Re: quantifiers on sumti - late response

["Dylan P. Thurston" <dpt@math.harvard.edu>]

mi cusku di'e
 > > The inner quantifier is {ro} unless it's changed, no?  By putting in
 > > {su'o}, you explicitly say it's not "the one and only set", but some
 > > piece of that set.

la xorxes. cusku di'e
 > ...
 > So {lo'i [ro] broda} and {lo'i su'o broda} refer to the same set, but in
 > the second case you are also saying that it is not the empty set.

Yes, sorry about the confusion.

 > >  > But you never encounter {lo'e remna}. Or rather, you can't conclude
 > >  > anything about {lo'e} remna from properties of the one you encounter.
 > >  > ...
 > >
 > > Yes, this is quite true, but not relevant.  And's point is that the
 > > properties of {lo'e remna}, unlike the properties of {lo'i} or {loi},
 > > are of the same type as the properties of {lo remna};
 >
 > The properties of {loi remna} are of the same type as those of
 > {lo remna}.

Well, they're probably the same type, but there's not generally any
particular relation between a property of any {loi remna} and a
property of {pa remna}.  Any property of {lo'e remna}, on the other
hand, you could probably reasonably conclude is a property if most
{remna}.

 > ...
 > > Huh?  How else would you say "x1 has exactly one head"?
 >
 > I didn't express myself clearly. {ta se stedu pa da} means "that has
 > exactly one thing as head". But there is another possible 1-place
 > predicate "x1 is one-headed" (or whatever) that is not a
 > relationship between two objects but only a property of one.
 > Say {pavselstedu} is that predicate, then you can say {lo'e remna
 > cu pavselstedu}, but you can't say {lo'e remna cu se stedu pa da},
 > because there are more than one thing that are in relationship
 > {stedu} with {lo'e remna}.

I think the issue really is what counts as identity here.  I would say
the typical human has one head, the typical head; but I would also
allow a name for a particular head to be used transparently to name
the typical head in this context.

Does this make sense?  I'm trying to relate this to more ordinary
problems--a single object can well have more than one name, so a
sentence like {ro da broda} could well be completed in several ways.

In any case, I'd really, really, like {ro da cu stedu lo'e remna} to
be true.  (Are you saying {lo'e remna cu se stedu ro da} would be
true?)  I dislike very much introducing expressions with lujvo that
have no (even approximate) paraphrase with just gismu.

 > > mu'o mi'e. dilyn.
 > >
 > co'o mi'e xorxes

mu'o mi'e. dilyn.