Re: [lojban] Please, the best explanation of {le} vs. {lo}

[Jacob Errington <nictytan@gmail.com>]

On 21 June 2013 08:49, la arxokuna <gleki.is.my.name@gmail.com> wrote:

On Friday, June 21, 2013 4:01:54 PM UTC+4, Pierre Abbat wrote:

When talking about a species, meaning all or typical members of the species,
use "lo":
lo guakmaio be la blanu joi pelxu cu xabju lo ketco solni'atutra
The blue-and-gold macaw lives in tropical South America.
It is also correct to use "lo'e".

And again I can't see why can't we use {le} or {le'e}. You are talking about macaw living in America so you have them in mind although you might no necessarily saw them.

 

Yes, you have it in mind, but you need to ask yourself, "Am I thinking about particular instances of {guakmaio}?" The answer in this case is no. You're thinking about the archetypal macaw, which itself doesn't really even exist. 

The difference between {le} and {lo} is essentially specificity. The former requires the speaker to have *particular instances of the described selbri* in mind, whereas the latter makes no such promise. {lo} is agnostic about specificity, which contributes to it being the never-wrong article that can be used anywhere.

As for veridicality, enough UD messiness can permit either to be nonveridical. I don't oppose someone being able to refer to the monopoly car piece with {lo karce} (although I may have in the past) as the piece satisfies some salient property of true karce, i.e. the piece looks like a (very small) car, despite not being automotive. Part of the rationale behind that is that in the "monopoly UD", the pieces do actually satisfy those properties.

.i mi'e la tsani mu'o

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