imperatives

[Logical Language Group <lojbab@access.digex.net>]

I think we are running afoul of English polysemy here.

>> May be my cultural bias, of course, but a "suggestion" of a predicate in
>> the future tense is a "proposal", while in the past tense is an
 "insinuation".
>
>No, a suggestion of a predicate in the future tense is still an
>insinuation:  "I suggest you will go".  Any predication in the
>indicative mood gives you an insinuation in English.  You have to use
>the imperative mood to get a proposal (indistinguishable from the
>present indicative in English, but distinct in Spanish).
>
>> But Lojban predicates, when unmarked, are nonspecific in time, so either
>> could be gotten from the same expression.
>
>The attitudinals are the only general way to mark the imperative mood in
>Lojban.  I don't think it's a good idea to confuse those two meanings.
>How would you know whether {e'u do ba klama} means "I suggest that you
>go", or "I insinuate that you will go".

Ok, that sense of insinuation.  I think that would not be expressed with
"e'u".  I would expect that differing overtones of insinuation could
be conveyed with different members of UI2: I postulate, I opine, I state,
I observe, I anticipate, etc.

>> A request is not necessarily a command, and Lojban imperatives are the
 latter.
>
>Then {e'osai ko sarji la lojban} is a command? That sounds strange.

The intent is that "ko" makes anything a command of a sort.
Attitudinals may modify the emotional nature of the command - in this
case to what I would label an "exhortation".  My dictionary labels the
grammatical term "imperative" as referring to commands, very strong
requests, and exhortations.

Of course ".e'ucai do" ".e'ocai do" might also be taken as very strong
requests and/or exhortations, but would not be imperative in nature.
But the current slogan was coined by a new Lojbanist several years ago
without my help, and I could hardly override a non-Lojbab slogan that
was any good at that time.

>> The fact that the English trnaslation is an imperative may mean only that
>> one has to be creative to avoid an impoerative construction.  I could have
>> also used "Please!  Are(n't) you going to tell me it isn't true?"  Which
>> when said in the typically pleading voice is not really a question, but
>> a petition, and in English doesn't use an imperative construction.
>
>I'm not sure how that matters.  The point is that {e'osai ko sarji la
>lojban} is not very different from {e'osai do sarji la lojban}.

I'll accept that.  We are dealing in subtleties too fine for English
translation, at least.

>> I think then that we are getting confused by the terminology.  I thought
>> you were talking about grammatical "mood" which is what "imperative mood"
>> usually refers to.
>
>Yes, that's what I'm talking about. {e'o}, {e'u} and {ei} all are
>usful to translate the imperative mood.

I don't think so, unless you are talking about imperative mood usages
from other languages that aren'e really imperatives.

>> >> In all cases, though, I think "ko" is a
>> >> indication of imperative mood that overrides any implicatures of the
>> >> attitudinals.
>> >
>> >The problem was not with {ko}, but what to use for the imperative
>> >case of {mi'o}. I said {e'o mi'o}, {e'u mi'o} etc can do the job,
>> >so that no new cmavo is needed for it.
>>
>> Already thought of that one.  "doimi'o ko" should work.
>
>Yes, but then you've reset the listener to include yourself. How do you
>say "let's go to your house" without turning it into "let's go to
>our house"?  I would just say {e'u mi'o klama le do zdani}.

That would get the point across without actually using an imperative
mood.  Especially since I have trouble thinking of most usages of
"let's" as being all that imperative.

But if you insist on a imperative you can "doimi'o ko doido'u".  The
latter phrase could be replaced by "da'o" if you had no other pro-sumti
to avoid resetting.  We could probably adopt by convention "ko goi/po'u
mi'o" as much shorter ways to do imperative "let's".

>> What LOjban does not have is a third person imperative  (Russian has
>> this explicitly and it is grammatically different than 2nd person imperatives
>> - indeed kind of attitudinal-like. English on the other hand expresses a
>> 3rd person imperative as a 2nd person "Let him do it".)  I've never been
>> sure that this is not a hole - to an English speaker of course, a 3rd person
>> imperative IS a kind of 2nd person imperative with the verb "let or allow".
>> But Russian's 3rd person imperative is quite distinct from those verbs.
>
>I don't see a problem. I would say {e'u ko'a gasnu}. I think {ko} is
>more or less redundant to the imperative-mood attitudinals, but it is
>useful because it is shorter.

I'm not sure that it went to the whole list, but our Russian native
friend Cyril Slobin replied to me that the Russian 3rd person imperative
might be taken as a command to the universe.

>> I've often wondered if there is some subtlety to third person imperatives
>> that is distinct from a normal 2nd person "let", so that we can see if the
>> subtlety can be expressed in Lojban.
>
>Do you really feel a second person imperative when you say "let him do it"?
>You can even say it to no one. I don't think that the fact that it is
>a second person imperative in _form_ takes anything out or adds anything
>to the meaning. The same thing happens with "let's go". It is not really
>a second person imperative, even though in form it is.

You can get an imperative feel in English using certain tones of voice.
And in those cases "let" indeed sounds like an imperative.  But then in
English, tone of voice can override grammar in many situations.

lojbab