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Re: [lojban] Quotation mark argument.

To summarize briefly, audio-visual isomorphism is not the idea that we
can always translate between text and audio with no loss of detail,
because there are many free variations in both forms, which are
impossible to render in the other. Instead, to me at least, audio-visual
isomorphism is this:

1) Lojban is fundamentally a sequence of *words* in the abstract. There
is no meaning to a text that is not derived from those words.

2) A Lojban orthography is a relation mapping every sequences of Lojban
words into at least one sequence of characters. It is possible for an
orthography to permit free variation. For instance, {.imibroda}, {.i mi
broda}, and {.imiBROda} (among others) are all valid renderings under
the standard orthography of the same sequence of Lojban words. No
meaning is imparted from which choice is made among free variants.

3) For a given orthography, there is an interpretation convention such
that any given sequence of characters resolves to at most one sequence
of Lojban words (zero if the characters are not a valid lojban text).
All of the character sequences listed in the example above resolve to
the same sequence of words. Since meaning attaches to the sequence of
*words* alone, no meaning is lost in this interpretation process.

4) Similar to the orthography in 2), there is a pronunciation standard
such that any given sequence of Lojban words can be pronounced in at
least one way. (With free variations existing in permitted allophones,
tone, length of pauses, inclusion or exclusion of optional pauses, etc).

5) Any sequence of sounds can be interpreted as at most one sequence of
Lojban words.

So we can convert between text and speech, but only through the sequence
of words. No meaning is gained or lost in the process, but not all
features of one representation are preserved in the transformation.

I strongly favor orthographies that use punctuation (if at all) in addition
to, no in place of, words. For interpretation, I treat all non-alphanumeric
characters (aside from dot, comma, and apostrophe) as whitespace, and the
choice of how much and what sort of white space is included where it is
permitted (space(s), tabs, newlines, paragraph markers, and things like
quotation marks) does not affect the meaning.

On Wed, 22 Sep 2010, Brian Robertson wrote:


There was a fairly heated argument in #jbopre about the use of quotation
marks in xorxes' alis work. I've edited it down and am posting it here
to make the arguments public to everyone interested, and possibly quell
any open hatred for the use of quotes from saupre.

---

<@rlpowell> Oh god you've got quote marks.  >:|
* rlpowell isn't sure he's OK with hosting that under his own name.
< Hugglesworth> rlpowell: why such brutal hatred for quote marks?
* Hugglesworth knows we've been over this before; long ago. He just forgets
<@rlpowell> Hugglesworth: Audio-visual isomorphism
<@rlpowell> Which I really, *really* like.
<@rlpowell> If you're going to replace lu/li'u and say "left-quote is pronounced lu in this work", .... enh.  I can live.
<@rlpowell> But to have them *in addition* breaks one of my favorite parts of the language.
< tomoj> in addition seems the only good way to me
<@rlpowell> Because {.i ca bo ca'o cusku «lu .oi} *in Lojban* is {.i ca bo ca'o cusku zunle bu lu .oi}, OSLT
<@rlpowell> tomoj: Does that explain?
< tomoj> I'd rather just ignore all non-lojban characters
<@rlpowell> I don't much like them instead-of either, because I really like Lojban's simple morphology.
<@rlpowell> But in-addition-to ... just no.
<@rlpowell> tomoj: Then what happens to zoi?
< tomoj> except when quoted
<@rlpowell> I may just be being crotchety, but I *really* like audio-visual isomorphism, and it upsets me when people fuck with it.
<@rlpowell> xorxes: I wasn't really kidding.
< tomoj> it's already fucked up
< tomoj> speech has many features which aren't represented in lojban text
<@rlpowell> tomoj: Only in extremely rare cases involving zoi, as far as I know.
<@rlpowell> tomoj: Umm.  Not Lojban as I speak it.
< tomoj> to aid in verbal understanding for example
< tomoj> the rate at which you say the words, for example
< xorxes> It makes the text much more readable
< jcowan> rlpowell: And yet you don't object to indentation/blank lines between paragraphs, or non-essential spaces between words?
<@rlpowell> Not to me.  And I hate that kind of quote mark anyways.
< tomoj> similarly we might use features in text which aren't necessarily represented in speech
<@rlpowell> jcowan: THose don't communicate any information.
< tomoj> neither do these
<@rlpowell> Same with tomoj's speech speed.
< tomoj> that's why in-addition-to is good
< jcowan> Of course they do.  Paragraph marking duplicates ni'o.
< tomoj> in-addition-to means you never use a « to mean anything at all
< tomoj> it's just there to aid the eye when reading
< jcowan> Exactly.
< xorxes> they are like the pictures in the middle of the text
< tomoj> if you make a mistake doing in-addition-to and write "«" where you want "«lu", your text is ungrammatical
< jcowan> tomoj: Or else it isn't, which is worse.
< Hugglesworth> rlpowell: do you have a problem with the paragraph tabs?
<@rlpowell> jcowan: You're right; if my complaint is that I can't speak out this text to a Lojbanist and get the same text back (which is exactly me complaint), I need to include thinsg like blank lines in said complaining, or STFU.  And indentation at the start of paragraphs, and suchlike.
<@rlpowell> Hugglesworth: ^^ you too
<@rlpowell> < xorxes> they are like the pictures in the middle of the text -- and that.
<@rlpowell> So yeah, I have a problem, in that I'm conflating "sounds must always communicate the same basic information as words" with "the text must come back identical".
< jcowan> Another case of non-exact-isomorphism is digits vs. digit words, and yet a mathematical work in Lojban that doesn't have any digits would be a huge pain.
<@rlpowell> jcowan: Explain?
<@rlpowell> Oh, NM; I get it.
<@rlpowell> Yeah.
<@rlpowell> Objection withdrawn.
<@rlpowell> I think someone should condense this and post it to the list, because I suspect that a lot of oldbies that are bothered by the quote thing were doing the same conflation as I was.

---

.lorx.




--
Adam Lopresto
http://cec.wustl.edu/~adam/

He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like
a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without
one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the
country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at
a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.
(Joseph Romm, Washington)

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