[lojban] Re: Usage of lo and le

["Maxim Katcharov" <lojban-out@lojban.org>]

On 5/7/06, Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/7/06, Maxim Katcharov <maxim.katcharov@gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 5/6/06, Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > On 5/6/06, Maxim Katcharov <maxim.katcharov@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > > {ro lo ci cribe}
> > > > {ci lo ro cribe}
> > >
> > > In the first case, I'm going to say something about three bears, that each
> > > of them is or does something. In the second case, I'm going to say
> > > something about all bears, that exactly three of them are or do something.
> >
> > You indicate that you say something about what the inner qualifier is.
> > How is it (in the second example) that you say something about all
> > bears?
>
> Consider for example:
>
>      ro tadni pu viska ci lo ro cribe
>      Each student saw exactly three of all bears.
>
> I'm saying something about all bears: that each student saw exactly
> three of them.
>
> Or for example:
>
>     na ku ci lo ro cribe cu blabi
>     It is not the case that exactly three of all bears are white.
>
> I'm saying something about all bears: that it is not the case that
> exactly three of them are white.

I see what you're saying. Yes. What I was saying regarding the
inner/outer and specificness: The inner is used to give the listener
an idea of what exactly is being talked about (all bears, three bears,
three bears and that also eat berries, all students and that also
attend), while the inner is that 'said something about them', but you
don't have some specific three in mind, they could be any three, but
there are three.

For the first example, the CLL says something along the lines of there
being more than three bears involved - that is, three for each
student, not necessarily the same three. Chapter 16 section 7.


> > ({xu (do) pu viska (lo ro cribe) (ca lo nu do vitke le dalpanka)}
>
> > In the above, wouldn't you mean {...ro lo cribe...}?
>
> You could say that too. In that case you would be emphasizing the
> distributivity. Something like "I'm asking about bears: did you see
> each one of them?"

My notion was that your example would imply that you were asking me
"did you see that all the bears were indeed at the zoo?" (perhaps
going on to say "No? Well then you don't know if the zoo contains all
bears, do you?"). The point being that your inner ro is not restricted
by anything (like "the bears that were at the zoo"), while a blank
inner would leave it up to context. Your blank outer (if it doesn't
default to ro) implies that you could be asking about some and not all
of all bears (unrestricted). The intent of my correction was to say
something like "I'm asking about some type of bears (I'll leave it up
to context for you to know which): you see each of that group while
you visited the zoo? (aha, probably that-zoo-dwelling-bears)"

> > Perhaps this: You had offered "I think that {le} indeed serves to
> > preclude the 'any' or 'in general' interpretation that {lo} does not
> > preclude". Point being that {le} had something to do with
> > specificness, and that {lo} allowed for something general. What is
> > this general thing? Some examples have been given, with focus on "3
> > bears eat berries" vs. "bears eat berries", where the latter was
> > intended to illustrate generalness. I don't think that it did, since
> > it could only, in my mind at least, mean one of two things: "the
> > typical bear eats berries", and "all bears eat berries", both of which
> > are adequately handled.
>
> Adequately handled by something other than {lo} you mean?
> But that's like saying that tenseless bridi should not exist
> because any tense is adequately handled by other means.

"The typical bear eats berries" is handled (in whatever way) with
specifically {lo'e}, while "all bears eat berries" is handled
specifically with {ro lo ro} - this is an aside from the issue, but in
what case would you need a general term that covers both of these
without specifying which?

> {lo} does not indicate anything more than conversion of a selbri
> into a sumti. If you want to indicate specificity explicitly, you need
> {le},

It may be so that lo covers loi/lo'e (and of course ro lo ro), but
what is this specificity that le is necessary for?

> if you want to indicate universal quantification explicitly, you need
> {ro}, if you want to indicate "typical" explicitly (whatever that turns out
> to be) you need {lo'e}, etc. {lo} does not serve to indicate explicitly
> any of that, but it doesn't preclude those interpretations given a
> suitable context.
>
> > What is the distinction between {lo} and {le} if it is not
> > 'specificness'? And if it is 'specificness', could you illustrate it
> > with a new example, or show how my interpretation of previous examples
> > fails?
>
> I lost track about which of your examples we were discussing here,
> sorry. These are things that in my view cannot be said with {le}:
>
>     mi nelci lo cakla
>     I like chocolate.

This is either "I like the typical chocolate", or "I like all
chocolate": both covered by what you consider specific sub-cases of
{lo}. (Very probably the former, since you'd want to avoid universal
statments like the latter.) I can't demonstrate much with these, aside
to say that my corresponding {le} forms, {ro le ro} and {le'e} would
just both mean "all of all things that are chocolate by my definition"
and "typical by my definition (i.e. stereotypical)".

>     lo cakla cu su'o roi bruna gi'e su'o roi blabi
>     Chocolate is sometimes brown and sometimes white.
>
>     mi citka lo cakla ca ro djedi
>     I eat chocolate every day.
>
>     mi citka lo cakla i xu do go'i
>     I'm eating chocolate, are you doing the same?
>
> These are things that can be said with {le}, and therefore also could
> be said with {lo} if you didn't care to use {le}:
>
>     le vi cakla cu kukte
>     This chocolate is delicious.

What does this imply that {lo vi cakla cu kukte} (the lo form) does
not? The le form and the lo form seem identical (aside from that thing
which we've discarded for purposes of discussion), including in their
implications. Better yet, what could the lo form say that this le form
cannot? If you say "those other two cases, the all and the typical",
then, well, yes. That's because (assuming that 'the typical' is a
sub-case of lo), you'd be doing this with {ro le ro} and {le'e}
instead - but this is bringing veridicity into the picture ("by my
definition").

So, what does {lo vi cakla cu kukte} allow that {le vi cakla cu kukte} does not?

>     xu do djica lo spisa be le cakla
>     Do you want a bit of the chocolate?
>     ("this" or "that" would be more idiomatic than "the" in English, but in
>      Lojban you can leave which one you mean to context.)

Same question for this...

>     ko fairgau le cakla le zvati
>     Distribute the chocolate among those present.

...and this.


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