Subject: Re: [lojban] a construal of lo'e & le'e

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 27 Oct 2001 16:37:21 EDT

In a message dated 10/26/2001 7:23:17 AM Central Daylight Time, 
[email-masked] writes:

> There is nary a shred of consensus about what {lo'e} and {le'e} mean.
> The main proposed interpretations that have some currency are:
> 
> 1. Something similar to {lo fadni be X} or {le fadni be X}.
> 

Surely, {le fadni be fi X}, since it clearly has some relation to a class of 
things. It may also be restricted in what properties are considered, but 
that is secondary.

<2. The fuzzily-defined xorxesian usage seen in {nitcu lo'e tanxe},
{djica lo'e pendo}, {kalte lo'e mirli}.>

But isn't this just one of those rare errors on xorxes part, meaning {tu'a lo 
broda} but trying to preserve English (surface) structure? Maybe we cannot 
generalize on {lo'e} but it still seems carry more existential commitment 
than these predicates allow. or maybe not. But it does get the wrong sort 
of thing: it is not the "any old" that is really intended here, but a very 
special (and probably non-existent) one.

<3. Something equivalent to {tu'odu'u ce'u broda}>

Does anyone really hold this? {lo'e broda} is in some sense a broda (even if 
imaginary), so rarely a property, unless brodas are.

<lo'e/le'e of types (1) and (3) are 
redundant, being mere abbreviations of other expressions>

An odd objection from a person who is constatnly looking for other ways to 
say the same thing as existing expressions and apparently often intends for 
them to be used. OTOH , the claim is only true of 1 really and an 
abbreviation might well be useful for resolving some ambiguities efficiently 
(Swedes eat more yogurt than Danes).

<OTOH, Lojban's lo v. loi (and le v. lei) distinction fails to capture
the distinction (which applies to intrinsically bounded individuals,
like people, but not to intrinsic masses, like water) between (i) a
group of things taken as a whole, and (ii) a prototype-theoretic
category, which is an individual such that members of the category
are versions of that individual. From what I can gather, Loglan "lo"
was formerly (ii) (so "lo remna/prenu/nanmu" = "Man" (not "man")),
while nowadays, like Lojban, it is (i) (so "lo remna/prenu/nanmu" = 
"mankind"). [In former years I called (ii) a "myopic singularizer".]
The contrast is evidence in examples like:

(i)  Mankind has (exactly) two eyes. [false]
(ii) Man has (exactly) two eyes. [true]
Lojban {re da kanla lo remna} means (i).>

Ignotum per ignotius: the Mankind-Man distinction (any one of the several 
that might be meant) is more obscure than {lo - loi} as is "groups taken as 
a whole" (isn't this {lo'i}?) v. "prototype-theoretic category" (whadafu?). 
The examples also fail to match the readings, as far as the most likely 
interps go.

<So how do we express 'categorial individuals', as in (ii)? -- Using
{lo'e}, I propose: {re da kanla lo'e remna}.>

Well, at least the Lojban is true, but I don't yet see what a categorial 
individual is -- unless it means a typical one or something like it, which we 
already knew.

<And what does {le'e} mean? Well, if there is a specific group of one or
more individuals, {le} refers to each member of the group individually, 
{lei} refers to them collectively, somewhat as if you ignore the boundaries 
between the individuals, while {le'e} refers to the one individual you get 
if you abstract away from the differences that individuate the different 
individuals -- in other words, it is the archetype of the group.>  

aHAH! This is getting a bit better but probably still won't really work, 
since a {le} group (and even a {lo}) may not have enough such properties to 
make an individual -- the resemblances may only be familial (and with {le} 
not even that). "Stand just there" and all. So the abstraction process has 
to be at least more complex than this pattern suggests -- closer to "the 
average X," though that will be inadequate in other ways.

xod:
<However, I am not sure that I like the
difference between lo'e and le'e being much different than the difference
between lo and le (or lo'i, le'i).

lo'e remna = categorial individual of lo remna
le'e remna = categorial individual of le remna

And let the difference reflect whatever difference there is between lo
remna and le remna. Actual Lojban usage seems to have contracted le and
lo into le. If you want to re-assert the difference, le/lo is where you
should apply your energy.>

While agreeing with the final point, I think that the {le'e lo'e} distinction 
& proposes does match that of {le lo} -- it is just that it is inadequate and 
so inaccurate for both.

&:
<I do want to wage war against excessive use of {le}. Doubtless it'll be
futile, but still it might be worthwhile. The problem is that people are
influenced by phonology when choosing 'default' forms, and hence 'le' and
'lo' feel more default than lei/loi/le'e/lo'e. Yet for singleton categories,
'le' and 'lo' are actually the least appropriate, involving redundant
quantification, and even lei/loi wrongly imply the relevance of a
distributive/collective distinction. So for singleton categories, le'e/lo'e
should be the default. At any rate, I myself will now be ditching {tu'odu'u} 
and
start using {lo'e du'u} instead.>

An arguable point, with a lot of merit on &'s side, but the singular as 
universal is deeply embedded in the history of logic (which had, admittedly, 
fewer resources). The lV'e version implies a fictive element which is 
presumably not only irrelevant but flat wrong. One does regret JCB's 
rejection of the descriptors of ordinary logic in favor of his own oddities, 
especially when he did such an abominable -- not to say contradictory -- job 
of defining them (to which Lojban has added new fillips).  

<ex rob
> Thank you for ditching {tu'odu'u} - using tu'o as an article seems to be
> just a way to deliberately communicate nothing.

Exactly! It was a way of avoiding communicating unnecessary information and
having to decide which unnecessary information to communicate. But I now 
realize
that lo'e will do this job.>

I don't see it as a general principle: {lo'e} carries its own freight. the 
virtue of {tu'o} is exactly that it is freightless.

<{ro} too requires great caution -- you have to check scopes are correct, & 
are
you sure you really mean "every"... Certainly if you have no specifics in mind
then a LE-series one is wrong. But ro v. lo v. loi v. lo'e still has to be
decided. To me, lo'e is by far the safest option.>

Maybe as a maxim of prudence, but it is always better to figure out what you 
really mean and say that, rather than just reduce your chances of saying 
something glaringly false or stupid.

cowan:
<(iii) Man(kind) speaks six thousand languages. (true)
(iv) Man speaks six thousand languages. (false)
(v) A man speaks six thousand languages. (false)>

What does iv mean? It is not (as it normally would be) iii and can hardly be 
v.

xod:
<For the trivial
case of a set containing only one member, doesn't le'e reduce to le [pa]?
What's the archetype of a singleton; what is the mean of a single event?>

Not necessarily, for the archetype may still be different from the actual 
realization (or, more accurately, the other way round) -- the realization has 
particular features that are not archetypal. Of course, this assumes that 
lV'e is an archetype rather than just a typical, etc. Which goes back to the 
initial question.

pier:
<{reda kanla lo'e remna} sounds not quite right - it should be {lo'e remna cu 
se kanla reda}. >

What is the quantifier on {lo'e} that makes this exchange different?