Re: [bpfk] polysemy of {nai}

[John Cowan <cowan@mercury.ccil.org>]

Jorge Llambías scripsit:

> I don't think you can use "mi na'e klama le zarci" to affirm that you
> are coming from the store. You can only use it to affirm that the
> relationship between you and the store, whatever that relationship may
> be, is other than "klama".

Exactly, and what I am affirming (though not explicitly) is that the
relationship is "se te klama".  In English, if I ask "Are you going to
the store", I may reply "I'm not *going* to the store", with sentential
stress on "going".  This is "na'e", whereas "I'm not going to the store"
without sentential stress may be "na'e" or "na", depending on context.
(I don't know how you make this contrast in the Romance languages.)

This is clearer if we look at sumti scalar negation with "na'e bo".
"mi klama na'e bo le zarci" definitely affirms that I went somewhere,
it just wasn't the store.  "mi na klama le zarci" makes no such claim.

> ".enai" is not any of those with respect to ".e".

It's true that "nai" does not contradict ".e", it contradicts what
follows.  I merely meant to show that the kind of negation represented
by "nai" depends on the preceding selma'o.

> That's not really saying anything different from "mi na klama le
> zarci". If you are coming from the store, both "mi na'e klama le zarci"
> and "mi na klama le zarci" are true, but neither affirms that you are
> coming from the store.

However, if I stand in no relation whatever to the store, or more
practically if the relationship I have with it is unrelated to "klama",
then "na'e" is false but "na" is still true.  "klama" is not really
scalar, so it's a bad example however you look at it.

> By systematically I meant it follows a pattern in how it changes words
> with the same function. I agree it is not possible to follow the same
> pattern for words with wildly different functions such as, for
> instance, ".e" and "ui".

In that case, spell out what "nai" means when attached to each selma'o,
and write the whole thing up as a proposal.  Without that, it's just
loosening for the sake of loosening.

-- 
John Cowan      <cowan@ccil.org>       http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
                Charles li reis, nostre emperesdre magnes,
                Set anz totz pleinz ad ested in Espagnes.

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