Re: [lojban] {zo'e} as close-scope existentially quantified plural variable

[Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com>]

On Sat, Oct 15, 2011 at 12:50 PM, Martin Bays <mbays@sdf.org> wrote:
> * Saturday, 2011-10-15 at 12:16 -0300 - Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com>:
>
>> >> {ro te cange poi ponse lo xasli cu darxi ri}
>
>> I would say the Lojban is meaningful and (roughly) equivalent to
>> "every farmer who is a donkey-owner is a donkey-beater".
>
> i.e. equivalent to {ro te cange poi ponse lo xasli cu darxi lo xasli}?

Not exactly, because we have no guarantee that the first "lo xasli"
and the second "lo xasli" will always have the same referent. For
example, I could indicate with my eyes that I mean "lo [vi] xasli" the
first time and "lo [va] xasli" the second time. But if nothing strange
like that is going  on, then yes, they would be almost equivalent. The
same would apply for example to two uses of "la djan" vs. a single use
plus an anaphora. With the anaphora you are guaranteed the same
referent, with repetition, you may only normally end up with the same
referent. "ri" repeats referents, not words.

> Would you similarly say that {mi cpacu lo plise gi'e ba bo citka ri} is
> equivalent to {mi cpacu lo plise gi'e ba bo citka lo plise}, and that
> any deduction that the same apples are involved is an informal pragmatic
> one?

With "ri" the same things have to be involved, but yes, we are not
given any direct information about which subthings may be involved.

> Generally that {zo'e noi broda ku'o ri} == {zo'e noi broda ku'o zo'e noi
> broda}?

This one is even less likely, since repetition of "zo'e" will only
rarely get you the same referent.

> Such a rule applied universally would make handling anaphora much easier
> (though admittedly only by pushing more under the rug of pragmatics).
>
> It still leaves super-donkey sentences like {su'o da poi te cange cu
> ponse lo xasli noi da darxi .i ri se kecti mi}, where simply copying the
> {lo} with its relative clause to the second sentence would give an
> unbound {da}. Assigning no meaning to such expressions seems reasonable.

"ri" does not copy words, so I don't see any major problem with that
sentence, at least if you leave it with "noi". With "poi" it would get
trickier.

mu'o mi'e xorxes

-- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "lojban" group.
To post to this group, send email to lojban@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/lojban?hl=en.