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RE: [jboske] Lojbab on tu'o (was: RE: RE: Nick on propositionalism &c



At 01:23 AM 1/11/03 +0000, And Rosta wrote:
Warning: I get really really really pissed off in this message.
Me too.  Luckily my mailer ate half of it, so you only get half of my disdain.

Lojbab:
> At 11:46 AM 1/10/03 +0000, And Rosta wrote:
> >CLL describes a usage of tu'o that is consistent with mo'ezi'o and
> >INCONSISTENT with mo'ezo'e, and it does not describe a usage that
> >is consistent with mo'ezo'e
>
> But it does describe a usage of tu'o that is consistent with the cmavo
> list, which species NEITHER mo'ezo'e nor mo'ezi'o but suggests that both
> are plausibly expressed using tu'o

It does NOT describe a usage of tu'o that is consistent with the cmavo list.
I disagree.  The CLL description is entirely consistent with the keyword 
"null operand"
The cmavo list is broken in this regard. There is no way to interpret the ma'oste entry in such a way as to make it both coherent and compatible with CLL.
We have differing ideas as to what is coherent.  No one had any question 
about the coherence of the definition until you and Jorge tried to use it 
for something else.  I have little sympathy when you set out to break 
things and actually succeed.
> Furthermore, there is no inherent rule that zo'e cannot include zi'o within
> its range of meaning. zo'e means some elliptical sumti place value.  zi'o,
> ce'u and all the other KOhA are possible values for a sumti place.

Either (A) what you say is wrong, because it has never been definitively prescribed one way or the other,
There are all KOhA and therefore are all possible values for a sumti 
place.  I'm not talking semantics; I'm talking syntax.  We prescribed very 
little about semantics, and I refuse to be called wrong for not prescribing 
something that we tried to avoid prescribing.  We wanted to avoid this sort 
of hairsplitting in the prescription figuring that the semantics would sort 
itself out based on Gricean principles: what meanings were relevant and 
communicative.
or (B) what you say is wrong, because
these issues have all been discussed
Frankly I don't give a shit what has been discussed on jboske by 3% of the 
Lojban community, while the rest were doing their best to tune out.
and there was a clear and reasoned
consensus that zo'e would never cover zi'o and would cover ce'u only in certain tightly-specified environments.
I was not part of the consensus.  Nora was not part.  Robin and Jay were 
not part.  I suspect that Nick was not part, depending on when this was 
pulled.  Your consensuses have no binding effect on anyone.  No one paid 
attention to most of your discussions, and several of us generally rejected 
the basic assumptions of your reasoning so the reasoning proves 
nothing.  As far as I am concerned, all of jboske (and jbioske arguments on 
the main list count as well) before Nick convenes the byfy constitute 
merely one possible argument which will have to be made from scratch, 
because none of us are going to be willing to read all that garbage - we 
weren't the first time, and it won't happen this time.
I won't go into all the reasons here, but it follows from both (A) and (B) that it is pointless to discuss it with you.
Probably.

I fully agree that the current prescription is a noxious mess that should die as soon as possible.
I disagree.  The current prescription is the basis of what most people are 
using in what Lojban usage there is.  And where there is deviation, I am 
sure it is not consistent with jboske argumentation most of the time.
But it's no use you trying to tell
me that Lojban works in way that is neither specified in the prescription nor consistent with the rational jboske consensus.
Actual usage is probably closer to the prescription than it is to 
jboske.  In the case of tu'o I showed that usage matched precisely what the 
cmavo list says.  It then becomes your job to prove this to be incoherent, 
not mine.
> You can
> call this a kludge, or perverse or illogical if you want, but when we
> defined zo'e we intended to be as wideranging and nonspecific as possible,
> and we especially intended it to eliminate arguments about what the logical
> value of some sumti place should be (i.e. to eliminate the sort of
> arguments we are now having, about what sort of non-value should be
> inserted into a place that syntactically desires a sumti)

I am past caring what the intention was. I'm sure the intentions were good. The results are a fiasco.
The only solution is to prescribe the fiasco away. We can do that with the 
BF and not keep on with this stupid argument.
If you can convince people.

