That the three descriptions refer to the same three peopl= e is a part of the case being discussed; it is not inherent in the descript= ions themselves (part of the reason for my remarks about different effects = of quantifiers). That is, that the three sets are the same is a preco= ndition for the discussion, not something that is derived in or from the di= scussion.

From: Luke Ber= gen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
= To: lojban@googlegroups.com
Sent: Wed, April 21, 2010 8:27:19 AM
Subject: Re: [lojban] About plural 'ro'<= br>
Sorry, I was going off of the wrong thing. I wanted to quote xorxes w= hen he was saying:

> Let's say that I assign "ko'= a goi la djan jo'u la pol jo'u la meris"
> (no mention of any carrying or any friendships in this assignment= ,
> just a list of three people, that I assign as the referents = of the
> plural variable "ko'a").
>
> We = also make this second assignment "ko'e goi lo ci pendo be mi" (I
> assign the same three referents to "ko'e", by a different method.= )
>
> And finally "ko'i goi lo ci bevri be lo vi pip= no" (again the same
> three people are assigned, this time to "k= o'i", by a third method).

<= span class=3D"Apple-style-span" style=3D"border-collapse: collapse;">So, if= this is how you say this, how would you say "three things that are friends= of me (which I will call ko'a). Three things which are called djan, = pol, and meris. Three things which carry this piano." Where all= these sets of three are not necessarily the same thing? I don't know= how you can have 3 separate bridi all saying {ko'V goi ci ______= } and say "yes, they're all talking about the same referent" necessari= ly.

On Wed, Apr 21, 2010 at 9:21 A= M, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:

Well, I don't like the the 'ganai... gi ..' format since that would allow f= or empty sumti, which are undesirable (if not incomprehensible) for a varie= ty of reasons. And yes, there is no general rule for 'ro<sumti>= ' nor can I think of a reason to expect one. Sumti refer to things in= a variety of ways and quantifiers naturally take these differences into ac= count. I we are going to have plural quantification, then that has to= be the fundamental form and others derive from it. The most obvious = way to deal with the problems that appear to arise from this is to adapt th= e rules for quantifiers to what is quantified over (given that we are now i= n fact quantifying over things that no actual logic quantifies over and so = we are winging it). If this gives undesirable results, then perhaps w= e need further rules about transitivity, though these get increasingly hard= to formulate. Alternatively, we can do away with plural quantification. which leads to problems,
given that terms have plural referents and instantiate bound variable= s, so that, then, variables don't cover their instances. Of course, we can = also drop plural reference and go back to singularity and get plurality exp= licitly when needed by the distinction between, say, 'lo' and 'loi' (well, = not plurality exactly, rather the interesting correlate of it, collectivity= ). Quantifiers continue to work differently depending on what the term appl= ied to is -- 'ro lo broda' is presumably partitive, 'ro loi broda' multipli= cative, and so on.

----- Original Message ----
From: Jorge Llamb=EDas <jjllambi= as@gmail.com>
To: lojban@googlegroups.com=

Sent: Tue, April 20, 2010 9:49:20 PM
Subject: Re: [lojban] About plural 'ro'

On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 11:22 PM, J= ohn E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo= .com> wrote:
> Well, as I said, if you use 'ko'a' then you have at best a purely deno= tative expression and you are stuck with what you get out. Which mean= s, of course, be careful what you do with those expressions. If= you work with 'ko'a' and quantify, then you do indeed get all the pluralit= ies and no filter. If you work with designative expressions you get t= he filter. All three of your sentences are apparently equivalent and appare= ntly all false.This is all about language, after all, not about reality.
So if I'm reading you correctly, you are saying that for you "ro ko'a
cu brode" and "ro lo broda cu brode" do not necessarily mean the same
even if "ko'a" and "lo broda" have the exact same referents? One can
be true and the other false? Certainly not the way I understand how
quantifiers work with sumti. For me "ro <sumti> cu broda" is always "ro da zo'u ganai da me <sumti> gi da broda", i.e. "for any x, if x is/are among the referents of <sumti>, then x broda", and that for me=
should work whether ro/da end up being defined as singular
quantifier/variable or as plural quantifier/variable. Alternatively,
if you don't like the ganai ... gi ... expansion (I forget which one
is the one you don't like) you can say that it's "ro da poi me <sumti>= ;
zo'u da broda", i.e. "for any x among the referents of <sumti>: x
broda", for any <sumti>.

I'm not sure what you gain by treating different sumti differently.

> The referents of plural variables are of course individuals, but may b= e several of them at once -- that is the problem. Similarly some pred= icates can take only inidivudals as arguemtns, others can take several indi= viduals as once as arguments (I'm skipping over the L-set reading with some= difficulty here). When the filter works, it filters out the inapprop= riate cases, where one variable has an inappropriate number of referents. &= nbsp;t also filters out appropriate numbers where the predicate doesn't app= ly: "carried the piano" allows plural referents for its subject, but not al= l the the subpluralities may be also true subjects of the predicate and so = "all who carried the piano" will not cover them, though it may cover others= of the same size or smaller.

So you don't have any general meaning for "ro <sumti> cu broda"
without knowing what the internals of <sumti> are, right?

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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