From jimc@MATH.UCLA.EDU Thu May 01 09:10:35 2003 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_2_6_6); 1 May 2003 16:10:35 -0000 Received: (qmail 54117 invoked from network); 1 May 2003 16:10:31 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.216) by m3.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 1 May 2003 16:10:31 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO digitalkingdom.org) (204.152.186.175) by mta1.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 1 May 2003 16:10:31 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.12) id 19BGdj-00088D-00 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:31 -0700 Received: from digitalkingdom.org ([204.152.186.175] helo=chain) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.12) id 19BGda-00087u-00; Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:22 -0700 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:20 -0700 (PDT) Received: from fern.math.ucla.edu ([128.97.4.251]) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.12) id 19BGdP-00087l-00 for lojban-list@lojban.org; Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:11 -0700 Received: from simba.math.ucla.edu (simba.math.ucla.edu [128.97.4.125]) by fern.math.ucla.edu (8.12.9/8.12.5) with ESMTP id h41GAAuY029596 for ; Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 (PDT) Received: from simba.math.ucla.edu (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by simba.math.ucla.edu (8.12.6/8.12.6/SuSE Linux 0.6) with ESMTP id h41GAA3I009760 for ; Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 Received: from localhost (jimc@localhost) by simba.math.ucla.edu (8.12.6/8.12.6/Submit) with ESMTP id h41GAAZh009757 for ; Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 X-Authentication-Warning: simba.math.ucla.edu: jimc owned process doing -bs Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 (PDT) To: lojban-list@lojban.org Subject: [lojban] Re: nai in UI (was: BPFK phpbb) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-archive-position: 5084 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: jimc@math.ucla.edu Precedence: bulk X-list: lojban-list From: Jim Carter Reply-To: jimc@math.ucla.edu X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=810565 On Thu, 1 May 2003, And Rosta wrote: > But I opine that a syntax tree is valid only if it is the syntax tree of > some sentence, and since a sentence is a pairing of a sound and a meaning, > a syntax tree is valid only if it yields a meaning. Well, that's where we differ, and I think the difference is important. Take for example the distinction between: 54 68 65 72 65 20 69 73 20 61 20 63 72 6f 63 6f 64 69 6c 65 20 69 6e 20 74 68 65 20 62 61 74 68 74 75 62 and "There is a crocodile in the bathtub". There is a whole lot of processing between the first one and the second. To demolish a straw man, the representation in octets is certainly valid (as a representation of a byte string in hex). You're not going to deny that, are you, despite the fact that there's a subtle flaw that invalidates the utterance at the final stage of processing. A major lesson of 20th century system design is, you get a lot more value for your effort if you make things modular, with well-defined interfaces that are not penetrated. In our context, lexing and parsing should be independent, and both should be isolated from semantic analysis. made a related point in his reply. In natlangs, meaning "informs" grammar, but Chomsky's lesson is that natlangs have a grammar that can be expressed with minimal reference to meaning. Not to say that every natlang conforms perfectly to this ideal, but even English comes pretty close. The Lojban grammar was created to refer to meaning only at the level of the syntactic category of the various words, and I think that design principle should remain unchanged. > I contend (a) that if we are dealing with language then we have to > engage with this notion of meaningfulness, since language is intrinsically > meaningful -- if you don't have meaning then you don't have language -- > and (b) that a logical language like Lojban ought to spend a lot of > energy on firming up the definition of meaningfulness (e.g. a well-formed > logical formula, augmented by extralogical stuff like attitudinality > etc.). Oh, yes, certainly, I agree with you 100%, and I think that there hasn't been enough attention paid to the last (and hardest) step, semantic analysis. But General February advises, don't split your force, or conversely, each module should deal with only the task assigned to it, and not fritter away its unity and effectiveness dealing with the tasks of other modules. Specifically, the semantic analyser depends on the parser realizing the agreed-on grammar, and that's all the parser should do. The parser should not be called on to recognize a misplaced kau; that positively ought to be left to a later stage, semantic analysis. (p.s.: The subtle flaw is a missing period, making the utterance not a statement and not useful as a warning. A Real Human could do error recovery, and each stage of processing should have error recovery features as much as practical, but of course the core task comes first: correctly processing valid utterances, and tagging garbage even if the program is too dumb to clean it up.) James F. Carter Voice 310 825 2897 FAX 310 206 6673 UCLA-Mathnet; 6115 MSA; 405 Hilgard Ave.; Los Angeles, CA, USA 90095-1555 Email: jimc@math.ucla.edu http://www.math.ucla.edu/~jimc (q.v. for PGP key) From jimc@MATH.UCLA.EDU Thu May 01 09:10:35 2003 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_2_6_6); 1 May 2003 16:10:35 -0000 Received: (qmail 54117 invoked from network); 1 May 2003 16:10:31 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.216) by m3.