> > > I agree with the part before the dashes.  The i.e. is an abstract
> > > interpretation of that limited fact, which was NOT self-evident, but
> > > instead was only recognized on the basis of Cowan's non-CLL
> > > opinion
> >
> >It is self-evident. The fact that it was John that came up with
> >mo'ezi'o and mo'ezo'e as a way to express the rival meanings
> >doesn't mean that it's not obvious that both zi'o and CLL tu'o
> >annul argument places
>
> That it was not self-evident should have been clear from the fact that you
> did not see it until sometime after Jorge proposed using tu'o in the way he
> did, and xod and pc did not see it until explained, and Cowan did not opine
> the mo'ezi'o interpretation until it was presented to him as a question
> wherein YOU ASSUMED that tu'o meant mo'ezo'e, and asked what would
> represent mo'ezi'o - it was in the answer to that message where Cowan
> opined that tu'o meant mo'ezi'o

If you just read the ma'oste, the best guess about what tu'o means is mo'ezo'e (given that "null operand" is unintelligible) -- that's the most reasonable assumption.
It is not unintelligible, because the first usage of the word was Nick's 
mekso example that fit it (and CLL) precisely.  I contend that there are 
ways to interpret null other than zi'o that are still consistent with the 
RPN notation.  I'll probably agree that a zi'o interpretation is more 
mathematically correct as an interpretation of what the RPN notation is 
trying to represent, but we knew in developing MEX that we were not being 
semantically true to the mathematics, just being syntactically unambiguous 
and representing the symbology correctly.
All the supposed lack of self-evidence concerns the use of tu'o=mo'ezi'o as a quantifier, not the interpretation of tu'o as mo'ezi'o. AFAIK that was controversial only because of the ma'oste entry.
I don't understand that paragraph.

> Every word, cmavo or brivla, has a range of meanings, which is somewhat
> affected by the construction.  It becomes polysemy when the meanings are
> sufficiently disparate as to sow confusion about the speaker's intent (not
> evident here) or when the meanings get sufficiently disjoint as to not be
> related
>
> je joins tanru elements with a logical AND, except when it appears in a
> construction with I, in which case it joins sentences.  That is a word
> changing meanings in different constructions, and it was perfectly
> intentional

How does it change its meaning?
In one case it means that two adjacent tanru elements are logically ANDed; 
in another it means that two larger constructs are logically ANDed.
Anyway, it is natural that the interpretation of a word should be to some extent construction-specific.
Which is my argument.  CLL only gives one construction which is coherent 
with the cmavo list "null operator";  the elliptical definition is not 
exemplified in any construction in CLL, and would probably be self evident 
in each of the places it has been used, because zi'o makes no sense in 
those contexts.  Imagine paretu'oci.  I can imagine a circumstance when 
this would be useful in number theory.  I cannot imagine a circumstance 
where a mathematician would want to zi'o a place.
 The point is that it mustn't
be ambiguous and it mustn't happen willynilly; it has to be part of the prescribed meaning of the word.
The prescribed meaning of the word is the cmavo list definition.  It is not 
ambiguous until you present an example where we can't tell from context 
which is intended.  (And below you seem to admit that there aren't any 
ambiguous words in the list.)  "Willynilly" is indeed what happens 
until/unless we  decide to specify how the meaning varies with context in 
the definition, which is a byfy task.
> mo'ezi'o can also be used to create
> a null operand, but CLL does not say this, and does not in any way equate
> the two (there could be more ways to specify a null operand besides these
> two, but CLL only gives the one in the cmavo list)

Who gives a kalci whether CLL says mo'ez'io can create a null operand.
The ONLY (yes, caps for shouting) relevant issue is that it says tu'o creates a null operand.
Which is also what the cmavo list says.  In non-operand situations, it is 
elliptical.
Because the meaning of tu'o is controversial, we are using the uncontroversial unambiguous term "mo'ezi'o" to refer to the null operand.
The null operand occurs ONLY in a mekso expression, and the CLL examples 
are solely mekso examples.  As quantifiers in non-mekso text, the phrase 
"null operand", and CLL's explanation, tells us little or nothing.
> >and because this is incompatible with it meaning mo'ezo'e
>
> It doesn't mean EITHER mo'ezo'e or mo'ezi'o.  If you push the question, it
> means both, and maybe more that is not representable by either

Of course we push the question. And in doing so, I can't find a rational answer, and nor can you.
I'm not pushing any question.  And I don't require a rational answer as you 
seem to define "rational".
> It is critical when one is arguing on the basis of CLL's baseline standard,
> to pay attention to what CLL actually says, and not what we deduce from
> it.  Since CLL does not give comprehensive definitions of cmavo, merely
> examples of SOME usages, deducing a definition from CLL is not possible -
> all you can do is generalize from the examples given, and that
> generalization could be erroneous

Either CLL is something I can make deductions from, or I'll throw it in the bin. (Of course, that's just a gesture, & I'll retrieve the precious tome immediately after casting it thither.)
From CLL we can extract some shreds that can form at least the basis of a 
language prescription. And even these meagre shreds you want to drown in 
the excrement of dubitability.
All you succeed in doing is in magnifying or manufacturing disdain for CLL 
qua prescription.
I have disdain for the assumption that CLL is the only prescription, and 
consider your argument two-faced because you are perfectly willing to throw 
out the CLL prescription when your argument requires it.  Thus your 
claiming scriptural qualities to the document rings hollow to me.
> >it depends on who was paying how much attention when -- that is, it
> >depends on the accidental facts of history, not on the facts of
> >Lojban
>
> And that is precisely why I have objected so much to the informal jboske
> debates.  I reject the idea that understandings reached by a few people who
> are "paying attention" when someone makes a "deduction" that is really a
> false generalization, (or in this case states an opinion that everyone in
> the discussion buys into because it fits the immediate purpose) is going to
> change a baseline definition that, while it may be vague and unsatisfactory
> to many people, is still a baseline definition.

