[lojban-beginners] Re: Why not a new LfB text?

["Wood Foster-Smith" <wrfostersmith@gmail.com>]

What I'm hearing andrus. saying is this (and I share the sentiment):

 

"I'm a new lojban learner.  How can I be sure that what I'm learning in "lobjan for beginners" is actually correct?  Am I learning complicated rules of logic and grammar that people don't adhere to, or that are never used in practice?"

 

I'm a REALLY new lojban learner -- I'm in Chapter 5 of LfB right now -- but I saw the earlier posting on this list about xorlo and, although I don't even know what gadri is yet, I saw that xorlo touches on the use of le, lo and loi, and that was a pretty complex little section that I spent some good time trying to grasp.  It was disconcerting seeing the xorlo information and wondering if that was a waste of time.

 

I'm not trying to be uptight about this -- it's all really just intellectual fun for me -- but it would be nice to know when something I'm learning isn't really "true", if that's ever the case.

 

Wood (mudris.)

 

On 10/17/07, Robert LeChevalier <lojbab@lojban.org> wrote:

ANDREW PIEKARSKI wrote:
> But will this issue be an open one forever, or is there a date by which
> we can expect a final decsion?

There is no specific date, and given my record of promising dictionaries
and textbooks for many years without delivering, you would be wise not
to believe me if I did give a date.

> Having all of the community accept the change is surely an impossibility

No.

There have been far greater changes that have been easily accepted.

>- in the meantime, confusion will reign unabated.

It shouldn't, since it is claimed xorlo would make very little pre-xorlo
text incorrect.   xorlo affects the logico-semantic analysis of a gadri
_expression_, but does not change the grammar.

Things have muddled along without xorlo for 20 years, and for 30 years
before that in Loglan.  Xorxes has been arguing for changes of the sort
incorporated into xorlo for about 13 years.  It is hard to see the lack
of a final decision as a crisis.

Just how are such things decided?

By consensus among the byfy membership, and consensus sometimes takes a
while to achieve, especially since a "final decision" is not a high
priority for many of us.  Furthermore, the policy right now is that NO
decisions will be final until we have completed ALL of the baseline
review, and defined ALL of the cmavo.

lojbab