From gudlat@web.de Sat Jun 16 14:35:40 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: d.gudlat@addcom.de X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_1_3); 16 Jun 2001 21:35:40 -0000 Received: (qmail 74881 invoked from network); 16 Jun 2001 21:35:40 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.142) by l7.egroups.com with QMQP; 16 Jun 2001 21:35:40 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO pille.addcom.de) (62.96.128.34) by mta3 with SMTP; 16 Jun 2001 21:35:39 -0000 Received: (qmail 24905 invoked by uid 502); 16 Jun 2001 21:35:38 -0000 Received: from f-dialin-2391.addcom.de (HELO gudysoft) (62.96.148.239) by pille.addcom.de with SMTP; 16 Jun 2001 21:35:38 -0000 Organization: W. E. Palmer Lumber Co. To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2001 23:35:36 +0200 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: [lojban] Are attitudinals assertions? (was: Attitudinals again (was: Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis Reply-to: gudlat@web.de Message-ID: <3B2BED48.8101.4DC907@localhost> Priority: normal In-reply-to: <20010615121216.A2165@stoic.electriceyeball.com> References: ; from jjllambias@hotmail.com on Fri, Jun 15, 2001 at 03:37:16PM +0000 X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.12c) X-eGroups-From: "Daniel Gudlat" From: "Daniel Gudlat" On 15 Jun 2001, at 12:12, Anthony Roach wrote: > On Fri, Jun 15, 2001 at 03:37:16PM +0000, Jorge Llambias wrote: > > > > Is a smile an assertion to you? > > > > > > No, because there is no proposition involved. > > > I'm new to this list, I don't know much Lojban, and I've never been > formally introduced to you all (Hi!), but I think I have idea on how > to clarify this for xod and others: > > This is an assertion: "I am smiling". > This is not an assertion: ":-)" > > The former is asserting something about myself, and the later is just > me smiling. > "I am smiling." and ":-)" are on two different levels. The former is > an assertion that involves the later (i.e. my smile). > > The same discussion can be applied to "mi gleki" and ".ui". The former > asserts that I am happy, and the later conveyes my happiness to you in > a textual form. > Anyway, I think it's great that Lojban has attitudinals so we don't > have to use things like ":-)" and ">:-|" to convey emotions in > written or spoken communication, and if we turn the attitudinals > into assertions, then what's the point of even having them? Thank you, Anthony, thank you. As appalled as I am from this ongoing discussion about a topic not even one of the participants seems to really have a grasp of, I'm unspeakably grateful for your levelheaded and insightful contribution to this shambles. I, too, have not yet progressed beyond the "mi klama le zarci" stage of lojban learning, although I've been on this list for about a year and a half. But the fact that there is at least one other member of the lojban list with a sane attitude about attitudinals is deeply reassuring (and no small bit disconcerting as well, as there really seems to be only two or three of us... :-( ) Since you basically said it all in the text quoted above, this is probably where I should stop, but being foolish and in the need to rant, I will first pick apart a few contributions of la xorxes - not because I dislike him or what he said more than anyone elses contributions to this thread, but because he provides a few nice hooks to dangle a rant from. Then, I'll try to state, as calmly and matter-of-factly as possible, my take on the matter. Warning, the following going to be rantish in nature, so don your asbestos underwear before reading on! la xorxes cusku di'e: > la lojbab cusku di'e > > a'o mi caca'a klama > > The only way I can understand that sentence is as non-assertive: > "I hope I'm actually going". If you use a'o followed by what > you intend as an assertion, I will almost certainly misunderstand > you. Hopefully you won't take {xu mi caca'a klama} or {da'i mi > caca'a klama} as assertions as well! > If he believes that he is actually going, he shouldn't say that he > hopes that he is actually going. Huh? If you want pacna, you bloody well know where to find it! He states that he is going. He also expresses a feeling of hope, which probably is connected to his going, what exactly that connection is, is not made clear. Reading anything more into this sentence is taking the list of attitudinals and bridi phrases posted by Rob Speer (?) and making it into a equivalence table. If this is really what you want, I would urge you to re-read chapter 13 of the Reference Grammar, then take a long calm stroll outside and think about what you read for a while before posting to this thread again! Oh, and please leave the poor discursives, observationals and other members of selma'o UI - a purely grammatical category - out of this. We are talking attitudinals only! And in another email, la xorxes says: > They are not assertions. If you say {ui ko'a klama}, and I > say {na go'i}, I am not saying "No, you're not happy", I'm > saying "No, ko'a is not coming". If you say {mi gleki le nu > ko'a klama}, then my {na go'i} does mean "No, you're not > happy". Yes, that's right. But you seem to be a little confused as to what exactly your standpoint in all of this is (no more so than several other participants in this raging battle, I might add): ui mi klama says that I come, while a'o mi klama says that I merely hope to? Isn't that a little on the contradictory side of things? Yes, the RefGram is contradictory in this as well, but it clearly states that the whole distinction of propositional and pure attitudinals is shaky and has been made mainly for the purpose of explanation, "it is not intended to permit firm rulings on specific points". So why the freaking hell (sorry, I'll be calm after this - promise) is everyone trying to read more into this than is clearly stated to be there in the first place? Attitudinals express attitudes, if you want to assert anything, that's what bridi are there for. Attittudinals are lojbans ingenious, culturally neutral, and unambigous way to express emotions and are therefore the more or less exact (though vastly extended) equivalent of smileys. I like this a lot and I'll attack anyone who tries to make them into the short version of some bridi claim or other, because, as Anthony has so nicely stated, what then would be the point of having the attitudinals in the first place? And, perhaps even more important: How then are we supposed to express our attitude reliably and culturally neutral, when a simple smile might get us gutted by the next Kzinti? So that everyone has the chance to call me a hypocrite, I'll add one more thing: This discussion is without the slightest bit of doubt exactly one of those things which should be discussed in lojban exclusively by fluent speakers of the language, as Lojbab has already remarked. So I would request that we all let this issue rest immediately until the day a number of fluent lojbanists feel the need to discuss it again. Hopefully, the discussion will be more civilized and a lot more fruitfull than what we had here until now. co'o mi'e daniel