Re: [lojban] Re: xorlo podcast

[Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com>]

On 9/28/05, John E Clifford <clifford-j@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> You know, I don't think I've ever seen this
> particular construction before, so I forgot the
> {lu'u}. In fact, I don't think I've ever used
> {lu'u} though I should have seen the ambiguity
> (well, not in Lojban, of course) as I wrote it.
> So maybe it is not quite automatic after all.

{lu'u} is rare, yes, I don't think I've seen it much
either. Probably because la'e/lu'e/tu'a/lu'a/lu'i/lu'o/vu'i
are themselves rare. Except for {la'e} in {la'e di'u}, if
they all disappeared I probably wouldn't miss them.

> Well, of course, your {mi terpa lo jukni} doesn't
> exactly mean "I fear spiders" either, since, if
> it were true as written, you would spend your
> entire life in terror because there are spiders.

I don't think {terpa} means "x1 spends their life in
terror because there is x2". Compare with {prami}:
{mi do prami} doesn't mean that I'm in a permanent
state of bliss because you exist, and similarly
{mi do terpa} doesn't mean I spend my entire life
in terror because you exist, and the same goes
for spiders. At least that's how I understand {terpa}.


> > I took "prelo" to be CLL-lo, that's the one
> > xorlo replaced.
>
> Wrong-o+, as you well know.  No one really used
> CLL-lo in this century.

Huh? CLL was published in 1997, so in a sense most of its use
was in this century. {lo} = {su'o lo} predates CLL by a good
bit, it was already in place at least in 1994 when I started with
Lojban. And it was used, by me and others, this century and last.

> The problems with
> practical applications and the differences from
> {le}, that worked about right, led to the
> discussions which reached some agreement about
> how to proceed (getting that official was one
> spring to BPFK, in fact).  On the technicality
> you are correct; xorlo is the new *official*
> Lojban {lo}

(Not quite yet, but hopefully some time soon.)

> but as the operant system it replaces
> the intermediate prelo -- which you also largely
> created.

Since prelo is a new term you just came up with, I couldn't
have known what you meant by it. And I still don't. There was
a lot of discussion before xorlo jelled, but I don't recall any
specific intermediate proposal that deserves a name.

> > Is {mi terpa tu'a lo jukni} = {mi terpa tu'a ro
> > lo jukni}
> > in prelo?
> >
> > What would the understood predicate be like?
>
> I would suppose so, though I haven't thought
> through the consequences.  Well, it isn't
> technically an understood predicate just an
> unspecified one.  To make it true, I would
> suppose that generally, in both cases (since they
> are pretty much equivalent), it would be
> something like "I see x" or "x touches me" or "x
> bites me" or whatever your fear really is of.

But "I fear spiders" can't be "I fear that for all x which
is a spider, x touches me". If anything it would be
closer to "I fear that for at least one x which is a
spider, x touches me".

mu'o mi'e xorxes