From lojban-out@lojban.org Mon Mar 03 15:14:20 2003 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_2_3_4); 3 Mar 2003 23:14:20 -0000 Received: (qmail 73110 invoked from network); 3 Mar 2003 23:14:19 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.217) by m2.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 3 Mar 2003 23:14:19 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO digitalkingdom.org) (204.152.186.175) by mta2.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 3 Mar 2003 23:14:19 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.12) id 18pz8V-00038v-00 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Mon, 03 Mar 2003 15:14:19 -0800 Received: from digitalkingdom.org ([204.152.186.175] helo=chain) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.12) id 18pz8L-00038c-00; Mon, 03 Mar 2003 15:14:09 -0800 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Mon, 03 Mar 2003 15:14:07 -0800 (PST) Received: from manyas.bcc.bilkent.edu.tr ([139.179.30.24]) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.12) id 18pz8D-00038G-00 for lojban-list@lojban.org; Mon, 03 Mar 2003 15:14:02 -0800 Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by manyas.bcc.bilkent.edu.tr (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1A7873200E for ; Tue, 4 Mar 2003 01:13:28 +0200 (EET) Received: from bilkent.edu.tr (ppp115.bcc.bilkent.edu.tr [139.179.111.115]) by manyas.bcc.bilkent.edu.tr (Postfix) with ESMTP id ED6CE2F4F1 for ; Tue, 4 Mar 2003 01:13:25 +0200 (EET) Message-ID: <3E63E200.8080300@bilkent.edu.tr> Date: Tue, 04 Mar 2003 01:15:12 +0200 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.1) Gecko/20020826 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban-list@lojban.org Subject: [lojban] Re: The Any thread References: <20030303164408.X38820-100000@granite.thestonecutters.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed X-Virus-Scanned: by AMaViS snapshot-20020531 X-archive-position: 4306 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: robin@bilkent.edu.tr Precedence: bulk X-list: lojban-list X-eGroups-From: robin From: robin Reply-To: robin@bilkent.edu.tr X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=116389790 X-Yahoo-Profile: lojban_out Invent Yourself wrote: > On Mon, 3 Mar 2003, jjllambias2000 wrote: > > >>Suppose that the folllowing are all true: >> >>la meris pendo la djan noi mikce >>la meris na pendo la fred noi mikce >>la meris na pendo la alis noi mikce >> >>Can we assert, based on that info, that: >> >> la meris pendo lo mikce >> >>? Yes, Mary is friend to at least one doctor, namely >>John. That of course does not mean that Mary is friend to >>any doctor. > > "Is Mary the friend of any doctor at all? Does she have any friends who > are doctors?" > > "Why, yes, she is the friend of a doctor." > >>If someone asks: >> >> xu la meris pendo lo mikce >> >>We have to answer {go'i}, she is the friend of at >>least one doctor. > How one can be a friend to a nonspecific doctor is hard to imagine. Quite. The difference is not in the usage of {lo} but in the semantics of {nitcu} and {pendo}. I can need a non-specific doctor, because I can have a need for a doctor even if there are no doctors left in the world. However, I cannot be a friend to a doctor without there being a doctor for me to be a friend to. > >>That again does not at all mean that >>Mary needs any doctor, all we are saying is that there >>is at least one that she needs. >> >>The way Xod and Craig want to use {lo} is not how it has >>been defined, but there certainly is a need for that other >>meaning. I use {lo'e} for that other meaning, but I would >>favour changing {lo} for that function, because it is >>very frequent and basic. That would change the meaning >>of {la meris pendo lo mikce} to "Mary is friendly to doctors", >>a generic statement, rather than the concrete meaning "Mary >>is friend to at least one doctor" that it has now. > > lo'e is a little heavy-handed. It achieves its nonspecificity by stripping > all distinction away from the doctors. "friendly to doctors" doesn't > necessarily apply to nontypical doctors, whereas lo mikce does include > them > "Mary is friendly to doctors" may best be expressed by a quantifier, e.g. {la meris. pendo so'e lo mikce} (allowing that there are probably a few doctors who really piss her off). But that raises the question of whether it is necessary to add the qualification {poi ke'a penmi ra} or whether pragmatics dictate that since Mary cannot be a friend of doctors she doesn't know, so it's unnecessary. robin.tr -- "The raisins may be the best part of a cake, but that doesn't mean that a bag of raisins is better than a cake." - Wittgenstein Robin Turner IDMYO Bilkent Univeritesi Ankara 06533 Turkey www.bilkent.edu.tr/~robin