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on 4/25/02 7:26 PM, Rob Speer at rob@hidden.email wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 25, 2002 at 06:29:51PM -0600, Rex May - Baloo wrote:
>>> Obvious, but it sounds idiomatic and heavily inspired by English to me.
>>> "A little bit later".
>>
>> Just musing here, but could we not say that a pred -can- modify a non-pred,
>> or at least form a compound with it?
>
> If a pred forms a compound with something, then by grammatical necessity that
> something is a pred.
>
> If "pi" can modify "fu", then if you try to say "The little one will
> sleep" as "to pi fu dorm", you end up with "to pifu dorm", meaning "The
> one that will sleep soon".
>
> It seems you're still thinking of "pi" as an adjective. It's a predicate
> like any other.
>
>>> Lojban ma -> kwa (what object?)
>>> Lojban mo -> kwo (what predicate?)
>>> Lojban xu -> kwe (yes/no question)
>>> Lojban xo -> kwi (how many?)
>>
>> I like this a lot. Does the yes/no thing really fit in there? I'd rather
>> use the kwe for your 'ji' below. And if we need more to fit here, go with
>> kway, kwey, kwaw.
>
> Hmm. My whole point was that Ceqli wouldn't need a word for "ji",
> because it would have the modifier "kju" plus another word. Maybe that's
> what you meant. Anyway, rearrange the vowels however you want.
>
> Incidentally, technically with "kju" most of the kw-words would be
> unnecessary. For example, "kwa" = "kju da". However, I assume that
> there's a Zipfean justification for having single syllables for the
> common question words. Perhaps "ji" is important enough to warrant its
> own word, then.
First, again just musing, suppose we just use 'ki' in order to keep the
sound as short as possible. Then we have
kida What argument
kifo What predicate (using 'fo' because it's short and contrasts in sound)
kihan What number?
kihe What connective? ('he' = loglan e)
kihaj What probability (with 'haj' meaning yes, and possible answers being
yes, no, maybe, probably)
Having done all that, and maybe several more, given that Lojban does more,
we could then, maybe, make contractions?
kja, kjo, kjan, kje, kjaj
and then 'ki' can remain the 'adjectival' use, as in
Zi ten ki te hon? You have which book?
Go kjam ti Dxan. Ki ti Dxan? Which John?
Does this look like a good direction?
--
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> Rex F. May (Baloo)
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