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

[John E Clifford <lojban-out@lojban.org>]

Has anybody commented on how odd the traanslation of "the dogs" into {su'o re la gerku} is?  Quite
aside from the fact that, as given, it says "at least two things named Gerku" (I assume that the
{la} is a typo for {le}), the external quantifier would almost never be used or called for.  Nor
do they do what is wanted: they say some more than one of some unspecified ..." From the point of
view of English, Lojban descriptions -- as I have said before -- are basically plural and only
incidentally singular.  More exactly, a Lojban description says "some number of ..." where the
number has to be non-zero but is otherwise unspecified.  To specify singular is just the same as
specifying 83 in terms of how it works in Lojban.  That is, the singular/plural distinction is not
obligatory, there is only specified vs. unspecified.  And the appropriate specification is an
internal quantifier.  (The semantic analogs of all this are that, in plural quantification, a term
may have any number of referents; in singular quantification, an individual is identified with its
unit mass.)

--- Maxim Katcharov <maxim.katcharov@gmail.com> wrote:

> On 7/11/06, Nathaniel Krause <nathanielkrause@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > Maxim Katcharov <maxim.katcharov@gmail.com> wrote:
> > When I first started
> > learning Lojban, I found the translation of English plurals strange.
> > {su'o re la gerku} seemed like an unintuitive and deficient
> > translation of "the dogs" - is that really the only reason we have
> > plurals? was the distinction between numerical 1 and all those numbers
> > greater than 1 - was this distinction by itself important enough to
> > have such a great effect on language? I didn't think much of it at the
> > time, but looking back now I find that this corresponds to my
> > position. It is my understanding that the large difference between 1
> > and >1 stems from how our minds treat single entities vs single
> > entities composed of many entities.
> > "su'o re la gerku" is about as good a translation of "the dogs" as anything
> > you'd find in Chinese. That is, it's certainly possible to have a
> > functioning language that ignores the difference between 1 and >1.
> >
> 
> I don't suggest that a language would not function without plurals,
> but that it's odd that the line was drawn between 1 and 2. Without an
> explanation for this, one would think that there are languages out
> there that have a pervasive plural that makes itself known between 2
> and 3, for example.


Actually, both Greek and Sanskrit (among many) do distinguish singular, dual, and plural.  I seem
to recall someone claiming that some language in the wilds of the Steppes had trial between dual
and plural.  Remember that in ancient Greek mathematics, one was not a number (arithmos).
  
> > Interestingly, Chinese does have a plural, but it can only be used to
> > describe people.
> >
> 
> Elaborate?
> 
> 
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> 



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