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on 4/30/04 9:32 PM, HandyDad at lsulky@hidden.email wrote:
> --- In ceqli@yahoogroups.com, "Rex May" <rmay@m...> wrote:
>> We of course have "fa", which can make an intransitive verb
>> transitive, as in "calfa" and "parfa", as well as working in other
>> ways much like the Esperano '-igi'. Now, it occurs to me that
>> English does quite well in most instances by using the same form of
>> the verb for both intransitive and transitive.
>>
>> The food is cooking.
>> He is cooking the food.
>> He stopped.
>> He stopped me.
>> The paper burns.
>> I burn the paper.
>>
>> It seems that only the fact that a direct object never shows up
> tells
>> the listener that we have an intransitive verb.
>>
> Agree, and it seems a workable rule.
>
>> Now, can ceqli operate that way? At least, nonformal ceqli that
> also
>> can do without articles and such?
>>
>> to komxo gi tunu.
>> da gi tunu to komxo.
>> da pa par.
>> da pa par go.
>> to buma bern.
>> go bern to buma.
>>
>> I don't know how far to go with this. In theory, since adjectives
>> are all just 'stative' verbs in ceqli, we could have:
>>
>> to hon hoq.
>> The book is red.
>> go hoq to hon.
>> I redden the book.
>>
>> Though, as an English speaker, I'd be very much more inclined to
>> use "hoqfa."
>
> So far, so good. Admittedly, our English brains want to see a
> difference between "to cause to burn" and "to be red", so we think
> of "bern" as a verb and "hoq" as an adjective. But I don't think
> there is a real difference. Loglan uses these stative verbs as a
> comparitive mechanism -- "to be redder than" -- but I think "to cause
> to be red" is an equally good interpretation of "hoq", whether
> intransitive ("The book causes itself to be red") or transitive ("I
> cause the book to be red").
Hm. I don't see "to hon hoq" as ever meaning "the book causes itself to be
red." I think to express that you have "to hon ho hoq" or to "hon hoqho."
I think what we have is a principle that an intransitive verb can become
transitive simply by adding a direct object.
Now, one slight point here is that these transitive verbs made this way seem
to have an element of 'starting' to them. That is, if "to hon hoq" it
always has been, or at least no 'starting' is implied, but in "go hoq to
hon" it wasn't red, and then I changed that somehow.
>
>>
>> With prepositions, however, there is always an object anyway (I
>> think), so I don't think we can handle it that way.
>>
>> pani dan spun.
>> Water is in the spoon.
>> *go dan pani spun.
>
> Now it gets tricky. 'Water causes-itself-to-be-within spoon' vs. 'I
> cause-to-be-within water spoon'. If a preposition acts as a
> transitive verb, then its object ("spun") must function as the direct
> object of the verb ("dan"). So "go dan spun pani" might be closer to
> correct, but we'd still need a marker to identify "pani" as the
> INDIRECT object of the verb "dan".
There's a problem with this however we make it transitive, I think.
Go dan to pani to spun.
Is too awkward. My brain, at least, says that "I'm in the water" and then
doesn't know what to do with "to spun." If, in the case of tunu or par,
etc, there's no direct object at all, there doesn't seem to be a mental
shift of the same magnitude.
I think there's the same problem with some intrinsically transitive verbs,
say "kan."
Go kan. I read. If there's no direct object, that just means that it's
not mentioned.
Go kan to hon. It is mentioned, but "kan" doesn't change its meaning.
but
Go kan zi to hon. Is analogous to "Go dan pani to spun." Intrinsically
confusing, because we didn't start with an intransitive verb. So the ideal
ceqli way to say these things would be:
Go fa ke zi kan to hon. Go fa ke pani dan spun.
And in cases like.
Go tunu.
Which, like in English, means 'I am cooking.' and can be taken as trans or
intrans, we can leave it alone and let context handle it, or we can make it
clearly transitive by adding ba
Go tunu ba.
>>
>> Though I don't see why we can't make a compound word:
>>
>> go spundan pani.
>> I in-spoon the water.
>
>>
>> I'd say let's allow it, and see what develops. Reactions?
>
> As long as we have a generic indirect object marker, sure.
Here I meant not necessarily to allow the strange handling of prepositions
we were discussing, but only to allow trans to have the same form as
intrans.
And, come to think of it, we also have "pon," put or place.
Go pon to pani dan spun.
Which is fine for ceqli1, that is, nonprecise ceqli. "Pon" as part of it's
definition having a prepositional phrase as its indirect object. To be more
precise, add "ko."
Go pon to pani ko dan spun.
Now, this is _not_, I realize, a place for vo-forms.
Go pon to pani vodan spun.
Would mean the whole operation took place in a spoon.
Notice that "ko" seems to have become a 'pure' preposition, i. e,, not any
kind of a verb. Much like "ci." What Loglan calls a 'free modifier', and,
I just realized, includes the time ones, pa, do, fu, gi.
All this make sense? Prepositions aren't prohibited from switching from
trans to intrans not because they're prepositions, but because, in ceqli
mode, they're intrinsically transitive and can't be stepped up to
double-transitive in the same way we handle tunu, par, etc. And the same
applies to all intrinsically transitive verbs.
Finally, try to take a look at the Babel Text, just to proof it, and after
it passes muster, I'll upload it to the Babel site.
--
Rex F. May (Baloo)
Daily cartoon at:
http://www.cnsnews.com/cartoon/baloo.asp
Buy my book at:
http://www.kiva.net/~jonabook/book-GesundheitDummy.htm