From pycyn@aol.com Fri Jul 05 09:20:29 2002 Return-Path: X-Sender: Pycyn@aol.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_7_4); 5 Jul 2002 16:20:29 -0000 Received: (qmail 41375 invoked from network); 5 Jul 2002 16:20:29 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.217) by m4.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 5 Jul 2002 16:20:29 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO imo-d04.mx.aol.com) (205.188.157.36) by mta2.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 5 Jul 2002 16:20:29 -0000 Received: from Pycyn@aol.com by imo-d04.mx.aol.com (mail_out_v32.21.) id r.4e.de79897 (4230) for ; Fri, 5 Jul 2002 12:20:24 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: <4e.de79897.2a572148@aol.com> Date: Fri, 5 Jul 2002 12:20:24 EDT Subject: Re: [lojban] pro-sumti question To: lojban@yahoogroups.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="part1_4e.de79897.2a572148_boundary" X-Mailer: AOL 7.0 for Windows US sub 10509 From: pycyn@aol.com X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=2455001 X-Yahoo-Profile: kaliputra --part1_4e.de79897.2a572148_boundary Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 7/4/2002 9:19:21 PM Central Daylight Time, lojban-out@lojban.org writes: > The '98 cmavo list calls it a set also. Don't see how it matters > anyway though. What cmavo liste are you looking at? My list is from Sept '94, right after the Logfest at which the issue was settled. I am sorry to here that '98 still has the older form. I did mean that {le remei} refers to a mass ("le remei" is a Lojban expression). You said that something beginning with {le} could not refer to a mass or a set and I pointed to a case -- other than {le remei} of an ex[ression that has to refer to a set to make sense. I would argue that {le se remei} is another such case, but that is begging the question in this discussion. <> > I was talking about the sumti themselves -- that's the only way this works. > > See below: > > As xorxes pointed out, {sumti} is used ambiguously in English: for both the > linguistic expression and its referent. It is not ambiguous in Lojban (it is > the expression) and I try to use it that way in English -- and take others as > doing so as well, if possible. What DO you mean by "the sumti themselves"? > Your text reads like something that fluctuates over the two English meanings > and, when read conistently in one reading or the other, is clearly false > (use-mention ambiguity in a peculiarly Lojbanic form). I mean the sumti as opposed to the "sumti referents", which is the term i've been using to refer to la'e of a sumti.> I take this to mean that you are talking about the expressions used, not the things mentioned by suing tose expressions. But then your claim -- that the referent of {le remei} is the two sumti is just false (in the present context), for the *expressions* are not referred to at all. <> > I was going on bad definition remei. the point was the "sumti smuni" part. > > I'm talking about a pair of things refered to by sumti. The two sumti > > referents mentioned were: > > all of somenumber of dogs > > all of somenumber of cats > > Well, unless the number is 1 in each case, this will not be a pair. "All" is > a lousy reading in English (and a bad translation from Latin and Greek), > "every" is better: the reference is each taken separately, not to any lumping > (mass or set) of them -- {le} always comes down to a conjunction. There is > no separate level of the sort you mention between the individual dogs and > cats and their mass. You seem to be missing the fundamental point. The are only *two* sumti. No matter how many animals are refered to. "le remei" being "the pair" being the speaker's description (ala "le") of "the referents of a pair of previous sumti". I don't know how much clearer it can get than that, so i'm out of this thread unless ya address that instead of addressing one-of-the-many-other-things-which- the-speaker-could-describe-as-a-pair.> Yes, there are only two sumt -- expressions, {le gerku} and {le mlatu}. And the number of things they each refer to is irrelevant to that fact. But {le remei} does not refer to that pair, since neither aexpression nor a team of expressions can be tired. Only living creatures (and probably only those of a certain degree of complexity) can be tired, and expressions aren't living creatures (Borges notwithstanding). You want {le remei} to refer to a mass (or whatever) composed of the referents of these two expressions. But the size of that mass will vary depending on the number of referents there are -- not on the number of expressions used to refer to them. The size of the referent of {lu'o le gerku} varies on the number things referred to by {le gerku} and does not depend at all upon the fact that those things are all referred to by a single expression. To be sure, I suppose that {lu'o le gerku} refers to only one mass (though I am not sure about that), but, so does {lu'o le gerku e le mlatu}. It is the number of referents, not the number of referring expressions, that decides the size of (the set underlying) a mass. You could get what you want, maybe, in some other way, though, since it is not something I have ever thought to say, I am not sure how. --part1_4e.de79897.2a572148_boundary Content-Type: text/html; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 7/4/2002 9:19:21 PM Central Daylight Time, lojban-out@lojban.org writes:


