; Wed, 08 Oct 2003 12:18:29 -0700 Received: from modem-118.leopard.dialup.pol.co.uk ([217.135.144.118] helo=thedave.homelinux.org) by tmailb1.svr.pol.co.uk with esmtp (Exim 4.14) id 1A7JpD-00074v-BR for lojban-list@lojban.org; Wed, 08 Oct 2003 20:18:19 +0100 Received: from thedave.homelinux.org (IDENT:1001@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by thedave.homelinux.org (8.12.4/8.12.4) with ESMTP id h98KHUxC014391 for ; Wed, 8 Oct 2003 20:17:30 GMT Received: from localhost (martin@localhost) by thedave.homelinux.org (8.12.4/8.12.4/Submit) with ESMTP id h98KHSZ8014388 for ; Wed, 8 Oct 2003 20:17:29 GMT X-Authentication-Warning: thedave.homelinux.org: martin owned process doing -bs Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 20:17:28 +0000 (GMT) X-X-Sender: martin@thedave.homelinux.org To: lojban-list@lojban.org Subject: [lojban] Tenses (was: Re: consolation) In-Reply-To: <20031008144034.98892.qmail@web41902.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-archive-position: 6387 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: mbays@freeshell.org Precedence: bulk X-list: lojban-list X-eGroups-From: Martin Bays From: Martin Bays Reply-To: mbays@freeshell.org X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=116389790 X-Yahoo-Profile: lojban_out X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 20869 cu'u la ba'e xorxes. > > --- Martin Bays wrote: > > cu'u la xod. > > mi'e la xod na.e la xorxes u'i .u'u.oiro'a tu'a me'o xy. cfipu > > > > Perhaps {lo nu broda cu mulno} <==> {ba'o mo'u broda}, since the > > > LHS is tenseless so the RHS should be tenseless too. > > > > Hmmm... I see your point, but I'm not sure using multiple ZAhO in a single > > tense gives a meaningful tense, at least in CLL Lojban. > > It is grammatical, why would it not be meaningful? > > CLL doesn't mention multiple ZAhO explicitly, but it does > have a multiple number ROI example, which follows the same > principle: > > >>Note the difference between: > >> > >>10.13) mi pare'u paroi klama le zarci > >> I [first time] [one time] go-to the store. > >> For the first time, I go to the store once. > >> > >>and > >>10.14) mi paroi pare'u klama le zarci > >> I [one time] [first time] go-to the store. > >> There is one occasion on which I go to > >> the store for the first time. > OK, yes, it does say that. But roi and re'u don't belong to the same *semantic* class - PAroi specifies an interval property, like TAhE, while PAre'u is an event contour (referring to a cycle of a cyclical activity (p.230)), like ZAhO. And a couple of pages before those examples, we're told '...from the viewpoint of Lojban syntax, ZAhOs are interval modifiers like TAhEs or ROI compounds; if both are found in a single tense, the TAhE/ROI comes first and the ZAhO afterward.' Now it doesn't explicitly mention re'u, but I can't see any way in which it makes sense to make an exception for it. You define a subset of the time-line with PU, ZI, ZEhA, TAhE/PAroi; then you optionally specify how that subset relates to the event of the bridi/seltcita sumti with ZAhO and PAre'u. That's my interpretation, anyhow, though I guess it might not be the only consistent one. Basically, I can see how multiple and out-of-place event contours could mean what you and 10.13 want them to, but I think it needs an explicit formal framework. So I've come up with one. Please bear with me, I'm new at this lark. I *think* this makes sense, but if it doesn't, sorry. We can make complicated tenses by joining basic ones with cmavo from JOI - cf. section 21. So first, let's define a JOI, JOI1, which works like this when connecting tenses - {Tense1 JOI1 Tense2} -- "Tense1 applied to (i.e. with event contours referring to) the event given by application of Tense2" So e.g. {mi pu zu ze'u pu'o JOI1 ba zi co'a le nu badri cu gleki} would mean "I for (a long time centered on a distant past point and contained before the soon start of sadness) was/am happy". (ce'o or sece'o might reasonably be decided to do the work of JOI1, but that's not important.) Then we can define that whenever a single tense contains an event-contour term that's "out of place" according to the above rules - i.e. doesn't appear at the extreme right end of the tense - then that term is followed by an implicit JOI1. So {mi pare'u paroi klama le zarci} == {mi pare'u JOI1 paroi klama le zarci} -- "[It now is] the first cycle of the activity of me going once to the store" -- "For the first time I go to the store once" And {ba'o mo'u broda} == {ba'o JOI1 mo'u broda} -- "[We are now in] the aftermath of the event of the completion of broda" Which was what was wanted. Phew. OK. I think that works. Ignore or destroy. > > > Yes, I suppose that it has to work for activities too: > > > > > > le nu mi bajra cu mulxadba ze'a le pamoi mentu gi'eku'i > > > mulno ze'a le drata temci > > > My running was half-hearted for the first minutes, but > > > to the full for the rest of the time. > > > > > > > 'K. Though again, your non-CLL use of tense seems strange to me, however > > useful. > > What's non-CLL about that? > > CLL: > >>12.12) loi snime cu carvi > >> ze'u le ca dunra > >> some-of-the-mass-of snow rains > >> [long time interval] the [present] winter. > >> Snow falls during this winter. > But according to section 12, a sumtcita tense defines an interval using the normal imaginary journeys system, but with the seltcita sumti as starting point. So {ze'u le ca dunra} surely refers to a long interval centred around the winter (glorking it as {ca ze'u le ca dunra}). So the interval might be contained within the winter, might contain the winter, or might overlap in some other way - but I don't see how it could be consistently defined to necessarily be *precisely* the duration of the winter. So in fact your and the CLL's uses are fine in this case - it's a reasonable assumption that exactly the whole interval is being referred to. I only mentioned it because I think I've seen attempts to *define* ZEhA as a sumtcita to always mean that, which I don't think works without breaking other things. I might be wrong. mu'o mi'e maten.