Re: [lojban] RECORD: containers

[pycyn@aol.com]

xorxes:<<saying {ta botpi noda} does
not make the claim "that is an empty bottle". It says
"that is not a bottle of something", exactly equivalent
to {ta na botpi da}, isn't it?>>

I skip over the problem (for which lb has no better solution
than English) of internal and external negations -- that this is
a bottle but not one containing something, and simply say
that, given we do acknowledge that ta is a bottle and being
good Griceans, we admit that not containing anything *of
relevance to the present discussion* is pretty much what we
mean by "empty" -- air, Coke dregs, a little water from the
washing up (including minute amounts of soap), and
mosquito turds don't count.
Even in a logical language, language ain't logic.