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RE: [lojban] An approach to attitudinals
At 11:33 PM 06/13/2001 +0000, Jorge Llambias wrote:
la kreig cusku di'e
>Why do we need a'o? isn't it under any of these proposals just a redundancy
>that could be a non-assertive .ui or other attitudinal and therefore a
>cultural bias from English, which keeps hope and would-be-pleasure
>separate?
All the proposals that have {ui} able to mean "would-be-happiness"
are missing an important point about attitudinals. Attitudinals are
for the expression of the immediate, present attitude. {ui} is for
"I am happy now", never for "I would be happy if".
But plausibly it can mean "I am happy now" about a situation (bridi) that I
am presently considering which is not a present reality, which
pragmatically often means "I would be happy if".
But the bridi together with an attitudinal may or may not be
an assertion, depending on the attitudinal,
and it may depend on the pragmatics.
and yes, it is a part
of the meaning of the attitudinal whether or not it effaces the
assertiveness of the bare bridi. But in any case, it is the
bridi, never the attitudinal that is asserted!
Agreed.
I am finding this discussion extremely useful, by the way.
I don't think we ever discussed attitudinals in such detail,
and it really does help a lot that we do.
If you are finding it useful, I guess it is useful, as your usage often
sets trends for others. Your comments above are closer to my thinking than
post others who have posted, which seems to be a rare situation. I will
revel in it %^).
lojbab
--
lojbab lojbab@lojban.org
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org