Re: [lojban] baby words, but general relevance: dai-like cmavo

[Craig Daniel <craigbdaniel@gmail.com>]

On Sun, Nov 13, 2011 at 1:29 PM, Michael Turniansky
<mturniansky@gmail.com> wrote:
>   Nope. It's called anthropomorphizing.  I'm sympathizing with the way I
> believe that item would feel, if it could feel pain.  For example, were I of
> a sadistic bent, And I stepped on a snail, crushing it, I could reasonably
> cry out, "oiro'osaidai .i uisairo'e" corresponding roughly to English "[high
> squeaky voice] Oh, ow! [gloating voice] MWA-HAHA!"  My mental state and the
> snail's do not correspond at all.

I disagree. I think ".oiro'osaidai .i .uisairo'e" implies changing
feelings about having stepped on a snail*, beginning by empathizing
with the snail's physical pain (not, technically, the same as feeling
said pain oneself - obviously, your personal feelings on the matter
are not physical - but if you don't empathize, I would think you would
want something involving "dainai" to directly negate the assertion of
empathy, the semantics of which are a matter of discussion) and
shifting toward happiness (that is not suggested as being empathic at
all, as befits the snail's unhappy state).

There are two interpretations of "dainai" proposed in this thread. In
one, it merely denies that your feeling is empathetic (negating the
"dai"), and you want something like ".uisaidainai", which is both fun
to say (although not as awesome as ".aisaidainai") and also a
statement expressing happiness which is felt in a thoroughly
non-empathetic way, meaning you're glad despite the snail's pain. In
the other interpretation, where "dainai" involves a nai negating over
the entire structure, ".oiro'osaidainai" would mean something like
"I'm feeling a distinct lack of sympathy for your serious physical
pain!" - which seems like precisely what you want to say with the
first sentence there; since you're not actually trying to empathize
*at all,* I have trouble seeing how an empathetic attitudinal fits the
meaning you want to convey.

*CLL, right after the part we were just talking about: "Finally, we
often want to report how our attitudes are changing. If our attitude
has not changed, we can just repeat the attitudinal. (Therefore, ".ui
.ui .ui" is not the same as ".uicai", but simply means that we are
continuing to be happy.)" For a mix of feelings, I'd be inclined to
leave out the ".i" in the middle, but what it's a blend or sequence
*of* is not changed.

 - mi'e .kreig.

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