Subject: Re: [lojban] Dictionary format

From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2001 13:42:40 -0400

At 04:59 PM 04/17/2001 -0700, Robin Lee Powell wrote:
>The Webster definition is:
>1an-i-mal \'an-e-mel\ n
>[L, fr. animale, neut. of animalis animate, fr. anima soul -- more
> at ANIMATE]
>(14c)
>1: any of a kingdom (Animalia) of living beings typically differing
> from plants in capacity for spontaneous movement and rapid motor
> response to stimulation
>2a: one of the lower animals as distinguished from human beings
>2b: MAMMAL
>3: a human being considered chiefly with regard to his physical or
> nonrational nature; also: this nature
>4: an individual with a particular interest or aptitude <the total
> political animal ... the true professional in government --J.
> M. Burns>
>5: MATTER, THING <the theater...is an entirely different animal --Arthur 
>Miller>
>-- an-i-mal-like \-mel-,(l)[0xF5]^-k\ adj
>-- an-i-mal-ness \-mel-nes\ n
>
>2animal adj
>(1615)
>1: of, relating to, or derived from animals
>2a: of or relating to the physical or sentient as contrasted with the
> intellectual or rational
>2b: SENSUAL, FLESHLY
>3: of or relating to the animal pole of an egg or to the part from
> which ectoderm normally develops
>syn see CARNAL
>-- an-i-mal-ly \-me-le^-\ adv
>
>
>
>and if we were actually trying to do a real dictionary, we'd need to
>have entries, or sub-entries, for each of those meanings.

My original intent was to do exactly that, using a commonly available 
dictionary as the source of word meanings. Given their availability, I 
would probably use one of the out-of-copyright dictionaries now available 
on the net, which would have such information for words and definitions 
used prior to 75 years ago.

But space would make this impossible (even if the volunteers were 
available) - the resulting text would necessarily be longer than the 
English-only dictionary, since it would have all that text as well as the 
Lojban. Printing costs are too high to include an English dictionary in 
with the E-L dictionary.

lojbab
--
lojbab [email-masked]
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