From lojbab@lojban.org Sat Sep 22 07:49:02 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojbab@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_3_2_2); 22 Sep 2001 14:48:23 -0000 Received: (qmail 64445 invoked from network); 22 Sep 2001 14:48:23 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by 10.1.1.220 with QMQP; 22 Sep 2001 14:48:23 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO stmpy-4.cais.net) (205.252.14.74) by mta1 with SMTP; 22 Sep 2001 14:49:01 -0000 Received: from bob.lojban.org (202.dynamic.cais.com [207.226.56.202]) by stmpy-4.cais.net (8.11.1/8.11.1) with ESMTP id f8MEn0605081 for ; Sat, 22 Sep 2001 10:49:00 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <4.3.2.7.2.20010922101019.00d03ec0@pop.cais.com> X-Sender: vir1036@pop.cais.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 4.3.2 Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2001 10:45:53 -0400 To: "lojban" Subject: RE: [lojban] Dumb answers to good questions In-Reply-To: References: <4.3.2.7.2.20010920174409.00e35d60@pop.cais.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" At 01:32 AM 9/22/01 +0100, And Rosta wrote: >lojbab: > > At 01:59 PM 9/20/01 +0100, And Rosta wrote: > > >So the general Lojban strategy I'd propose would be twofold > > >(a) a method of isolating the focused item along the lines sketched > > >above, > > > > We have a prenex approach to this where it is a sumti you want to draw > > focus to, as well as fronting and trailing markedly, which brings focus by > > the marking. > >What'd help here would be Lojban translations of > >It was John that Bill hit la bil darxi la djan bi'u >It was Bill that hit John la bil bi'u darxi la djan >What John did was hit Bill la djan darxi bi'u la bil. >What John did to Bill was hit him lenu la djan gasnu tu'a la bil zo'u jy darxi >What happened to Bill was John hit him lenu gasnu tu'a la bil. zo'u la djan darxi by lenu la bil lifri zo'u la djan darxi by >It is John and Bill that are respectively x, y such that x hit y da po'u la djan bi'u de po'u la bil bi'u zo'u da darxi de or explicitly using "respectively" operator da fa'u de vu'o po'u bi'u la djan fa'u la bil zo'u da darxi de or having more fun with multiple prenexes la djan la bil zo'u da po'u jy de po'u by zo'u da darxi de The latter took more time trying to figure out what the English meant than it did to render into Lojban. Hopefully I got the emphasis down. >etc. -- Using structural methods of isolating the focused phrase. I'm sure you could come up with a hard one if you tried %^) But whether you could say it clearly in English as opposed to logical notation might be tougher. > > ba'e of course directly adds emphasis, but does not indicate why, which > > draws focus. > >Not bad, but there are other reasons for emphasis besides focus, so >ba'e will no do as the focus marker. ba'e will draw focus, whether that is the reason used or not. Overriding ba'e drawing focus to use it for some other purpose could be trickier. > > > (b) an optional UI to mark the focused item -- the equivalent > > >of English intonation's focal stress ("Bob HIT Bill", etc.). > > > > The closest we have to this beside ba'e is bi'u/bi'unai which were > > originally intended by Colin Fine who proposed them to deal with one > > particular reason for focus. > >bi'u(nai) is for given/new rather than for focus. While focused information >is new, not all new information is focused. So nor will bi'u do as the >focus marker. I disagree. Only if you have a conflicting example, where the focus is on x but y is the new information, would it be tricky, and I'm not sure how to do that in English. But the combination of zo'u and bi'u can be powerful as I hope I showed above. >More generally, though, as with po'o this is a 'problem' that should >be fixed by logical/structural means rather than primarily by a >discursive. I'm not sure it is broken, but then as champion glorkjunkie, I might not recognize when I am glorking. (These weird words that beginners don't understand: can someone bi'u come up with ba'e Lojban words for these? If we're going to use jargon, we ought to do it in-language so people have some idea what we ba'e mean!) (How was that example of multiple emphasis and focus, albeit in English with subtitles?) lojbab -- lojbab lojbab@lojban.org Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc. 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273 Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org