Re: [lojban] Archivist/Founders: {ri'a nai} vs. {se mau nai}

[Bob LeChevalier <lojbab@lojban.org>]

Robin Lee Powell wrote:

>I'm looking at the BAI* cmavo, and I notice that {ri'a nai} (and
>{ki'u nai}, and so on) all mean something like "despite (tagged
>sumti)", whereas the only non-causative BAI NAI sumti ({se mau nai}
>and {se ma'e nai} mean something like "it is not the case that
>(tagged sumti)".
>
>The "despite" thing seems to be a huge wart, and I'm wondering if
>you guys had anything in mind for BAI+NAI *in general*.
>
>-Robin

JCB created causative tags before and separately from modals and both
separate from case tags; then (he or we) discovered that they were more
or less identical in grammar.  The concept that all BAIs should have
similar and predictable semantics (based on place structures) came very
late, indeed actually the basic design was done (by and large, the
concept of systematic semantics was one that JCB and later I had
rejected as an impossible dream, not worth the effort of trying - then
Nick came along and tackled jvajvo, and hammering out BAI came about the
same time.).

If there was any thought to "general" systematic rules for negation of
BAI, and you can't find something in CLL, I would look in the old
negation paper just in case, but would probably guess that we did not
consider it.

But I should think that the causals will be more or less in line with
whatever you come up with - I believe that we found that the semantics
of "despite" and "nevertheless" are predictable from contradictory
negation of sumti.  You say that they are a "wart", but how so?

lojbab




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