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On Tue, 5 Aug 2003, And Rosta wrote:
> xod:
> > On the subway, reading Nick's article, I realized another place where he
> > had already answered a question that we were chewing today. He says
> > 'Likewise, the generic statement "Dogs make good pets" ignores the
> > distinction between Fido, Rover, and Azor; it even ignores the exceptions
> > like Fifi...'
> >
> > And there is also my previous argument: that a Mr. Bird who satisfies the
> > exact characteristics of every real bird in turn is a trippy idea but no
> > different from discussing the actual birds taken as individuals.
> >
> > Therefore, I no longer think that Mr. Bird is sometimes a carnivore and
> > sometimes an herbivore. Such a question should be answered na'i.
>
> Whatever the answer is, it should be the same answer as we give for "xod".
>
> > Mr. Bird
> > has 2 wings, feathers, and a beak, and flies. The cases of single-winged
> > or flightless birds are ignored like Fifi.
>
> You can encounter Mr Bird when he is flightless, just as you can encounter
> xod when he is dreadlockless. But out of context, I would not describe
> Mr Bird as flightless or xod as dreadlockless.
By flightless I don't mean {no flying but walking at the moment}. I mean
{cannot fly, like a Penguin}.
Flightlessness is not true of the Kind. It is not true of the Prototype,
nor of the Prototype Instances.
> > I now see 3 concepts.
> >
> > a) The quality of birdness; kamcipni. Abstract.
> >
> > b) The Prototype Bird. Claims about b are claims about the definition of
> > "cipni". Intensional? Uncountable, or countably one.
> >
> > c) A Prototype-Instance of Bird. Claims about an instance do not reflect
> > upon the definition or any other instances. Extensional? Countable.
>
> OK. But none of these are Mr Bird.
If not, then my above criticism of Mr. Bird applies. It's the 2nd
paragraph of this email.
> > Now for some bold, unfounded claims.
> >
> > 1) b = CLL-lo'e = lo'e'e.
>
> CLL-lo'e is not as specifically psychologized as (b). A zoologist can make
> empirical statements about lo'e cinfo which are zoological rather than
> psychological, i.e. about lions in general rather than about the
> psychological
> lion prototype.
I can accept that Prototypes (definitions, in general) are constant across
contexts but differ between them.
> > And that c = Jorge-lo'e = lo'e'a = Mister = lo
> > jai ka broda.
>
> Jorge-lo'e = Mister != c. Mr Bird treats birdkind as a single individual
> bird, just as we generally treat xodkind as a single individual xod.
I'm not disputing the unity of Mr. Bird, but his attributes, and how
wildly they are permitted to vary.
> As for
> {lo jai ka broda}, it is hard to see what that would mean, apart from
> something unfathomably vague.
>
> > 2) b is almost useless, and can indeed be better expressed by ka'u lo'e'a
> > na'o broda cipni.
>
> Prototype-theorists, i.e. some cognitive psychologists, would want to talk
> about (b), but it needn't be built into the fabric of the language.
Perhaps you're taking a more specialized interpretation of Prototype than
I am.
> > 3) The intensional/extensional relationship between these 2 should
> > be explored and exploited, unless I'm mistaken and it doesn't really
> > exist. But it seems to me that b is some sort of a symbol for the members
> > of c, such that some LAhE applied to b should give us an instance of b
> > which is a c.
>
> b is a variety of a.
Not really. a is abstract, b is not. a doesn't have wings, b has 2.
> Do we mentally represent birdiness as a list of
> properties, or do we represent it as something that is itself birdlike?
> When deciding whether something is a bird, do we run through the checklist
> of properties seeing whether the thing satisfies each property, or do we
> compare the thing against the birdlike image? That's a question that
> matters psychologically, but not so much linguistically.
It's true that there may be some redundancy between a and b. I wasn't
proposing them as candidate gadri, but rather simply trying to organize
the mess.
> > 4) If the nonspecificity of lo is ever going to be taken seriously, we
> > will see that it relates to interchangable prototype instances, and is so
> > closely related to lo'e'a that there is no need for both to exist.
>
> I don't understand. I think we all take the nonspecificity of lo seriously.
> (c) is not equivalent to {lo}, since (c) adds an element of ordinariness,
> unexceptionality.
je'enai
> Kind/Mr is not equivalent to {su'o lo}, because Kind?Mr
> involves no quantification. I can't say whether Kind/Mr is equivalent to
> {tu'o lo}, because as yet we have no idea of what, if anything, {tu'o lo}
> should mean. (The outer quantifier of Kind/Mr must be {tu'o}, though --
> that is beyond question.)
I am impatiently waiting for someone to resolve the initial contradiction
that I discovered in Nick's piece and mentioned in the first note with
this sujbect header.
It seems there are 2 directions to operate in.
(lu'e-like) I can have a certain item in mind, and try to describe it to
you as a this or that. Specific, and countable.
(la'e-like) I can have a certain set of characteristics in mind -- a
prototype! -- and discuss interchangables that fit the profile. The
latter is "I need a doctor", "I like chocolate". Nonspecific, and
countable.
Is the latter lo? Some sort of lo'e? Mister?
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