From lojban+bncCIywt_XDCRDoxMPeBBoEY0nN7w@googlegroups.com Thu Apr 22 16:57:55 2010 Received: from mail-yw0-f137.google.com ([209.85.211.137]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1O56HG-0007H2-Hs; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:54 -0700 Received: by ywh1 with SMTP id 1sf2513482ywh.28 for ; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:44 -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:message-id:x-ymail-osg:received :x-mailer:references:date:from:subject:to:in-reply-to:mime-version :x-original-authentication-results:x-original-sender:reply-to :precedence:mailing-list:list-id:list-post:list-help:list-archive :sender:list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; bh=Mbu4s0TNGYl0m3+KfQXXAnd6Sc3tkWc8ra0ZuXJZ/HQ=; b=A/mmMyl/U3cBSePlGcyzBlgej7wkiXpERFNJMeiz7ne/rKEcLTHT9tgwbzrU6btKQx BJddsJctQ4qEMRMo1cyljGE5hAfL10AdQ/4+NrJNgATPnlFqYFwJlNIE2DWOlf5Kwy+k HnZ+ZqQ5tF+s+5wX3xS51ccsnhcmUPR0Zurh4= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=googlegroups.com; s=beta; h=x-beenthere:received-spf:message-id:x-ymail-osg:x-mailer:references :date:from:subject:to:in-reply-to:mime-version :x-original-authentication-results:x-original-sender:reply-to :precedence:mailing-list:list-id:list-post:list-help:list-archive :sender:list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; b=lMPcNugNjaK2+VVFggTULhE/vVEnibzop9xUurApjtPbmZQ3zVdgm/mGBbMOvpN/tk ZzPSK2N7LGISkAUAKM/s6w8lvQAq9ym7SKvMbGqXhvZtXlfMJXTA+H70UBccAo3hBqkU uPzxYZytGOvgE/dh2OkAT8LEwA3xlqCq9TKKA= Received: by 10.101.64.5 with SMTP id r5mr1105150ank.52.1271980648587; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:28 -0700 (PDT) X-BeenThere: lojban@googlegroups.com Received: by 10.101.145.21 with SMTP id x21ls25144605ann.3.p; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:28 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.101.137.23 with SMTP id p23mr7777002ann.36.1271980647786; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:27 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.101.137.23 with SMTP id p23mr7776996ann.36.1271980647599; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:27 -0700 (PDT) Received: from web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com (web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com [68.142.199.118]) by gmr-mx.google.com with SMTP id q40si827704anh.1.2010.04.22.16.57.26; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:26 -0700 (PDT) Received-SPF: pass (google.com: best guess record for domain of kali9putra@yahoo.com designates 68.142.199.118 as permitted sender) client-ip=68.142.199.118; Received: (qmail 40415 invoked by uid 60001); 22 Apr 2010 23:57:25 -0000 Message-ID: <779167.40101.qm@web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com> X-YMail-OSG: 8U6hrK0VM1kBALg70RygxyuHgGYzWJl70IJtkbsZBBrT1Ce cfvBDSn3OUfUOJ8JroMJnSrdKpp6kbfJimGPj5ZW83A4GIYQv3CQL9rUEpJJ GLilhxz4GEIoOVS9vlgPgupc.fch62g0gom28.nUZIeCpsuoVCy_OyAMkfhO 4wF.9kYM2CosxEKXnXa1hWiRNuUcu4u1kgvFXa05YvDIsXQHmeYPD6mwgEBP l.y9s3sF8YXydx509LTPAESULkn1fIiFP1svFdUgjdj1gj.y6ONFBDRb0rBr lXU0RDLKQu_nU0mAbfuqo0TLWBka6cjKk7q6q0Jre72DI2YgYfHtI6Vi69wk _i19yJ94bGaLxRPrTdSc.I32qjqkbFrrW7GaPyA-- Received: from [71.14.73.129] by web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com via HTTP; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:25 PDT X-Mailer: YahooMailRC/348.5 YahooMailWebService/0.8.102.267879 References: <6a2c862a-91f0-452e-9a31-0064620d5d06@g11g2000yqe.googlegroups.com> <934390.40893.qm@web81308.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <391970.26672.qm@web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <225049.90411.qm@web81306.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <734238.40743.qm@web81307.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <4BD060B7.5020903@gmail.com> Date: Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:57:25 -0700 (PDT) From: John E Clifford Subject: Re: [lojban] About plural 'ro' To: lojban@googlegroups.com In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Original-Authentication-Results: gmr-mx.google.com; spf=pass (google.com: best guess record for domain of kali9putra@yahoo.com designates 68.142.199.118 as permitted sender) smtp.mail=kali9putra@yahoo.com; dkim=pass (test mode) header.i=@yahoo.com X-Original-Sender: kali9putra@yahoo.com 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: Sender: lojban@googlegroups.com List-Subscribe: , List-Unsubscribe: , Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable ----- Original Message ---- From: Jorge Llamb=EDas To: lojban@googlegroups.com Sent: Thu, April 22, 2010 4:34:48 PM Subject: Re: [lojban] About plural 'ro' On Thu, Apr 22, 2010 at 11:44 AM, And Rosta wrote: > > If every possibly combination of individuals constitutes a > group/bunch/set/collectivity, so that there is no doubt over the > definitiion, is it necessary, and is it advantageous, to invoke plural > quantification/predication? Plural reference is useful to say things like: lo tadni cu dasni lo xunre mapku gi'e sruri lo dinju "The students wore red caps and surrounded the building." With groups instead of plural reference, we would have to split the claim into two: each student (not the group) wore red caps, and the group (not each student) surrounded the building. [And you don't have to do that with plural reference because....? 