From lojban-out@lojban.org Thu Nov 30 08:46:52 2006 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (qmail 93702 invoked from network); 30 Nov 2006 16:41:34 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.67.33) by m40.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 30 Nov 2006 16:41:34 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO chain.digitalkingdom.org) (64.81.66.169) by mta7.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 30 Nov 2006 16:41:34 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1GpomB-0008RT-OZ for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:28:50 -0800 Received: from chain.digitalkingdom.org ([64.81.66.169]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1GpokC-0008OC-Pw; Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:26:48 -0800 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:26:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1Gpojc-0008NZ-83 for lojban-list-real@lojban.org; Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:26:04 -0800 Received: from nz-out-0506.google.com ([64.233.162.238] helo=nz-out-0102.google.com) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1GpojS-0008NL-Mi for lojban-list@lojban.org; Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:26:03 -0800 Received: by nz-out-0102.google.com with SMTP id r28so1278271nza for ; Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:25:47 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.78.166.7 with SMTP id o7mr3718500hue.1164903946210; Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:25:46 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.78.144.3 with HTTP; Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:25:46 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 11:25:46 -0500 In-Reply-To: <20061130152244.7637A4FE9C@ws6-5.us4.outblaze.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline References: <20061130152244.7637A4FE9C@ws6-5.us4.outblaze.com> X-Spam-Score: -2.5 (--) X-archive-position: 13276 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: matt.mattarn@gmail.com X-list: lojban-list X-Spam-Score: -2.5 (--) To: lojban@yahoogroups.com X-Originating-IP: 64.81.66.169 X-eGroups-Msg-Info: 1:0:0:0 X-eGroups-From: "Matt Arnold" From: "Matt Arnold" Reply-To: matt.mattarn@gmail.com Subject: [lojban] Re: (no subject) X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=116389790; y=RapTlUsf9MyeH8znkKf716Bjs6Xuq4isxZTWDzybNRinGAEajw X-Yahoo-Profile: lojban_out X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 27712 On 11/30/06, Arika Okrent wrote: > Other gismu issues were whether cunso really captures "arbitrary". I was never happy > with that choice. It doesn't capture the idea of "chosen at someone's whim" (the > argument structure includes x3 "with probability distribution") but it's good enough I > guess. You might want to use a tanru, {cuxna cunso}, "choice-type-of-random". x1 chooses/selects x2 [choice] from set/sequence of alternatives x3 (complete set) Or, {jdice cunso}, "decide-type-of-random". x1 (person) decides/makes decision x2 (du'u) about matter x3 (event/state) > This quote is about an early invented language by John Wilkins. (I have translated it into > his language as well) but I think it applies to lojban insofar as it aspires to be a 'culturally > neutral' language. lojban has to have a lexion that allows it to interface with the real > world, which means it has to make some assumptions about the organization of the > world. This isn't necessarily a problem -- all languages do that -- but it calls the > neutrality of lojban into question. We touched on this a little in the discussion. I don't > think everyone agreed with me. Examine your expectations for what "neutrality" means. What do you think the language architects meant by "culturally neutral"? I believe this selling point was specifically designed to remedy the famous problem of Eurocentrism in Esperanto, not to remedy anthropomorphism. Lojban was intended to be substantially no more English than Chinese, no more Hindi than Spanish, no more Russian than Farsi. (Please read those words as "x language with y vocabulary and z grammar" rather than "population from x country with y cultural assumptions.") This, like every other selling point of the language, is achieved within reasonable limits. Lojban imperfectly achieves goals which few other conlangs that get beyond the concept stage have the slightest interest in attempting at all. By specifying that the neutrality was cultural, the Lojban inventors did not claim that the language made no philosophical assumptions. Granted, their debates are on record frequently arguing for a language feature on the grounds that it would not constrain the speaker to a particular philosophical standpoint. But they probably knew better than to think they could create a language that would not have cultural elements of its own. Since language is a cultural artifact, the only way to have that would be to have no language at all. As Nick Nicholas said, culturally neutral in this sense "is culturally null". By some understandings of "culturally neutral", predicate logic itself is thought to be specifically anglo-american, and for that matter, so is the notion that all cultures should be treated fairly. Nick Nicholas and And Rosta have both argued along these lines. However, the idea behind predicate logic grammar was to be utterly alien to human nature. In this way, it could be argued that the means to be neutral among a set of alternatives is to reject all of them, as presumably a secular state is intended to settle the fights of religion over how the nation is to be governed. It's like a parent rendering a verdict that because the children were fighting over a cookie, neither one can have it. > Why was Logfest first advertised as jbonunsla, then jboselsla, and then back to > jbonunsla? What happened there? I was trying to get to the bottom of what the community would prefer to name the event, in Lojban. I kept changing how I publicized it, because I just needed to get a judgement from the experts of the community, and I am leaving off learning how to create properly-formed lujvo of my own until I have a greater command of the vocabulary. I was alerted to the fact that the original translation of "Lojban Festival" into a Lojban lujvo, {jboselsla}, was not as well thought out as it could have been. Without the affix {sel} (which causes the taking of the x2 place), {sla} would have taken the x1 place by default, and meant "the celebrator(s)". And yet it was eventually realized that the x2 place of {salci} is "the event that is celebrated". It was a reasonable misunderstanding. {nun} is an affix for the abstractor cmavo {nu} which means "the event of". If I understand correctly, abstraction affixes do not single out one sumti place, but take all of them simultaneously, considered together. For example, "the event of x1 celebrating x2 with activity x3." I kept prompting discussion on it, which usually went back and forth between whether to say {jbotersla} ({tersla} being the x3 place, the activity or practices of the celebration) or {jbonunsla}. Of course, every discussion of vocabulary is just as much a discussion about the reality of what the thing is, as a discussion about language. -Eppcott 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.