From jspickes@etrademail.com Mon Nov 12 14:12:37 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: jspickes@cc96364-a.hwrd1.md.home.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_0_1); 12 Nov 2001 22:12:37 -0000 Received: (qmail 93254 invoked from network); 12 Nov 2001 22:12:37 -0000 Received: from unknown (216.115.97.171) by m9.grp.snv.yahoo.com with QMQP; 12 Nov 2001 22:12:37 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO cc96364-a.hwrd1.md.home.com) (24.23.49.116) by mta3.grp.snv.yahoo.com with SMTP; 12 Nov 2001 22:12:36 -0000 Received: from jspickes by cc96364-a.hwrd1.md.home.com with local (Exim 3.32 #1 (Debian)) id 163PJD-0008Lp-00 for ; Mon, 12 Nov 2001 17:12:03 -0500 Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 17:12:03 -0500 To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [lojban] Introduction, and zutse/se sutse Message-ID: <20011112171203.A29619@cc96364-a.hwrd1.md.home.com> Reply-To: jspickes@etrademail.com References: <20011112133346.A8718@cc96364-a.hwrd1.md.home.com> <3BF04115.8030009@reutershealth.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <3BF04115.8030009@reutershealth.com> User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.20i X-eGroups-From: jspickes@cc96364-a.hwrd1.md.home.com From: jspickes@etrademail.com On Mon, Nov 12, 2001 at 04:37:25PM -0500, John Cowan wrote: > What you are missing is that not only is tense optional in Lojban, so is > "potentiality". da se zutse may mean either "that is sat on" (any > tense) but also "that could be sat on". If something cannot under > any circumstances be sat on, then it is not a "se zutse". > This distinction can be made explicit with the cmavo "ca'a" > (actually is) and "ka'e" (capable of being). .ua ki'e This appears to be exactly my problem. This is something I hadn't picked up in my (certainly nonthorough) readings of the grammar and draft textbook. I was interpreting everything with an implicit ca'a, unless ka'e was specified. In fact, the sentences in the learning materials I've read seem to also translate lojban to english as if ca'a was implied. I guess this was probably done to avoid confusing the reader. Thanks for the explanation. That clears up a lot in my mind. This leads to another question, which I think I may already know the answer to.. If broda can mean either ca'a broda or ka'e broda, then what can lo broda mean? Is ca'a the default when lo is used? If not then I think the usual translation of lo broda as "something(s) nonparticular that really is broda" is rather misleading. co'o mi'e djan.