Re: [lojban] translation exercise

[Invent Yourself <xod@sixgirls.org>]

On Thu, 4 Oct 2001, John Cowan wrote:

> And Rosta wrote:
>
> > I'm wondering how to say this in Lojban:
> >
> > "Fortunately, the madman was captured before he murdered someone"
>
> I was going to say .ui le fenki pu kavbu ca le nu fy. pu'o catra
> da, but I think we decided that you can't be in the pu'o stage of
> something that never gets to the ca'o stage.



This is impossible.

pu'o means there is every reasonable indication that the event is going to
occur, but since it is in the future, we cannot be certain. If what you
said is true, it means that pu'o could never be used as a current tense
(mi pu'o plipe), but could only be used after the fact (mi pu pu'o plipe).
(We can only guarantee the ca'o stage after the event has already
started.)

Your translation is correct in the tense aspect.



>
> How about .ui le fenki pu kavbu pu leda'i nu fy. catra da, then.
> The "da'i" emphasizes that "fy. catra da" does not hold.
>
> I know the predicates are not too precise.




-- 
It's said that Mullah Omar has met two non-Muslims in his life. Others say
even that's not true.

Sami ul-Haq, Osama bin Laden's closest friend in Pakistan, runs the
"University for the Education of Truth," a fundamentalist institution that
educated and trained nine out of the Taliban's top 10 leaders.