On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 8:47 PM, David Gowers (kampu)
<00ai99@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi,
On Thu, Feb 24, 2011 at 10:11 AM, Alex Rozenshteyn <
rpglover64@gmail.com> wrote:
> A square has four equal sides.
>
> {lo kubykurfa se pagbu vo dunli korbi} is an almost literal translation, but
> I feel like it's unacceptably vague for lojban.
for a start
oi se'i that was a transcription error. I had it right in another tab, but I mistyped here.
possibly 'ka kubli fi li vo' amounts to 'four equal sides'.. all {lo
kubli} have equal sides.
I suggest something like {lo kubykurfa ku ckaji lo ka kubli li re li vo}.
When translating from English (or French, or..), you need to be wary
of words like 'has', even if you think you know what they mean in the
context. In this case, it seems to have prompted you to think as if
'having four equal sides' is the *only* important property of a
square.
(if you really think that, you could use {pavykai})
>
> Starting with choices of translations for the word "square": {kurfa} is not
> precise enough, as it can mean rectangle, {kubykurfa} could mean cube, but
> not unless context or an explicit dimension place indicate it, and
> {pitkubykurfa} is necessarily planar.
>
> ta'o {sa'orkurfa} seems like a horrible word to mean rhombus/diamond, since
> {kurfa} has right angles but not necessarily equal sides, and a rhombus has
> necessarily equal sides but not necessarily right angles.
>
> ta'onai {kubykurfa} seems to be a good choice to mean "square".
>
> The English "has" means "is made up of", so {pagbu} and {gunma} seem to be
> the reasonable choices. I can't figure out which one is more appropriate.
> ji'a, both seem to lack the implication that the parts are all there is,
> va'i we're not talking about a hexagon with side-lengths 4,4,4,4,2,1 (maybe
> {vo broda noi dunli}).
do you think it's genuinely true that a square is 'only' made up of four sides?
personally I suggest that a square is a hypercube of dimension 2.
No, but it is made up of only 4 sides, whose only relation to each other is their equality.
to'u the non-exclusivity of the definitions is probably intentional..
even for most abstract concepts, we don't know exhaustively what they
are made up of.
My problem with this is that something whose potential lack of a property is key in its definition is defined in terms of something that necessarily has the property.
If you really want to say that in that manner, what about {rolpau}?
(I contemplated mulpau, which is a bit ambiguous; also arguably {lo
kubykerfa ku munje fi vo te kubli}; and {zo kubykurfa valsi lo kubli
be li re bei li vo} (my favorite))
I don't like the one which defines the word square (as a translation; it's great standing alone), and the first one makes my brain twist.
>
> Next, what should I use for "equal"? li'a I need {dunli}, but should I use
> it as part of a tanru or in a subordinate clause in a tanru logical
> connection, or something else?
>
> Now for "sides", {korbi} and {mlana} seem to be the obvious choices, but
> neither seems quite right.
korbi seems okay to me-- it's just that equal length/angle relation
edges are implied.
dunli zei korbi -> dunkoi?
Not directly related to this, but how do I claim that a bunch of variables are independent, vs that they are pairwise independent, vs that they are k-wise independent?
David