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Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 19:02:37 -0300
Message-ID: <925d17561003291502n2e214555y3a726fed512f0d1d@mail.gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [lojban-beginners] Re: Duration questions
From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jorge_Llamb=EDas?= <jjllambias@gmail.com>
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On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 5:06 PM, Michael Turniansky
<mturniansky@gmail.com> wrote:
> 2010/3/29 Jorge Llamb=EDas <jjllambias@gmail.com>
>>
>> Reason one: parallelism with zi/za/zu. If you accept that ZI tags the
>> full time displacement magnitude, it is only natural for ZEhA to tag
>> the full duration magnitude. Similarly for VA and VEhA. There is no
>> "total displacement" equivalent to ze'e/ve'e in ZI/VA. (This reason
>> does not apply to those who don't use ZI/VA to tag displacement
>> magnitudes.)'
>
> =A0 Which of course I don't

Right, which is why I included the caveat.

But surely having one common rule for zi/za/zu, ze'i/ze'a/ze'u/ze'e,
vi/va/vu, ve'i/ve'a/ve'u/ve'e has to count as a good reason.

>> Reason two: consistency with the rest of the tags. "ze'u broda" says
>> that broda takes a long time. "broda ze'u ko'a" should say the same
>> thing, with more precision as to what a "long time" is, it should not
>> shift to meaning that broda takes the best part of some interval,
>> perhaps not a long time at all if the interval in question happens to
>> be a short interval.
>
> =A0 You and I have different ideas about what a "consistency" would
> entail.=A0 "pu ko'a broda" isn't a "more precise version" of 'pu broda'
> (although it CAN be).

Well, let's put it this way. If someone says "pu broda", and you are
not quite sure what reference point they are taking "pu" from, you can
always ask for more precision with "pu ma broda".

>=A0 For example... mi pu klama le zarci -- I went
> to the store before this point.

Assuming you already know, or can figure out, that the reference point
is "this point", "now".

> mi pu lo bavlamdei cu klama le zarci
> -- I am going to the store store before tomorrow.=A0 I haven't specified
> the time period more precisely, in fact, I have possibly completely
> shifted it from the past to the future.

Of course. But you could have used "mi pu klama le zarci" to mean that
too, if "lo bavlamdei" had been established as the reference point or
was the obvious reference point from the context.

> A tagged sumti makes the
> tense relative to the sumti, rather than to now.=A0 Using "ze'u lo
> dunda" to mean "a long tim relative to the winter (i.e. most of the
> winter)" would continue that, making it consistent with all the other
> tense-tagged sumti.

(That's "dunra", BTW) "Most of the winter" can count as a very short
duration, depending on what it is a duration for. There is nothing in
"for a large fraction of winter" that says that that time interval is
a long time for doing whatever the main selbri is. To remain
consistent with the selbri tcita use, "ze'u" has to say that the main
selbri takes a long time for that kind of activity, not that it takes
a large fraction of some interval.


>> Reason three: it is easy to get the fractional meaning by other means:
>> "ze'a pi so'u ko'a", "ze'a pi so'i ko'a", "ze'a pi so'a ko'a", etc.
>
> =A0 =A0 Thats a non-reason. a) I disagree that's "easy". =A0It's two more
> words, for an already-wordy language b)=A0ability to do something in
> more than one way doesn't mean that both ways shouldn't be available.

It's not such a frequent thing to say that it needs a short form. But
ok, don't call this one a reason, call it a preemptive strike against
a potential "but how else are we going to say 'for a
small/medium/large fraction of interval X'" type of argument. In other
words, there is no real need to deviate from the most natural
interpretation of ZEhA as sumti tcita, which I think is established by
reasons 1 and 2.

> =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 --gejyspa
> (Off for the next two days due to Passover, so don't expect any
> replies to any replies to this any time soon)

je'e mi'e xorxes

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