History: A pound was five dollars

Source of version: 1 (current)

How do you say "a pound was five dollars"? *__lo brityrupnu be li pa pu vamji lo merkyrupnu be li mu__ We don't say "mu merkyrupnu" for "five dollars"; that means five things (prices? costs?) which are a dollar each. How do we do it instead? ''Uh, lo merkyrupnu be li mu?'' No, that doesn't work either: that is one or more things which are (cost?) five dollars each. ((Loglan)) solves this problem by a conventional hack of using the number ''5d'' to mean five dollars. This is ''malylojbo''. The more general question is, how do you speak of measurements, abstracted from the thing being measured? The abstract notion of "5 m", as opposed to "that which is 5 m long"? Solve that, and you solve the abstract $5, as in "my bank balance is $5." For the physical currency, on the other hand, all you need is ''sicni be le merko befi li mu'' (sicni obviously being intended for banknotes as well as coins); and I don't think ''sicni befi mu meryru'u'' is unintelligible either. -- nitcion. ''What's the second __be__ for in ''sicni be le merko befi li mi''? Is the ''fi li mi'' supposed to be attached to ''merko''? --pne'' Or is it supposed to be a ''bei'' instead? --((pne)) ''le ka ritru'u li pa pu dunli le ka meryru'u li mu kei le ka ce'u vamji makau'' Yeah, I was afraid the answer was ''ka''. I certainly don't think it's ''ni''; ''leni meryru'u li mu'' seems to be just silly. But does this work for "my bank balance is $5"? Or do I use ''vamji'' there too? -- nitcion ?? meryru'u mumei? It requires a convention, but a relatively clear one, whose literal meaning is not going to be common. * This is clearly ''not'' a general solution (if a solution at all), for "five feet", say, is not a set and even less so "five degrees" of temperature.