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On Thu, 24 Oct 2002, And Rosta wrote: > Xod: > > On Wed, 23 Oct 2002, And Rosta wrote: > > > > > Xod: > > > > On Wed, 23 Oct 2002, And Rosta wrote: > > > > > > > > > But only two Lojbanists have come > > > > > up with sustained and relatively coherent (-- coherent enough > > > > > to be debated, at least) explicit accounts of these gadri -- Jorge > > > > > and me > > > > > > > > That's right. The rest of us are using them and understanding each other > > > > perfectly well > > > > > > IMO, a basic premise of jboske is that whether people use x and > > > understand each other perfectly well is largely irrelevant to jboske > > > We know from the study of natlang that ordinary people have no trouble > > > understanding each other even when what they say is very different > > > from what they mean. (People with impaired theory-of-mind faculties, > > > e.g. autistics, are less good at this, because the ability heavily > > > replies on being able to guess how the other person thinks.) So > > > being understood is not relevant to the question of "what does this > > > sentence mean?" > > > > You seem to be implying here that meaning exists outside of the two people > > engaging in communication > > Absolutely I am. John and I have been having a coldwar sort of argument > about this for years, each of us thinking the other insane. OK, here you step up to the plate... > First of all, I see language (or 'grammar' in the sense of the rule > system of the language -- 'langue' in the Saussurean sense) as a > code. If I want to communicate idea X to you, I don't necessarily > have to utter a sentence that encodes X. I can utter a sentence > that encodes Y, such that I am confident that from Y you will infer > X. > > How is the code determined? For natlangs, we define the meaning of a > sentence as that element of meaning that is constant across contexts > -- across multiple utterances of the sentence. For Lojban, though, > we work it out deductively from general principles (such as the > principle that the language is consistent, regular, unambiguous, > etc., that scope is left to right, etc. etc.). ...but never take a swing. I will rephrase my challenge. You seemed to imply that meaning (the interpretation of symbols) exists outside the consciousnesses of the participants in the discussion. -- Henry McCullers, an affable Plano, TX-area anti-Semite, praised the Jewish people Monday for doing "a bang-up job" running the media. "This has been such a great year for movies, and the new crop of fall TV shows looks to be one of the best in years," McCullers said. "And the cable news channels are doing a terrific job, too. Admittedly, they're not reporting on the Jewish stranglehold on world finance, but, hey, that's understandable."