John:
> Invent Yourself scripsit:
> > What I am really
> > saying here though, which nobody is addressing, is that we should reserve
> > mass-gadri for collectives. And disambiguate collectives from substances,
> > because they are very different things
>
> I don't agree that they are different, much less very different. I think
> this view (which you hold) is just as much a Whorfian mind-lock as the
> view (which you don't hold) that an individual != a quantity of a substance
>
> The "Creatures of Lo[i]" view is that when water (which is a portion of
Water)
> flows over a dam, this is the same situation as when monkey (which is
> a portion of Monkey) falls out of a tree
All sorts of issues are being mixed up here:
1. Which distinct notions is Lojban to be able to express?
2. Which conflated notions is Lojban to be able to express?
3. Which of these notions does a speaker choose to emply to describe
a given thing?
Xod addresses (1). You answer by making a point about (3). The one I
care about is (1). We don't really have to bother with (3); I am
perfectly happy for a Lojbanist to say that the mass of all monkey(s)
falls from a tree. But I want to be able to treat Substance and
Collective distinctly.