From 3xZuvSw8JBlwGC6B48F.8P8LMIHAG4CF.6IGFID54HAIIAF8ALIOJM.6IG@groups.bounces.google.com Sun Mar 28 11:11:44 2010 Received: from mail-gy0-f189.google.com ([209.85.160.189]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from <3xZuvSw8JBlwGC6B48F.8P8LMIHAG4CF.6IGFID54HAIIAF8ALIOJM.6IG@groups.bounces.google.com>) id 1NvwxX-0004Ps-HA for lojban-list-archive@lojban.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:44 -0700 Received: by gyd5 with SMTP id 5sf16642271gyd.16 for ; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:33 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=googlegroups.com; s=beta; h=domainkey-signature:received:x-beenthere:received:received:received :received:received-spf:received:received:received:mime-version :subject:from:in-reply-to:date:message-id:references:to:x-mailer :x-original-authentication-results:x-original-sender:precedence :mailing-list:list-id:list-post:list-help:list-archive:x-thread-url :x-message-url:sender:list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; bh=zZ7IKW17EFF7LBKuzNjWZOcv+8hwZTaRozlkK4VeAx4=; b=HdD0dT1MdX9RU+XJf17GdIry0bN/PveEh4XDBwgB5ll701pXuxgCLsITcd29f+ccSV l0iY6vxvWG4fuzdJepFTUndIPUwyDqXL/SgR6x9Phrgu3/b+rHMu607UM8uEUrWJ6k59 pR3mimX9KnDhFBBiWmYNBhAGSBUFr+PjVUG0w= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=googlegroups.com; s=beta; h=x-beenthere:received-spf:mime-version:subject:from:in-reply-to:date :message-id:references:to:x-mailer:x-original-authentication-results :x-original-sender:precedence:mailing-list:list-id:list-post :list-help:list-archive:x-thread-url:x-message-url:sender :list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; b=eagoVliAl1uuTmOnaWmMQ6g1mnJHeA86US2cNoSJdYrDi3/rHk7UGvVwGALUU3ugwf Z13mHhWN410D5kSAPWPtEPnV7embue4w/XLHdDgqnLt/apEQbEnhrwI5jgW5VR6I0hPO MwQBKAYJ8LkfDmxb38XGOBACNcs0fVo6aHzEM= Received: by 10.91.121.20 with SMTP id y20mr285972agm.23.1269799877404; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:17 -0700 (PDT) X-BeenThere: lojban@googlegroups.com Received: by 10.204.6.87 with SMTP id 23ls4422506bky.0.p; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:14 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.204.36.198 with SMTP id u6mr244989bkd.15.1269799874373; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:14 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.204.36.198 with SMTP id u6mr244988bkd.15.1269799874350; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:14 -0700 (PDT) Received: from mail-ww0-f47.google.com (mail-ww0-f47.google.com [74.125.82.47]) by gmr-mx.google.com with ESMTP id e24si4043419bke.6.2010.03.28.11.11.13; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:13 -0700 (PDT) Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of michael.everson@gmail.com designates 74.125.82.47 as permitted sender) client-ip=74.125.82.47; Received: by mail-ww0-f47.google.com with SMTP id 13so1282252wwb.34 for ; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:13 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.216.162.204 with SMTP id y54mr2119049wek.224.1269799872121; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:12 -0700 (PDT) Received: from [192.168.1.104] (murrisk2.westnet.ie [88.81.100.235]) by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id j8sm11476745gvb.1.2010.03.28.11.11.10 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=RC4-MD5); Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:11:10 -0700 (PDT) Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v1078) Subject: Re: [lojban] la .alis. From: Michael Everson In-Reply-To: <702226df1003281009v16765b67t15164adbc68e98d@mail.gmail.com> Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 19:11:08 +0100 Message-Id: <6B3DDDFE-901C-4F09-9D60-C0EEA821D33F@gmail.com> References: <44766EDC-06BC-4C51-BFEB-15C7E8893161@gmail.com> <702226df1003281009v16765b67t15164adbc68e98d@mail.gmail.com> To: lojban@googlegroups.com X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.1078) X-Original-Authentication-Results: gmr-mx.google.com; spf=pass (google.com: domain of michael.everson@gmail.com designates 74.125.82.47 as permitted sender) smtp.mail=michael.everson@gmail.com; dkim=pass (test mode) header.i=@gmail.com X-Original-Sender: michael.everson@gmail.com Precedence: list Mailing-list: list lojban@googlegroups.com; contact lojban+owners@googlegroups.com List-ID: List-Post: , List-Help: , List-Archive: X-Thread-Url: http://groups.google.com/group/lojban/t/62f96e395a91e500 X-Message-Url: http://groups.google.com/group/lojban/msg/e06368957ef23149 Sender: lojban@googlegroups.com List-Subscribe: , List-Unsubscribe: , Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On 28 Mar 2010, at 18:09, Jonathan Jones wrote: > Lojban doesn't have "punctuation". No spoken language has writing of any kind. Until it is employed. > For example, Lojban's equivalent to "?" is {xu}, as in {xu do jimpe mi}, = which means "Do you understand me?" So? Chinese has in interrogative particle, "ma": "=E4=BD=A0=E5=A5=BD=E5=90= =97=EF=BC=9F N=C7=90 h=C7=8Eo ma?" 'Are you well?'; Irish has an interrogat= ive particle, "an": "An dtuigeann t=C3=BA?" 'do you understand?' In both la= nguges, the question mark is arguably redundant. Yet it is written, as an a= id to readers. > While Lojban does have 3 special characters- {.