From rob@twcny.rr.com Thu Aug 23 11:38:04 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: rob@telenet.net X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_3_1); 23 Aug 2001 18:38:04 -0000 Received: (qmail 36646 invoked from network); 23 Aug 2001 18:36:53 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by l9.egroups.com with QMQP; 23 Aug 2001 18:36:53 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO telenet.net) (204.97.152.225) by mta1 with SMTP; 23 Aug 2001 18:36:53 -0000 Received: from riff (ip-209-23-14-40.modem.logical.net [209.23.14.40]) by telenet.net (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id OAA27944 for ; Thu, 23 Aug 2001 14:36:50 -0400 Received: from rob by riff with local (Exim 3.22 #1 (Debian)) id 15ZzLE-0000VK-00 for ; Thu, 23 Aug 2001 14:36:32 -0400 Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2001 14:36:31 -0400 To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: status of ka (was Re: [lojban] x3 of du' Message-ID: <20010823143631.B597@twcny.rr.com> Reply-To: rob@twcny.rr.com References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.18i X-Is-It-Not-Nifty: www.sluggy.com Sender: Rob Speer From: Rob Speer On Thu, Aug 23, 2001 at 02:21:57PM +0100, And Rosta wrote: > The arguments have mostly been about whether empty places are > interpreted as containing ce'u or zo'e or either. There are pros to > the ce'u option and pros to the zo'e option. > > I therefore proposed that empty places in du'u contain zo'e and > empty places in ka contain ce'u. There is now no ambiguity and > everybody has the best of all worlds. > > It would invalidate some prior usage -- many former kas would need > to be read as du'us. But language evolution always invalidates earlier usage. I hardly see it as evolution to leave ka entirely unusable. It's already been pointed out that nobody uses more than 2 ce'us - under this proposal, you'd often have to use a lot of zo'e just to get the number of ce'us under 3. In fact, this seems like it would invalidate _all_ prior usage, given that either people use {ka} with no ce'us to mean {nu} or {du'u}, or they include one {ce'u} and assume that the rest of the places will behave. Now you're taking both of those usages and making them into functions of up to 5 variables, which I assume nobody using {ka} intended when they wrote it. I support the approach that if there is no {ce'u} in a {ka}, then it is implied. Relative clauses get by with implied {ke'a} just fine, although it is of course clearer to include the {ke'a}. What makes {ce'u} different? -- Rob Speer