Re: CPE: Corliss Lamont

[John Cowan <cowan@ccil.org>]

Lee Daniel Crocker wrote:

> I don't think that works at all.  Even though neither "thick"
> nor "finger" fills a place of the other here, there should be
> no question that tsudegji is a kind of finger, and degro'u is
> a kind of thickness--perhaps one could describe a branch as
> being finger-thick.  Surely one should not abandon the basic
> rule that a tanru is a kind of (its tertau)?

This invocation of the "basic rule" is superficially correct,
but actually conceals a deep flaw (one that most English-speakers
tend to make from time to time): "rotsu" as a noun does not mean
"thickness", but "thick thing".  Being a "finger" is no more
fundamental in Lojban than being a "thick thing".

The term "degro'u" in fact can be interpreted as either a symmetric
or an asymmetric lujvo:  in the first case, it means simply
"that which is a finger and a thick thing"; in the second
case, it might well mean "that which is thick by standard
a finger", and describe a branch or other such long thin object.

Per contra, "tsudegji" has an asymmetrical interpretation as
"finger that is a component of a thick thing".

BTW, there is a separate gismu "tamji" for thumb/hallux/pollex.

> > There are some cases, like {ji'ervi'o}, where it seems at first
> > that both expansions can be made: something that is permanent
> > in being alive, or the symetrical one, something that is both alive
> > and permanent. But this latter form I find kind of twisted, ...
> 
> Again, I don't see that.  Either it's a permanent kind of living,
> if it's the living you want to emphasize in the structure; or it's
> a living kind of permanence, if you want to emphasize the latter.
> I don't think "alive and permanent" is really an option unless you
> want to say so explicitly with a connective.  In this case, I think
> either one works fine.

Symmetrical lujvo are well-established in the language:  "blanyzdani"
means a house which is blue, or a blue thing which is a house,
as you will.  On one view, indeed, the asymmetrical lujvo are
actually elliptical:  asymmetric "degro'u" can be understood
as "te ke degji je te rotsu".

See the lists of tanru at the end of Chapter 5 for more
insight into asymmetrical and symmetrical tanru/lujvo.

-- 
John Cowan						cowan@ccil.org
			e'osai ko sarji la lojban