Re: PLI: zoigy. unless .gy. xelfanva lu secau

["Jorge J. Llambias" <jorge@INTERMEDIA.COM.AR>]

la dn di'e cusku
>ni'o la xorxes. pu fanva lu secau li'u fuzoigy. unless .gy.

i ienai i mi pu fanva pa valsi na.e lo jufra

>The conjunction "unless" implies causality something which does not follow
>from 'secau'.

Perhaps not explicitly, but I think it was clear in the context. The sentence
I was translating was something like:

        Your seeking is useless unless you know the mystery.

which I think is close enough in meaning to:

        Your seeking without knowing the mystery is useless.

Your translation was:

        lenu sisku na sidju ki'u lenu na'e djuno filo nalterju'o

which means something like: "It is not the case that: seeking is helpful
because the mystery is unknown." I think you meant {na} not to have scope
over {ki'u}, but it does. I guess you could say something like:

      le nu sisku cu na'e sidju ki'u le nu na'e djuno fi lo nalterju'o

which I agree also conserves the original meaning more or less. But I still
find mine with {secau} quite acceptable. Notice that you have to talk about
_not_ knowing the mystery, while with {secau} I was able to keep it as
knowing it. That is just a matter of preference, in any case.

>    I will go to the bank unless you give me some money.
>means,
>    I will go to the bank for-the-reason you do not give me some money.
>
>    .i mi klama lo banxo ki'ulenu do na dunda lo jdini mi
>whereas,
>    .i mi klama lo banxo secaulenu do dunda lo jdini mi
>
>I take to mean, "I will go to the bank, and you didn't give me money".
>Similar to,
>    .i mi klama lo banxo faulen do na dunda lo jdini mi
>

But here things are slightly different. I was able to put the {secau} clause
inside one of the arguments. In this other example you are leaving it
at the sentence level.

In any case, I would probably say:

        i mi klama le banxa va'o le nu do na dunda lo jdini mi
        I will go to the bank if you don't give me money

I propose the use of {va'onai} as a general translation for "unless":

        i mi klama le banxa va'onai le nu do dunda lo jdini mi

va'o: under conditions...
va'onai: under any condition except...

        le nu sisku cu nalsidju va'onai lenu djuno fi lo nalterju'o


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co'o mi'e xorxes