Subject: RE: [lojban] Re: Usage deciding (was: RE: Re: [Announcement] The Alice TranslationHas Moved And Changed

From: Robert LeChevalier <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 11 Oct 2002 00:04:46 -0400

At 01:50 AM 10/11/02 +0100, And Rosta wrote:
>Lojbab:
> > >I took Lojbab to be talking about consensus in the broader Lojban
> > >community, not solely within the LLG.
> >
> > LLG *IS* the community. The voting members are not all of LLG.
>
>I didn't realize that. I've been told before, but it didn't sink in.

%^)

>Anyway, until I became a voting member I never realized that I could
>put forward motions and suchlike;

You couldn't officially do so until you were a member, but there are 
several members that will put an idea on the floor on behalf of a 
non-member. The only reason for the distinction of voting members is for 
legal purposes - we have to have some specific group with the power to do 
organizational things, up to and including dissolving the 
organization. The bylaws also require a quorum of the voting members for 
business to be transacted, which is why we need those proxies even if you 
abstain on everything. But if we can go to on-line meetings that problem 
may be reduced.

>I had no sense that the formal
>meetings were there to represent the whole community in quasi-
>parliamentary or Congress-like way.

That's the ideal, and I think the members who actually attend LogFest go 
out of their way to represent the points of view of people who are not there.

> > But the views of the community WERE sought, and lack of objection was taken
> > to mean consent, if not consensus.
>
>My memory is fallible, but I really don't remember it happening that
>the views of the community were sought on the language design any
>time after 1991.

Much of the stuff you were interested in back in 1991 was settled before 
then - the morphology for example. We could have used some people pounding 
the semantics issues back then when the language was more fluid.

> > >And indeed, neither views nor consensus were sought.
> >
> > False. Every chapter of CLL was posted as it was written to Lojban List
> > for review over the course of around 2 1/2 years. Comments were sought,
> > and Jorge and Nick in particular made many which were
> > incorporated.
>
>This was a reviewing of CLL, though, not of the design.

There were many design changes made as a result of writing and reviewing 
CLL - all 40-odd TECHFIXs. John himself proposed most of them and I think 
he wrote all of them, but he had inputs from others.

>If, say, CLL
>accurately described a design feature that I thought flawed, it was
>not appropriate for my review to say I thought the feature flawed,
>since CLL's description of it wasn't flawed.

It didn't stop Jorge %^)

> > Likewise, the gismu and cmavo lists and rafsi lists were up
> > for discussion, and there was considerable debate about the last revision
> > of the rafsi list before consensus was achieved.
>
>Yes, I must concede that the rafsi reassignments were submitted
>after 1991 for the approval of the wider community.
>
>But this really just illustrates the fact that approval was sought
>piecemeal at the point where each feature of the design was instituted.

Yes. Until we had people working on some aspect of the design, there was 
no one to listen to ideas.

> > It is true that not all that many Lojbanists felt themselves competent
> > enough at that point. to question the baseline decisions, but on issues
> > that they understood, they spoke up and were listened to.
>
>That's not the same thing as views and consensus being actively sought
>on the design.

We THOUGHT we were actively seeking them. And the key people pretty much 
all responded. I'll admit that we put less priority on those people like 
yourself that seemed to be studiously maintaining an outsider 
position. But I believe Cowan was himself seeking your opinions on some 
issues in your discussions with him - though you may not have realized it.

>I don't deny that a large enough groundswell of opinion from sufficiently
>influential members of the rank and file led to changes.

Isn't that how consensus usually works? On non controversial things, 
people tend to consent, saving their ardor for the things that really bug them.

lojbab

-- 

lojbab [email-masked]
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org