Those definitions do not make very clear what kind of argument is expected by detri-x1 and tcika-x1. In actual usage, those argument slots are used the following way: • { .i detri fa li re no no bi pi'e mu pi'e re mu } • { li pa no pi'e vo no cu tcika fo mi } However, does the {detri} sentence actually have the intended meaning? Isn't {me'o} more appropriate than {li} for expressing dates? The problem is the following: As far as I can tell, {li} takes a numeric _expression_/symbol, and evaluates it (using the specified numeric base or otherwise the most likely one according to the context), returning a pure number (the abstract number represented by the numeric _expression_). So, {li pa re ju'u bi} is similar to {lo mekna'u be me'o pa re bei li bi} (the abstract number represented by the digit string "12" in base eight, which is equal to ten in base ten). In a similar fashion, I'd expect detri-x1 to parallels mekna'u-x2 (the _expression_/symbol), while detri-x4 would parallel mekna'u-x3 (the system whereby the _expression_ is evaluated/interpreted). In sentences such as { detri fa li re no no bi pi'e mu pi'e re mu }, it seems that the date _expression_ "2008:5:25" is first evaluated into a pure number (using some unspecified base), and then given to detri-x1, in which case detri-x4 seems to become completely useless, as it cannot be applied to any numeric _expression_ (as all is given to it as input is a pure number). { detri fa li re no no bi pi'e mu pi'e re mu fo ko'a } would then be about as meaningful as { li ze no no no no no cu detri fo ko'a }. An alternative to using {me'o} instead of {li} could be giving a number sequence to detri-x1, as exemplified below: • { li re no pa mu ce'o li ci ce'o li so cu detri lo cabdei fo ko'a } The drawback to this is that it's two syllables longer than the li+pi'e usage (and one syllable longer than me'o+pi'e), but the upsides are that 1) the job of evaluating/interpreting the date _expression_ is clearly delegated to detri-x4; 2) it is much easier to extract one of the numbers (such as the year number) from the date _expression_ (for example: {lo pormoi be li pa bei lo detri be fo'a} = the first member (the year) of the number sequence which represents the date of the fo'a event). Any thoughts, opinions, suggestions or comments would be greatly appreciated. mi'e la .ilmen. mu'o -- 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. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. |