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| In a message dated 10/22/2002 7:07:17 PM Central Daylight Time, jjllambias@hidden.email writes: << ><< >> But, what if the arguments to {buska} are not individual terms? Then we do not know what {buska a} means because we do not know how to translate it to {sisku}. so we know what {buska} means on in special (albeit very common) cases. << >How would we determine whether {mi >buska loi blabi} is true? By rewriting it in terms of sisku: mi buska loi blabi = da po'u loi blabi zo'u mi buska da = da po'u loi blabi zo'u mi sisku tu'o ka ce'u du da >> As I said, it is the applications that get you into trouble. {loi broda} is NOT an individual term and therefore you cannot use this move (and, indded, said you never used it) . Now, it may be that there is a way to deal with {da poi du loi broda} that eventually gets down to the right form and can then be reconstructed on the other side back to {da po'u loi broda}, but I don't know of one and you don't offer one. When you you do, I'll withdraw that particular objection and, hopefully, come up with another, until you convince me that this is not just an idle game off in its own playing field somewhere. << How is it incomplete? What would constitute a complete definition? Is, in general, \xF(x) = \xG(\yH(x,y)) an incomplete definition? What else is needed to make it complete? >> Well, it depends on the system. In Logic, the lambda calculus is complete. But in Logic the only terms refer to individuals. In Lojban there are a number of terms that do not: {lo broda, lo'e broda, loi broda} to deal with the ones mentioned so far. Some of these can be reduced to direct references to individuals -- {lo broda} for example. Others of them, (lo'e broda} and (loi broda}, for now, cannot be -- or have not yet been shown to be. So, in Lojban, the lambda definition is incomplete precisely in leaving those cases without a defined meaning. Now, definition 2 fills in the {lo'e} case. Is there an unmentioned Definition 3 to take care of the {loi} case? Even filling that may not be enough: I have run through all the possible sumti forms yet to see how many are covered. << Ok, now you're getting ahead of me. Before testing my definition against actual usage, we have to agree that it is not incoherent. I will be happy to test it against actual usage once we've settled that it is not nonsensical. >-- or, if it is, must be >checked to see whether it coheres with how {lo'e} already behaves in the >language. It must be, in due time. But you've been trying to kill it before it gets on its feet. >> I don't have to take a concrete block out on the runway to see that it won't fly. I think there is a grain of truth in this whole contraption, but it will be buried in the contraption. As for checking against usage, there is very little usage, I suspect -- though I know of no one who has made any effort yet to find out what usage there actually is -- and what there is is largely in Llamban, so not particularly informative about Lojban. But, we do have the guidance of CLL and the cmavo list, neither of which is very complete but both of which are suggestive in the same direction, which is only vaguely related to your path (which, if anything, suffers from being to precise and concrete -- keep "the average man" in mind). << >Unfortunately, such a check is not possible, since the recently >introduced predicate {buska} is not defined for this context. Nothing is defined for this context, because {lo'e broda} introduces a new context. We know how {buska} behaves in all normal contexts, and the introduction of {lo'e} creates a new context (which we will eventually generalize to other predicates besides {buska}). >> OK. As I said, {buska} is not defined with {lo'e broda} as an argument, so we can freely define it any way we want as part of filling out the definition of {buska} from the beginnmings in Def 1. This is a good choice in that it connects back to know words and indeed to the same word that was used in Def 1. But that is not enough to make the meaning of {buska} clear throughout. So far, all we have is a rule that allows us to rewrite some (but by no means all) {sisku} sentences as {buska} sentences, at a significant savings of ink, but with other problems within the greater Lojban schme of things (that unmarked intensional context for one). (Of course, if we could rewrite every {sisku} as a {buska} one and conversely, then one or the other would be superfluous -- and my vote would go for saving {sisku} -- and, since I suspect that you want something more than just a rewrite scheme, so part of the definition of {buska} has got to go outside {sisku} to somehting else.) << ><< >Now, how is that definition useful? It is useful because it >permits us to contrast: > >(A) buska lo broda = da poi broda zo'u sisku tu'o ka ce'u du da >(B) buska lo'e broda = sisku tu'o ka da poi broda zo'u ce'u du da > >> >Was there a problem with these contrasts before or is this a new discovery. There was no problem with these contrasts before. We were already able to express the contrast in terms of sisku: >> So, what was worth adding a new predicate to the language? The contrast was put forward as a great (well, at least some) advantage, but if the contrast was already available then nothing was gained. << >I have to admit that this version is novel -- false, but novel. What is false? I have only used the definitions. >> Sorry. You're right. As arguments for {buska} that is exactly what {lo broda} and {lo'e broda} come to. The problem is that there is no evidence for the claim that is going to be made on the basis of this, that quantifier scope will account for the difference of between {lo} and {lo'e} -- and some casual evidence against it. So, the equations are not false, simply because they are made in a closed game set up to make them true; what is false is the generalization from them. I misspoke and got ahead of the game. << >I think the >novelty comes from not having considered the various concepts that are >identical (oof!) to tu'o ka ce'u broda. The falseness just comes from this >not being what {lo'e broda} generally means. You are saying that my definition of {lo'e} is false because it does not agree with what {lo'e broda} already means. But you don't say what it is that it already means. Perhaps you could give a situation in which the true {lo'e} gives a true sentence and mine gives a false one, or viceversa. >> Oh, nice move! If I could give a full and detailed definition of {lo'e broda}, we would not be in this discussion, since the question would be answered. I can't and I don't see any likelihood of doing so soon, which is why I would like to