From lojban+bncCJ2UzZHuDRD5tdDxBBoEBfwKKQ@googlegroups.com Sat Jul 30 07:53:58 2011 Received: from mail-qw0-f61.google.com ([209.85.216.61]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.72) (envelope-from ) id 1QnAvL-000774-Pm; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:58 -0700 Received: by qwh5 with SMTP id 5sf4859328qwh.16 for ; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:49 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=googlegroups.com; s=beta; h=x-beenthere:received-spf:mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date :message-id:subject:from:to:x-original-sender :x-original-authentication-results:reply-to:precedence:mailing-list :list-id:x-google-group-id:list-post:list-help:list-archive:sender :list-subscribe:list-unsubscribe:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; bh=FwAvjlawmVMjdwJonw3UTKL0J6GPwe52BOcCJnPYjiU=; b=FBvyTzToU7DQrBl71CUmcHy1lrSinfjGVleITiCMF3CYr/wQrkCoJd82kfrxeIjsOP 1P//6FYyJNvQX36IHNfa4GAP2oqaeKyh+ATHwvmXvf5OeX+cod2nvRrC8uXEVipi1bVS sw6XSLu2T0qSZ1BK0pgiKMGEeEYr/kN22RSsc= Received: by 10.229.129.19 with SMTP id m19mr262211qcs.6.1312037625530; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:45 -0700 (PDT) X-BeenThere: lojban@googlegroups.com Received: by 10.224.89.4 with SMTP id c4ls3606079qam.1.gmail; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:44 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.224.210.193 with SMTP id gl1mr2120501qab.2.1312037624423; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:44 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.224.210.193 with SMTP id gl1mr2120500qab.2.1312037624407; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:44 -0700 (PDT) Received: from mail-vx0-f179.google.com ([209.85.220.179]) by gmr-mx.google.com with ESMTPS id p20si4157565qca.0.2011.07.30.07.53.43 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=OTHER); Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:43 -0700 (PDT) Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of jjllambias@gmail.com designates 209.85.220.179 as permitted sender) client-ip=209.85.220.179; Received: by vxi32 with SMTP id 32so3617760vxi.10 for ; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:43 -0700 (PDT) MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.52.24.43 with SMTP id r11mr2697140vdf.529.1312037623161; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:43 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.52.115.133 with HTTP; Sat, 30 Jul 2011 07:53:42 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <1312034760.68779.YahooMailRC@web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <201107191408.50207.phma@phma.optus.nu> <1311780839.58357.YahooMailRC@web81304.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <1312034760.68779.YahooMailRC@web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Date: Sat, 30 Jul 2011 11:53:42 -0300 Message-ID: Subject: Re: [lojban] Gerunds, infinitives and other technicalities From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jorge_Llamb=EDas?= To: lojban@googlegroups.com X-Original-Sender: jjllambias@gmail.com X-Original-Authentication-Results: gmr-mx.google.com; spf=pass (google.com: domain of jjllambias@gmail.com designates 209.85.220.179 as permitted sender) smtp.mail=jjllambias@gmail.com; dkim=pass (test mode) header.i=@gmail.com Reply-To: lojban@googlegroups.com Precedence: list Mailing-list: list lojban@googlegroups.com; contact lojban+owners@googlegroups.com List-ID: X-Google-Group-Id: 1004133512417 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 On Sat, Jul 30, 2011 at 11:06 AM, John E Clifford wr= ote: > Well, I'm not quite sure what a generic abstractor =A0or generic bridi > subordinator would do. =A0It seems that each case where subordination of = the sort > involved here is concerned, only a limited number of =A0types (by the way= how do > we fill in x2 of 'su'u'?) are possible and each gives a slightly differen= t > meaning. =A0What is left for the generic case? =A0I suppose, following xo= rlo by > analogy, that it would, in each case, be the indeterminate middle of all = the > possible inserts, assuming that makes any sense at all (what is the middl= e of > propositions, events, and properties?). =A0It seems to add obfuscation ju= st where > clarity us sought. It seems to me that whenever a subordinate clause is needed, only one type (of the three main ones) makes sense and the others don't just give a slightly different meaning, the others give nonsense. For example, the subordinate bridi that goes in x1 of frili must be a nu. It makes no sense to say of a proposition or of a property that it is frili. The subordinate bridi that goes in x2 of jinvi must be a du'u, it makes no sense to jinvi an event or a property. The subordinate bridi that goes in the x2 of mutce must be a ka, it makes no sense to say that something is mutce in an event or a proposition. As far as I can tell there are hardly any cases where we have a choice, and then what's the point of duplicating the information that is already there in the meaning of the predicate? And in the cases where we hesitate which one is "right" (usually between nu and du'u), it's only because the predicate is not well defined, not because there are two separate meanings that the same predicate would distinguish. That's as far as the "big three" are concerned: du'u, nu and ka. In the case of the four types of nu (pu'u, za'i, zu'o and mu'e) the determination comes from the inner bridi rather than from the slot where the bridi is inserted, but again there is little or no choice, the event described by the bridi practically determines the subtype of nu, so there is no point in duplicating that information with different NUs. ni and jei are special cases because they do encode additional information, although they have the problem that they are badly defined, so that each of them has two separate usages. Their main usage is in encoding an indirect question. jei can be just avoided and replaced by "du'u xu kau". ni (in the indirect question sense) is usually something like "ka se la'u ma kau". I can't say much about li'i and su'u because I don't really understand them, but they are hardly used anyway. In summary, I tend to agree that a single subordinator would have made things simpler without really losing anything important. 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.