Re: Some thoughts on Lojban gadri

[Logical Language Group <lojbab>]

la .and. cusku di'e

> I'd always assumed these were inceived into Lojban to handle generics
> ("The lion lives in Africa", "The dodo is extinct", "The dodo ate
> grubs"). Some weeks ago I wrote a discussion of these terms, given
> my understanding of them.
> 
> Since we have no other way of doing generics, I think "lohe" and "lehe"
> should be kept for them.

Agreed.

> BUT the difference between "typical" and "stereotypical" is not very
> useful - Lakoffs Women, Fire & Dangerous Things includes these two
> in a much longer list of metonyms where a member of a category
> represents the category, so it seems rather arbitrary to select just
> two of them. Instead, I would like to see lohe/lehe used to
> distinguish class generics from member generics, as in:
>    The dodo is extinct, The dodo survived for millions of years.
>    The dodo ate figs, The dodo had a lifespan of ten years.

The last two statements are about "lo'e cipnrdodo", but the first two
aren't: they are about "le jutsi po'u la'o ly. Raphus cucullatus ly.".
or, less precise but perhaps clearer, "le cipnrdodo jutsi".

A biological species isn't really a category of individuals; it is itself an
individual, a line of descent from a common ancestor.  Thus, statements about
species don't require class generics.

la xorxes. pu cusku di'e

> > lo'i broda      Same as {lu'i ro lo broda}.
> > le'i broda      Same as {lu'i ro le broda}.
> >
> > I think these are not really necessary, since they are only useful in
> > very restricted mathematical contexts,

Not entirely true.  There are now a number of non-mathematical gismu,
notably {ciste}, {cuxna}, {fadni}, {kampu}, {liste}, {mupli}, {ralju},
{slilu}, {steci}, {traji}, which can or must have set-valued arguments.
In addition, lots of "mathematical" gismu, like {clupa}, {cmima}, {cnano},
{girzu}, {jbini}, {kancu}, {klesi}, {kruvi}, {kurfa}, {plita}, {porsi},
have plenty of uses outside the domain of mathematics as such.

[For those without handy lookup software, the gismu above have keywords of
"system", "choose", "ordinary", "common" (in the sense "general/universal"),
"list", "example", "principal", "oscillate", "specific", "superlative",
"loop", "member", "norm", "group", "between", "count", "class", "curve",
"square", "plane", "sequence".]

> > and the long form is much more
> > explicit. One of these days I'll publish my cmavo blacklist, with all
> > the cmavo that I think are unnecessarily cluttering up cmavo space
> > (quite a number of them) :)
> 

la .and. cusku di'e

> Why not publish it sooner rather than later.

Please do, as soon as possible.

> I've sometimes suspected
> that some were bunged in without sufficient thought (e.g. lehe, zuho
> and the other NUs for aktionsart), which, if true, is ironic, given
> the agony these days involved in making the case for an extra cmavo.

Probably true, if for "sufficient thought" we read "sufficient consensus".
"le'e" appeared in the Lojban Fundamento (our 16 rules, 5 of which are
empty), but was then forgotten and reassigned to what is now "le'a";
I pointed out the duplicate.  The Aktionsarten represent pc's view of the
subject; Nick's survey points out a degree of non-overlap between the
various scholars who have discussed the conceptual area, so perhaps our
set is as good as any (but perhaps not).

> And who would weep at the loss of a few cmavo? There's less to learn,
> which is a boon, given that they're all so similar in form.

There is a tendency, which should have a name, but doesn't (the
Innominate Law?) for all versions of Loglan to fill up cmavo space.  The
problem is then "solved" by extending cmavo space (the most recent stunts
being the separation of "vv" and "v'v" and the letteral-words ending in
"y"), only to have it fill up again.

-- 
John Cowan		sharing account <lojbab@access.digex.net> for now
		e'osai ko sarji la lojban.