get others working on the problem and not going off on side games. I have some nice slogans ("the actual behavior of the typical man is the typical behavior of men") which encapsulate some of the points, and I have the example of "the average man" which gives a pattern, but none of this get very far along the line -- but none of it has to do with quantifier scope either. And, of course, since for the moment we only have {lo'e} explained in the context of {buska} and {buska} is set up to work this particular way, I can't offer a counterexample to the only example I have (and, of course, all the {kairbroda} are set up the same way, so they will also always work that way -- and any case that does not fit this pattern will be handled by fiddling in the undefined areas of {kairbroda}. That the nice part of closed games.) << >Well, it also involves the (not obvious) identities among \x(x broda), >\x(da >poi broda zo'i x = da), \x(x du lo broda) Yes. I don't really see why they are not obvious. You seem to keep accepting them grudgingly though. >> Well, they are not obvious because it seems odd in property theory that a property specified in terms of a predicate should also be specifiable in terms of an identity and in terms of a particular claim. As I have said, I am forced to see that this is ot a problem by the necessary coextensions of the various concepts. But the last of these, that whichever of the others you want is the same as \x x du lo'e broda really does depend upon your notion of {lo'e broda} again, in a way that the others do not. I am not saying that you can't justify the connection, just that it is not clear just how. I have accepted the moves here largely because I suspect that actually either defending or defeating the claim would be very time consuming and, since it does not make the proposal any better or worse, I don't see the point of spending the time. << >and \x(x du lo'e broda) The last of >these works on your theory but has not been justified in it, so far as I >can >remember. It is not involved in the move to (B), but it will turn out to be true. To show you how it is true though, we first need the full kairbroda theory. So far we only know how {lo'e broda} behaves in the x2 of {buska}. We don't yet know how it behaves as an argument of {du}. >> I have seen the argument, of course, but the crucial move still requires that {du lo'e brode} comes out of {da poi broda zo'u du da} in the obvious way different from the way the same gives {du lo broda} . I, of course, do not believe that this works, though it does seem to for your system (what works inside concept forms is one of those head twisting things and I am going to try to avoid doing it if possible). << >It is a nice differentiation, as I noted, though not quite the >right one, I think, outside this novel situation. Ok. How does it differ from the "right one"? It is one valid differentiation. I don't see what could be "wrong" about it. >> Try explaining "the average man" in terms of it. (I must say that if you can do that -- or make a plausible start at it -- I have really misunderstood what you are doing and will apologize all over the place for evcer doubting you. But claim some credit for getting you to expatiate clearly).) << I personally don't intend to use {buska} at all. I will keep using {sisku} with the meaning of {buska}. >> I thought you disapproved of unmarked (or even marked) intensional places. << . I want to be clear about which step exactly makes my definitions pointless. >> The fact that it never gets out of its closed circle nor explains what {busku} means other than as a rewrite device. Nothing informative projects back on to the {kairbroda}& {buska}-less Lojban. << Maybe it is not the right one, but at least you agree that there is a difference. >> Yes, quantifier scope often makes a difference. Big whoop! << For the moment, just notice that they are different and that there is nothing incoherent about it. Once that is admited, we can move to the next step which is to generalize the buska-sisku relationship to any broda-kairbroda pair by analogy. Does this step introduce an incoherence? I don't think so. If it doesn't, we can start to analyze what this gives for {lo'e broda} with different predicates. >> If used carefully they will not be incoherent. They will also not be informative beyond their own closed game. {kairbroda} will be defined so as to give nice reading for some sentences involving {broda} and, if someone says "But that is not what {broda a} means," you can say, "'Tis too, 'cause that is just how {kairbroda} is defined in the case of {a} as sumti. Of course, we don't know what {kairbroda} means, any more than we know what {buska} means -- burt we will know how to rewrite sentences of one sort (though not all) in terms of sentences of the other sort. That is at least one of the formal properties of an explanation. << Can you figure out what {kairbroda} is from the kairbroda:broda::sisku:buska analogy? If so, then I'm prepared to start looking at useful cases. If not, what is the problem with making the analogy? >> Gee, I thought i had written the explicit forms of the analogy at least once (I actually thought twice, but can't find the other one on the list). So, yes, I can work the analogy. I do, however, have trouble imagining a useful case, since it will probably involve {broda} and {kairbroda} on opposite sides of an equation and thus just be the definition of the new terms all over again. And I know those work if the moves are made carefully. << >-- unless we suddenly develop aneed for {buska}, >which seems inherently unlikely (it has an unmarked intensional slot, for >example, which would be really a bad idea in Lojban). Huh? Which intensional slot? All slots of {buska} are ordinary slots. {buska lo broda} behaves identically to any other {brode lo broda} as far as quantifiers and intensionality is concerned. >> Well, it doesn't seem to: {mi buska la crlakomz} = {mi sisku tu'o ka ce'u du la crlkakomz} , from which you notoriously cannot move to {da zo'u mi sisku tu'o ka ce'u du da}, since Sherlock Holmes does not exist. But, if {buska} were a regular predicate, then we could go from the sentence above to {da zo'u mi buska da}, moving from true ot false by purportedly legal moves. The most likely move to be wrong in this case is generalization on {la crlakomz}, since we know tha is illicit for other reasons. So, {buska2} is intensional (I can work an identity case too if you want). << Well, if I were to spread codswallop, I think I would prefer to do it knowingly though, so I will not be offended. :) >> Self abnmegation is not a good move in this group; someone might take you literally. |