Subject: Re: [lojban] RE:literalism

From: Invent Yourself <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2000 15:06:59 -0400 (EDT)

On Fri, 20 Oct 2000 [email-masked] wrote:

> xod:
> <<There are an infinite number of tanru, but lujvo are limited by
> "reasonable" size. Also, information is lost in the tanru --> lujvo
> process (lujvoization? lujvoizing?) because 1. we drop cmavo, 2. we select
> one of many possible meanings. So I must disagree that tanru and lujvo
> face the same issues.>>

> There are an infinite number of lujvo, too, and tanru are also limited (by 
> human capacity) to a"reasonable size" (in fact, probably less complex than 
> reasonable lujvo, because tanru are longer, by and large). We *can* drop 
> cmavo, but don't have to (and literalists don't even like to), we obviously 
> select one meaning for a tanru each time we use it -- and it would be really 
> bad form to select a different meaning each time we use it, especially in the 
> same context. But yes, lujvo meaning gets fixed, tanru meaning -- outside of 
> a context -- does not (officially). But how does that save the situation in 
> a given case, which is largely what is at issue here: the meaning of the 
> tanru (and of the lujvo) should be, the literalist says, a rule governed (and 
> my ordering of rules at that) product of its components else it is wrong, 
> bad, inaccurate, malwhatever, etc. The two cases seem exactly on a par.

We fight hard battles over lujvo because we have to. The prononents of
each plausible tanru duke it out for the right to occupy a certain
lujvo. They have to invoke arguments which are moot in the freeform
coexistence available to tanru. 

Do recall that I advocate very long tanru as being Good Lojbanic Style. 

ni'o

A metaphor: "pc is a yam."
A simile: "pc is like a yam."

Meta: it would be nice if you left a blank line between the quoted text
you delimit with "<<", and your response.

-----
"...widespread, systematic and gross violations of human rights 
perpetrated by the Israeli occupying power, in particular mass 
killings...measures which constitute...crimes against humanity.''
UN Commission on Human Rights, 19 Oct 2000