[lojban-beginners] Re: "The pen is mightier than the sword."

[Stela Selckiku <selckiku@gmail.com>]

On Sat, Aug 22, 2009 at 3:50 PM, Luke Bergen<lukeabergen@gmail.com> wrote:
> my lojban is nowhere near good enough to be able to understand discussion
> about lojban in lojban.  Could someone give me a brief synopsis of what's
> being said here:  I gather that it's a minor disagreement having something
> to do with stress/emphasis of sumti?


.ui sai

Lojban is making good progress!  I remember when I first joined the
Lojban list, I think it was a bit more than a decade ago now, I
wondered why all the debates about Lojban's grammar were in English.
I felt that they would be much clearer in Lojban.  And now we're
finally to the point where discussion of Lojban in Lojban is common,
so common that it's always even spilling over into when we're supposed
to be teaching newbies! :>

The topic is the difference in status between a sumti which takes one
of the proper places of a selbri, as x1, x2, etc., vs one which is in
a tacked-on BAI place.  I would say that it's not so much a difference
of emphasis as of specificity.  Something in a numbered, basic place
has a definite, conventional relationship to the activity, but
something tagged with a BAI or a fi'o phrase has a certain vagueness
to its relationship.  I heard someone on IRC recently describe "broda
fi'o brode ku" as being parallel with "brode broda", and I would agree
with that; something in a BAI or fi'o place is in the same vagueness
of relationship to the selbri as something attached to a seltau (se
tanru, the modifier, the first part).

So for instance in the translation we're discussing, "lo xarci cu
vlipa mau lo pinsi", the sumti "lo xarci" is in the x1 place and so it
is clearly in the role of being powerful.  The other sumti though, "lo
pinsi", is in a BAI place created by the tag "mau", zmadu, more.  All
we know about the pencil is its more-ness, not specifically what the
relationship is between its more-ness and the power discussed in the
selbri (though there is certainly some relationship).  I would say
it's very similar to the vagueness you'd get if you said "lo pinsi cu
zmadu cei broda" (a pencil is more, which we'll call broda) and then
said "lo xarci cu broda vlipa".  The moreness of the pencil is
involved somehow with the relationship, but it's not said how.

In context, though, it's plain to see what the relationship is, and
what's meant.  In my opinion it's a perfectly clear and useful way of
translating the phrase.  Lojban is just very specific about its
vagueness.


mi'e la stela selckiku mu'o