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Re: [lojban] About plural 'ro'

On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 7:05 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
> The point is, of course, that 'ro' is plural, but filtered, by the very nature of the expression.  To be sure, if we assign the members of lo broda to some 'ke'a' so that the method of their selection is lost, we may make a mistake and get the wrong results -- which is probably a good reason for not doing that or being very careful what you say after doing it.

Let's only consider the cases where we don't make mistakes, for simplicity.

Let's say that John, Paul and Mary, my three friends, carry a piano.

Let's say that I assign "ko'a goi la djan jo'u la pol jo'u la meris"
(no mention of any carrying or any friendships in this assignment,
just a list of three people, that I assign as the referents of the
plural variable "ko'a").

We also make this second assignment "ko'e goi lo ci pendo be mi" (I
assign the same three referents to "ko'e", by a different method.)

And finally "ko'i goi lo ci bevri be lo vi pipno" (again the same
three people are assigned, this time to "ko'i", by a third method).

Can I say that "ko'a du ko'e ko'i"? I think I can, because all that
matters for "du" is whether "ko'a", "ko'e"and "ko'i" have the same
referents, not the method by which they acquired those referents.

Are these three the same or different claims:

     ro ko'a cu ponse pa karce

     ro ko'e cu ponse pa karce

     ro ko'i cu ponse pa karce

?

For me, they all say exactly the same thing. (What exactly they say
will depend on whether "ro" is singular or plural. I think it's
singular. But whatever "ro" is, surely all three statements must be
equivalent, right?)

If ko'a/ko'e/ko'i are not just ordinary plural variables with
referents and nothing else, does Lojban have any ordinary variables at
all that have referents and nothing else?

> The point is that 'lo broda' is designative not purely denotative, that is, it refers to a number of things, but only insofar as they broda (unlike 'ke'a', apparently, or even 'le broda'), so the designative aspect comes in and the quantifier can take out only what is there.  Of course, if what is there can be plural, then it takes out all the plurals, but if it is individual, then it takes out only the individuals:  All those who carried the piano were rewarded, subset of them (there are probably better cases but I can't think of any now).

The referents of a plural variable are always only individuals. None
of the referents is ever plural. It is the variable that is plural,
not its referents. "What is there" in a plural variable are always
individuals, not "plurals".

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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