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

On 5/20/06, Maxim Katcharov <maxim.katcharov@gmail.com> wrote:

On 5/20/06, Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/19/06, Maxim Katcharov <maxim.katcharov@gmail.com> wrote:
> [...]
> > "Unless you're dealing within a {zasti}-type relationship, zasti is
> > implicitly added as a restriction." This rule that I defined has
> > nothing to do with context, it's more like a rule of grammar than
> > anything.
> [...]
> > Adding a sticky tense or redefining
> > a word has nothing to do with context. Context originates from things
> > that we say, stickyness and redefinitions originate from what we say.
> > Stickyness and redefinitions do not originate from context.
>
> For me, both of these are instances of context. In any case, it doesn't
> really matter whether we call it "context" or something else. The important

I think it does. The definitions were laid out in the first post of
this thread (and then later I laid them out more extensively), and if
we're not going to stick to them, we're going to have a hard time
understanding each other.


This is what Alex wrote:
"For this discussion, I will use context specifically to refer to the
_spoken_ context into which the {all} is placed. This includes all of
the discourse prior to the {all}, the rest of the sentence after the
{all}, and possibly what the listener anticipates."

I would include the physical setting as part of the context too, and
any knowledge of the world that the participants have, but that's not
relevant here.


> thing is that in at least in those two cases the referent of {lo ro cribe} will
> change because of things said in a different part of the discourse. So

It does matter if the word "context" is ambiguous. What you *were*
saying was "context (referents and concepts brought up or implied in
the course of discussion) affects the definition of words". Now you
seem to be saying "context (each word including cmavo previously used
to do something) affect the definition of words". The former is false,
the latter is true.


I never restricted context to referents and concepts brought up or implied
in the course of the discussion, although I do consider those as _part_ of
the context of an utterance.

In any case, we both seem to agree now that what you call "stickyness"
will have an influence on the interpretation of referents of an expression, and
also that predicates used other than in the expression under consideration
will have an influence on the interpretation of the expression. Both of these
things are external to the expression, and I see no reason to say that they
are not part of the context, but whether we say that or not changes nothing.


> those two at least are cases where our positions coincide. We can start
> from there.
>
> Now, what exactly counts as a zasti-type relationship?
>
>      ze'i lo ro cribe cu zasti


Oops, that should have been {me'i}, not {ze'i}. Sorry about the confusion.
{me'i} means "less than all" = "not all".


>      "Not all bears exist."

ronai lo ro cribe cu zasti


{ro nai} is currently ungrammatical, though I think {nai} should be allowed
after any word.


"not all of the entire hypothetical bear-mega-set will exist"

>      mi pu viska lo pixra skina i lo ro cribe pe ri cu dasni lo mapku
>      "I saw a cartoon. All bears in it wore hats."

This specific {pe ri} is what I would consider a zasti-type. I deduce
from context that it means "...that existed in the perceptual-universe
of the cartoon".


It only means "associated with it", the rest is your (certainly valid)
interpretation from the context. Compare with:

     mi pu klama lo dalpanka i lo ro cribe pe ri cu dasni lo mapku
     "I went to a zoo. All bears in it wore hats."

Same {pe ri}, but this time presumably not zasti-type. So zasti-typeness
is something that has to be figured out from context, right? Some words
will have it in some contexts but not in others?


> As for stickyness, consider these three situations:
>
> (1) A formal agreement such as
> <http://www.grrb.nt.ca/pdf/wildlife/grizzly/Grizzly%20Bear%20Management%202002.pdf>
> where {lo ro cribe poi se catra lo prenu} would be licensed
> by the formal definitions at the beginning of the agreement.
>
> (2) A semi-formal situation where for example an instructor with a prepared
> speech explains the agreement to a group of people. They may start their
> talk by saying: "In what follows, when I say 'bear' I will mean the grizzly
> bears at GSA" and so on.

I'd like a restrictive sticky to exist in Lojban. Like if I say {lo
cribe poiki dasni lo mapku}, from now on when I say {lo cribe} I mean
that it's bears restricted to ones that wear hats. I think that it
would be useful.


The current {ki} with its tag-like grammar won't do for that. You can always
do things like {ko'a goi lo cribe poi dasni lo mapku} and then use {ko'a}
which you have already fixed.

Let me add a couple of variations to (2):

(2a) Instead of saying "In what follows, when I say 'bear'..." the instructor
opens with "I am going to speak to you about the grizzlies at GSA" or
something of that sort, so he makes no explicit reservation of the word "bear".
Would that change anything for the later interpretation of {lo ro cribe
poi se catra lo prenu}, which may come perhaps twenty minutes later?
If yes, does that mean that one is forced to keep in mind not just the sense
of what the instructor is saying, which is basically the same in both cases,
but also the exact wording used?

(2b) One of the attendees at the conference arrives late so they miss the
instructor's warning that they will use 'bear' to reffer to grizzlies at GSA.
When the instructor mentions that "all bears killed by people must be
accounted for under the quota", however, the late arrivee has no trouble
figuring out that it doesn't include bears that were killed by people two
hundred years ago in another continent. I predict that the same would happen
in English or in Lojban. Would you rather have a fluent Lojban speaker be
confused in that situation? (This situation is basically the same I faced
when reading this sentence for the first time, I only saw the single sentence
without knowing that it belonged to a formal agreement with definitions
at the beginning, and yet I understood immediately that they were not
talking about all bears ever. The very sense of the sentence itself made
that quite clear.)


> (3) An informal situation: "You're new here, right? OK, then you have to know
> this: all bears killed by people must be accounted for, no exceptions are
> admitted".

In this case I wouldn't use {ro}/"all": "...know this: bears killed by
people...", or I'd probably say something like "all bears killed here
must be accounted for", to which they may reply "disambiguate 'here'",
to which I'd reply "lo Wasomething Settlement".


But the "all" is important here, as emphasized by the "no exceptions are
admitted". Indeed the original had some other type of emphasis, something
like "all bears killed by people, including illegal killings, accidents, ..." or
something like that.

So disallowing the {all} in this situation I would consider problematic.

mu'o mi'e xorxes


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