}, {,}, and {'}, they are = used as letters, not as punctuation. Yes, and they are even optional (well, I shouldn't think that the last ough= t to be optional).=20 > The correct form of the Lojban {mi klama la.bast,n. .i la.bab cusku lu mi= klama li'u} is {mi klama la.bAst,n. .i la.bab cusku lu mi klama li'u} Correct? Common, certainly. "Standard", perhaps, even. THough I haven't see= n la.bab run together in most texts.=20 >> Caps for proper names (la Alis), and anomalous stress marked by acute ac= cents rather than by capitalization (which is thereby freed for other use).= Near as I can tell the only word in the text affected by this is "la meri,= An" ("la Meri,=C3=81n" or "la Meri,=C3=A1n"; the original is "Mary Ann"). >=20 > Capitalization in Lojban is used to mark non-standard stress. Notice that I already acknowledged this. Capitalization is a convention com= monly used in Lojban to mark non-standard stress.=20 > In Lojban, all words are stressed on the second-to-last syllable, except = in names, when marked by capitalizing either the entire syllable or just th= e vowel of the syllable that gets primary stress. la.meri,an. is thus prono= unced la.merI,an., stressed on "ri", whereas la.meri,An is stressed on "an"= . And yet there is no particular utility in this convention. It just looks LI= KE SHOUTING. Spanish, one of the source languges for Lojban vocabulary, use= s the acute accent to mark anomalous stress. If one does that, then one may= be free to use capitalization in the conventional way it is used in other = Latin-script languages. This enhances the readability of a text to anyone u= sed to the convention (as most of us have been since we were four or five y= ears of age). > The Punctuation page describes where and how it is acceptable to use punc= tuation. However, such punctuation in not part of Lojban. "Part of"? Is writing in Latin script "part of" Lojban? I see that there ar= e Cyrillic and Tengwar orthographies. Are they "part of" Lojban? > {xu? do jimpe mi} is {xu do jimpe mi} with a non-Lojbanic character inser= ted to indicate that {xu} is a question word. Actually I wouldn't consider that to be useful. The speaker of Chinese or I= rish knows that "ma" and "an" are interrogative particles. The whole senten= ce is marked with a question mark, as a matter of convention. One would not= write *"An? dtuigeann t=C3=BA".=20 > {mi cusku lu" mi cliva "li'u} is {mi cusku lu mi cliva li'u} with non-loj= banic characters inserted to indicate the begin and ending quote words. Yes, I know. > They are NOT part of Lojban writing, have never been used in any Lojban w= riting I've seen, and only serve one purpose, to my knowledge- which is, to= help beginning learners remember what certain words do. And there is something wrong with that? I pointed out that my Cornish edition of Alice is used alongside the Englis= h edition by learners. The fact that they use similar typographic conventio= ns is an advantage to the learners, in finding their place when making comp= arisons, for instance. > Since I I highly doubt that someone so new to the Lojban language that th= ey can't even remember what {xu} or {li'u} means without a foreign characte= r put in the text would be able to read {la.alis.}, such foreign punctuati= on has no place in the text. Yes, well, we remember what "an" means in Irish, and also the negative inte= rrogative particle "nach", and yet we are quite happy to write the question= mark at the end of the sentence. > > I don't think he likes us anymore. >=20 > I like you fine. I just disagree with your stance on punctuation and typo= graphic conventions. >=20 > Our stance is, use Lojban punctuation and typography. It's that simple.= =20 I did not say that I did not understand your stance. I said that I disagree= d with it. > I also like Lewis Carroll, and good typography. I find long paragraphs wi= th no clear visual indication of sentence boundaries to be bewildering. I a= m sure that computers and savants find it quite simple to parse. I as a mul= tilingual trained linguist expert in writing systems, I still find it much = easier to navigate the language when standard Latin-script conventions are = used. >=20 > As far as I'm concerned, you're perfectly allowed to insert line breaks a= nd paragraphs in the appropriate locations. For instance, "ni'o ni'o= " would be fine as: > " > ni'o >=20 > ni'o > " >=20 > {ni'o} being equivalent to the paragraph in English. ({ni'oni'o} being se= ction, {ni'oni'oni'o} being chapter, etc.) Really? Did you know that {ni'o} does not occur even once in Xorxe's transl= ation of Alice? {ni'oni'o} occurs at the beginning of each chapter. > Indeed, in http://www.lojban.org/publications/reference_grammar/chapter3.= html, we find the following. >=20 > "Technically, the period is an optional reminder to the reader of a manda= tory pause that is dictated by the rules of the language; because these rul= es are unambiguous, a missing period can be inferred from otherwise correct= text. Periods are included only as an aid to the reader." >=20 > A period is not necessary if a space is used, a space is not necessary if= a period is used. Fine. If the text uses spaces between words, then the full stop can be used= , redundantly, at the border between the end of a sentence and before space= preceding the {i} which begins the next sentence.