[lojban-beginners] Re: Question around beginner's chapter 4

[robin <robin@bilkent.edu.tr>]

Yann Le Du wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I'd like some explanation on the existence of, and difference between, 
> the following bridi :
>
> .i le ci le gerku cu blabi
>
> .i le ci lo gerku cu blabi
>
> .i lo ci lo gerku cu blabi
>
> .i lo ci le gerku cu blabi

Unless my knowledge of Lojban has plummetted further than I thought 
since writing that chapter, you don't want double articles here. {le ci 
gerku} is "the three dogs", but {le ci} on its own means "the three" 
(e.g. the holy trinity or the three rings of the elf lords), so with {le 
ci le gerku} you have two sumti. This won't work with "blabi", which 
IIRC is a one-place predicate, but if we change the selbri it becomes clear.

le ci gerku cu klama
the three dogs go
ci le gerku cu klama
three of the dogs go
le ci le gerku cu klama
the three go to the dog

> Also, it is mentioned in "the complete lojban language", p. 132, section 
> 8, that on can omit "lo" e.g. "ci lo gerku" => "ci gerku". So am I right 
> to conclude that "le ci gerku" is in fact the same as "le ci lo gerku" ?

No, for the reasons stated above. {le ci lo gerku} means "the three, a 
dog" (using the malglico shorthand of "the" for "that which I call", and 
"a" for "that which really is").

robin.tr

--
"His youngest brother, Tendzin Choegyal, says one of the Dalai Lama's 
greatest finds of recent years was super-glue -- second, in fact, only 
to the more recent discovery of super-glue remover."

Robin Turner
IDMYO
Bilkent Universitesi
Ankara 06533
Turkey

www.bilkent.edu.tr/~robin