GEN: almost-PROPOSAL: intervals

[Goran Topic <topic@STUDENT.MATH.HR>]

> >His proposal most certainly amounts to innovation, and not mere
> >usage conventions.
>
> Innovation in Lojban means new cmavo, gismu, grammar.  Since he proposes
> a new MOI, I guess that part is  "innovation".  New conventions are
> semantics arguments, which I would ignore were it not for the likelihood  that
> they will end up in the refgrammar.  All that matters to me is that we have
> *A* way to express it.  "How good" is a questions that "usage will decide".

All that matters is that we have *A* way to express it? We still have no
way of expressing exact intervals short of using {temci} or {tersei},
which is way too long - and I miss it much more than fuzziness. There
are two proposals, but there was never any arbitration (as far as I
remember). So I thought I could remind you, again, hoping that one of
the proposals could get accepted before the baseline. If not, I would
like arguments against both, and a counterproposal, because I feel I
really need this construct. These proposals were argued just between
xorxes and me, with an occasional comment from somebody else, and I
never heard an official ruling. I am not very comfortable with YACC or
BNF, so I am afraid I cannot write a formal proposal. But, this is as
good as I can do it:

1. VA/ZI

   Change the meaning of VA/ZI cmavo as sumti tcita so that
   <VA/ZI>+<sumti> no longer means "<small/med/large>
   <distance/interval> from <sumti>" but "<small/med/large>
   <distance/interval> which is <sumti>"

   Positive: requires *no* new cmavo.

   Negative: redefines the meaning of existing cmavo, and makes corpus
             archaic; inherent subjective judgment of the length of the
             interval

   Examples:            mi baza pa jetfu cu cliva
             Currently: I will leave a medium time from a one-week event
             Would be:  I will leave in a week, which is a medium time

                        ko'a kelci be'a lo ckule va lo ki'omitre
             Currently: They play north of the sch., med dist. from 1km thing
             Would be:  They play 1 km north from the school.

2. xe'i (with asperations of te'i-hood)

   New cmavo; I do not know which selma'o, but it needs to combine
   freely with tenses. Meaning of {xe'i <sumti>} should be "<sumti>
   distance/interval". xe'i could be taken to signify only temporal
   distance, and let fe'exe'i take care of the spatial ones, or
   could signify distance in space-time (type of sumti decides which
   it is, like xe'i lo mitre is clearly spatial, and xe'i lo nanca
   is clearly temporal).

   Positive: does not change the corpus

   Negative: requires 1 new cmavo (the proficient in YACC grammar need to
             tell me if a new selma'o is also required)

   Examples:            mi bate'i jetfu cu cliva
             Currently: undefined
             Would be:  I will leave in a week.

                        ko'a kelci be'a lo ckule [fe'e]xe'i lo ki'omitre
             Currently: undefined
             Would be:  They play 1 km north from the school.

So, please, tell me what will it be: 0da, 1moi, 2moi or 3moi no'u ma.
Anything except 0da will satisfy me. I *need* such a mechanism, and
I believe this should be expressible within the tense system. It
ba'e belongs into the tense system. I hate writing

  lenu mi pu klama la glazgov. cu temci lo cabna lo nanca belipimu

when I can say

  mi klama la glazgov. puxe'i lo nanca belipimu

or

  mi klama la glazgov. puza lo nanca belipimu

It is not a question of extra 6-7 syllables. It is a matter of principle.

ta'o, this was rauroi written in lojban... I thought it might be time to
set it forth in English. Details left to the expert community to work
out. I am being boring, I know. But I *need* cai this. Really.

co'o mi'e. goran.