Re: ears and legs

[jorge@phyast.pitt.edu]

> Imagine two people are lost in the woods, and you have reason to believe
> they might be together.  You know one is wearing a bright blue garment.
> You and others are looking, and you spot through the underbrush,
> something bright blue and appropriately sized moving.  You might yell to
> the others "I see them", even though you actually have not seen any
> piece of any person, but merely the garment of one of the people, and
> even though you don't actually know that the second person is with the
> blue-garbed one.

I agree with you, but you are not addressing the issue.

The issue is: can you use {re lu'a le ninmu ku joi le nanmu ku joi le verba}
to refer to the man's ear and the man's leg? I think that you can't.

If you are looking for the three of them that are lost in the woods,
and you see the man's ear and leg, you would not say "I see two of them",
meaning the ear and the leg, when "them" is the three people.

Jorge