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[lojban-beginners] Re: [bpfk] polysemy of {nai}

la gleki wrote:

Let me see if I understand negators correctly (scheme attached in a file
to this post).

{na'e} says that we are somewere at another point but on the same scale.


On the negative side of the same scale, but not necessarily the opposite


{no'e} says we are in the middle of the same scale.
{to'e} says that we are at the opposite point of the same scale.
{na'i} says that we are outside this scale (i.e. this predicate
relationship)




{na}. Here I have a problem. According to what I draw {na} means that we
are not at this point of this scale and may be even outside this scale.
So for me {na} is (warning! bad grammar follows) {na'i ja na'e}.
na has nothing to do with scales, but rather with truth tables. It is contradictory negation, and in general says that the predication without the na is false 


But may be you prove me wrong (I'm not sure myself).

Anyway, I want all types of negation to fit on the same scheme.
They can't because negation is NOT a single scheme, conceptually. There is contradictory negation and contrary/scalar negation. 

The negation chapter of CLL goes into this at length.


Last time when I draw a similar scheme I could completely solve (at
least for myself) the problem of subjunctives in lojban.
Now it's time for negation.
You have to know the problem in order to solve the problem. At the time we solved it, the most comprehensive book we could find on the linguistics of negation was _The Natural History of Negation_ by Horn 

http://cslipublications.stanford.edu/site/1575863367.shtml


    There is one "meaning" - a syntactically appropriate afterthought
    negation of a single word.  The semantics of that negation are specific
    to what is being negated, but generally it is a scalar/contrary
    negation
    (cf. na'e) of the specific word being marked.  Sometimes the nature of
    the construct means that a scalar negation is effectively equivalent to
    a contradictory negation (cf. na) (this is especially the case for
    logical connectives, by intent).


I understand that on boolean scale {na'e=to'e}
na'e and to'e have nothing to do with booleans. Boolean negation is contradictory negation, which uses na.
Sometimes the na'e and even the to'e of a predication has the same truth value as the one without the scalar. That is not the case for contradictory negation ("not the case" is a contradictory "na" negation expressed in English) 


but what is {na} then?


contradictory (Boolean), not scalar


    As a scalar negation, it is NOT the equivalent of to'e when attached to
    a UI, but rather na'e (generalized rather than extreme contrary
    negation).


na'e is {cu'i ja to'e} (grammar ingnored), isn't it?


No.
Let me concoct an example with a well-defined scale. Perhaps I'll manage this with no mistakes, being rusty.
Let us arbitrarily define any natural number (positive integers) larger than 100 as "large" and any number smaller than 100 as "small". Then 

li 200 cu (je'a) barda ke rarna namcu
li 100 cu no'e barda ke rarna namcu
li 1 cu to'e barda ke rarna namcu
li 1 bi'i li 99 cu na'e barda ke rarna namcu
li za'u 1 cu na'eto'e barda ke rarna namcu
li ci'i cu to'eto'e barda ke rarna namcu
li 1 bi'i l00 na barda ke rarna namcu = naku zo'u li 1 bi'i l00 cu barda ke rarna namcu 
lo mlatu na barda ke rarna namcu (lo mlatu na namcu)
le cinfo cu barda ke rarna na'e namcu (emphasizing that na'e can apply to the next word, and that it can be used when the "scale" is unclear to mean "other-than")
"lo mlatu cu namcu" could also be marked with na'i on the entire sentence, or on the words mlatu or namcu because it is metalinguistically inappropriate to talk of cats as numbers.
If I had not strictly defined what "large" meant, then both of the following could be true 

li 200 cu barda
li 200 cu na'e barda


      naicai would be the afterthought "nai"-like equivalent of
    to'e when attached to UI.  That said, sometimes a scalar situation
    degenerates to the point where to'e and na'e are equivalent in meaning.

This is not the case with some UI that have {cu'i}  as an appropriate
point on the scale.


correct.  I said "sometimes"


       The separate words exist for those situations when the scale is NOT
    degenerate.

     > Next question is why {nai} should move to CAI and then to UI when UI
     > have no truth value?

    It shouldn't, and I have no idea why such a thing would be proposed (I
    haven't read the cited proposal, and personally don't consider any
    proposals until/unless formally brought before byfy - not that I know
    what the procedure for doing so would be these days).

One more vite that it shouldn't be done. Therefore, the poll is closed.
moving to CAI - may be.
moving to UI - no.
:)


moving at all - no
changing the language, unless things are so truly broken that the byfy (i.e. Robin) can't write it up - no 

(and at this point, unless Robin says so, NOTHING is subject to a vote)
I am opposed *in principle* to language change by decree at this stage. We aren't designing the language any more. 


    They can't be so replaced, unless some proposal screws up the language
    in an attempt to oversimplify the negation problem.  Having multiple
    words allows the semantics of each situation to resolve over time with
    usage evolving the way each word is interpreted.


That's what I'm proposing. Separate words for different meanings.


"meaning" is itself an ambiguous term


    Note also that nai is afterthought (like UI) while the NAhE family of
    words are forethought and can be used with larger constructs than a
    single word.

UI/CAI can be used with larger constructions, don't they?
only by using it in a way that the word that it marks is a delimiter for a larger construction (generally one of the construct-terminators or one of the start-construct words - e.g. fu'e bu'o ke to tu'e) and at the beginning of the sentence/utterance (where it is afterthought of nothing). In those cases, the longer scope is inferred from what is marked 

NAhE's and NA's scope are defined by the syntax rules

--
Bob LeChevalier    lojbab@lojban.org    www.lojban.org
President and Founder, The Logical Language Group, Inc.

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