Re: [lojban] Logical translation request

[pycyn@aol.com]

In a message dated 12/18/2001 7:01:51 PM Central Standard Time, jjllambias@hotmail.com writes:

Can you give an example of an agglomeration of tense words that
could not possibly mean anything? I doubt you could find one,
and the worse part is that even if you do, it probably has an
equivalent form that is grammatical anyway

This is going to depend upon just what the time system is; that is, what is the hidden presuppositions in the incredible journey through time.  this is (wisely) not specified but that means all the possibilities are open.  So, for example, tense time could be SAE, which makes at least past futures potentially incommensurate with any other tenses, i.e., "puba P" does not entail "ga pu P giga ca P gi ba P" (this is one way SAE gets irrealis subjunctives, after all).  So there can be tense strings that are too long to deal with (around seven shifts, say) in real time and ones that have no other description than the one given in the old Loglan strings.