From lojbab@lojban.org Fri Apr 14 18:29:55 2000 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 13217 invoked from network); 15 Apr 2000 01:29:54 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by m4.onelist.org with QMQP; 15 Apr 2000 01:29:54 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO stmpy.cais.net) (205.252.14.63) by mta1 with SMTP; 15 Apr 2000 01:29:54 -0000 Received: from bob (31.dynamic.cais.com [207.226.56.31]) by stmpy.cais.net (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id VAA13627 for ; Fri, 14 Apr 2000 21:28:37 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <4.2.2.20000414212054.00acb760@127.0.0.1> X-Sender: vir1036/pop.cais.com@127.0.0.1 X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.2.2 Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2000 21:33:21 -0400 To: lojban@onelist.com Subject: Re: [lojban] Bringing it about that In-Reply-To: <20000415005740.89581.qmail@hotmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed X-eGroups-From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" At 05:57 PM 04/14/2000 -0700, Jorge Llambias wrote: > > >John IS an event by many definitions > > > >Yes and if his mere existence motivates something, that would seem > >acceptable in x1. > >Why is John, as an event, merely his existence? Isn't John >the sum of all of his actions and properties, including >but not limited to his existence? Is {le nu la djan zasti} >such a special event that it gets to be named John all >by itself? You can name any event "John", but that happens to be an event more likely to be named "John" zo'o. > >I think that the important point in flagging the place as an event is to > >get people to think about what the real motive is before making the claim, > >which usually is not just "John". > >But the point was that it is just as arbitrary to stop >at any level of abstraction as it would be to stop at John. >What is it that motivates you to hit John? Him? His laughing? >The annoyance of his laughing? etc. etc. Yes, any or all >of them. I agree that it is arbitrary. You communicate causality to the level you choose. Did John kill George, or John shooting a gun, or the bullet piercing George's heart, or George massively bleeding through a wound, or ... All are causes of George's death. > >I think people are > >still prone to thinking two-placedly (there ought to be a good ten-dollar > >Latinate word for that! A 10-rupnu Lojban word is easy, of course). > >What is the dekrupnu Lojban word, then? Is it really so easy? relterbrisku, pei >Also, what would be a good lujvo for "prone": > >x1 is prone/has a tendency/inclination/proclivity/predisposition >to be/do x2; jinzi, ckaji (fadykai), fadytra all seem to cover some aspects of this. > >Indeed, I think the > >tendency is the other way, towards overly analytical semantics, especially > >as compared to the poetic lujvo that Michael Helsem used to coin (and may > >still, since I never have time to read his writings, sorry Michael). > >How can the tendency be away from Michael when Michael is the >most prolific author we have now, and has been for quite a >while? You must be thinking of the tendency of commentators >rather than the tendency of actual usage. One person, however prolific, does not make a trend unless his patterns are followed, by others. As it is, we have your experiments to show that few people actually read all-Lojban writings, so his writings are not nearly as normative as dictionary entries at this point. The norm amongst the rest of the community is to expect/rely on the dikyjvo conventions in the Book being used, and that is what people seem to expect in analyzing place structures (e.g. the recent attempt to analyze a group of lujvo). I somehow doubt that Michael could be so prolific if he did such analysis for each new word he used. lojbab ---- lojbab lojbab@lojban.org 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 (newly updated!)