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Re: [lojban] Re: A (rather long) discussion of {all}
On 6/8/06, Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com> wrote:
On 6/8/06, Maxim Katcharov <maxim.katcharov@gmail.com> wrote:
> My take on it is that
> {cmima} concerns things seen more seperately - a squadron of planes,
> family of bears, [...]. {gunma} would concern things that look like
> they're quite close together - a pencil, a book, a car, a body.
> {pagbu} would be the word to use when you don't care to detail if you
> see them dispersed or visibly combined.
If your take on {gunma} is that the x2 is distributive, then you cannot
expand {loi tadni} as {lo gunma be lo tadni}. Consider this case:
The building is surrounded by students and professors together. Then:
loi tadni cu sruri le dinju
Students surround the building.
is false.
No, true. This is an issue of English pragmatics being brought in to a
language that doesn't need them. {[da poi sruri] cu gunma [lo tadni]}
contains no {po'o}. If you wanted to specify that only students
surround the building, then you'd do just that - and it's not done
here.
lo gunma be lo tadni cu sruri le dinju
A group that has students as components surrounds the building.
would be true.
Yes
da poi sruri le dinju cu gunma lo tadni
Something which surrounds the building has students as components.
would also be true.
Yes
So you must either take the x2 of gunma to be non-distributive, or you
need a different expansion for {loi tadni}.
> But it doesn't really matter to me which exact interpretations are
> given: all of these have the same format - there's one aggregate, and
> component parts of it.
{pagbu} and {cmima} are both like that, yes. If A and B and C are parts of D,
then A by itself is a part of D, and B by itself is a part of D, and C by itself
is a part of D. If A and B and C are members of D, then A by itself is a
member of D, and B by itself is a member of D, and C by itself is a member
of D. That's what we mean by saying that the x1 of {pagbu} and the x1 of
{cmima} are distributive.
But {se gunma] is different: if A and B and C conform D, then A by itself
does not conform D, B by itself does not conform D and C by itself does
not conform D. Only together, jointly, do A, B and C conform D.
No, A by itself is a component part of D. My lungs are organs that are
in my body at a certain position. They, by themselves, are a component
part of me. There might not be a D if there wasn't an A and a B, yes,
but that's beside the point, since there /is/ an A, a B, and a C. But
if there wasn't an A and a B, it wouldn't matter that they weren't
there, because the "group" wouldn't be there in the first place. The
relationship wouldn't even be a subject of discussion.
This seems a bit like McKay's "shipmates" line of reasoning - I went
into that subject in a bit more detail in my June 5th reply to aleks.
A generic statement of my objection is that I don't see why this
relationship should get a unique treatment.
{gunma} means "x1 consists of x2".
{se gunma} means "x1 conform x2".
"consists" is "includes"+po'o. {gunma} means "x1 is a
mass/team/aggregate/whole, together composed of components x2,
considered jointly" - mass, team, aggregate, whole, together,
composed, components, jointly - all of these are gloss words for the
relationship. Saying that it means a mere "consists of" is... strange.
"conform" means to become or be similar, but I assume that you mean
the "together form" definition. Yes, they together form x2 - in the
sense of "they are something together: a group / mass / aggregate /
whole / compound / form"
> I'd disagree with that. It's a "mass/team/aggregate/whole, together
> composed of components...". "Consists" is a special term, it has very
> specific pragmatics attached to it.
{gunma} does mean "consists of". But even if you think {gunma} means
something else, the predicate that you need to make your expansion
of {loi} is one that means "x1 consists of x2", not one that means
"x1 has component x2"
Ah. No, I don't need it to make my expansion.