WikiDiscuss

xod:
> It seems to me that maxims, and claims that sweep similarly broad,
> should be translated with ro, not lo. And since ro applies to every
> member, and hence to the whole type by definition, then in cooperative
> usage lo will be used to discuss subsets, often but not necessarily prope=
> r.

Each and every child being forgiving of each and every grown-up
just doesn't work, as most children don't even come into
contact with most grown-ups. This is just about Mr Child being
forgiving of Mr Grown-up, or "children" being forgiving of
"grown-ups", it's not about counting instances. The maxim says
that things ought to be such that the child forgives the grown-up.
Which child? Which grown-up? How many of each? Those are the wrong
questions to ask because we are not talking about instances.

> >>ca lo nicte lo cinfo cu kalte lo cidja
> >>At night lions hunt for food.
>
> This is a quasi-definitional sentence such as we might expect to find in
> an encyclopedia. Hence, I suggest {ca lo nicte ro cinfo cu kalte lo
> cidja}, with possible shuffling if needed to avoid scope side effects.

It's not a claim about all lions. The context might be:
"Be careful, don't stray too far from the camp. At night
lions hunt for food." You are giving information about
lions and nights, but of a generic kind, not about instances.
Maybe you're lucky and just tonight there aren't any lions
around hunting for food. It's still the case that "at night
lions hunt for food" so you ought to be careful.

> Such a claim is a universal claim, not simply a non-specific one. {ca lo
> nicte lo cinfo cu kalte lo cidja} should not be interpreted as general
> claim about lions any more than it's a general claim about nights or
> food.

Agreed.

> (It should be clear that the treatment of lion in that sentence
> should be tagged differently than nights and food.) If you want to
> wiggle out of making an absolute claim refuted by a single wacky lion,
> so'a cinfo will do.

It's not meant to be a claim about how many instances of lions
do that.

> >>lo pa pixra cu se vamji lo ki'o valsi
> >>One picture is worth a thousand words.
>
> 3: Here is another case for ro pixra. Use pe'a as nerd-proofing, lest some
> lamer produce a picture worth only 999 words.

{pe'a} is ok, but even then, ro is inadequate. The idea is not that
you examine each picture and conclude that its worth is that of
a thousand words. The idea is that in general a picture gives
information that could only be conveyed by a lot of words. So
pictures are worth a lot of words, but this is not about counting
the number of pictures this applies to.

> >>lo ctuca cu fendi lo selctu mu lo vo tadni
> >>The teacher will divide the class
> >>into five groups of four students.
> >>
> It could be argued that the author is writing a script and has a
> particular scene in mind, and in that sense is referring to that
> specific teacher. I would expect the all-but-first references to use le;
> the first reference having grabbed a random teacher out of the air, and
> the following references referring to that teacher and only that one.

Kind of like English "the"...

I read it as:

TEACHER divides CLASS into 5 STUDENT-FOURSOME

The only relevant quantifier in the statement is 5 (4 is part of
a description). If there is any specificity it is not of the usual
kind, because the speaker doesn't have any particular teacher in
mind.

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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