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 1 May 2003 16:10:31 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO digitalkingdom.org) (204.152.186.175) by mta1.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 1 May 2003 16:10:31 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.12) id 19BGdj-00088D-00 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:31 -0700 Received: from digitalkingdom.org ([204.152.186.175] helo=chain) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.12) id 19BGda-00087u-00; Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:22 -0700 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:20 -0700 (PDT) Received: from fern.math.ucla.edu ([128.97.4.251]) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.12) id 19BGdP-00087l-00 for lojban-list@lojban.org; Thu, 01 May 2003 09:10:11 -0700 Received: from simba.math.ucla.edu (simba.math.ucla.edu [128.97.4.125]) by fern.math.ucla.edu (8.12.9/8.12.5) with ESMTP id h41GAAuY029596 for ; Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 (PDT) Received: from simba.math.ucla.edu (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by simba.math.ucla.edu (8.12.6/8.12.6/SuSE Linux 0.6) with ESMTP id h41GAA3I009760 for ; Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 Received: from localhost (jimc@localhost) by simba.math.ucla.edu (8.12.6/8.12.6/Submit) with ESMTP id h41GAAZh009757 for ; Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 X-Authentication-Warning: simba.math.ucla.edu: jimc owned process doing -bs Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:10:10 -0700 (PDT) To: lojban-list@lojban.org Subject: [lojban] Re: nai in UI (was: BPFK phpbb) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-archive-position: 5084 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: jimc@math.ucla.edu Precedence: bulk X-list: lojban-list From: Jim Carter Reply-To: jimc@math.ucla.edu X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=810565 On Thu, 1 May 2003, And Rosta wrote: > But I opine that a syntax tree is valid only if it is the syntax tree of > some sentence, and since a sentence is a pairing of a sound and a meaning, > a syntax tree is valid only if it yields a meaning. Well, that's where we differ, and I think the difference is important. Take for example the distinction between: 54 68 65 72 65 20 69 73 20 61 20 63 72 6f 63 6f 64 69 6c 65 20 69 6e 20 74 68 65 20 62 61 74 68 74 75 62 and "There is a crocodile in the bathtub". There is a whole lot of processing between the first one and the second. To demolish a straw man, the representation in octets is certainly valid (as a representation of a byte string in hex). You're not going to deny that, are you, despite the fact that there's a subtle flaw that invalidates the utterance at the final stage of processing. A major lesson of 20th century system design is, you get a lot more value for your effort if you make things modular, with well-defined interfaces that are not penetrated. In our context, lexing and parsing should be independent, and both should be isolated from semantic analysis. made a related point in his reply. In natlangs, meaning "informs" grammar, but Chomsky's lesson is that natlangs have a grammar that can be expressed with minimal reference to meaning. Not to say that every natlang conforms perfectly to this ideal, but even English comes pretty close. The Lojban grammar was created to refer to meaning only at the level of the syntactic category of the various words, and I think that design principle should remain unchanged. > I contend (a) that if we are dealing with language then we have to > engage with this notion of meaningfulness, since language is intrinsically > meaningful -- if you don't have meaning then you don't have language -- > and (b) that a logical language like Lojban ought to spend a lot of > energy on firming up the definition of meaningfulness (e.g. a well-formed > logical formula, augmented by extralogical stuff like attitudinality > etc.). Oh, yes, certainly, I agree with you 100%, and I think that there hasn't been enough attention paid to the last (and hardest) step, semantic analysis. But General February advises, don't split your force, or conversely, each module should deal with only the task assigned to it, and not fritter away its unity and effectiveness dealing with the tasks of other modules. Specifically, the semantic analyser depends on the parser realizing the agreed-on grammar, and that's all the parser should do. The parser should not be called on to recognize a misplaced kau; that positively ought to be left to a later stage, semantic analysis. (p.s.: The subtle flaw is a missing period, making the utterance not a statement and not useful as a warning. A Real Human could do error recovery, and each stage of processing should have error recovery features as much as practical, but of course the core task comes first: correctly processing valid utterances, and tagging garbage even if the program is too dumb to clean it up.) James F. Carter Voice 310 825 2897 FAX 310 206 6673 UCLA-Mathnet; 6115 MSA; 405 Hilgard Ave.; Los Angeles, CA, USA 90095-1555 Email: jimc@math.ucla.edu http://www.math.ucla.edu/~jimc (q.v. for PGP key)