Subject: Re: [lojban] RE: Opposite of za'o

From: "Jorge Llambias" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 02 Jul 2000 09:28:14 PDT

la pycyn cusku di'e

>Well, I am not sure you can keep making a point when its
>natural ending time seems not to have come -- namely when
>your interlocutor gets it (I am also unsure that you can keep
>on making a point that you have only said once -- in a
>parenthesis, at that).

Ok, I retract the superfective. I had said it more than
once, though granted not always in response to you.

>But, lets see:
>{za'o, ba'o, pu'o, ca'o} span time, the first two from a
>stopping point (natural though unused in the first case,
>actual in the second) , the third up to a (perhaps unrealized)
>starting point (can we work off the unrealized to get
>something here -- natural but unused?),

I don't think that pu'o can help us much with the
natural/actual contrast. It is bound to remain special
due to the fondness that time flies have for arrows.

>the last the span
>between beginning and end On the other hand, {mo'u, co'u.
>co'a, co'i, de'a, di'a} are all points, beginnings or endings of
>events and so have no span.

I don't mind giving them a span, but they are always transitions.
We can consider their span in protracted transitions: {ze'uco'a}
"a long start of" (different from {co'aze'u} "the start of a long".
But it always refers to the transition between not-happening
and happening.

>The mirror of {za'o} ought
>then to be a spanner, covering time up to the natural
>beginning, as {pu'o} mirrors {ba'o} (minus some
>differences).

Right. Although rather than a spanner I would call it a
non-transition. I would classify {co'i} together with what
you have as spanners, because it is a point but non-transitional.
I think more than the extension of the interval what is
significant is the change of state.

>But {co'u na} just stops the non-going (say)
>or starts the going, but does not point to the space between
>that transition and the natural transition point, which is what
>"already" is supposed to do -- indeed, once the natural
>starting point arrives, "he is already going" or whatever no
>longer applies (mirroring the perfect this time). But {ba'o
>co'u} doesn't do it quite, since, while we are in the
>afterglow of the not going, we are in that as long as he
>goes.

True, it is not exactly it. I have also not incorporated yet
the notion that {co'u} is necessarily not the natural ending.
I still tend to think of it as {co'a na}, the actual ending,
whether {mo'u} or not (that was the official definition anyway).

>What about the the change that happens with the
>natural starting point, when we have to change from "is" to
>"was" in English?

Indeed, but we can't talk about the natural ending point
when it doesn't happen either. {mo'u} is natural and actual,
not just natural whether or not actual, isn't it?
Maybe this transition is not that important?
We go from "it is happening" to "it is still happening"
when it becomes remarkable that it is happening,
but the actual turning point is too fuzzy to detect,
and similarly we go from "it is already happening" to
"it is happening" when it is no longer remarkable that
it is happening, but again no detectable turning point.

The is/was distinction in English is equivalent to ca/pu
because with "already was" we are not talking about the
permanence after the natural starting point, we are simply
referring back to the premature period. We can't tell from
it what is going on now.

But I do agree with you, {ba'o co'u na} is not the ideal
mirror of {za'o} because of what you say: it keeps working
for too long...

>By parity of reasoning (or "parody"), the mirror of {co'u}
>should be a point and {za'o na} gives a span.

The mirror of {co'u} (taken as a premature end) should be a
late start, no?

>In this case,
>however, what we want is probably the span: "still not
>going". And the end of that (and its aftermath?) is the point
>(plus a perfective again?) "finally/at last"

The mirror of {co'u}, i.e. the delayed start, is the
transition point between the "still not/not yet" span
and the "finally/at last" span.

>(? {co'u za'o na}?)

Wouldn't it be {mo'u za'o na}? Otherwise we'd get a premature
end to the overextended not. Could they cancel out?

>English would use the achievative to announce the start and
>then go to past, but that may be peculiar. Or it may use the
>progressive, somewhat strangely.

Why is it strange? It seems that the progressive is the
right form for the action that is happening.

I am not writing.
I am still not writing. (When I should have already started.)
I finally start to write. (The transition.)
I am finally writing. (Happening after the delayed start.)

co'o mi'e xorxes

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