From a.rosta@dtn.ntl.com Thu Sep 06 17:56:58 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: a.rosta@dtn.ntl.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_3_2_1); 7 Sep 2001 00:56:58 -0000 Received: (qmail 97946 invoked from network); 7 Sep 2001 00:50:25 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.142) by l9.egroups.com with QMQP; 7 Sep 2001 00:50:25 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mta07-svc.ntlworld.com) (62.253.162.47) by mta3 with SMTP; 7 Sep 2001 00:50:25 -0000 Received: from andrew ([62.253.88.88]) by mta07-svc.ntlworld.com (InterMail vM.4.01.03.00 201-229-121) with SMTP id <20010907005023.NZGB710.mta07-svc.ntlworld.com@andrew> for ; Fri, 7 Sep 2001 01:50:23 +0100 Reply-To: To: Subject: RE: [lojban] Siver threads among the mold Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2001 01:49:39 +0100 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Importance: Normal In-Reply-To: <1e.1a76ae00.28c15070@aol.com> X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 From: "And Rosta" pc: > a.rosta@dtn.ntl.com writes: > > *He believes what the fuck he hears. > *He believes why she came. > *He believes who came. > *He believes what > > But "believes" can't tak an indirect question at all, I had understood you to be saying otherwise. > so that doesn't help in > this case: e.g. *He believes who the murderer is. (Note, all of these are OK > with a certain intonation pattern, too.) > > <"He sees what he likes." > > a poor choice. See also means "understand", and allows an interrogative > complement in that sense.> > Maybe, but the ambiguity of "what he likes" remains even if the sense is > restricted to "visually perceives." > > some people who fail to recognize it. That is, it's a very superficial > problem.> > > And so a problem for us until we are sure that we are always > recognizing it. > Since we still don't have a test for it in English, it remains possible that > it lies behind some of the aberrant cases in trying to deal with indirect > whatsis. I still don't see what the problem is. If you're not sure whether clause C is relative or interrogative, try replacing it with one, C', that has analogous meaning but a form that is unambiguous. That'll show you whether C is relative or interrogative. AFAICS, this is simply not a problem in the analysis of English, except for beginners, and I don't see any evidence of relative/interrogative ambiguities having contaminated our attempts to deal with Q-kau. --And.