RE: [jboske] interpretation of LAhE (was: RE: Digest Number 136

["And Rosta" <a.rosta@lycos.co.uk>]

xorxes:
> la and cusku di'e
> 
> > > LAhEs lose much of their
> > > reason of being if they are transparent to quantifiers
> >
> >I agree. If you assume that LAhE is a tool well-designed for its
> >job, then it turns out to have less useful a job than if you
> >just think "here's a tool, what can it most usefully be used for?" 
> 
> Also, if we want {tu'a} to work like all other LAhEs, they
> have to be opaque 

Or, in a true grammar of Lojban, tu'a would belong to a different
wordclass.

> > > What we are disagreeing about is on how to handle the
> > > notationally odd F(Qx). You want it to be just a variation of
> > > Qx:...Fx... I want to give it a more complex but I think more
> > > useful meaning. But we are not disagreeing about the basic
> > > unquantified Fx
> >
> >That's right. But F(Qx) is odd whether F is a function or a
> >predicate. It's a notation allowed by Lojban as a convenience,
> >but it has to be translated into something logically sound 
> >
> >I understand that your meaning is more useful, but you are in
> >effect changing the meaning of F when in F(Qx) 
> 
> Not really. For example, lu'i would be defined as something
> like:
> 
> lu'i Qx = da poi ge Qx cmima ke'a
> gi no de poi na du x cu cmima ke'a

The second x is unbound.

> and the same formula would apply without the quantifier 

In which case, we are also disagreeing about the meaning of Fx,
since F is not being treated as a function.

> This is like what happens with {tu'a}:
> 
> tu'a Qx = le du'u Qx co'e
> 
> but if the quantifier is outside it remains outside 
> 
> > > How do you propose to say "a mass of two books (only)"?
> >
> >{lo cukta re mei}, {lau'o re cukta}, {lu'o lau'i re cukta} 
> >
> >There is no decent way in current Lojban, but I don't think
> >that justifies mungeing LAhE 
> 
> I'm not sure I see the point of having LAhE at all if they
> are transparent 

When you have true functions, treating them as predicates
involves redundant quantification (or some other redundant sort 
of gadri use). Transparent LAhE avoid this redundancy. 

It is unfortunate that there is no counterpart of {fi'o} that 
turns a selbri into a LAhE, so that {xi'o mamta ko'a} would 
mean "ko'a's mother". I can't just propose it as an experimental
cmavo, though, because it would involve a grammar change.

--And.