Subject: ka'e (was: Re: [lojban] Introduction, and zutse/se sutse

From: And Rosta <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2001 17:13:38 +0000

>>> <[email-masked]> 11/13/01 09:55pm >>>
[email-masked] writes:
[...]
#> 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."  

Here's my take on this.

1. ka'e expands the world to include a contextually-determined range of
possible worlds. Often, the context will determine a range that amounts
to the class of potential worlds. Hence "potentiality" is a typical and
common subcase of the basic meaning of "ka'e".

2. The "innately capable of" is open to the objection raised by Jorge --
that it wrongly privileges one sumti.

3. My reasons for holding (1) are:
a. it makes sense & fills a gap that needs filling (the "Holmes is a
detective" gap)
b. discussion on this list (the last time ka'e/ca'a were discussed)
c. actual usage, not so much of overt ka'e, but with implied ka'e modifying
nu ("le/lo (ka'e) nu").

#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).  

I think this distinction is to be glorked from context, and, if made explicit,
to be rendered by a brivla for "is potential".

#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.  

Maybe. Alternatively, the meaning of {lo broda} simply can't be
established until it has been glorked whether {lo ka'e broda} or {lo ca'a
broda} is meant.

#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, outsideof 
#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).

We seem to agree.

--And.