Re: [lojban] Re: [lojban-beginners] Re: mi kakne lo bajra

[Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com>]

On Sat, Oct 30, 2010 at 12:58 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Raising is always a risky business, because it appears to involve moving items
> from a subordinate, temporary universes of discourse into the main one.

So it does, but there's nothing special about raising in that. There
are plenty of other ways of doing it that don't involve raising. For
example:

    la djan cu jinvi lo du'u zasti kei lo cevni
    "John thinks about gods that (they) exist."

By saying that, we have introduced gods into the universe of discourse
through raising.

But if we say instead:

    la djan cu jinvi lo du'u lo cevni cu zasti .i la djan cu so'e roi
tavla mi lo cevni
    "John thinks gods exist. John often talks to me about gods."

No raising there, but we have also introduced gods into the universe
of discourse.

Introducing things into the universe of discourse is something we all
do all the time, whenever we speak. It's part and parcel of what
speaking is all about.

> If I
> say "I want for me to ride a unicorn", say, I am not at all put off by the
> objection "There are no unicorns" because the unicorn I want is buried in a pair
> of worlds which pertain to two different counterfactual conditonals and so have
> nothing to the universe of present discourse.  If I say, on the other hand
> (assuming English is something like a logical language :)),

Being a logical language has nothing to do with it. You're talking
about ontology, not about logic. "There are no unicorns, so you can't
want one" is an ontological objection, not a logical one. And a silly
one at that, from someone who thinks that it is only possible to talk
about things that exist in the real/material world.

> "I want a unicorn
> for me to ride", I seem to be saying that there are unicorns (in the present
> domain) and I want one of them to ride. The claim that there aren't any is then
> false, even though the interlocutor has believed it true and has not agreed to
> an expansion, as required by the rules of conversation.

"Sorry, there aren't any here", or "there aren't any in this world" or
"sorry, but unicorns don't exist" is a perfectly legitimate and true
answer. "Universe of discourse" is not the same as "the material
universe in which we exist".

> Indeed, his remark
> might well be a reminder that the universe of the dialog does not encompass
> unicorns (whatever may happen in wish-worlds and the like).

The universe which the dialogue is about encompasses them as soon as
they are mentioned. That of course does not mean that the universe in
which the dialogue takes place suddenly encompasses unicorns.
Unfortunately it doesn't work like that. You can't create things into
existence just by talking about them. But "the universe of the
dialogue" is ambiguous, you know it, and yet you relish bringing it up
every time. Why?

> Further, the new
> form implies that there is a unicorn I want to ride and that, even in the
> expanded domain, is false, since no one unicorn is singled out by my desire, but
> rather any one will do.

I will not get drawn into that one this time.

> There are other problems, about the laws of identity
> and the like that this move can give rise to.  So, as a general rule, don't
> raise unless you are sure the referent of what you raise is already set up to be
> talked about.

In other words, "don't ever speak"? Or just "don't ever speak in Lojban"?
How do you set up something to be talked about other than by mentioning it?

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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