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la and cusku di'e
A claim about {lo'ei} broda reduces to some claim about
{lo broda}. {lo broda} itself is less context-dependent. For
instance, it is certainly true that {lo cinfo cu xabju lai iran}.
Not if by {xabju} we understand "living in the wild",
or "relevantly living".
OTOH, in your tea example, {re da kabri lo tcati} and
{vo da kabri lo tcati} could each be true, depending, as you
say on the contextually contingent criteria for deciding
whether something is se kabri.
Right. But the relevant criteria for deciding whether
"the Lion lives in Africa" is true is also about {xabju},
not about {cinfo}. Isn't "the Lion lives in South Africa"
true, even though most lions don't? Or is it false? Is there
only one place where the Lion lives?
"Man has a nonretractible penis" "Man lactates" "Man does not both lactate and have a nonretractible penis" "Man lactates and Man has a nonretractible penis" These all seem true to me.
Yes, to me too.
I think it fairly clear that {lo'e} was supposed to do generics.
Everything else that CLL and John say is an attempt to explicate
that. Since, as our discussions show, generics are tricky, John's
explicatory efforts have not been wholly successful, and shouldn't
be taken as the last word on {lo'e}.
I agree. I was just answering John's objections that {lo'e} could
not be {lo'ei} because {lo'ei cinfo cu fetsi} can be true and
{lo'e cinfo cu fetsi} can't according to CLL. I was pointing
out that {loi'e cinfo cu fetsi} is true in the same contexts
where {lo'ei cinfo cu fetsi} is true.
In the light of this, I'm happy with the idea that lo'e = loi'e, and that explicit claims about typicals and statistical norms can be made using appropriate brivla.
I'm happy with that too, since I don't see a difference between
{loi'e} and my use of {lo'e}.
> Ok. I should have said: "Surely {da kalte loi'e cinfo} can
> be true (in the right context), can't it?". John says that
> {da kalte lo'e cinfo} just makes no sense
Well, what is the right context? What state of affairs would
prevail in the world as we know it, such that we would claim
{da kalte loi'e cinfo}? I'd have thought that John might
accept that in that state of affairs {da kalte lo'e cinfo}
might also be appropriate.
When we are discussing a person and what type of animals that person hunts, for example. In that context, seeing lions as the Lion would be appropriate. He hunts the Lion but never the Tiger.
Maybe that's too glib an answer. I'll try again.
"There is someone that hunts the one lion". Nothing wrong
with that, but if we're meaning it as a description of the
world in general as we know it, then it is perhaps inapt, for
in the process of abstracting away the differences between
lions, the fact that a few of them are hunted probably gets
lost. OTOH, if you examine every lion separately, but elect
to (temporarily) hold that they are the same individual, then
{da kalte loi'e cinfo} would be apt.
We are examining a particular situation usually, not the
world in general. Of course, in the absence of context,
we turn our attention to the world in general, and then
start thinking in terms of typicality and habituality.
But {lo'e} is for particular situations too and mainly.
Hopefully you and John will agree with that, seeing as you both say you're amenable to lo'e = loi'e.
I'm amenable. John says he is amenable too, but I don't know
if our ideas of what {loi'e} is coincide.
mu'o mi'e xorxes
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