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

[Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com>]

On Sat, Nov 5, 2011 at 2:12 AM, Martin Bays <mbays@sdf.org> wrote:
>
> So "is true" was a simplification. Let me coin a new notion: a sentence
> is metatrue if, were I to claim it out of the blue, you would reasonably
> be able to interpret it in a way which made it true.

If it weren't for the "reasonably", I would then posit that every
non-contradiction is metatrue, so everything here seems to hang on
reasonability.

> Then the point is that (A) is metatrue iff (B) is, and generally that
> metatruthhood is not affected by permuting quantifiers.

But that doesn't seem reasonable. In particular, I don't find it
reasonable to interpret an out of the blue quantification as
quantification over a singleton domain.

>> If I say "ro faspre cu dasni su'o ransedyta'u" you can in no way
>> conclude that that I mean to say that all french people share a single
>> beret. They are different statements.
>
> Agreed; the question was what to make of {su'o ransedyta'u cu se dasni
> ro faspre}.

I would say any reasonable interpratation of that requires a domain
with more than one ransedyta'u ("ranmapku"?). For example that there
is some type of beret that every French person wears, that would be my
"reasonable" interpretation.


> How about in a situation where the EA claim is more plausible - e.g.
> when talking about the residents of some fictional country:
>    {ro xabju cu se turni lo xabju} ;
> would "some resident(s) govern all residents" not be a plausible
> reading?

My reading is that every resident is governed by residents (as opposed
to being governed by non-residents, say). I don't see any "E" in that
claim. It says nothing about how many residents do any governing.

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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