WikiDiscuss

WikiDiscuss


BPFK Section: gadri

But asking for a doctor is just the sort of opaque reference where — as you say — the real existence is irrelevant. Reporting what a doctor did when there are no doctors is another matter and one where existence is relevant.

As for {mi djica lo ractu}, I can think of several ways whereby this would be a meaningful way to say I want a rabbit. Unfortunately, none of them seem to be the way that {lo} is presently (incoherently) explained. And, of course, almost all of them leave problems problems in other places (contrasts with {le} in some contexts, permissible external references, and the like) which are avoided by the old Lojban locution. Can you — xorxes having so far not — provide a clear case of properly used old {lo} which causes a problem which new {lo} solves?
xod <xod@thestonecutters.net> wrote:
John E Clifford wrote:

>Nice — and would that it were so simple. But it fails to cover the case where there are no rabbits or where the one I want doesn't exist, that is the opacity of {djica2}. Other than that, the {lo}-{le} distinction is just fine, as it always has been and without any fluff.
>

By "lo-le" distinction I hope you mean the one I've described below.

It does in fact cover the case of no rabbits. Questions of existence are
a distraction. There is no existence claim in lo here. And even if all
doctors are slaughtered, it will still be possible to ask for one and be
understood, even if the listeners are powerless to help. Therefore such
sentences do express something which is actually invariant with respect
to the existence of doctors.


> In fact, I think that it is perfectly fine even with that problem, provided only that we get over thinking that "I want a rabbit" is {mi djica lo ractu} rather than {mi djica tu'a lo ractu}.
>
>

We do intend {mi djica lo ractu} to in fact gloss as {I want a rabbit}.


>xod wrote:John E Clifford wrote:
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>
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>>So from "I want Mr. Rabbit" we can presumably generalize to "There is something (indeed, a rabbit kind) such that I want it." But "I want Mr. Rabbit" does not say the same thing as "I want a rabbit;" that requires "I want a manifestation of Mr. Rabbit." And from this we can get "There is something (some rabbit kind) such that I want a manifestation of it." My problem is to know which of these is what {mi djica lo ractu} means and, having said that, how do I say the other. The situation is easy in old Lojban (up to possible
>>needed predicates: {mi djica tu'a le ka ractu} (taking {ka}as the nearest thing to -kind, for the moment) whence {su'o da (poi ka ractu) zo'u mi djica da} and {mi djica tu'a lo ractu}, whence, by a longer route perhaps, {su'o da (poi ka ractu) mi djica tu'a lo ckaji da}. The new {mi djica lo ractu} seems to fit somewhere in between — or maybe mix parts of one with parts of the other. (Incidentally, if "I want Mr. Rabbit" is not meant in some weird sense, it seems to me always false since I always have Mr. Rabbit — and all other abstractions — as much as I can.)
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>There are only 2 actual use cases we must cover.
>
>1. I want a rabbit, any rabbit, it doesn't matter which one. (selkaicfa;
>referring to some real objects; the speaker has revealed all of his
>criteria; uses lo)
>
>2. I want the rabbit, a certain rabbit, not any other. (kaicfa;
>referring to some real objects, the speaker has not revealed all
>criteria but retains some unspoken — he'll let you know if you bring
>the wrong rabbit; uses le)
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