Re: [lojban] Re: Mini-rant: gismu place consistency

[Pierre Abbat <phma@bezitopo.org>]

On Saturday, March 09, 2013 07:13:55 Jonathan Jones wrote:
> As another example, all of the gismu of the measurement family have the
> exact same place structure: "x1 is x2 [units of measurement] by standard
> x3", and for non-metric: "x1 is x2 [units of measurement] in standard x3
> with sub-units x4", /except/ for mitre: "x1 is x2 meters in direction x3 by
> standard x4", which moves the typical x3 place to the x4 and places an
> additional "in direction" place in its stead, and minli: "x1 is x2 long
> local distance units with sub-units x3 in standard x4", which has the exact
> same places as it's brethren, except that the final two are in reverse
> order.
li'o 
> Which only makes things worse in this scenario. Say we make an "alternative
> gismu" for mitre. First off, what shape should it have? {mitre} is arguably
> the best shape for the Lojban word for "meter". Secondly, how would
> convince people to stop using mitre and instead use this new word, when
> they've already learned {mitre}="meter"? Would it not be simpler to merely
> say "From now on, the x3 place of mitre is the standard place, and the
> direction place is x4.", especially since mitre's x3 and x4 are so seldom
> used it wouldn't really affect the corpus, and would make it consistent
> with its brethren, thus making it easier to learn fully?

I think we should drop the direction place of "mitre" and the subunit places. 
I have no idea what to put in a subunit place, and the direction place could 
be expressed with a preposition if appropriate.  "gucti" has just as much 
reason to have a direction place as "mitre" does, but "caltre" has none, even 
though by jvojva it has to have one if "mitre" does.

> 1) Take the whole of the gismu, possibly including the experimental ones,
> and group them into families. Species {badna}, Transportation {klama}, Mode
> of Travel {cadzu}, Measurement {mitre}, and Comparatives {barda} are a few
> families I can think of off the top of my head. Species might need to be
> split into the kingdoms (animal, plant, etc.) just because of size.

There's no big problem with species. There are a few species words with a 
third place (tirxu, mledi, lanme, mlafi'e) and one missing x2 (remna), which 
should have it, as paleontologist talk about several species of Homo.

Pierre
-- 
When a barnacle settles down, its brain disintegrates.
Já não percebe nada, já não percebe nada.

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