'dasni' = is marked for taking its subjects singularly, while 'sruri' is marked for c= ollective? I thought that was the gadri's job (together with quantifiers p= erhaps). From what you said elsewhere just now (I'm doing these backwards = apparently), there seems to be no guarantee that the students who wore red = caps and the ones who surrounded the building are exactly the same -- or ev= en partially, for that matter: 'lo tadni' has different referents at differ= ent times". But that, of course, violates a basic rule of sentence collaps= ing: you can't collapse ab & ac into a (b&c), if a means different things in the two original sentences, ] Or else, change one of the predicates to something like "participated in the surrounding of the building", or "has members each of which wore red hats". That's less appealing than just saying of the students that they wear hats and that they (the same students that wear the hats) surround the building. [But apparently you haven't said that yet.] For that, we only need plural reference, not plural quantification. According to pc, we can't have plural reference without plural quantification. I don't have a problem with introducing let's say "ro'oi" and "su'oi" for the plural universal and existential quantifiers. As long as we leave "ro" and "su'o" for the usual singular ones, which are the ones most often needed. That's the case for plural reference. A second issue, completely separate from the above, is the meaning of an expression like: ro cu broda given that "ro" is the singular universal quantifier, and is a term with plural reference. Now, a quantifier needs a domain of quantification. A term with plural reference has a number of referents. What to do? I know! Let's use the set of referents of the sumti as the domain of quantification for the quantifier! (What else?) But what if instead of a singular quantifier, we have a plural quantifier: ro'oi cu broda Now, a plural quantifier also needs a domain of quantification. Again, we note that a term with plural reference has a number of referents. What to do? How about... let's use the set of referents of the sumti as the domain of quantification for the plural quantifier! [But the question seems to be, where did those referents come from? They do= n'r necessarily satisfy the predicate in the description -- to stick to the= problematic case -- either collectively or individually, yet there they a= re. Are all descriptions just 'le' then?] Now comes a third issue, independent of the other two issues. We know (or at least don't argue much about) how sumti such as ti, ta, tu, mi, do, ri, ra, ko'a, di'u, etc. get their referents, which can be one or many. But how does a sumti like "lo broda" get its referents? No matter how it gets them, we know that they must satisfy the broda predicate, i.e. "lo broda cu broda". Is it necessary that each of the referents satisfy the predicate? No. Is it necessary that they satisfy it all collectively? No. Is it necessary that they satisfy it in groups of seven? No. In groups of varying numbers? No, that's not necessary either. All that is required is that its referents must satisfy the predicate "broda", in whatever arrangement they do it, i.e. "lo broda" =3D "zo'e noi ke'a broda", it is a sumti whose referent(s) satisfy the predicate broda. [Whoooooa! They don't have to satisfy the predicate in an preestablished w= ay, but they do have to satisfy it in some way. Any old way will do? But = that is not what the notion of a description -- or the relevant sense of sa= tisfaction -- is about. With plural referents you have basically two choic= e -- individually, each of them is a broda, or collectively, all of them br= oda together. Since these are either just things or L-sets of things, you = can't even say that abc broda and def broda, therefore abcdef broda. We ca= n't take the fact that one thing brodaes yesterday and another tomorrow and= combine them to say that the two are in lo broda today.] When we need to specify how exactly the referents of "lo broda" broda, we have to do it by some other means, because "lo broda" by itself doesn't say. Similarly, in "lo broda cu brode", when we need to specify how exactly the referents of "lo broda" brode, we need to do it in some other way, because neither "lo broda" nor "brode" do it. [So the standard line that 'lo broda' talks about brodaers collectively and= 'ro lo broda' talks about them individually is out, as is the assignment o= f places to be collective or singular.] What means do we have at our disposal? One is the singular universal quantifier "ro": ro lo tadni cu dasni lo xunre mapku "Each one of the students wears a red cap." What about the surrounding of the building? Well, we could say, for example= : pa djine be lo tadni cu sruri lo dinju "One ring of students surrounded the building." Or: ci djine be lo tadni cu sruri lo dinju "Three rings of students surrounded the building." After all, there are many different configurations in which the students could surround the building together. If we are not too concerned about the exact configuration, but we still want to insist that they did it as a group (in case that's not obvious from the context), we could say: lo gunma be lo tadni cu sruri lo dinju "A group of students surrounded the building." As someone once said, the price of infinite precision is infinite verbosity= . {But this is doing away with a useful precision for not apparent reason at = all -- except perhaps your still mysterious notion that 'lo' is a totally c= ontent neutral term maker, which also seems pretty pointless (Lord lnows we= have enough totally neutral terms already, we don't need more and especial= ly we don't need ones that seem to be doing something useful).] mu'o mi'e xorxes --=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. =20 --=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.