Subject: Re: [lojban] ce'u once again

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2002 21:01:51 EST

In a message dated 4/3/2002 4:29:08 PM Central Standard Time, 
[email-masked] writes:

> Subj:Re: [lojban] ce'u once again 
> Date:4/3/2002 4:29:08 PM Central Standard Time
> From:<A HREF="mailto:[email-masked]">[email-masked]</A>
> To:<A HREF="mailto:[email-masked]">[email-masked]</A>
> Sent from the Internet 
> 
> 
> 
> la pycyn. cusku di'e
> 
> > > No it doesn't. 'zmadu' requires a unary property in the 3rd place.
> > >
> > Why? Why not say "is to the left of"?
> 
> I'm not sure what you are suggesting should be replaced by 'is to the left
> of', but 'zmadu' compares the result of applying the x3 property to x1 with
> the result of applying it to x2 and claims that the former 'is more than'
> the latter.
> 
> The best I can come up with for a binary property in x3 of 'zmadu' is that
> the binary property would specify the relationship between x1 and x2, maybe
> something like 'la fred. la djordj. zmadu le ka ce'u ralju le cecmu be
> ce'u' --> 'Fred is more than George in being the head of his community.'
> This might be a cute trick, but it's very different from the normal use of
> 'zmadu' and in any case isn't a way to interpret the sentence this
> discussion is based on. ('lenu la fred. bilma cu zmadu lenu la djordj. 
> bilma
> kei leka ce'u rinka leka ce'u ruble') In that sentence, the second argument
> for the binary property isn't itself a sumti of the main bridi, and so at
> best it's very confusing.
> 

I suppose you mean {la fred la djordj cu zmadu le du'u ce'u ralju le cecmu be 
cy}, which is technically a 1-place predicate. If you do mean the second 
{ce'u} then it is a free floating variable that makes the whole rather 
obscure, being essentially universal (relevance conditions assumed) -- but 
what I had in mind. What is the trick it is supposed to cutely do?