Robin Lee Powell wrote:
On Fri, May 27, 2005 at 12:37:46PM -0400, robin wrote:Opi Lauma wrote:For example to say that the dog is man's best friendyouwould use {lo gerku}: {lo gerku cu xagrai pendo lo remna}OK, in this example {lo gerku} means neither "all dogs" nor "some dogs", it rather means "most of dogs" isn't? Really, we can say that "the dog is man's best friend" only if MOST OF DOGS are man's best friends. Or the same {lo gerku} can be replaced here by "a typical dog" without changes in meaning, I think. So, are "most of ..." and "a typical ..." correct substitution for {lo}? If "Yes", can this interpretation be used always? By the way in English sentence "The" has been used and in lojban {lo}. Why?{lo gerku cu pendo lo remna} means that there is at least one dog,such that it is a friend to at least one human,Not under the BPFK it doesn't. Or at least, not *necessarily*. http://www.lojban.org/tiki/tiki-index.php?page=How%20to%20use%20xorlo In particular, {lo} can mean {lo'e}, being totally generic.
I hadn't been following the proposed changes to {lo}, but they seem sensible. We need something that simply says "the following is a sumti" in a similar way that {cu} says "the following is a selbri". I'm usually a conservative when it comes to baseline issues, but the baseline {lo} was such a monumental pain for newbies, I wouldn't mind seeing it modified.
Even though, my point above remains. Under the orthodox version of {lo}, {lo'e gerku cu pendo lo'e remna} implies {lo gerku cu pendo lo remna} but not vice versa, and the situation is unchanged with xorlo. If you want to say "the dog is man's best friend" and not simply "some dog(s) is/are some man/men's best friend(s)", then {lo'e} is the way you want to go.
robin.tr