WikiDiscuss

On Wed, May 19, 2004 at 04:23:12PM -0700, wikidiscuss@lojban.org wrote:
> > > Constants are short names or abbreviations for longer names; hence
> > > "s" is a constant when it is used to abbreviate "Socrates".
> > >
> > > So "lo mlatu", if it's a constant, should stand for some particular,
> > > individual cat or cats, correct?
> >
> > Or "Mr. Cat" himself, yes.
>
> Those seem to be completely different kinds of things to me.
>
> Please note that these aren't objections, I'm just trying to understand better.

I have to agree. The rest of the gadri proposal makes perfect sense to me; but
as soon as Mr. Cat enters the picture, it sounds like something completely
different and alien.

I don't know when I'd want to talk about Mr. Cat, and I don't think I'd want to
accidentally be talking about him. I imagine that the concept will be similarly
difficult to grasp for most learners of the language.

It seems perfectly fine to define "lo" as an empty gadri. Why does Mr. Cat need
to be brought up at all?
--
Rob Speer