From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Sun Nov 18 07:57:38 2007 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Sun, 18 Nov 2007 07:57:38 -0800 (PST) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.67) (envelope-from ) id 1ItmWf-0006IN-OW for lojban-list-real@lojban.org; Sun, 18 Nov 2007 07:57:38 -0800 Received: from eastrmmtao103.cox.net ([68.230.240.9]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.67) (envelope-from ) id 1ItmWb-0006Hy-Rx for lojban-list@lojban.org; Sun, 18 Nov 2007 07:57:37 -0800 Received: from eastrmimpo01.cox.net ([68.1.16.119]) by eastrmmtao103.cox.net (InterMail vM.7.08.02.01 201-2186-121-102-20070209) with ESMTP id <20071118155727.FAFS16684.eastrmmtao103.cox.net@eastrmimpo01.cox.net> for ; Sun, 18 Nov 2007 10:57:27 -0500 Received: from [192.168.1.100] ([72.192.234.183]) by eastrmimpo01.cox.net with bizsmtp id EFx41Y00F3y5FKc0000000; Sun, 18 Nov 2007 10:57:05 -0500 Message-ID: <474060B3.7050404@lojban.org> Date: Sun, 18 Nov 2007 10:56:35 -0500 From: Bob LeChevalier User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.7 (Windows/20050923) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban-list@lojban.org Subject: [lojban] Re: Poll (not lojbanic, but whorfish) References: <3ccac5f10711180120h22d76144p2975dff7770c9fd7@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <3ccac5f10711180120h22d76144p2975dff7770c9fd7@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Spam-Score: 0.0 X-Spam-Score-Int: 0 X-Spam-Bar: / X-archive-position: 13952 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: lojbab@lojban.org Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-list@lojban.org X-list: lojban-list Cyril Slobin wrote: > If you see a plastic bag with two books inside and a pair of shoes, > how much items do you see? And, if your answer is not 1 or 5, list > these items, please. > > Yes, this is all about mapping between reality and language. The poll > is also posted in my blog (in Russian), results will be compared. > > The question is not invented from scratch, it arose from a real-life > confusion between me and my wife. My first reading, without looking at any of the other answers, gave 5 because I interpreted the shoes as being inside the bag, and the bag as transparent (because that was the immediate significance to me of specifying the material that the bag was made of). Reading the other answers, I realize that the bag might not be transparent even though plastic (in which case, all other things being as first interpreted, I see only one item, the bag), and the shoes have not been stated to necessarily be in the bag, in which case, I see 3. To me, whether the shoes are inside the bag or not is ambiguous as you presented the English. With a comma after "inside", the pair of shoes would be clearly separate from what is inside the bag. With the word inside moved to after the word shoes, then the shoes are clearly inside the bag. If you were orally asking me the question, intonation would also likely disambiguate. In American English, a pair may refer to two individual items and be grammatically plural, or it may be a mass term that is grammatically singular (I would accept both "The pair of shoes are in the bag" and "The pair of shoes is in the bag" as being grammatical). A pair of shoes is two items in all contexts I can think of, whereas a pair of eyeglasses is always one item in all contexts that I can think of. lojbab 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.