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Thanks a bunch, And. Unique != Intensional. We had already agreed on that.I was just this morning (because you people have ruined Christmas Mass for me too) thinking, "whatever the intensional is expressed as, it's not only individuals and {da} that can be intensionals. It's also masses and sets and the rest:
mi djica lenu da poi gunma loi marjrxodiumu zo'u: mi cpacu du I want some xodium (whether or not it exists)So, unfortunately, this is true: since masses, sets, and individuals can all be intensional, intensionality cuts across these categories.
One solution (a solution I think pessimal) is to make this a gadcolumn.Another solution (which I think preferable) is to leave the gadcolumns alone, and go propositionalist. After all (as I found in CLL to my delight), prenexes by default go to the innermost, not the outermost bridi --- so the default interpretation of {mi nitcu lenu mi tavla lo mikce} *is* "I want to talk to a doctor, any doctor", not "there's this particular doctor I want to talk to".
Another solution, which I think easiest, is to do what we did with {kau}: just stick a UI on, and say "wherever that UI is, we quantify the referent right here, not in the prenex."
So,
{mi skicu loi xodiumu} presupposes that xodium exists
{mi skicu loi XVV xodiumu}: I describe xodium [which is in a world
where xodium exists]
(... is XVV da'i?) I think there's a lot to be said for le...ce'u, though:I seek, using the template "X is xodium" in mind = mi sisku leka ce'u marjrxodiumu
I describe, using the template "X is xodium" in mind = mi skicu leka ce'u marjrxodiumu?
I draw some xodium = mi pixrygau fi leka ce'u marjrxodiumu?
You know, these don't look half so bad to me.
---
I see what you're also doing is saying:
{le} is +specific -veridical
{lo} is -specific +veridical
If we had a -specific -veridical, we'd have the solution to our
problems. Yes? Is that what you mean by 'presuppose'?
I don't know that this is so. {le nanmu} presupposes that a referent of {le nanmu} exists, too, and conventionally claims of it {da nanmu}, without vouching for it. But whatever {le nanmu} is, there is {su'o pa} of it. Right?
If that's so, then [-specific -veridical] doesn't help. If you seek one of those as a unicorn, you're saying you're actually seeking something else instead. But you're actually seeking a nothing.
Let me try again. There is no six-letter gismu of Lojban, right? Can we say: mi nitcu lo xavlerfu gismu --- no, because that's su'o da poi xavlerfu gismu zo'u: mi nitcu da Can we say: mi nitcu le xavlerfu gismu--- depends on whether le X presupposes that it has a non-null referent. I think it does, but the CLL description of le is pretty opaque.
If you *can* say the latter, your proposed -spec -veridical might work.Both politically and for reasons of logic formalisms familiar to me, I'd rather we not make up a gadri for this at all, but stick with ce'u and da'i.
Or... why can't we just say mi nitcu lo su'o no xavlerfu gismu Over... ### ki egeire arga ta sthqia ta qlimmena;#Nick Nicholas, French/Italian san ahdoni pou se nuxtia anoijiata # University of Melbourne thn wra pou kelahda epnixth, wimena! # nickn@hidden.email stis murwdies kai st' anqismena bata.# http://www.opoudjis.net-- N. Kazantzakhs, Tertsines: Xristos#