Some commonly encountered (please keep the list in alphabetical order):
- botpi "bottle"is a container, but it is not necessarily a bottle. this is hotly debated, of course.
- carvi "rain" — includes snow, sleet, hail, etc.
- cfari "initiates" --"commences"
- cinmo "emotion" x1 is not the emotion but the one that feels the emotion. Possible replacements: emote
- clika "mossy" — "lichen"
- cnemu "reward" --"awards"
- cortu "pain" --that which "hurts"
- cradi "radio" Same as for {tivni}, but I don't know a better keyword.
- danre "pressure" --"presses"
- darsi "audacity" Possible replacements: audacious
- djedi "full day" is the x2, the x1 being "measured in full days"
- dunku "anguished" Possible replacements: anguished, distressed
- jeftu "week" is the x2, the x1 being "measured in weeks"
- jgira "pride" --is "proud"
- jgita "guitar" is any stringed musical instrument, not necessarily a guitar; in particular, the violin family is included. ("One has no frets." --Douglas Hofstadter)
- masti "month" is the x2, the x1 being "measured in months"
- mipri "secret" --the "concealer"
- mledi "mold" --"fungus"
- nanmu "man" — not necessarily adult. "male"?
- "male" is already used by nakni. Perhaps nakni could be changed to "masculine".
- natfe "deny" — contradict; x1 (du'u) contradicts x2 (du'u)
- ninmu "woman" — not necessarily adult. "female"?
- "female" is already used by fetsi. Perhaps fetsi could be changed to "feminine".
- senva "dream" --the "dreamer"
- skina "cinema" I don't know any dialect of English in which cinema refers to the motion picture, and not the place for showing motion pictures. Possible replacements: movie, motion picture
- skoto "Scottish" --"Celtic"
- slabu "old" --"familiar"
- tabra "trumpet" is all brass instruments.
- talsa "challenge" (I can't make any sense of the definition)
- tivni "television" is neither the receiver or the medium, but the entity that broadcasts it. Possible replacements: televise
- vofli "flight" --"flies"
- xagri "reed" --"reed instrument" (BPFK To-Do)
Added djedi, jeftu and masti, which follow the pattern x1 is x2 [measurement] in duration (default is 1 [measurement]) by standard x3 using the measurement as keyword, which to me rather seems to be the x2 whereas the x1 is something measured. ie pei doi certu — mi'e la donri
All of the gismu which have an emotion instead of an emoter as a keyword, are very obviously in error. For example, for ckeji we have "ashamed", not "shame". --mi'e tsali
They are important because until one has used gismu a great deal, the tendency is to rely on memorizing gismu-English keyword equivalences. Eventually, of course, people will learn Lojban from talking with fluent Lojbanists, but at this point it is a frequent source of errors & confusion.
- Inasmuch as the fluent Lojbanists are unlikely to land here from another planet, this means a nasty bootstrapping problem (how does the correct sense get acquired, particularly if the place structure doesn't help --- e.g. senva?) The problem will get resolved only through further debate (*sigh*) and documentation. (The nature of such documentation, of course, is a hardliners/naturalists sticking point.)
But I, as an alleged hardliner, agree that naturalist-like explanations (ie. illustrative examples) are a lot better than nothing, and in many if not all cases, enough. — nitcion.
The examples should be pulled from actual usage, preferably in larger works or conversation, rather than a cabal of geniuses sitting around a table and scribbing example sentences. --xod
"Actual usage" gave us le ka mi prami, too; that hasn't stopped it being rejected. And the minute anyone uses a gismu controversially, ten other Lojbanists say "no, you can't do that." (And rightly so, I contend; after all, you too have done it.) So I'd like to modify this to "pulled from actual usage, where the particular instance of usage has not drawn fire."
That said, I agree that the dictionary should have examples drawn from things like extant text and IRC logs, where available. But not all semantic distinctions and fine print will be resolved by extant usage - nor for that matter have all gismu been used in extant usage. So it is legitimate to supplement those examples with examples devised by a cabal. nitcion.