* Saturday, 2011-11-05 at 11:33 -0300 - 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.
I don't see where singleton domains came from.
All that's required to pass from a domain in which
(AE) {ro broda su'o brode cu brodi}
is true to one in which
(EA) {su'o brode ro broda cu se brodi}
is true is to make sure that the second domain has a (mal)kind
corresponding to the brodes in the first domain.
Do you mean that, since you prefer not to have kinds and their instances
in the same domain, you would have the second domain not containing any
of the brodes from the first domain, leaving you with only one brode?
Assuming so: firstly, we could just as well have used {pa} rather than
{su'o}; secondly, the second domain could have multiple brodes too
- e.g. lots of different kinds of beret, even if it has no "mundane"
berets.
> >> 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"?
Ah! I had thought there was a gismu for 'hat'... but jbovlaste misled
me.
> ). For example that there is some type of beret that every French
> person wears, that would be my "reasonable" interpretation.
Right. Yes.
> > 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.
This is a side-issue on the meaning of {lo}, but an interesting one.
So to clarify, let me ask: if it were the case that there was e.g.
a single monarchial resident who ruled all residents, could {lo xabju}
in {ro xabju cu se turni lo xabju} have that monarch as its referent? If
so, would this be the most likely interpretation?
ta'o nai, what about
{pa xabju cu turni ro xabju}?
Based on the berets example, it seems you would want to interpret this
as "residents govern all residents", i.e. the same as for {ro xabju cu
se turni lo xabju} above?
Or perhaps you wouldn't, but only because we have {xabju} on both the
left and the right, blocking a domain with only one xabju? If so, how
about {pa na'e xabju cu turni ro xabju}?
Martin
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