Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: [jboske] Quantifiers, Existential Import, and all that stuff

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 9 Mar 2002 13:22:39 EST

In a message dated 3/9/2002 10:48:39 AM Central Standard Time, 
[email-masked] writes:

> >What about {su'o broda cu zasti}? Presumably false, but also I-, so it 
> >ought
> >to be true.
> 
> It is false, and it is I+ in my system, as well as in yours.
> 

So I see, but it has the no importing set at its base -- what I mean bybeing 
unable to decipher the principles involved here.

<Well, And seems to have understood me, so I can at least consider
that my failure to explain it to you may not be entirely my fault.>

Well, having the same delusions about {ro} probably helps working through 
this.

<>The set can be empty, but then the reference to its members has to be
>treated in whatever way is appropriate for expressions that don't have a
>referent. I'm not sure what the Lojban rule is about that, if there is 
>one.

If you're not sure that there is a Lojban rule, why is the one
I'm proposing against Lojban?>

General principle: a rule based on a false assumption is very likely going to 
turn out to be the wrong rule. It turns out that there are several 
contextually dependent rules about meaningless expressions, but I have to 
admit that none of them is very clear -- usage not having decided nor 
authority.

<If we don't even have Lojban rules, the ones I'm proposing are
not against Lojban rules. An of course if you would show that
my proposal gives rise to inaccuracy or incoherence I would have
to shut up about it, but you haven't.>

Same principle. Your rules may not be incoherent in themselves but they are 
incompatible with Lojban principles. Whether they are a better set of rules 
will have to wait for the Lojban set to appear. I've sent around a first 
shot for comment, and then we can see what develops.

<I hardly think the existential import of {ro} warrants a new
language. Would anyone ever notice that they are two different
languages?>

I think they they might at a number of crucial points -- exactly when 
existential plays a role -- issues like whether or not there are workable 
peace proposals, for example, regardless of whether all of them are flawed.

<I'm moving this back to jboske then. The problem is that
reply-to in jboske is not sent to the list, so I probably
end up bringing it back to lojban by mistake.>

It's already happened, so I think that -- on the off chance anybody else paid 
any attention -- we should continue of Lojban.