Subject: Re: [lojban] Set of answers encore

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2001 17:42:17 EDT

In a message dated 9/22/2001 1:25:58 PM Central Daylight Time, 
[email-masked] writes:

> da zo'u la djan jinvi/krici tu'odu'u da -extension tu'odu'u
> ce'u pa moi merko -president
> 
> -- i.e. as not substantively different from the treatment of djuno.
> 
Not so: the corresponding analysis would be 
{da de poi du'u da extension of ledu'u ce'u pamoi merko president zo'u la 
djan jinvi de}
However, in working the details of this out, I see that it does work as well 
as well in this case as in the {djuno} one. I keep forgetting that when you 
say "extension" you mean the propositions that such-and-such is the 
extension, not the set itself (I think this ahs been a problem for a while -- 
back to whether the things that go in for {makau} are answers). I'll try to 
remember this is the extension-claim theory, not the extension theory, which 
is very different.

<I yet again reject the idea that Set-of-Answers and Extension can be
treated as competitors.

I think I can translate any Set-of-Answers analysis into an Extension
one, so whatever Set-of-Answers works for, so does Extension.>

I am glad to hear that you now reject the rivalry which you fostered and that 
you see the two as different formulations of the same general answer. I 
agree that (after finally getting the details of the formal, but very messy, 
presentation down) this looks plausible and hope that together we can get a 
reasonable set of rules laid out soon.
I now begin to see how to convert extension-claim analysis to set-of-answer 
analysis fairly simply.

<The solution does require [reducing all qkau to {makau} and/or higher level 
lambdas] if that by definition is a criterion of
what counts as a solution -- for me to understand qkau I need to feduce
it to a logical formula that contains logical elements only of standard
sorts.>

Well, I am not sure what you mean by "standard sorts" -- both reduction and 
higher order lambdas are non-standard in a pretty clear sense (most logic 
books don't have them) but everyday in the appropriate fields within logic 
(and used a variety of different ways, then). Reduction is pretty clearly 
the Lojban way, but higher levels might be clearer. If we need them at all;  
I kinda like the treatment I have given to the {frica} and {dunli} cases, 
which get rid of even the original selbri. I see that you do too, though 
along a different route:

<Ah.  What is it then that it gives you a two-ce'u problem?

"differ in who they love". Standard lojban renders "they" as ce'u. I
think "who" should be rendered as ce'u. Hence apparent two-ce'u
problem. Solution: "they" is not ce'u. The solution was spelt out in an
earlier message, which I repeat here, for your convenience:

#I think I am now able to offer a halfway decent analysis:
#
#no da ro de poi ke'a cmima la dybiyb ce la tcelsik [-- or cmima of whatever
#class of differers --] zo'u
#da -extension-of tu'odu'u ce'u mamta de
#
#= D frica C tu'odu'u ma kau mamta ce'u
#= Dubya and Chelsea differ in who their mothers are
#
#Now that can be done more simply as:
#
#no da ro de poi ke'a cmima la dybiyb ce la tcelsik zo'u da mamta de
#
#or indeed
#
#no da mamta ge la dybiyb gi la tcelsik
#
#But the longerwinded method comes into its own in cases like:
#
#  X and Y differ in who gave them what
#= ... frica tu'odu'u ma kau dunda ma kau ce'u
#= ... da -extension of tu'odu'u ce'u dunda ce'u de
#
#Admittedly, this "halfway decent analysis" does not use {frica}, but there
#was no guarantee that {frica} is logically sound, and hence no guarantee
#that frica could be used in a logically explicit formulation.>

Note, though, that, despite what you said at the beginning, you end up with 
"they" being {ce'u} and "who" and "what" {makau}. Now I know you want 
{makau} to be a sort of {ceu}, but from your ussage it appears to be simply 
one with longer scope, able to step out of its immediate matrix. And very 
useful it is too.

<my feeling is that interrogatives and qkau involve only logical 
>   answers -- illocutionary answers are a red herring. 
> 
> A nice distinction.  I think that we will need to allow illocutionary 
> answers, so as to encompass cases like "believes" and maybe "same" 
> and "different."  We'll see what happens as more cases come under the 
> microscope. 

I'll need to see concrete examples of where illocutionary answers might
be needed, because I'm finding of any myself.

Let me try. You want to be able to sat "John has an opinion about
who went", such that this covers a case where John's opinion is that
the set of goers includes da poi ninmu. I would handle this case 
not by using indirect questions that allow for i-answers, but rather
by, say, "la djan jinvi tu'odu'u lo'i klama mo kau", or

  da zo'u la djan jinvi tu'odu'u de ge cmima tu'o -extension tu'odu'u 
  ce'u klama gi da ckaji de>

I think what I had in mind (that "extension" rather than "extension-claim" 
again) was the case where John opined that someone went who in fact did not.  
That case aside now, what is the one you have set up and why might I think it 
a problem for either of us? I don't see aproblems either way for this 
translation of "John has an opion of what goes are like" or some such 
phrasing.  

<I don't accept that the set-of-answers theory gets us to a satisfactory
analysis of qkau. But what I meant was the latter -- that I don't accept
that "lo'i du'u ma kau broda" is the way to say "the set of answers to 
the question 'ma broda'". I don't reject it outright, though; my position
is that that meaning does not automatically follow from the constituent
parts, but that since I can think of no other sensible meaning it is
an unobjectionable interpretive convention.>

Well, if we can intertranslatem perhaps we will come to agree that it does 
(cf. Turing and abacus). As for that being the way to say "the set of 
answers," 
at least it's got set and proposition right, the rest is open to some 
criticism. But then, we don't have "is the extension of du'u makau broda" 
down yet either, so we are
about even. 

<I think I've said in other messages that I don't think qkau can be
explained unless we can eliminate it (from underlying logical forms).>
I think that rules for generating presuppositions and consequences of qkau 
would be quite enough, even if we never found a way to say the same thing 
without using qkau. It does look like total elimination -- except for 
rhetorical effect and convenience -- is possible, however.