Subject: Re: [lojban] the set of answers

From: And Rosta <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 10 Sep 2001 17:51:29 +0100

>>> <[email-masked]> 09/10/01 02:08pm >>>
[email-masked] writes:
#> but in {ko'u fo'u frica lo du'u ce'u prami ma kau} (in standard
#> usage), there are two variables: {ko'u fo'u frica lo du'u X prami Y}.
#> X is restricted to Dubya and Jeb (do we *have* to use Bushes in our
#> exsmples??) and Y ranges freely. By my analysis of Q-kau, Y is
#> underlyingly ce'u -- ordinary unrestricted woldemarian ce'u. So
#> although I could accept your story that X is a contextually restricted
#> ce'u, this leaves us with free and contextually restricted ce'u in the
#> same bridi, and with no way to tell them apart (in logical form). 
[...]
#Well, the {makau} {ce'u} is restricted, too -- maybe more so -- since it 
#has to generate *answers* and not every possible value will apply 
#(indeed, generally most will not). Further, unlike the "bound" {ce'u}, 
#the restrictions tend to be implicit rather than overt.  

I think this is incorrect. The extension of ka is the set of all ordered
n-tuples that instantiate the n ce'u in the ka. So the ce'u are not
restricted.

#My objects to counting {makau} as {ce'u} are two: 1) it overlooks the 
#relation to the other interrogatives ({xukau, mokau, ...} which behave in the 
#same way, 2) it gives a less useful spin on the interpretation of {makau} 
#expressions. Although the difference between a function and a set is nominal 
#in this case, thinking of a set of answers and pulling items out it, makes 
#for clearer discussions than thinking about a function on a function does.

These objections would carry a lot more weight if there was a rival 
analysis to the Ka Extension analysis. Then you could compare the
rival analyses as to how well they stand up under those and other
objections. 

But as things stand, there is no rival analysis. The set of answers analysis
is intuitive and attractive, but it is informal, and nobody has shown how it 
helps to provide an explicit Q-kauless logical and/or lojban equivalent
of Qkau sentences.

--And.