2011/2/22 Jorge Llamb=EDas <= ;jjllambias@gmail.com>

On Tue, Feb 22, 2011 at 10:36 AM, Ian Johnson <blindbravado@gmail.com> wrote:> Except that domain of discourse in general is quite explicit in logic= al or
> mathematical contexts. That is to say, you walk into (for example) an<= br>> undergrad real analysis class and it is usually very explicit that = that "for
> all x" means "for all x in R". When i= t isn't, it's always specified in one
> way or another; the original statement of the theorem you're discu= ssing may
> be talking about a domain that is a compact interval, and= then the "for all
> x" quantifies over that interval, sinc= e you're handing x to f. In more
> general contexts, such as set theory, "for all x" quantifies= over literally
> everything that the theory causes to exist, such as= the entire collection of
> sets.
>
> These things don= 9;t bring up Lindar's issue of "which everything are we
> talking about?". If they did, mathematicians and logicians would = be doing
> something else to alleviate it.

Indeed.

> By contrast, in a general conversation, that uni= verse of discourse is
> perhaps not some absolute one, but it is a ve= ry very large one, because a
> conversation could take twists and tur= ns very very easily by comparison with
> a real analysis class. Thus the universe of discourse has to be an
= > appropriate size to compensate for that.

The domain of di= scourse takes twists and turns together with the
discourse. Just look at= any conversation in any natlang and see how
often "everybody" is meant to include the speaker, George Washing= ton,
everybody that will be born in the year 2017, Sherlock Holmes, Sant= a
Claus, and anything else that qualifies as "prenu". I would = say not
very often. =A0So whatever problems anyone has with "ro da" they = will
find the same type of problems with "ro prenu".

> I really think it isn't so hard, if you want= to be lazy, to simply use {ro
> srana} and {da poi srana} (I forget,= would {lo srana} suffice?). If you need
> a binding, {ro da poi sran= a} or {ro srana goi ko'a} work too.

We only need to wait and see what happens in practice. You can= 9;t have
a rule that says that the domain of discourse must always inclu= de
Sherlock Holmes as one of the values that variables may take, and you=
can't have a rule that says that Sherlock Holmes is a value that
var= iables may never take (at least I don't think either of those rules
= can work in practice) so it's almost inevitable that you will need
context to determine what the universe of discourse is.

If "ro = prenu" can, in some contexts, refer to the 6 or 7 billion
people al= ive that make up the human population of the Earth today,
then it can ju= st as well refer, in a different context, to the 6 or 7
people in the room now. There are, in both cases, an infinite number
of = potential values being left out that may turn up in another
context.

=A0

=A0

=A0 I don't understand what is so onerous about simply SAYING &quo= t;ro le prenu" if that's what you mean.=A0 You are arbitrarily res= tricting it to mean exaclty whatever it is you think it should be retricted= , and explicitly saying so.=A0 So instead of the listener having to ponder,= "Oh, I wonder if the speaker is really intended to mean everything, o= r if he is intending to restrict it to some context, and if the latter, wha= t context is it?"=A0 He already KNOWS the answer to the first part (re= stricted), and simply has to figure out the second part.=A0Whereas if you s= ay "ro prenu" you mean exactly that -- "all people, everywhe= re"=A0 No further pondering necessary.

=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 --gejyspa

=A0