[lojban] Re: A (rather long) discussion of {all}

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

On 5/17/06, John E Clifford <clifford-j@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> The move from "the x that are p and the x that
> are q" to "the x that are p and q" is a normal
> error on the part of first month Logic students.
> The correct distribution is to "the x that are
> either p or q": not that everything in the
> combined heap has both proerties but that each
> has one or the other.

ki'enai for comparing me to a first-month Logic student. I understand
the concept very well, but I misused a word. When you made typos in
previous posts, did I hasten to offer these sorts of comparisons?
Keeping this sort of stuff out of an argument like this benefits
everyone.

On 5/17/06, John E Clifford <clifford-j@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> Contracts are, alas, rather cases of one of the
> sort of thing I am pointing out, namely that you
> cannot actually cover all the cases by a simple
> description (or a complex one for that matter).
> Consider a contract between a customer and a
> dairy  for the dairy to deliver two quarts of
> milk to the customer's home every Thursday.  One
> Thursday a tiger escaped from a circus and was
> roamin in the area of the customer's home and
> attacking people.  The dairy told its deliveryman
> not to deliver the customer's milk that day.  The
> customer sued for breach of contract (Thursday
> but no milk).  The court ruled for the defendant,
> saying that contract did not have to say "except
> on tiger days" for this to be an exception; tiger
> days just don't count as Thursdays for this
> contract.  The ruling was affirmed on appeal.
> Here is as unambiguous a description as possible
> and yet it too is relative to some interests,
> which interests  may not be dealt with beforehand.

Despite the unrealistic use of "tiger days", I'll reply on your terms.
The court is stating that the restriction given, "all tuesdays", was
not the one intended. It's saying that both parties screwed up in
writing the contract. This is a result of the ambiguity of "all". If
the word "ool" was defined as "every single one. Yes, those too. NO
EXCEPTIONS", and it was used in a contract, how do you think that this
hypothetical court would have ruled? Speakers of a language with a
word like "ool" would be well versed in the dangers of using it, and
would indeed be better contract writers - I'm sure that you've heard
of clauses like

"...on all tuesdays from [...] to [...]. The milk company reserves the
right to not serve milk on days that are unreasonable in the sole
judgement of the milk company."

in real contracts, yes?


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