Re: pc on hunting

[ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>]

> I pass over whether a loi is the right thing to be hunting, to remind
> (because we did go through this less than a year ago) all that "hunt"
> and its Lojban translations create an opaque object position, which
> strictly in Lojban ought to have a "subject raising" mark (_tu'o_ ?
tua
> ) unless cancelled (as it is not in this case) by an external reference
> mark (one of those _xe'V_ from that discussion). "Hunt" and the Lojban
> as well have the deep structure of a verb ("get," "kill," "catch," or
> some such) in the scope of a "strive to bring to pass" main verb, so
> the surface object actually comes up two semantic layers, even if no
> syntactic ones.

This is not quite how I remember the upshot of the discussion. Here's
my understanding:

1. With "hunt" gismu (sisku, troci, nitcu, djica, etc.) as currently
defined, the x2 must be transparent.
2. To get an opaque reading, you need to have two syntactic layers
matching the two semantic layers (so you can stick quantifier in
subordinate bridi).
3. To get two syntactic layers matching the two semantic layers, you
need a different brivla.
4. It would be better to redefine all "hunt" gismu so that their syntax
matches their semantics, but that's not how things are at present, and
Lojbab has shown no signs of intending to revise them.

As for xe'V, it's never been formally proposed, so for the time being
we must do everything in forethought (which works, except for imperatives
and illocutionary-force-affecting cmavo in UI). (I was originally in
favour of ways of signalling scope in afterthought, but now I'm not,
because there is no sufficiently general solution.)
---
And

pc to xorxes:
> > > "hunt" and its Lojban translations create an opaque object position,
> > Not necessarily, in my opinion. Or are you saying that there is
> > no way in Lojban to say "That lion, Clarence, is being hunted
> > by John". If the x2 of {kalte} was always opaque, we could not use
> > it for the transparent use of "hunt".
> There are, as I recall, at least three.  One is to be sure that that
> lion, Clarence, is introduced well outside the intensional context --
> another sentence or a prenex with appropriate anaphora will do.

Right. But {kalte} doesn't create such a context. (At least not unless
Lojbab changes definitions.)

> The second is to mark the buried occurrence with the "external reference"
> mark (which, I recall was not needed for local descriptions and known
> names).

This I now think is not worth bothering with.

> The third, which you might have been using but took you not to
> be (and so it now appears), is to use both tu'a and xe'e (or whatever it
> was) and then allow them to cancel out to an unmarked form.  this third
> is the most risky, of course, because it may result simply from
> carelessness or ignorance of the nature of the place, rather than really
> claiming there is a referent in this world.

I'm not sure what you have in mind here.

> > > "Hunt" and the Lojban as well have the deep structure of a verb
> > > ("get," "kill," "catch," or some such) in the scope of a "strive to
> > > bring to pass" main verb,
> > That may be so, but that does not mean that you can't use the
> > transparent meaning of those verbs.
> > Let's say {kalte} means {troci le nu kavbu}, "try to catch".
> > Then I can say:
> > (1)     mi troci le nu da poi cinfo zo'u mi kavbu da
> >         I try that there be a lion such that I catch it.
> > (2)     da poi cinfo zo'u mi troci le nu mi kavbu da
> >         There is a lion such that I try to catch it.
> > Now, which one of those is this:
> > (3)     da poi cinfo zo'u mi kalte da
> >         There is a lion such that I hunt it.
> > I would say that (3) has the meaning of (2).

Indubitably.

> > That means that {kalte}
> > behaves normally, like any other predicate. If (3) means (1), then
> > we would need to make a list of all the gismu places that have this
> > weird feature. In my opinion there should be none.
> 3 does mean 2, since the quantifier is nicely outside the opaque context.

Right. And, just to confirm, the quantifier is also outside the opaque
context in {mi kalte lo cinfo}, which also means (2).

> The problem is having 3 mean 1 or inferring 3 (or 2) from 1. I think it
> would be very nice indeed if there were no gismu that had opaque places
> except those that took full lenu (etc.) sumti.

That is indeed, I believe, the current situation as far as the design
goes, though not as far as usage goes.

> But I also think that no one would tolerate losing all the familiar
> words (hunt, want, etc.) that have those places (and do in countless
> natural languages -- how do you think philosophers keep in business?

I think we should tolerate that loss. But if we don't, then we must at
least accept that they are transparent, and accept their loss for when
we need an opaque interpretation.

> It may not be Lojban's job to solve philosophical problems, but, if
> the problem has a solution -- as this one does, Lojban should
> incorporate it and, to that extent, keep philosophitis at bay).

Hear hear.

coo, mie And