Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: On what there isn't

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 28 Sep 2002 18:42:22 EDT

In a message dated 9/27/2002 4:14:51 PM Central Daylight Time, 
[email-masked] writes:

<<
> > {roda zasti} is a Lojban tautology -- and is unexpressible in 
> normal formal 
> > logic, where it is incorporated into the symbolism. 
> 
> Well, {zasti} has two reference places for lack of one.
> {roda zasti de di} seems like a truth, but I'm not sure
> I would call it a tautology. On the other hand {roda zasti
> rode rodi} is almost certainly false. I would use {roda du} 
> for the tautology. 
>>
I meant (and think the Lojban said) "everything exists for the interlocutors 
in the current world" The point is that, to talk about something not 
her-annd-now existing, the official line is that we shift (otherwise 
unmarkedly) to a world in which it soes exist. The plan here is to talk 
meaningfully without making the shift. But, yes, {roda du de} is a tautology 
(and remains so, though the meaning of {de} changes), {roda zasti} is merely 
an axiom.

<<
> We begin by distinguishing between nuclear and extra-nuclear 
properties and 
> relations. 

This presentation seems to have some things in common with my
proto-predicates, which would correspond to the extra-nuclear
relations
Well, they share the property that neither is as clear as one would like, at 
least. But I agree that there may be a deeper relation (in fact a nuclear 
one as "equally unclear" pretty clearly is not )

<<
My proto-predicates for these would be:

x1 is the property of something that exists.
x1 is the property of something fictional.
x1 is the property of something possible.
x1 is the property of something thought about by Parsons.
Wher, as we know, the "something" is not to be taken literally in either way: 
neither a further property of some thing that happens to ... nor as a 
property that applies to everything that ..., nor yet, apparently, the 
property of ...ing. I take it that nuclear proerties are just a 
clssification of ordinary proeprties, not another kind of properties. so 
plain old "is blue" is a nuclear property, without any complications.

<<
>and siome new new that arise within the 
> system itself like "is complete." Most other properties are 
neclear (at 
> least until proven otherwise) and, further, every extranuclear 
property has a 
> "watered down" version which is nuclear. 

The way I see it, every normal predicate (nuclear) has its
corresponding proto-predicate (non-nuclear), but it is clear
that some non-nuclears would be called into use more often
than others.
At this point it becomes clear that the nuclear/etranuclear distinction is 
onto somehting different that your protopredicates (where have you used this 
terminology before by the way -- I'm not sure now which critters you are 
talking about). The relation between the two is reversed, that is, as noted, 
every extranuclear has a corresponding nuclear ("watered down") but not 
necessarily conversely.

<<
>what we would call the various ways of 
> plugging the relation, filling all the places but one with 
particulars. That 
> aRb holds is then the conjunction of the claims that a has the 
property of 
> being R to b and that b has the property of being Rd by a. 

This would go something like this with protopredicates:

ko'a broda ko'e

= ko'a kairbroda le ka ce'u du ko'e
ije 
ko'e se kairselbroda le ka ce'u du ko'a 
Yes, that is similar, except that the relation between term and property is 
always just {ckaji}.

<<
> Thus, though Holmes might have the proprety of being knighted 
> by Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria does not have the property of 
having 
> knighted Holmes (though her surrogate would). 

i la xolmyz cu se nolgau lo'e glico nolraitru
i ku'i no glico nolraitru cu nolgau la xolmyz
I'd stick with {la viktorias}, since bringing in {lo'e} -- whatever that 
means -- introduces a whole range of problems which this shift is designed to 
help solve, not to have incorporated into it. In particular, the Victoria we 
are talking about is the familiar one, not one of her surrogates in a book or 
elsewhere; that is, an existent, not a non-existent. (and notice, since all 
her surrogates are English queens, the {no glico nolraitru} is false).