From a.rosta@dtn.ntl.com Thu Jul 06 12:15:08 2000 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 4559 invoked from network); 6 Jul 2000 19:15:08 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.142) by m1.onelist.org with QMQP; 6 Jul 2000 19:15:08 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO relay3-gui.server.ntli.net) (194.168.4.200) by mta1 with SMTP; 6 Jul 2000 19:15:08 -0000 Received: from m714-mp1-cvx1c.gui.ntl.com ([62.252.14.202] helo=andrew) by relay3-gui.server.ntli.net with smtp (Exim 3.03 #2) id 13AGy0-0007Tu-00 for lojban@egroups.com; Thu, 06 Jul 2000 20:05:44 +0100 To: Subject: "which?" (was: RE: [lojban] centripetality: subset vs component Date: Thu, 6 Jul 2000 20:15:02 +0100 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Importance: Normal In-Reply-To: <20000520180748.82769.qmail@hotmail.com> X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 From: "And Rosta" Jorge (to Ivan): > > > But I've always had trouble asking "which?" > > > in Lojban. I agree that {le mo broda} just doesn't do it. > > > >Perhaps `whose?' (`of what larger unit?'), {le ma broda}, is closer. > > Yes, that's what I thought too, but I think I've changed my > mind. I now think that the difference between "which" and > "what kind of" is fully and well adressed by the choice of > article: {lo mo broda} = "what kind of broda?", and > {le mo broda} = "which broda?". This is because an answer > with {le} will perforce refer to an instance, and an answer > with {lo} will refer to an unspecified member of a kind. > > le mo mlatu i le blabi mlatu > Which cat? The white cat. > > lo mo mlatu i lo blabi mlatu > What kind of cat? A white cat. [Please excuse me if this topic was taken up in a different thread which I've not read yet.] I don't think this necessarily works, except as a convention that exceeds the grammar's stipulations. Specifically, the problem is that when discussing "le mlatu", you might want to ask what kind of cat it is, and not all relevant answers to that question will tell you which cat is being referred to. I myself can't think of any way of expressing "which" unambiguously, though it's hard to find a relevant interpretation of "le mlatu voi mo" other than as a "which" question. BTW, does nonveridicality extend to the end of the sumti? That is, in "le broda poi brode", is "brode" nonveridical? I was assuming, perhaps incorrectly, that "le mo broda" is approximately equivalent to "le broda poi mo", but if it is in fact instead approximately equivalent to "le broda voi mo", then of course my suggestion is useless. As for "xomoi", which I see in a different thread, I don't understand it and have not come across a decent explanation of it. But it sounds promising. --And.