Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: Three more issues

From: "Jorge Llambias" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 26 Apr 2001 00:35:57

la adam cusku di'e

>"loi cinfo" is "pisu'o loi cinfo", according to the book (chapter 6,
>section 7)

Right! Then I don't see what we are arguing about. The problem
is in translating it as "the mass of all lions" when it obviously
cannot be so translated when it means just "some part of the mass
of all lions".

I was confused about where I differ from the book. It was about
{lei}, which for me has to be default {piro lei} (exactly parallel
to {ro le}) and the book has it as {pisu'o lei}.

>I want to
>make a claim about all lions, which will still be true logically, even
>though I haven't bothered to actually check that each and every lion
>lives in Africa.

We both regard {loi cinfo cu xabju le friko} as true apparently,
but for me it just means "some lions live in Africa". I don't
understand how you can accept {pisu'o} as the quantifier and
yet get the claim to mean something more than that.

> > >To take another example, say a meat-eater says "loi rectu cu
>kukte". m
> > >does not want to claim that every piece of meat is tasty,
> >
> > Unfortunately, you are thinking of {piro loi rectu}
>
>No, I'm thinking of "pisu'o loi rectu", as per the book.

Then we agree. It just means "some meat is tasty".

> > In your view of things, does the mass of five books also
> > weigh 1, 1.5, and 2 kg? i.e does it inherit the properties of
> > its submasses as well as those of its components?
>
>Yes, it weighs all of them.

But there is no "it" to speak of! Every time you use it {loi broda}
can refer to a different chunk of broda. Of course different chunks
can have different weights, so if you take {lei broda} as
{pisu'o lei broda}, we are in agreement. But don't translate it
as "the books" when what you mean is "some of the books".

>Under most circumstances it's probably not
>useful to claim those weights, but there might be circumstances. For
>example consider the following:
>
>a: i mi nitcu lo ki'ogra be li papimu
>b: i lei mu cukta cu ki'ogra li papimu

The first sentence has to be understood as "there is at least one
.5 kg object that I need", it is a claim about existent .5kg objects
as well as about {mi}. What you really mean is a claim about {mi}
only, not in relationship with any particular object. That's why
I use {lo'e} there instead of {lo}.

That's not really addressing your point though. Changing {lo} to
{lo'e}, the answer works if you mean "some part of the 5 books
weighs 1.5 kg" by it. I don't get that meaning because for me
{lei mu cukta} is {piro lei mu cukta}, "the whole mass of 5 books".

Using {pisu'o} instead of {piro} makes {lei} a much more
complicated term logically in its interactions with other terms.
{piro lei} on the other hand is the simplest of all, as its
order of appearance doesn't change anything.

> > Is {lei mu cukta} heavier or lighter than a 1.5 kg object?
>
>Both, if you want to force the meaning of "all 5 of the books
>together, you can use "piro lei mu cukta cu ki'ogra li repimu".

Yes, that is what I mean by {lei mu cukta}. It seems we are not
in much disagreement after all.

>I
>think this works if you consider the individual properties of masses
>as special cases of the collective properties, when the group making
>up the property is of size 1. Then "piro lei mu cukta" specifies that
>we want a collective property involving the entire mass, and the only
>one having to do with weight is "ka ki'ogra li repimu".

The only point where we disagree then is in your calling {lei broda}
and {loi broda} "the mass of broda" while using it to mean "some
part of the mass of broda". Why do that? You are not claiming that
the mass has all the properties of all of its members. You are
claiming that for each property of any of the members, there is
some part of the mass that has that property. Of course such a
claim is unobjectable, almost tautological, since each member is
itself a part of the mass.

co'o mi'e xorxes

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