Re: [lojban] No default quantifiers.

[Robin Lee Powell <rlpowell@digitalkingdom.org>]

On Wed, Jun 15, 2005 at 09:02:26AM -0700, Opi Lauma wrote:
> Hello.
> 
> In the Lojban-Wiki I have found the following:
> 
> There are no default quantifiers. At all. For example, the default
> outer quantifier of "lo" used to be "su'o", which means "at least
> one", but that is no longer the case. "lo cribe" could be one, or
> a billion, or none.
> 
> I do not understand what for the default quantifier {su'o} has
> been removed. 

Because it made it very hard to say a lot of things that people
thought they were saying, but actually weren't.  It also lead to a
lot of very serious confusion when "na" was involved.

> Now if I say {lo cribe cu danlu} I say nothing. Because this
> expression is always true. 

{lo cribe cu danlu} is an extremely context-dependant sentence.
This is a good thing most of the time.  If you want logical
precision, use an explicit quantifier.

-Robin

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