The '98 cmavo list calls it a set also.  Don't see how it matters
anyway though.  What cmavo liste are you looking at?


My list is from Sept '94, right after the Logfest at which the issue was settled.  I am sorry to here that '98 still has the older form.

<Ahh it sounded like you meant "le remei" as a set/mass (which it isn't).>

I did mean that {le remei} refers to a mass ("le remei" is a Lojban expression).  You said that something beginning with {le} could not refer to a mass or a set and I pointed to a case -- other than {le remei} of an ex[ression that has to refer to a set to make sense.  I would argue that {le se remei} is another such case, but that is begging the question in this discussion.

<> > I was talking about the sumti themselves -- that's the only way this works.
> > See below:
>
> As xorxes pointed out, {sumti} is used ambiguously in English: for both the
> linguistic expression and its referent.  It is not ambiguous in Lojban (it is
> the expression) and I try to use it that way in English -- and take others as
> doing so as well, if possible.  What DO you mean by "the sumti themselves"? 
> Your text reads like something that fluctuates over the two English meanings
> and, when read conistently in one reading or the other, is clearly false
> (use-mention ambiguity in a peculiarly Lojbanic form).

I mean the sumti as opposed to the "sumti referents", which is the term i've
been using to refer to la'e of a sumti.>

I take this to mean that you are talking about the expressions used, not the things mentioned by suing tose expressions.  But then your claim -- that the referent of  {le remei} is the two sumti is just false (in the present context), for the *expressions* are not referred to at all.

<> > I was going on bad definition remei.  the point was the "sumti smuni" part.
> > I'm talking about a pair of things refered to by sumti.  The two sumti
> > referents mentioned were:
> >     all of somenumber of dogs
> >     all of somenumber of cats
>
> Well, unless the number is 1 in each case, this will not be a pair.  "All" is
> a lousy reading in English (and a bad translation from Latin and Greek),
> "every" is better: the reference is each taken separately, not to any lumping
> (mass or set) of them -- {le} always comes down to a conjunction.  There is
> no separate level of the sort you mention between the individual dogs and
> cats  and their mass.

You seem to be missing the fundamental point.  The are only *two*
sumti.  No matter how many animals are refered to.  "le remei" being
"the pair" being the speaker's description (ala "le") of "the
referents of a pair of previous sumti".  I don't know how much
clearer it can get than that, so i'm out of this thread unless ya
address that instead of addressing one-of-the-many-other-things-which-
the-speaker-could-describe-as-a-pair.>

Yes, there are only two sumt -- expressions, {le gerku} and {le mlatu}.  And the number of things they each refer to is irrelevant to that fact.  But {le remei} does not refer to that pair, since neither aexpression nor a team of expressions can be tired.  Only living creatures (and probably only those of a certain degree of complexity) can be tired, and expressions aren't living creatures (Borges notwithstanding). 

You want {le remei} to refer to a mass (or whatever) composed of the referents of these two expressions.  But the size of that mass will vary depending on the number of referents there are -- not on the number of expressions used to refer to them. The size of the referent of {lu'o le gerku} varies on the number things referred to by {le gerku} and does not depend at all upon the fact that those things are all referred to by a single expression.  To be sure, I suppose that {lu'o le gerku} refers to only one mass (though I am not sure about that), but, so does {lu'o le gerku e le mlatu}.  It is the number of referents, not the number of referring expressions, that decides the size of (the set underlying) a mass. 

You could get what you want, maybe, in some other way, though, since it is not something I have ever thought to say, I am not sure how.






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