From a.rosta@dtn.ntl.com Fri Nov 02 05:18:02 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: a.rosta@dtn.ntl.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_0_1); 2 Nov 2001 13:18:01 -0000 Received: (qmail 61257 invoked from network); 2 Nov 2001 13:18:01 -0000 Received: from unknown (216.115.97.167) by m10.grp.snv.yahoo.com with QMQP; 2 Nov 2001 13:18:01 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mta01-svc.ntlworld.com) (62.253.162.41) by mta1.grp.snv.yahoo.com with SMTP; 2 Nov 2001 13:18:01 -0000 Received: from andrew ([62.255.43.214]) by mta01-svc.ntlworld.com (InterMail vM.4.01.03.00 201-229-121) with SMTP id <20011102131759.QFIU18177.mta01-svc.ntlworld.com@andrew> for ; Fri, 2 Nov 2001 13:17:59 +0000 Reply-To: To: Subject: RE: [lojban] lo with discourse-scope? Date: Fri, 2 Nov 2001 13:17:16 -0000 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) In-Reply-To: <20011102014102.A2043@twcny.rr.com> X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 Importance: Normal From: "And Rosta" X-Yahoo-Profile: andjamin Rob: > On Fri, Nov 02, 2001 at 04:25:36AM -0000, And Rosta wrote: > > "An/This Englishman walks into an Irish pub. He goes up to the bar and..." > > > > Which Englishman? > > It doesn't matter -- any old Englishman. > > So not {le glico} then? > > No. > > So {lo glico}? > > Well, no, because its quantifier should bind only what is within its scope, > > yet throughout the rest of the joke, "he" and "le glico" refer back to the > > Englishman. > > So what we need is a way to indicate an existential quantifier that > has scope > > over an entire text? > > Yes. > > And how do we do that? > > I've no idea. I'll ask The List. > > {le glico} can refer back to {lo glico} - quantifiers have absolutely > nothing to do with it, much as you seem to think they are the source of > all meaning - and what you want to say is probably {pa bi'u glico}. If {lo glico} is within the scope of negation then it has no referent. If {lo glico} is within the scope of universal quantification then it has different reference for each instantiation of the variable bound by the universal quantifier. If {le glico} is used to mean "that which was referred to by {lo glico} earlier in the text", then {le glico} will have a referent that is as nonexistent or as variable as {lo glico} does, and hence the sentence containing {le glico} is de facto brought within the scope of whatever has scope over {lo glico}, which is (I think -- I may be wrong) tantamount to the quantifier that binds {lo glico} having scope over the rest of the text -- or least over those sentences that contain the {le glico}. In summary, then, what I think happens when {le glico} in a later sentence refers back to {lo glico} is that you glork a logical structure that conflicts with any set of determinate quantifier scope rules but yields the right meaning. And what I'm asking is how to produce a text with the right quantifier scope without having to rely on glorking. > I base this on the use of {bi'u pa nanmu...} in "bradi je bandu" to > mean "There's a man..." Just {pa nanmu} means "there's a man". {bi'u pa nanmu} if sentence-initial means the whole sentence is new info. Otherwise, it's the word before bi'u that gives new info. I would interpret the new information in {pa bi'u nanmu cu broda} as the statement that the cardinality of {lo'i nanmu gi'e broda} is 1. --And.