Re: quantifiers on sumti - late response

[jorge@phyast.pitt.edu]

la kris cusku di'e

> Given the way we use masses, quantifiers greater than one don't seem to mean
> much -- "re lei prenu" is apparently one of those cases where it's
> grammatical but doesn't mean much.  Would it be appropriate then to define
> "[Quant > 1] [mass]" to be shorthand for "[Quant > 1] lu'a [mass]" so that
> "re do" means "re lu'a do" (two of you) and "repa lei respa" means "repa
> lu'a lei respa" (21 of the in-mind mass of reptiles)?  The form is probably
> going to be used, and the meaning is quite understandable.

Probably it can be understood that way in those cases, but it could cause
confusion. For example {re le gunma} means "two of the masses", which is
different from {re lu'a le gunma}, "two components of the mass". In the
case of {lei}, {loi}, {do}, etc there is a single mass, and so a quantifier
greater than one doesn't make sense and can probably be understood to mean
the components, but when the sumti refers to more than one mass, there
could be trouble.

Jorge