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Mike S., On 28/08/2012 02:33:
On Mon, Aug 27, 2012 at 7:23 PM, And Rosta <and.rosta@hidden.email <mailto:and.rosta@hidden.email>> wrote:
Mike S., On 25/08/2012 00:41:
> On Fri, Aug 24, 2012 at 12:03 PM, And Rosta <and.rosta@hidden.email <mailto:and.rosta%40gmail.com> <mailto:and.rosta@hidden.email <mailto:and.rosta%40gmail.com>>> wrote:
>
> Mike S., On 24/08/2012 03:13:
> >
> > There would be relatively little homonymy and no need for a kludge if
> > there were a way to transliterate names from the vast array of
> > natural languages with relatively little change. I gather that
> > transliteration is not a primary aim of the language, but
> > nevertheless I believe it would be useful and convenient for Xorban
> > speakers to have a relatively faithful and easy method of
> > transliteration. Using a designated phoneme like the glottal stop
> > (properly spelled) {'} would allow that. That way, recognizable words
> > like {'spageti'-}, {'betxoven'-}, {'joxanezberx'-}, {'kimono'-},
> > {'tiranosawrus'-} are possible that cause little need for fussing or
> > guessing. To xorbanize, simply drop/alter the vowels and drop
> > glottals -> spgt-, btxvn-, jxnzbrx-, kmn-, trnsrs- and
> > modify/compound if there is a collision with an existing predicate.
> >
> > Or, maybe the first {'} could be a CV as you suggested, and the
> > second {'} always preceded by a vowel. That would be a little longer,
> > but easier to pronounce.
>
> If <'> is an allograph of <q> (if <q> is /?/), that would indeed be a nice way of marking quotatives (i.e. mentioned linguistic material), and one function of quotatives could be, as you suggested, in a construction meaning "X is name of Y".
>
> Yes, <'> is /?/. I would say that name quotatives enclosing a name X
> produce a two-place name predicate expressible in metalanguage as
> "x"(y, z) which means "Y (is known as X to) Z".
OK. Let it also be the stem of a one-place-predicate such that "x"(y) means "y is the linguistic object x". Since argument suffixes can't be omitted, the number of argument suffixes serve to disambiguate the stem.
Glossing over the quotatives for a moment, that would make {la
"djan"a} mean (in Lojban) {zo .djan.} instead of {la .djan.}. To get
{la .djan.} you'd need {la "djan"ako'e}. Surely the latter, which
we'll need much more often, should have the shorter form.*
Fine. I thought that by saying "Y (is known as X to) Z" you were intending that the suffixes should by VkV always. I agree a plain V suffix is warranted for brevity. I also think my suggestion was independently poor because it wouldn't allow for the quoted string to contain /q/.
The need for referencing the name is less urgent than in Lojban,
because people can say {"djan"a'a} ="I am John" or {la prmaka'a
"djani"a'aka}="I am 'Johnny' to my friends." Of course we do need to
reference the name. How about:
CV1+ X + q = "x"(y, z) which means "Y (is known as X ending in vowel to) Z
CV2+ X + q = "x"(y, z) which means "Y (is known as X ending in cons. to) Z
I'm not sure it's worth it. Ambiguity over whether the last vowel was included would occur only with /@/, and that ambiguity is livable with.
CV3+ X + q = "x"(y) which means "Y (is the name X ending in vowel) CV4+ X + q = "x"(y) which means "Y (is the name X ending in cons.)
Probably better to go for a method that allows q to occur within quotes. I.e. a zoi-ish system.
*Moreover, I think that all elided trailing variables are implicitly "o'e",
I'm not too happy with that. First of all, it requires a rule that multiple unbound o'e are independently bound, i.e. o'eko'e is not reflexive, and I'm not sure such a rule would be desirable. Second, it overprivileges the ordinal priority of suffixes, and creates competing imperatives for ordinal priority -- is ordering done by semantic role or by frequency of being o'e-bound and hence elidable? Rather, each stem should have its definition relative to its number of arguments. PtkV and PtkVkV are different predicates, tho it may be that PtkV happens to be defined as an abbreviation of PtkVkV.
I don't think that dropping a variable changes the predicate!
I do.
> I saw you and Xorxe working on csna'e-type bindings last night, but I
> haven't figured it all out, but "what we're discussing" seems to
> match my idea for a set of assignable discourse topics.
Strictly speaking, definites needn't have already been directly discussed; rather, the hearer can identify which referent the speaker has in mind.
There are a couple of theories for definiteness, the worst being
Bertrand Russell's "definite descriptions" which is the only major
flaw that I find in Montague Semantics. As far as I can tell,
currently Xorban does not have anything marking specificity or
definiteness. The closest thing is "s-" which seems specific, but
that only persists within the formula that it produces.
There are two main approaches to understanding definiteness. One approach treats it as 'referring' to, collectively or distributively, all members of a certain group (described nonveridically by the description part). The other treats it as referring to things such that the addressee can identify which are being referred to. When I suggested a series of variables that are interpreted as definites when unbound, I was thinking of the latter definition of definiteness. --And.