This is why Lojban should split into two dialects. Rational jboske discussion is probably fundamentally incompatible with the stable, constant shambles that is SL.
But no one wants to use what you are jboskeing.  You are creating a work of 
art, perhaps an incarnation of your Livagian logical artlang.  That isn't 
Lojban, which is a language that people will use.
> The purpose of the byfy is to ensure that decisions affecting the baseline
> are made with all parties "paying attention" and on notice that a decision
> will be made so that they should pay attention

I'm deeply pessimistic about its prospects, you won't be surprised to hear.
I'm not.


> >The ma'oste is broken. CLL isn't
>
> The byfy will decide that question, not jboske

The BF will decide what to fix. But the brokenness of the ma'oste is a simple fact, if you accept the basic principles of Lojban.
The basic principles of Lojban are the baseline, the baseline, the 
baseline.  People have rejected the other possibility "founder intent" as 
having anything else to do with basic principles, so we are left with 
nothing but the baseline to argue from.
> >Yes, CLL doesn't say "tu'o = mo'ezi'o" in those very words, but it gives
> >a definition equivalent to it
>
> It gives no definition at all other than the keyword (and we've noted that
> keywords are not adequate definitions).  It gives an explanation of a
> particular usage.  The as-yet-unwritten dictionary gives definitions
>
> >Tell me how the definition of tu'o on p450 is not equivalent to mo'ezi'o
>
> Quote "the definition" you are referring to, and explain how it fits the
> definition of a "definition"

If you had any interest in finding answers and solutions, then I would discuss these things with you. But you don't, so I won't.
I think the answer is already determined, and the word will split in 
two.  But I am not interested in finding answers until the byfy is 
constituted.  I already know that one person is somewhat resentful that 
byfy issues are being debated on jboske while the others await a forum that 
is worth participating in.  jboske isn't, for them.
> >But that isn't the claim. The claim is that it follows from the governing
> >principles of Lojban
>
> Which governing principles are these, and where are they stated in baseline
> form?

Screw the baseline -- you have exterminated the last dregs of my respect for it. You stick to your dialect and I'll stick to mine.
And no one but Jorge will be able to understand it, as exemplified in the 
phone game.  But maybe yuou don't care.
> >Which is irrelevant. We know perfectly well from the evidence of natural
> >language that ambiguity is usually not an impediment to clear understanding
>
> We seem to agree that the cmavo list definition is semantically
> ambiguous.  That is not against the rules in Lojban.  Most of the words are
> semantically ambiguous to some extent

I don't know of any ambiguous Lojban word. That is, a word with two meanings such that a sentence can be true on a reading with one of the meanings and false on a reading with the other.
Then what is your problems such that the cmavo list tu'o is "broken"?

> >Note, though, that this conflicts with CLL. CLL defines tu'o as
> >"mo'e zi'o", not as "mo'e zi'o a zo'e"
>
> NO IT DOESN'T!!!
>
> There is not one word in CLL that is inconsistent with tu'o = mo'e zi'o a
> zo'e, and probably not with several other possible definitions of tu'o

If you read the examples and exposition on p450 as meaning that the sentence is true if tu'o is a null operand and true if tu'o is vague number, then that utterly perverts CLL. If you don't read it that way, then it is inconsistent with tu'o = mo'e zi'o a zo'e.
That is why I was arguing for joi rather than a; I followed your lead 
erroneously in that sentence.  Amend to mo'e zi'o joi zo'e.  Go look at 
every discussion of zo'e in CLL.  In one place (for selbri) it says that 
zo'e doesn't include zi'o.  In all the rest, it says that zo'e is vague, 
unspecified, or some other formulation that leaves one no idea what the 
value is.  Therefore zo'e joi zi'o covers the range of all possible values 
or non-values of a sumti.  That corresponds to what we tried to do with 
tu'o. And lacking a zi'o counterpart, that is what co'e and do'e etc also 
have to mean.
> jboske is broken.  It started being taken as a means of railroading change
> to the baseline through its "logic".  This argument is probably the first
> of many that will probably arise as people cite jboske arguments to
> override the baseline

I won't be citing jboske arguments to override the baseline. I am so disgusted by this exchange that unless I can be persuaded that you are what I believe is called a troll and so are grossly unrepresentative of SL, I don't want to have anything to do with it.
That is between you and Nick.

lojbab

--
lojbab                                             lojbab@hidden.email
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA                    703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban:                 http://www.lojban.org