=20 As I pointed out the 69-page PDF of Alice doesn't have any full stops in it= at all.=20 > As such, {mi tavla do la.alis.}, could also be written {mi tavla do la .a= lis.}, {mi tavla do la alis}, or the horribly atrocious looking and much fr= owned upon {mitAvladola.alis.}, all of which are the exact same utterance. Yes, because spoken language is just an utterance. This is really all very = elementary writing theory. Obviously utterances can be written in various w= ays. In Burmese and Thai, they do not put anything at all between words. Th= eyjustrunthemalltogher andthenusespacestoseparateclauses. > My personal preference is, when a glottal stop would be pronounced when s= peaking something, to choose the period over the space, as in {mi tavla do = la.alis.}. Other people prefer to not ever use the period in writing, as in= {mi tavla do la alis}. The CLL, the official reference grammar, at no poin= t omits either, and would write it as {mi tavla do la .alis.}. Any of these= conventions regarding {denpabu} is fine by me, as they are all {lo lojbo}. Now, now. Conventions are devised by people. In the Latin script, certain c= onventions are used for most languages. Capitals at the beginning of senten= ces, full stops at the end, capitals for personal names. Sure, when Lojban = was devised, other conventions were used. That does not mean that text in L= ojban ceases to be Lojban if traditional Latin casing and punctuation conve= ntions are used. After all, if Tengwar can be used, or Cyrillic, then why s= hould there be some sort of "ban" on using "Victorian typographic conventio= ns" for a book written in the nineteenth century? It's just a convention. Y= ou might not prefer it. You've stated that you've got preferences.=20 > Certainly, you can write {la.meri,An.} as {la.meri,=C3=A1n.}. Accents are= an acceptable form of non-standard stress demarcation. Really? Since the beginning of the language? Or is this a more recent innov= ation? > However, {la.Meri,=C3=A1n.} is just plain wrong. No, it's just not a familiar convention. There's nothing "wrong" about it. = It would be pronounced just exactly the same way. As it would if it were=20 > Lojban does not capitalise proper nouns. Lojban doesn't even have nouns. = The name of Paris in Lojban is {la.parIs.}, or, if you like, {la.par=C3=ADs= .}, it is not {la.Par=C3=ADs.} There is no intrinsic difference between "la parIs" or "la par=C3=ADs" or "= la Par=C3=ADs". The text is the same. The pronunciation is the same. The co= nventions are different, that is all.=20 > Furthermore. The "." is a letter in Lojban. The "?" is not. It might not = be strictly necessary to use "." in {lo nu lojbo ciska}, but only because a= person proficient in Lojban knows that one goes in that place. {mi klama d= o la alis la lojban} is still pronounced as {mi klama do la .alis. la .lojb= an.}, regardless. It is more a quasi-letter, since it can be omitted entirely. In the convent= ion I am interested in, it would not be used as a letter or quasi-letter. > In the issue of punctuation, Lojban is more like Japanese then English. F= or example, to say "You are healthy." in Japanese, is "Ogenki desu". In loj= ban, {ko kanro}. To ask "Are you healthy?" in Japanese, is "Ogenki desu ka"= . While it is true that the question mark is not obligatory in Japanese, both= =E5=81=A5=E5=85=A8=E3=81=A7=E3=81=82=E3=82=8B=E3=81=8B=E3=80=82(with a ful= l stop) and=20 =E5=81=A5=E5=85=A8=E3=81=A7=E3=81=82=E3=82=8B=E3=81=8B? are acceptable rend= erings in Japanese. > In Lojban, {xu ko kanro}. I personally feel that foreign punctuation, suc= h as {?} and {"} would actually be detrimental. Detrimental? In what way could the use of such redundant marks be "harmful"= ? > In other words, far from being the help you seem to think they would be, = I see them as a hindrance. It is clear that you do see them as a "hindrance". As a hindrance to what, = may I ask? In the middle of page 43 of the Alice PDF there is a paragraph o= f ten lines. Not a bit of punctuation in it. It is impossible to tell at a = glance if there are any questions in that paragraph. > I would not be at all surprised if the majority, if not the entirety, of = my fellow Lojbanists agreed with me on this. Jorge has already indicated that he is at least interested in discussing th= e matter.=20 I am not, by the way, trying to reform Lojban or change anyone's habits. I = am interested, however, in the typography of a particular book, and in a di= alogue about legibility and writing conventions. I see from the archives of= this list that the question of punctuation and capitalization arise from t= ime to time. I see that John Cowan raised the question in 1992.=20 Evidently it is an interesting question to some, even if not to you. Fair enough? Michael --=20 You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "= lojban" group. To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegrou= ps.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban= ?hl=3Den.