From cowan@ccil.org Mon Mar 29 04:12:09 2004 Return-Path: X-Sender: cowan@ccil.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (qmail 45745 invoked from network); 29 Mar 2004 12:12:08 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.166) by m11.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 29 Mar 2004 12:12:08 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mercury.ccil.org) (192.190.237.100) by mta5.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 29 Mar 2004 12:12:08 -0000 Received: from cowan by mercury.ccil.org with local (Exim 3.35 #1 (Debian)) id 1B7vaV-0001jl-00; Mon, 29 Mar 2004 07:09:55 -0500 Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2004 07:09:55 -0500 To: rlpowell@digitalkingdom.org Cc: lojban@yahoogroups.com Message-ID: <20040329120955.GB16482@ccil.org> References: <20040329070110.GO6569@digitalkingdom.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20040329070110.GO6569@digitalkingdom.org> User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.28i X-eGroups-Remote-IP: 192.190.237.100 From: John Cowan Subject: Re: [lojban] "pu" versus "pu ku" and LR(1) X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=212516 X-Yahoo-Profile: johnwcowan X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 21863 Robin Lee Powell scripsit: > Am I correct in my belief that there is absolutely nothing wrong with > accepting the first case, given the infinite lookahead required to > realize that the remainder is a gek-sentence and that the pu *must* end > immediately? I'm a little cautious about totally identifying "pu" and "pu ku" semantically, despite the expansive claims of the Red Book on the subject, because I do not know what to do when the tense involves a -roi quantification. Consider these four sentences: 1) da poi cribe roroiku zo'u da xagji 2) roroiku da poi cribe zo'u da xagji 3) da poi cribe roroi xagji 4) roroi xagji fa da poi cribe There is no doubt that 1 means there's a bear that's always hungry (false) and that 2 means there's always a hungry bear somewhere (true), and that 4 is the same as 2. The question is, is 3 the same as 2 or the same as 1? Arguing by analogy with na vs. naku, it's the same as 2, because the tense before the selbri is placed at the left end of the prenex, just as a na before the selbri is. Arguing that na vs. naku is a special case that ought not to be imitated, 3 is the same as 1. I lean toward the latter, and it follows from what the Red Book says, but I'm not 100% sure of it. > In other words, is the fact that the first case doesn't work a pure > LR(1) issue, or am I missing some ambiguity that allowing the first case > introduces? If the above doubt can be cleared away, then I would say there's no problem. History shows, however, that I'm not very good at spotting lurking ambiguities. Sorry not to be more helpful. -- Mark Twain on Cecil Rhodes: John Cowan "I admire him, I freely admit it, http://www.ccil.org/~cowan and when his time comes I shall http://www.reutershealth.com buy a piece of the rope for a keepsake." jcowan@reutershealth.com