From lojban-out@lojban.org Mon Sep 05 00:57:22 2005 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (qmail 63979 invoked from network); 5 Sep 2005 07:57:21 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.172) by m33.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 5 Sep 2005 07:57:21 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO chain.digitalkingdom.org) (64.81.49.134) by mta4.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 5 Sep 2005 07:57:21 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.52) id 1ECBnv-0001On-8n for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Mon, 05 Sep 2005 00:54:11 -0700 Received: from chain.digitalkingdom.org ([64.81.49.134]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.52) id 1ECBmo-0001Nb-4T; Mon, 05 Sep 2005 00:53:06 -0700 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Mon, 05 Sep 2005 00:52:53 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.52) id 1EC4Y7-0003pQ-BO for lojban-list-real@lojban.org; Sun, 04 Sep 2005 17:09:23 -0700 Received: from zproxy.gmail.com ([64.233.162.203]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.52) id 1EC4Y2-0003pH-B7 for lojban-list@lojban.org; Sun, 04 Sep 2005 17:09:23 -0700 Received: by zproxy.gmail.com with SMTP id v1so603788nzb for ; Sun, 04 Sep 2005 17:09:16 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.36.118.18 with SMTP id q18mr4233776nzc; Sun, 04 Sep 2005 17:09:16 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.36.36.8 with HTTP; Sun, 4 Sep 2005 17:09:16 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <8f2fd4aa0509041709526efc86@mail.gmail.com> Date: Sun, 4 Sep 2005 17:09:16 -0700 In-Reply-To: <737b61f30509031343308edbf0@mail.gmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by Ecartis Content-Disposition: inline References: <737b61f305090214262772927d@mail.gmail.com> <8f2fd4aa050902192027d151b1@mail.gmail.com> <737b61f30509031343308edbf0@mail.gmail.com> X-Spam-Score: -2.5 (--) X-archive-position: 10493 X-Approved-By: rlpowell@digitalkingdom.org X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: brandon@yrick.com X-list: lojban-list X-Spam-Score: -2.5 (--) To: lojban@yahoogroups.com X-Originating-IP: 64.81.49.134 X-eGroups-Msg-Info: 1:12:0:0 X-eGroups-From: Brandon Wirick From: Brandon Wirick Reply-To: brandon@yrick.com Subject: [lojban] Re: lojban as an auxiliary language X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=116389790; y=R1YmPrOOJbsedxA3mBTSk_afRkxvc0ahN6iDFkFkxy-kad7IoA X-Yahoo-Profile: lojban_out X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 24874 > Hmm. It seems to me that the hardest part of making the semantic web > really work is getting everyone to agree on the same intentional > meaning for any given word. Lojban vocabulary tends to be a bit less > overloaded than English, but the extensional boundry of any given word > isn't much less fuzzy, in general. And when you start to think about > lujvo, well, things go downhill pretty quickly. If Lojban were to ever > be used in a widespread manner, many lujvo would acquire two distinct > senses based on different interpretations of the tanru, or an > assortment of slightly different place structures for the same > meaning. So does Lojban really help this part of the problem? I was under the impression that lujvo were vague, not ambiguous. A {gerzda} is some sort of nest/house/dwelling with some sort of dog-like aspect to it, right? It is not necessarily a doghouse as English-speakers understand the term. If you look at one of the large upper-ontologies like SUMO or OpenCyc, the terms there are vague as well, but the names are contrived English labels. The makers of those ontologies even disclaim the names they give classes, saying that the actual meanings of the entries may have nothing to do with the way a reader may interpret the name. In Lojban, that would not be the case. In Lojban, the names motivate the meanings. > I'm really not sure I understand you here. Are you arguing that people > should voluntarily avoid using Lojban for non-technical communication > so that it remains usable for technical purposes? And how would that > make it more usable? I'm saying, really, that for a system that already restricts conversations to rather technical communication (e.g. something Semantic Web-oriented) Lojban would be a wonderful internal medium. To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.