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John: > And Rosta scripsit: > > > As you know, we don't agree on this. I don't agree that the instance > > need be representative or imaginary. It can be real, but it must be > > the only member > > I can't swallow this. Consider the set of European countries. One could > by appropriate squinting locate the most typical/prototypical/modal > country in the set, but that would not be lo'e ropno gugde; instead lo'e > ropno gugde is an imaginary/abstract instance. It is fair to say that > lo'e ropno gugde is a democratic country, but not that it is Poland > (e.g.) I don't see why this rule should break down if we speak of > British countries rather than European ones I'm not sure why you mention "British countries" -- context would suggest that you are thinking that there is only one British country, but it's a strange example given that Britain is normally held to consist of three countries. Anyway, I understand what you say, and your position is consistent with how I described myopic singularization. However, my description of myopic singularization failed to adequately capture my notion of it, so I must take the blame for seeming to disagree with what I had previously said. (Said a couple of months back, I mean.) Essentially, your position is that lo'e broda *must* be arrived at through squinting, which necessarily makes it imaginary. My position is that loi'e broda [I say "loi'e" to make it clear that I am talking about a particular concept I am trying to pin down, not about what "lo'e" should mean] *must* be a single individual, and be seen as the one individual that satisfies the description. So what does "loi'e ropno gugde" mean? Well, one way to derive its meaning is indeed through squinting. But -- though for this particular example it's a bit of a stretch -- I could conceivably see European Country as a single individual (just like I see John Cowan) that is actually manifest and nonimaginary. I would find it present when I look at France, when I look at Hungary, and so forth. I think that several different strands of discussion are converging on two series of gadri, one yielding a *representative* and *imaginary* member of lV'i, derived by averaging and squinting, and the other that simply presupposes that lV'i is singleton. I will restate this in another message. --And.