Re: big rethink on Unique and other gadri

[Nick Nicholas <opoudjis@optushome.com.au>]

Thanks a bunch, And.

Unique != Intensional. We had already agreed on that.

I was just this morning (because you people have ruined Christmas Mass 
for me too) thinking, "whatever the intensional is expressed as, it's 
not only individuals and {da} that can be intensionals. It's also 
masses and sets and the rest:

mi djica lenu da poi gunma loi marjrxodiumu zo'u:
mi cpacu du

I want some xodium (whether or not it exists)

So, unfortunately, this is true: since masses, sets, and individuals 
can all be intensional, intensionality cuts across these categories.

One solution (a solution I think pessimal) is to make this a gadcolumn.

Another solution (which I think preferable) is to leave the gadcolumns 
alone, and go propositionalist. After all (as I found in CLL to my 
delight), prenexes by default go to the innermost, not the outermost 
bridi --- so the default interpretation of {mi nitcu lenu mi tavla lo 
mikce} *is* "I want to talk to a doctor, any doctor", not "there's this 
particular doctor I want to talk to".

Another solution, which I think easiest, is to do what we did with 
{kau}: just stick a UI on, and say "wherever that UI is, we quantify 
the referent right here, not in the prenex."

So,
{mi skicu loi xodiumu} presupposes that xodium exists
{mi skicu loi XVV xodiumu}: I describe xodium [which is in a world 
where xodium exists]

(... is XVV da'i?)

I think there's a lot to be said for le...ce'u, though:

I seek, using the template "X is xodium" in mind = mi sisku leka ce'u 
marjrxodiumu

I describe, using the template "X is xodium" in mind = mi skicu leka 
ce'u marjrxodiumu?

I draw some xodium = mi pixrygau fi leka ce'u marjrxodiumu?

You know, these don't look half so bad to me.

---

I see what you're also doing is saying:

{le} is +specific -veridical
{lo} is -specific +veridical

If we had a -specific -veridical, we'd have the solution to our 
problems. Yes? Is that what you mean by 'presuppose'?

I don't know that this is so. {le nanmu} presupposes that a referent of 
{le nanmu} exists, too, and conventionally claims of it {da nanmu}, 
without vouching for it. But whatever {le nanmu} is, there is {su'o pa} 
of it. Right?

If that's so, then [-specific -veridical] doesn't help. If you seek one 
of those as a unicorn, you're saying you're actually seeking something 
else instead. But you're actually seeking a nothing.

Let me try again. There is no six-letter gismu of Lojban, right?

Can we say:

mi nitcu lo xavlerfu gismu

--- no, because that's

su'o da poi xavlerfu gismu zo'u: mi nitcu da

Can we say:

mi nitcu le xavlerfu gismu

--- depends on whether le X presupposes that it has a non-null 
referent. I think it does, but the CLL description of le is pretty 
opaque.

If you *can* say the latter, your proposed -spec -veridical might work.

Both politically and for reasons of logic formalisms familiar to me, 
I'd rather we not make up a gadri for this at all, but stick with ce'u 
and da'i.

Or... why can't we just say

mi nitcu lo su'o no xavlerfu gismu

Over...

###
ki egeire arga ta sthqia ta qlimmena;#Nick Nicholas, French/Italian
san ahdoni pou se nuxtia anoijiata # University of Melbourne
thn wra pou kelahda epnixth, wimena! # nickn@unimelb.edu.au
stis murwdies kai st' anqismena bata.# http://www.opoudjis.net
-- N. Kazantzakhs, Tertsines: Xristos#