From a.rosta@dtn.ntl.com Sun Jul 09 18:08:40 2000 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 23230 invoked from network); 10 Jul 2000 01:08:39 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.142) by m2.onelist.org with QMQP; 10 Jul 2000 01:08:39 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO relay3-gui.server.ntli.net) (194.168.4.200) by mta1 with SMTP; 10 Jul 2000 01:08:39 -0000 Received: from m3-mp1-cvx1c.gui.ntl.com ([62.252.12.3] helo=andrew) by relay3-gui.server.ntli.net with smtp (Exim 3.03 #2) id 13BRui-0003CD-00 for lojban@egroups.com; Mon, 10 Jul 2000 01:59:13 +0100 To: Subject: RE: zi'o & otpi (was: RE: [lojban] So, wait til you feel a cold no-nose Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2000 02:08:31 +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: <20000707233012.82134.qmail@hotmail.com> X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 From: "And Rosta" Jorge: > la and cusku di'e > > >The language > >will either be defined by usage, in which case its grammar will > >be relatively vague and indeterminate, or it will be defined by > >formal documentation, in which case usage will largely be > >irrelevant. > > In some cases formal documentation may follow usage. Suppose > that in 2015 someone decides to publish a Lojban > dictionary and instead of just taking them from the gismu > list, for the gismu places they ask a panel of 100 fluent > Lojbanists about some place structures that they're not > too sure about. They ask what they think are the > place structures without looking them up. Then if there > is enough agreement among the speakers on a place structure > different than the gihuste's they print that preferred > place structure. If the dictionary becomes authoritative > it would be a definition by formal documentation based > on usage. > > >(Presumably, until computers are as intelligent as > >people, computers would have to speak the formally documented > >version.) > > Computers can't speak any version at all for the moment, > so there is time to document the actually used version > if it differs from what is defined. I agree. > >So better than zi'oing off unwanted places, or pretending they're > >not there, is to use some alternative brivla. If VCCV fu'ivla > >really are kosher then they are an attractive solution, since > >they're even shorter than gismu, > > They are not very attractive to me, and the shortness is > more than compensated by the obligatory preceding pause. Or glottal stop. Following a vowel-final word the glottal stop actually makes it easier to say, for me. And consonant final words have to be followed by a pause anyway. > >So, for example, if you want a word for > >"bottle such that something actually is a bottle even when > >it's empty", then you could use "otpi" (with, in lujvo, the > >same rafsi as "botpi"). If "otpi" were as well-documented as > >"botpi", it'd stand a chance of competing against it in usage, > >and then usage really would tell you which was the more popular. > > "otpi" would probably only be used to mean "empty bottle", > because there is a much better alternative for non-empty > ones. Probably. And equally probably, people won't be too fussed about x2 of botpi, & will blithely describe empty bottles as botpi, in cases where the emptiness is not foregrounded. --And.