* Sunday, 2011-10-23 at 18:57 -0400 - John E. Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>:
> I don't think I ever held that all flying albatrosses had to exist at
> a single time ( and I can't figure out what I said that would sound
> like that). What I probably did say was that all flying albatrosses
> are in the domain of discourse when I say "Flying albatrosses look
> funny" as a full generalization. Otherwise it wouldn't be a full
> generalization. But that has nothing to do with either existence or
> time.
> I've forgotten what (i) is, so I am not sure (but then I have
> forgotten what Richard's semantics looks like in crucial details).
> Especially the generalized arbitrary partition bit.
The issue was simply whether, in {lo vofli cipnralbatrossa cu xajmi}, we
have
(a) a bunch of things, which is at some time a bunch of flying
albatrosses
or (b) a bunch of things each of which are at some time flying
albatrosses.
If {lo broda} has to get a bunch which satisfies {broda} (this is what
"(ii)" referred to), it seems we're forced to (a), which is no use for
making general statements.
> On kinds, my position is just that kinds (if you want to use that
> word) are just biggest bunches viewed in certain ways and so call for
> nothing other than things of the ordinary sort. To be sure, the
> recent talk about mass nouns has made me start to think again about
> details, but even they don't lead me toward mass-like kinds from which
> individuals are temporarily carved out. Not for Lojban anyhow.
I seem to be in agreement. But I guess no-one else is, so far.
Martin
> On Oct 23, 2011, at 17:33, Martin Bays <mbays@sdf.org> wrote:
>
> > * Sunday, 2011-10-23 at 14:15 -0700 - John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>:
> >
> >> Maybe I shouldn't have made the Buddhist crack, it does complicate matters. If
> >> you take different times as separate worlds, then the ever-new view of domains
> >> does turn out to be like xorxes stages. That is certainly not my intention, on
> >> either view (though the problem doesn't arise on the always-same view) [I
> >> actually tend to be a nominalist in a rather strict sense and so closer to Hans'
> >> discourse representation, which never officially gets behind the words. But that
> >> is not relevant here.] But given that alway-new sense and taking times as
> >> worlds, your description of the situation is essentially correct (and its vague
> >> feeling of absurdity is one of the problems with that interpretation). The
> >> connection between the two sets of albatrosses is not merely anaphora, but
> >> something involving vectors in time or some such analogy - "world lines" is a
> >> nice cover term (which, alas, also seem to reify the connections -- an old
> >> problem for Buddhists, too). Of course, "here now" does cut things down to
> >> existents, pretty sharply (I suppose someone could argue, .... . But why
> >> bother?). The point is that Lojban quantifiers do not add "and exists", ever.
> >> That comes out of the predicates, if at all. As to whether the former flying
> >> albatrosses are flying now, that is hard to say (partly because it is unclear
> >> just what is being asked); in some cases they are in the current domain of
> >> discourse and in the extensions of both "albatross" and "flying", but it is not
> >> clear whether the current domain of discourse is tightly correlated with "now".
> >> And, of course, there is no rule that requires either the always-new
> >> interpretation of things nor the worlds view of time. There are advantages and
> >> disadvantages to all of these choices.
> >>
> >> A reasonable view (except for the
> >> complexities that spelling it out exactly involves) is that each world extends
> >> through time, with things coming into existence and falling out as time goes
> >> along, i.e., that our world is a typical world. The formal gains of deviating
> >> from this view have to be pretty impressive to justify shifting from it. On
> >> that view, the ten minutes ago's flying albatrosses still exist (most of them
> >> anyhow usually) but are no longer flying (the ones we can see, anyhow) and they
> >> did look funny and so contribute to the general claim that flying albatrosses
> >> look funny, even though they now look quite sedate -- largely because they are
> >> not flying.
> >
> > But the point was that we needed all flying albatrosses to satisfy "is
> > flying" at a single time for the (ii) interpretation of {lo} to work.
> > I thought you were claiming this.
> >
> > If you're not... I'm relieved!
> >
> > What you wrote from "A reasonable view" on seems to agree with the
> > kind of universe I'd been assuming (i.e. that of Montague's PTQ).
> >
> > So do we agree that (i), or your generalised arbitrary-partition version
> > (is), is needed to do kinds-like things with {lo} (assuming we want to
> > avoid introducing xorxes-kinds)?
> >
> > Martin
>
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