Subject: Re: [lojban] Introduction, and zutse/se sutse

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 13 Nov 2001 16:55:14 EST

In a message dated 11/13/2001 10:12:53 AM Central Standard Time, 
[email-masked] writes:

> >>> <[email-masked]> 11/12/01 11:31pm >>>
> [email-masked] writes:
> #> .. 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. 
> 
> I agree. The "really is" is there to contrast with nonveridicals' "is 
> described
> as", and would better be rephrased as "is claimed to be".
> 
> #Yes, for all the good it does (given the other problems so far), {lo 
> broda} 
> #really means "some things that really broda" -- at the time and in the 
> world 
> #being talked about. And that "world" makes it possible to talk about 
> #unicorns using {lo pavyseljirna} and a perfectly straight face, if, for 
> #example, you are talking about the Dark Forest about Hogwarts, just as {lo 
> #stizu} applies to a chair that is never in actual history sat upon (burned 
> #within instants of construction, say). 
> 
> I think your answer is misleading. If {ca'a} is sometimes glossed as 
> "really is" (or some equivalent expression), then it is misleading to
> gloss {lo broda} as "that which really is broda", since {lo broda}
> can mean not only {lo ca'a broda} but also {lo ka'e broda}.
> 
> Further, it is possible to talk about {lo pavyseljirna} with a straight face
> even outside Forbidden Forest contexts, so long as {lo pavyseljirna}
> is interpreted as {lo ka'e pavyseljirna} and not as {lo ca'a pavyseljirna}.
> lo'i ca'a pavyseljirna is the set of all unicorns in the real world, so is
> empty, unless the locally real world is potterian or suchlike, while
> lo'i ka'e pavyseljirna is the set of all unicorns in any of a contextually-
> determined set of not-necessarily-real worlds, so is nonempty.
> 

I think that there are a number of muddles going on here and I am not sure 
that I have all of them (or even the main ones) sorted out yet. 
The most obvious one is that between possibility and potentiality and that 
seems at the heart of things. {ka'e} is glossed in terms of potentiality "is 
inherently capable of." Now obscure as that is in itself (is, to cite a 
frequent example here, a person born blind, without optic nerves say, 
inherently capable of seeing because he is human?) it is clearly different 
from possibility, which (depending on what of several kinds is intended) 
takes in a range of cases that go beyond the inherent capabilities of the 
things involved (it is possible that I fly on my own power, for example). 
And is correct that Lojban gismu are basically about {ka'e}, not {ca'a} and 
so that when we say {lo broda} refers to things that really are broda, that 
"really are" is about potentials. 
But the issue of possibles -- which is the matter of "other worlds" -- is a 
different one (at least a broader one -- you can argue that potentials 
areabout acertain very restricted kind of possible worlds, though it's harder 
to define them than to deal with potential by other means). Thus, outside of 
worlds where unicorns are real or, at least, potential, lo'i (ka'e) 
pavyseljirna is empty. The fact that it is possible for old Bessy, my white 
horse, to have gold horn in the middle of her forehead does not make her a 
potential unicorn (see the B&B goat of a few years back).