From lojban+bncCN673cmqFBCv-IneBBoEC0PeQw@googlegroups.com Sun Apr 11 18:49:57 2010 Received: from mail-gy0-f189.google.com ([209.85.160.189]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1O18me-0006vF-SD; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:49:57 -0700 Received: by gyd5 with SMTP id 5sf3129096gyd.16 for ; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:49:46 -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:x-vr-score :x-authority-analysis:x-cm-score:message-id:date:from:user-agent :x-accept-language:mime-version:to:subject:references:in-reply-to :x-original-authentication-results:x-original-sender:reply-to :precedence:mailing-list:list-id:list-post:list-help:list-archive :x-thread-url:x-message-url:sender:list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe :content-type; bh=mcfdBdZ4GQl3eqsw4OmtjRoNwpFB85XBnxui6XzwP/g=; b=OQFDD9qd89iMzBl1lQaplcNhvg8mUcs5Ihgc4UZ3pNPCD6fPaMNfsm+pJZhsiZpEwB lgzf3clSorrJIPQgR95gTheheOUIbv0rQ0tmG0zkmP/PE0IgbygNARgvETDMhxx4YhxF 0Vgn70hL5jz97mNqWEExnD9akD5M7xoTG6T2g= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=googlegroups.com; s=beta; h=x-beenthere:received-spf:x-vr-score:x-authority-analysis:x-cm-score :message-id:date:from:user-agent:x-accept-language:mime-version:to :subject:references:in-reply-to:x-original-authentication-results :x-original-sender:reply-to:precedence:mailing-list:list-id :list-post:list-help:list-archive:x-thread-url:x-message-url:sender :list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type; b=uO2jNR7yn6+ZIc6jWI6387hcYGVl8uvr1NQHolOUyCzNIRauyhKASnsVoMY7ukhlen 8+6GbUDXSrHuymNJS+3T2Fvhlx6jj7+ic1sDNNnS8dtklp+WwpxA7QqBM+b0vkk2lWC7 9/XJFYyeCLNSLN2C0sZB25uJlFVin/YNrbZd0= Received: by 10.91.91.6 with SMTP id t6mr534573agl.14.1271036975713; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:49:35 -0700 (PDT) X-BeenThere: lojban@googlegroups.com Received: by 10.91.93.10 with SMTP id v10ls286518agl.3.p; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:49:34 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.90.10.20 with SMTP id 20mr2493748agj.0.1271036973976; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:49:33 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.90.10.20 with SMTP id 20mr2493746agj.0.1271036973888; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:49:33 -0700 (PDT) Received: from eastrmmtao107.cox.net (eastrmmtao107.cox.net [68.230.240.59]) by gmr-mx.google.com with ESMTP id 25si386705ywh.15.2010.04.11.18.49.33; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:49:33 -0700 (PDT) Received-SPF: neutral (google.com: 68.230.240.59 is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of lojbab@lojban.org) client-ip=68.230.240.59; Received: from eastrmimpo01.cox.net ([68.1.16.119]) by eastrmmtao107.cox.net (InterMail vM.8.00.01.00 201-2244-105-20090324) with ESMTP id <20100412014932.BGIU23683.eastrmmtao107.cox.net@eastrmimpo01.cox.net> for ; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 21:49:32 -0400 Received: from [192.168.0.100] ([70.187.225.124]) by eastrmimpo01.cox.net with bizsmtp id 4RpY1e00E2hfrC602RpY6b; Sun, 11 Apr 2010 21:49:33 -0400 X-VR-Score: -100.00 X-Authority-Analysis: v=1.1 cv=u9aaE4Pfr0xy9UvPxuh9qFR1i2SV5RyaXjJQawTgqeY= c=1 sm=1 a=8nJEP1OIZ-IA:10 a=lsg66w07okjF3vGJL2g+Jw==:17 a=cvWrOKHcP3ZpKvoAsXYA:9 a=nWEbpCj_XKYK9tav24UA:7 a=jY8uNw-d1As5D2na_6yFVQzdnYIA:4 a=wPNLvfGTeEIA:10 a=lsg66w07okjF3vGJL2g+Jw==:117 X-CM-Score: 0.00 Message-ID: <4BC27C9E.2040306@lojban.org> Date: Sun, 11 Apr 2010 21:51:26 -0400 From: Robert LeChevalier User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.7 (Windows/20050923) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: [lojban] Active-stative? References: In-Reply-To: X-Original-Authentication-Results: gmr-mx.google.com; spf=neutral (google.com: 68.230.240.59 is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of lojbab@lojban.org) smtp.mail=lojbab@lojban.org X-Original-Sender: lojbab@lojban.org Reply-To: lojban@googlegroups.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/cdf18777732f3c27 X-Message-Url: http://groups.google.com/group/lojban/msg/ce41ceec570e61c Sender: lojban@googlegroups.com List-Subscribe: , List-Unsubscribe: , Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Christopher Doty wrote: > The only way I can think of to get Lojban to have an ergative/absolutive > alignment, given the strict word order, would be to have some gismu > which have two slots syntactically, but only one sematically, so that > the first always has {zo'e}. At one point, there were a lot of gismu which had one place for a raised sumti, and one for an abstraction from which it was raised. We tried to eliminate as many of these as possible when we revised the grammar for explicit sumti-raising, and I can't off the top of my head remember any really egregious examples. We do have some words like djuno in which it is perhaps possible to consider 2 syntactic slots to be one semantically in most usage, though it is possible to do otherwise. x1 knows fact x2 about x3 by metaphysics x4. x2 and x3 are in quasi-opposition, in that almost always if one specifies x2, then they will not specify x3 (which will be zo'e) because x3 is probably the most prominent and expressed sumti in the abstraction predicate that fills x2. Or they will specify x3, but leave the specific fact known about x3 unspecified because it is obvious from context, or because it is a large set of facts that no one would ever express. (Some senses of "I know calculus" might translate expressing x1 and x3 only.) I'm not sure if this is what you mean. The other problem I see with this argument is that gismu are by no means the complete set of brivla in the language, and indeed it is an open set, *and the forms you described as not being found among gismu are perfectly possible in the set of potentially coinable brivla*. Nothing is stopping anyone from coining a fu'ivla corresponding to a Basque word, and giving it only an x2, or making unusual with the semantics of multiple sumti. When ages ago, I was proposing the use of Lojban as an auxiliary metalanguage for expressing linguistic examples in a neutral way, those were the sorts of things I indicated were possible. Lojban's bells and whistles allow the mimicking of almost anything in a form which communicates more information, more unambiguously, than the typical linguistic example expressed in English translation (like the Basque example in this thread). > Or, alternatively, that there are some > gismu which simply can't have any of the arguments in their predicate > placed before the verb.* There are no such gismu, but there could be brivla or other predications with that property. They'd give all sorts of semantic complication interacting with other rules of the language. A broda with no x1 has no meaning for "lo broda". But then a broda with no x5 has no meaning for lo xe broda. > But so what if English "prioritizes subject" and other languages don't? > The point is that Lojban "prioritizes" the x1 slot in the same way. > What you're really trying to say with "prioritize," I think, is which > tends to be required by the grammar It is not required by the Lojban grammar, but by the semantics of the predefined lexicon, which were assigned their place structure without a lot of consideration of semantics (because I don't know any semantic theory), but rather a projection of usage vs brevity (Zipf's law). lojbab -- 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@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban?hl=en.