From xod@sixgirls.org Fri Aug 24 17:07:37 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: xod@reva.sixgirls.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_3_2); 25 Aug 2001 00:07:37 -0000 Received: (qmail 51987 invoked from network); 25 Aug 2001 00:07:37 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.27) by l10.egroups.com with QMQP; 25 Aug 2001 00:07:37 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO reva.sixgirls.org) (64.152.7.13) by mta2 with SMTP; 25 Aug 2001 00:07:36 -0000 Received: from localhost (localhost [[UNIX: localhost]]) by reva.sixgirls.org (8.11.6/8.11.1) with ESMTP id f7P07a102811 for ; Fri, 24 Aug 2001 20:07:36 -0400 (EDT) Date: Fri, 24 Aug 2001 20:07:35 -0400 (EDT) To: Subject: Re: [lojban] Re-evaluation + an idea - Was: A parable In-Reply-To: <20010825003552.A4085@uazu.net> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII From: Invent Yourself Now here's a man that speaks the language I want to hear! On Sat, 25 Aug 2001, Jim Peters wrote: > Maybe I should come as clean as I can. I threw the spanner in > regarding the defined meanings of Lojban words being non-abstract, as > a Sapir-Whorf thing. What does this mean? > So I'm like a wanderer coming back with strange stories, lots of bits > and bobs of experiences and a few skills, but not much in the way of > the kind of systematic information that might be required to help > build or improve a language. No, I think it's time for a few strange tales from foreign places, actually. > If the approach so far with Lojban has been to base everything on a > physical-scientific world-view, then I'm in absolutely no position to > argue with that. In any case, it does have the advantage that all > Westerners will understand it, and science has been spreading pretty > well to other places. Maybe this could be seen as the chosen "tone" > of the language. Do you think Lojban has that tone? What's the best world-view you've seen for building rocketships? How about for keeping a marriage together? > I don't know how big a task this might be - how many phrases are > required to completely define all the words and constructions to the > depth that you'd all like them to be defined. Maybe it's an awful > lot, so maybe this isn't actually feasible in practice. Wonderful idea! We have random sentence software. > > [*1: Justification: Working with healing, I know that there are many > systems to help understand and resolve illness, and all of the ones I > know do indeed work, in their own ways. Although there are some > common themes that occur, in several cases one world-view will say > completely the opposite of another. So you can't make a bigger better > world-view that actually works by merging them. This doesn't make any > sense, but this is my experience. This is very discordian. But what if you try? Cultures don't disagree on the brokenness of a bone. So there are some illnesses whose state has nothing to do with the world-view. Perhaps you'd like to qualify that statement of extreme relativity? ----- "It is not enough that an article is new and useful. The Constitution never sanctioned the patenting of gadgets. [...] It was never the object of those laws to grant a monopoly for every trifling device, every shadow of a shade of an idea, which would naturally and spontaneously occur to any skilled mechanic or operator in the ordinary progress of manufactures." -- Supreme Court Justice Douglas, 1950