Re: [lojban] About plural 'ro'

[John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>]

Thank you for the reductio ad absurdum.  What gives the right result in this system is so remote from the question at hand as to demonstrate the total inadequacy of the system.



----- Original Message ----
From: Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com>
To: lojban@googlegroups.com
Sent: Wed, April 21, 2010 8:13:52 PM
Subject: Re: [lojban] About plural 'ro'

On Wed, Apr 21, 2010 at 8:38 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
>  In Lojban, iirc,  it would be something like 'ro da poi bevri lo co'e cu ba se cnemu' (I admit I am trusting you for vocab here), where I leave the nature of 'ro' open.
> Suppose there are five strongmen, no one or two of which can lift the whatsis and any three of which can.  And all the groups that can, do.  And the reward is a hundred bucks.  How much do you have to pay out?

(1)    ro da poi bevri lo co'e cu ba se cnemu fo lo rupnu be li 100
        "Any one (person) that carries the whatever will be rewarded 100 bucks."

(2)    ro'oi da poi bevri lo co'e cu ba se cnemu fo lo rupnu be li 100
        "Any one or more (people) that carry the whatever will be
rewarded 100 bucks."

In case (1), there are no rewards. In case (2), since there were 16
carryings, the total amount rewarded is $1600. Assuming the carriers
always divide the reward equally among themselves, each strongman will
end up with $320. (I'm assuming that the universe of discourse is
people.)

> The obvously correct answer is $500.  No interpretation of 'ro' presented gives that answer (they range from $0 to $1600)

Then obviously neither of those two sentences expresses what you
wanted to express. This one does:

(3)    ro da poi su'o roi me lo bevri be lo co'e cu ba pa roi se cnemu
fo lo rupnu be li 100
        "Any one who is at least once one of the carriers of the
whatever will be awarded once 100 bucks."

Since each of the 5 were at least once one of the the carriers, each gets $100.

I added the "su'o roi" and "pa roi" for clarity. You can remove them
if you think it's clear from the context. The key ingredient is "ro da
poi me lo bevri", "each one who is one of the carriers".

> I should add that the shift from "carries the whatsis" to "is a member of a bunch that carries the whatsis" seems particularly illegitimate, since we are trying to work up to questions about what quantifiers mean applied to terms by figuring out what
>  they mean in their natural habitat

"me lo bevri be lo co'e" does not mean "is a member of a bunch that
carries the whatsis". It means "is one of those that carry the
whatsis".
(Not that it makes any difference if you want to talk about bunches,
it's just that it is not necessary to invoke bunches.)

>-- and of course, carrying a pianno is very different from being in a group, even if the group is carrying a piano.

Right, all that matters is that they carry the piano. It's not
necessary to decide whether they are a group or not, and it is
certainly not necessary to call them a group even if they are one.

> (And, as a terminological point, 'roro'; is obviously the singular quantifier, since it takes the plural and breaks it down again.)]]]]

Do you like "ro'oi"? It even brings reminiscences of "loi".

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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