Re: [lojban] Re: Is srana symmetrical?

[Bob LeChevalier <lojbab@lojban.org>]

At 10:49 AM 11/24/03 -0800, Robin Lee Powell wrote:
>On Mon, Nov 24, 2003 at 10:47:27AM -0800, Jorge Llamb?as wrote:
> >
> > --- Robin Lee Powell <rlpowell@digitalkingdom.org> wrote:
> > > On Sun, Nov 23, 2003 at 06:10:23PM -0800, Jorge Llamb?as wrote:
> > > > The tag {sera'a} is used much more frequently than plain
> > > > {ra'a}. That at least would seem to suggest that {srana} is
> > > > not symmetrical.
> > >
> > > That is much more likely to be because the keyword for ra'a,
> > > "pertained to by", is incredibly confusing.
> > >
> > > I, for one, have no idea what it means, and have been avoiding
> > > ra'a for that reason.
> >
> > I think the idea of {srana} is that it means "x1 is about x2".
>
>I think that might be the case, but I think it might also mean "x1
>is relevant to x2".

That is correct. srana includes "relevant to"; it also can include "about", 
but there is a place of pemci or prosa or cfika and other words that more 
specifically give the "about subject" place

There is some intended parallelism between srana and steci with the latter 
being more restricted (I'm not sure that steci necessarily means srana po'o 
"pertains only to" but that is certainly one major sense in which it might 
be understood).  There is also a parallelism with ckini, which I think is 
more clearly symmetric and with a specific defined relationship in x3 (the 
symmetry of ckini is such that a is related to b if b is related to a, but 
the x3 might have to be expressed differently if the x1 and x2 were 
reversed). srana is less definite than ckini as to the nature of the 
association between x1 and x2.

The reason for sera'a vs ra'a is probably English bias coupled with a 
certain level of directionality in relevance.  We might say that 
information about the meaning of English "about" is relevant to/pertains to 
(srana) the meaning of Lojban "srana".  But we would be unlikely to say 
that the meaning of Lojban "srana" pertains to the meaning of English 
"about".  Thus in English, relevance is not perfectly symmetric, though I 
would have trouble characterizing the asymmetry.  We left it unspecified 
whether Lojban srana would necessarily have the same symmetry or lack of it.

> >     mi sanga sera'a le vi cukta
> >     I sing about this book.
> >     My singing is about this book.

mi sanga lo pemci [selsanga] be le vi cukta

> >     mi sanga ra'a le vi cukta
> >     I sing "pertained to by" this book.
> >     This book is about my singing.
>
>OK, that makes sense.

On the other hand,

do srana la lojban and
la lojban srana do

are both true for you (and probably most Lojbanists)

>Can you think of a better phrase than "pertained to by" that doesn't
>require re-arranging sentence order in the English translation?

"is associated with" would go with both ra'a and sera'a and ki'i and seki'i 
and thus would not be distinguishing.  Remember that LogFlash required 
unique keywords, which is why the two would have to have different wordings 
even if there is perfect symmetry.  The keywords were NEVER intended to be 
definitional for either gismu or cmavo - they were an artifact of the need 
for unique tags in LogFlash.  The two wording choices given in the cmavo 
list make it clear to someone using LogFlash cued by the keyword which of 
"ra'a" and "sera'a" is to be given in response, and that is all they were 
supposed to accomplish.

lojbab

-- 
lojbab                                             lojbab@lojban.org
Bob LeChevalier, Founder, The Logical Language Group
(Opinions are my own; I do not speak for the organization.)
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban:                 http://www.lojban.org



------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark
Printer at MyInks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada.
http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511
http://us.click.yahoo.com/mOAaAA/3exGAA/qnsNAA/GSaulB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

To unsubscribe, send mail to lojban-unsubscribe@onelist.com 

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/