Subject: Re: [lojban] tu'o usage

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2002 10:11:37 EDT

In a message dated 9/24/2002 8:08:24 PM Central Daylight Time, 
[email-masked] writes:

<<
> {lo ro broda cu brode} means something like "some broda is brode
> and the cardinality of the set of broda is the cardinality of the
> set of broda" -- I can't think of a better way of putting it,
> unfortunately. The Lojban is not tautologous like my English version,
> but it is as vacuously uninformative. Maybe "some broda is brode
> and lo'i broda has a cardinality" might be better.
> 
> So in that case, {lo ro broda na brode} means "it is not the case
> that both some broda is brode and the cardinality of the set of
> broda is the cardinality of the set of broda (or, alternatively,
> lo'i broda has cardinality". Since it obviously is the case that the 
> cardinality
> of lo'i broda is the cardinality of lo'i broda -- or that
> lo'i broda has a cardinality -- the inevitable inference is that
> it is not the case that some broda is brode.
>>
That is, of course, interpretation. What is said is that the cardinality is 
ro, just another number. So, if negation is going to affect that, it changes 
it to {me'iro} or some other version of {na'e ro}. Now, that may in the end 
give an equally contradictory component of some compound, if that is how it 
develops, and tha component may drop out to give just the basic negative, 
without any component about cardinality. But what then justifies adding back 
in a cardinality component, namely, the one jut dropped out. I suppose that 
it come back in because it is a tautology (why the negation dropped out). 
Well, at least this coheres so far, but I await a case where {lo PA broda} 
negated turns up as {lo na'e PA broda}. (As you point out later, this may be 
a long wait because no one ever uses {lo PA broda}.)

<<
Firstly, but less importantly, 'definite descriptions' -- closely
comparable to Lojban le -- are fairly standard exx of presupposition,
I think.
You mean as a way to dodge the Russell cases. Probably, although I 
personally go with the explicit formats, the eight and ninety ways remaining 
to do descriptions -- all of which are also right.

<<
Second, the essence of le is specificity, with nonveridicality something
of a by-product. My personal view is that logically specificity
involves existential quantification outside the scope of the operator
that carries illocutionary force (e.g. assertive force). If the
sumti tail is held to also be outside the scope of the illocutionary
operator, then nonveridicality is an automatic consequence. It is
also my personal view that the essence of presupposition/conventional
implicature that it is outside the scope of the illocutionary
operator. Therefore I see specificity as "presuppositional existential
quantification".
Both of these theories of yours are interesting and need some mulling (my 
first instinct is to like it a lot). But I don't see that the fact that you 
have these theories (even if they turn out to be correct -- i.e., pick of the 
litter) requires us to use them to explain the present case, which isn't 
directly about that. But, of course, if specificity is a pre-illocution 
quantifier, then INNER, which is that quantifier, is presuppositional.

<<
Finally, I too don't recall it ever having been established that
the inner cardinality indicator is nonveridical (=subjectively
defined), but I think that is the more consistent position to take.
So, when I say {le ci mlatu} meaning those four dogs -- or even those four 
cats -- I did not misspeak myself, since I know what I mean -- but can't 
count -- and you know what I mean, even if you can count? Given the history 
of {le}, that seems plausible -- and thoroughly disastrous. 

<<
So I'm back to square one then, understandingwise. Never mind, I'll
see if McCawley enlightens me.
Sorry if I didn't fit your hypothesis. I have trouble imagining what you 
could have been thinking of. The importing forms (yes, restricted 
quantification) always entail the corresponding unrestricted ones. If some 
broda is brode then there are broda and something is brode -- the same thing, 
in fact.

<<
yet it's easy to come up with examples of
nonimporting "every": "everyone who answers all questions successfully
will pass the course" -- this does not claim that some has answered
or will answer all questions successfully.
But, I would never say that but rather "Any student ,,,"

<<
I understand where you're coming from, treating presupposition as
kind of analogous to parenthesis. But from what I say above, you
can see that I see presupposition as basically a matter of scope
relative to the illocutionary operator.
Neat. And I would add that negation then comes after the presuppositional 
part, either as part of or in the scope of the illocutionary operator. 

<<
Of course, but you seemed to imply that there were many such cases.
I suspect that there aren't, and that if you did find some, the
authors might feel that their usage was an inadvertent mistake.
Sorry about the implication (worse, I think I asserted it, without checking 
what data I had). There don't seem to be any cases at all one way or the 
other. So, no conclusion can be drawn from usage, althoug the absence of 
usage might suggest that people just don't quite know what to do with it. 
Or, more likely, that no occasion has arisen for both mentioning the size of 
the set (and precious few for that alone) and negating.