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Invent Yourself scripsit:
> Why? lo birje is a beer, or it's some beer. I don't see why substance
> quantities need to be distinguished from individuals. The only difference
> is that, with individuals, we often agree on the amount that makes up an
> individual (how many pounds of doctor make a Doctor), whereas the size of
> "a beer" is more debatable.
Exactly. And since Lojban makes no such distinction, it is only glico/ropno/
SAE thinking that tells us that there is some difference between "lo birje"
(a beer) and "lo mikce" (a doctor). Both of them are arbitrary but convenient
chunks sawed off of loi birje and loi mikce respectively.
> > I agree that we have been conflating massification with collectivization
> > (groups with emergent properties). I intend to distinguish them by
> > using lu'o for the massifier and lu'oi for the collectivizer. Hopefully
> > the BF will also distinguish them somehow.
>
>
> Hopefully we will reserve mass gadri for emergent masses, and continue the
> process of the erasure of the individual/substance distinction that Lojban
> started.
I don't see any meaningful difference between a porridge with emergent
properties and a group with emergent properties. It's true that a surgical
team has more structure than a bowl of oatmeal, but Lojbanically speaking
they are the same: their boundaries have been erased. When we hear that a
committee has decided this, that, or the other we don't ask whether it acted
by unanimous consent or majority vote: the boundaries between committee
members have been erased. (It is also legitimate to think of a committee
as a set, however.)
--
John Cowan
jcowan@hidden.email
I am a member of a civilization. --David Brin