* Wednesday, 2011-09-21 at 08:16 -0700 - John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>:
> I am probably obtuse (as well as abstruse), but I don't see the
> problems here. In the ckina sentence, the {lo} phrases are all in the
> scope of the universal quantifier on events and so are defined for
> each particular case as need be, different bunches for different
> contexts.
But wasn't one of the main selling-points of xorlo that {lo} ignores
such scope issues?
I assumed the rule you were going for was that {lo [selbri]} gives
a Skolem function whose only arguments are the quantified variables
which literally appear in the selbri, as in {broda ro da lo broda be
da}.
If not that, then what rule?
> I can't comment on {zo'e} since I don't know what it means,
> but in most of the readings, including the quantifier version,
> negation doesn't seem to be a problem. What problems there are, if
> any, seem to be with picking that interpretation of {zo'e} (I'm not
> sure that there is a universally acceptable interpretation -- why
> I prefer {zi'o}).
I'm not really sure what you mean here. But the point was that if we
want zo'e to have the obvious meaning in
A: xu do pu klama su'o zarci
B: mi na klama
(and I just did a quick poll on irc, which seemed to confirm that some
quite experienced lojban speakers expect zo'e to work this way),
then zo'e can't be a simple Skolem function if we keep everything else
simple (by which I mean: no funny business with kinds, or distributive
predication).
Martin
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: Martin Bays <mbays@sdf.org>
> To: lojban@googlegroups.com
> Sent: Tue, September 20, 2011 7:07:57 PM
> Subject: Re: [lojban] {zo'e} as close-scope existentially quantified plural
> variable
>
> (posting here for now; feel free not to read if theorising annoys you)
>
> * Tuesday, 2011-09-20 at 09:19 -0700 - John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>:
>
> > We seem to be in a three-way cross-purpose conversation. As far as
> > I can understand, for xorxes {lo broda} refers to broda-kind,
> > a something or other (xorxes has always had trouble when we get down
> > to defining it) which has individual brodas as manifestations
> > (avatars, etc.).
> >
> > MB seems usually to think {lo broda} is down up broda, the set (C-?)
> > of brodas assigned to the world of the present conversation by the
> > function which is the meaning of {broda}. which world he seems also to
> > define in a fairly restricted way, a situation.
>
> I wouldn't agree with that summary.
>
> The C was an attempt to get directly at certain uses of {zo'e} and {lo}
> which involve, effectively, existential quantification. There was not
> intended to be any funny business with intensionality - the expansion to
> the existential was meant to be done in a world, so in particular
> C would depend on the world. (Which may sound at first like funny
> business, but hopefully not at second.)
>
> Xorxes would prefer to explain these existential uses of {zo'e} and {lo}
> by going via kinds. He might prefer not to put it in those terms,
> however.
>
> JC would, if I understand correctly, explain them by appealing to
> disjunctive predication - i.e. we have a plural predication which
> resolves itself as a disjunction over atoms.
>
> > I think {lo broda} refers to a L-set of brodas (or just a bunch of
> > them, without the set-talk) selected by the context.
>
> When you talk of L-sets and bunches, I am taking you to mean that we are
> working in a domain like Chierchia's - essentially an atomic boolean
> algebra - and an L-set/bunch is a not-necessarily-atomic element of the
> domain.
>
> My only problem with having {lo broda}, and indeed {zo'e}, give simply
> Skolem functions with value one of these bunches is that they are often
> used in expressions which seem to be about usual individuals rather than
> kinds, but whose meanings can't be explained by this treatment of {lo}
> and {zo'e} without going via kinds or introducing distributive
> predication. Since I consider routing via kinds to be something of
> a hack, and don't really understand how the hack works in general, and
> consider distributive predication for this purpose even more of a hack,
> I was hoping for another approach.
>
> Examples of such usage:
> For {zo'e}, pretty much any negated sentence.
> For {lo}, the skina sentence from the gadri BPFK section page,
> which I mentioned in a previous mail, will do:
> {ca ro nu mi rere'u catlu lo skina kei mi cpacu lo so'i se cusku poi mi
> na cpacu ca lo pamoi}
>
> I've no real idea how to explain that using kinds...
>
> Similarly for many of the other sentences on that page.
>
> > When it comes to using these different definitions, we generally get
> > about the same results, but some definitions appear to require more
> > mechanisms than others. (I have passed over xorxes' insistence on
> > bringing in person segments necessarily along with persons and his
> > contrarian refusal to have brodas along with broda kind in the
> > universe of a discussion).
> >
> > They are also terminologically unified in that both MB 's and my view
> > would hold that the maximal set of brodas in a given situation is
> > broda-kind in that situation,
>
> Not really... I'm currently understanding kinds as Chierchia does:
> they're actual atoms in our universe, and predications which involve
> only kinds are true in all worlds or none.
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