Re: [lojban] Re: ki'a

[John E Clifford <clifford-j@sbcglobal.net>]

--- Bob LeChevalier <lojbab@lojban.org> wrote:

> Yanis Batura wrote:
> > On 20.11.2006, 6:48, Bob LeChevalier wrote:
> >>Yanis Batura wrote:
> >>
> >>>{pinpedi} is a stage 4 fu'ivla, like {djirafa}, {alga}, {caxmati} etc.
> > 
> > 
> >>And is an example of why I am opposed to inventing stage 4 fu'ivla at 
> >>this point in the language evolution - as we can see, no one has any 
> >>idea what it means.  A fu'ivla should remain a Type III - marked by a 
> >>semantic-hint rafsi - until its usage is so common that usage (and/or 
> >>Zipf's law) indicates a need for a shorter form.  I don't think that any
> >>fu'ivla has received such usage.
> > 
> > 
> > There are only 1342 semantic hint classes.
> 
> Most natural languages using a semantic classifier system have a couple 
> orders of magnitude fewer classes (they are commonly called "genders", 
> Swahili has 14, and Russian has only 3), and they work anyway.
> 
A more nearly parallel case are the radicals in chinese orthography.  there are a couple hundred
of these, probably not actually enough to disambiguate pinyin, but enough for the present purpose,
one hopes.