From a.rosta@ntlworld.com Fri Aug 03 08:49:49 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: a.rosta@ntlworld.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_2_0); 3 Aug 2001 15:49:49 -0000 Received: (qmail 33474 invoked from network); 3 Aug 2001 15:49:28 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.27) by m8.onelist.org with QMQP; 3 Aug 2001 15:49:28 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mta05-svc.ntlworld.com) (62.253.162.45) by mta2 with SMTP; 3 Aug 2001 15:49:28 -0000 Received: from andrew ([62.253.88.158]) by mta05-svc.ntlworld.com (InterMail vM.4.01.03.00 201-229-121) with SMTP id <20010803154926.VGQX20588.mta05-svc.ntlworld.com@andrew> for ; Fri, 3 Aug 2001 16:49:26 +0100 To: Subject: RE: [lojban] From the Wiki: The 17 tallest men Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2001 16:48:38 +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: X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 From: "And Rosta" Nick: > The question on "How do you say the 17 tallest men" came up in the Wiki; > this is what I've proposed, but I think it should be more widely > discussed: [...] > I think that if you > have more than a singleton in the x1 of ''traji'', they can reasonably be > presumed to be ranked #1, #2, #3... Not merely presumed, because ##1-17 will collectively rank higher than any other 17mei selected from the same parent set. But the 17mei ranks superlatively not in height but in something like the property of having members that are taller than other members of the same parent set. Fatigue deters me from trying to say that in Lojban. I've never been sure whether {traji} is supposed to mean 'extreme, maximal', like Italian _-issim-_, or whether it means 'the most', 'more X than all other Y are', like Italian _il piu_. I can't work it out from the place structure: x1 is superlative in property x2 (ka), the x3 extreme (ka; default ka zmadu) among set/range x4 Clearly it's the latter sense that's required here. --And.