From pycyn@aol.com Tue Aug 20 08:50:01 2002 Return-Path: X-Sender: Pycyn@aol.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_7_4); 20 Aug 2002 15:50:01 -0000 Received: (qmail 62681 invoked from network); 20 Aug 2002 15:50:01 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.218) by m4.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 20 Aug 2002 15:50:01 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO imo-d04.mx.aol.com) (205.188.157.36) by mta3.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 20 Aug 2002 15:50:01 -0000 Received: from Pycyn@aol.com by imo-d04.mx.aol.com (mail_out_v33.5.) id r.ac.2c1ef401 (4584); Tue, 20 Aug 2002 11:49:57 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Date: Tue, 20 Aug 2002 11:49:57 EDT Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: I like chocolate To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Cc: Philip.Newton@datenrevision.de MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="part1_ac.2c1ef401.2a93bf25_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_ac.2c1ef401.2a93bf25_boundary Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 8/20/2002 8:59:03 AM Central Daylight Time, Philip.Newton@datenrevision.de writes: > > << > ly pycyn. cu cusku di'e > > > On the whole, moving off into the intensional seems the right > > > thing to do > > > > I do not understand what you mean here; what does "intensional" mean? > > > > > (and what xorxes would have {lo'e} do, usually). > > > > For right now, the crucial thing about intensional contexts (inside > > the scope of abstractions and a few other places) is that you can't > > quantify out of them. > > I'm afraid I don't understand that, either ("quantify out of them"). > > > {mi nelci lo nu mi citka lo/loi cakla} does NOT entail {da poi cakla > > zo'u mi nelci lo nu citka da}. Similarly, {mi nelci tu'a lo cakla} > > does not entail either {da poi cakla zo'u mi nelci tu'a da} or > > {... nelci da}. Thus xorxes problem is avoided without resorting to > > {lo'e} (whose chief function often is just to avoid this problem -- > > in xorxes' usage). > > Sorry; that doesn't help me, either. Can you explain it a different way, > perhaps? > > (Or maybe I need to take a semester or two of linguistics to get this, in > which case trying to explain may be futile. I can't tell. Sorry for being > thick about this whole thing.) > << Not linguistics, but Logic, alas. Briefly, an expression like {le/lo broda} refers one or more things which are broda and exist in the world (with occasiional doubts about the bbroda part in the case of {le} -- but not about the "exists in the world" part). The expression {da poi broda} (and several variants) means "there is at least one broda in the world such that," pretty much the same thing, although with a slightly different grammar. And, indeed, we can validly infer the second form from the first in most cases. Abstractions ({ka, nu, ni du'u,...} are peculiar in that they refer, more or less directly, not to this world but to an imaginary or logically possible or... world. In that world, thinks that exist in this one may not exist, and things that don't exist here may exist. Thus, in those contexts, {lo broda}, for example, refers to the things that broda in that world but may not in this world (indeed, may not even exist in its world). So to go from {mi krici le du'u lo broda cu brode} which is my belief about brodas in my mental world (which I probably believe reflects the real one -- but have no guarantees about) to {da poi broda zo'u mi krici le du'u da brode} (which claims something about a broda in this world) is illegitimate. There may not even be broda in this world or it may be that none of them brode (in which case my belief is false, of course) even though there are some in the imaginary world of my beliefs. That was thoroughly unhelpful, I suspect. Let me try an analogy. "There was a man who shot Lincoln" claims that at some past time that man shoit Lincoln. It does not say (nor deny) that that man still exists: "There is a man who shot Lincoln". The past, in this sense, is similar to the imaginary worlds just discussed (indeed, technically is such a world). Moving the reference to the man from the past to the present is moving from true to false, since John Wilkes Booth is no longer alive. [A warning: sometimes -- but not always -- Lojban allows that past people still exist, even when they are no longer alive. If this happens, modify the example from "man" to "living man."] --part1_ac.2c1ef401.2a93bf25_boundary Content-Type: text/html; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 8/20/2002 8:59:03 AM Central Daylight Time, Philip.Newton@datenrevision.de writes:



<<
ly pycyn. cu cusku di'e
> > On the whole, moving off into the intensional seems the right
> > thing to do
>
> I do not understand what you mean here; what does "intensional" mean?
>
> > (and what xorxes would have {lo'e} do, usually). 
>
> For right now, the crucial thing about intensional contexts (inside
> the scope of abstractions and a few other places) is that you can't
> quantify out of them.

I'm afraid I don't understand that, either ("quantify out of them").

> {mi nelci lo nu mi citka lo/loi cakla} does NOT entail {da poi cakla
> zo'u mi nelci lo nu citka da}.  Similarly, {mi nelci tu'a lo cakla}
> does not entail either {da poi cakla zo'u mi nelci tu'a da} or
> {... nelci da}.  Thus xorxes problem is avoided without resorting to
> {lo'e} (whose chief function often is just to avoid this problem --
> in xorxes' usage). 

Sorry; that doesn't help me, either. Can you explain it a different way,
perhaps?

(Or maybe I need to take a semester or two of linguistics to get this, in
which case trying to explain may be futile. I can't tell. Sorry for being
thick about this whole thing.)
<<

Not linguistics, but Logic, alas.  Briefly, an expression like {le/lo broda} refers one or more things which are broda and exist in the world (with occasiional doubts about the bbroda part in the case of {le} -- but not about the "exists in the world" part).  The expression {da poi broda} (and several variants) means "there is at least one broda in the world such that," pretty much the same thing, although with a slightly different grammar. And, indeed, we can validly infer the second form from the first in most cases. 
Abstractions ({ka, nu, ni du'u,...} are peculiar in that they refer, more or less directly, not to this world but to an imaginary or logically possible or... world.  In that world, thinks that exist in this one may not exist, and things that don't exist here may exist.
Thus, in those contexts, {lo broda}, for example, refers to the things that broda in that world but may not in this world (indeed, may not even exist in its world).  So to go from {mi krici le du'u lo broda cu brode} which is my belief about brodas in my mental world (which I probably believe reflects the real one -- but have no guarantees about) to {da poi broda zo'u mi krici le du'u da brode} (which claims something about a broda in this world) is illegitimate.  There may not even be broda in this world or it may be that none of them brode (in which case my belief is false, of course) even though there are some in the imaginary world of my beliefs.

That was thoroughly unhelpful, I suspect.  Let me try an analogy.  "There was a man who shot Lincoln" claims that at some past time that man shoit Lincoln.  It does not say (nor deny) that that man still exists: "There is a man who shot Lincoln".  The past, in this sense, is similar to the imaginary worlds just discussed (indeed, technically is such a world).  Moving the reference to the man from the past to the present is moving from true to false, since John Wilkes Booth is no longer alive.  [A warning: sometimes -- but not always -- Lojban allows that past people still exist, even when they are no longer alive.  If this happens, modify the example from "man" to "living man."] --part1_ac.2c1ef401.2a93bf25_boundary--