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pier:
> On Friday 08 August 2003 06:01, And Rosta wrote:
> > * pa broda is a singular entity too (in some sense), but is likewise
> > sensitive
> > to scope.
> >
> > * Arguably the very possibility of examples like the ones under
discussion
> > should be enough to prove the existence of scope effects.
> >
> > * How on earth would you say "Lions have four legs"? According to you,
> > {lo'e cinfo cu se janbe be vo da} means "Exactly four things are legs of
> > lions".
> >
> > * Recasting CLL-lo'e into a logical formula would (I reckon) involve
some
> > sort of "typicality/characteristicality" operator, which would be scope-
> > sensitive.
>
> I think {lo'e} is scope-sensitive and cannot easily be logicalized. {lo'e
> cinfo cu se tuple voda} ({janbe} means "bell"; I think you were thinking
in
> French)
[Because I am tenuously familiar (mutce milxe se slabu) with Lojban gismu
and with some Romance languages & many lojban gismu resemble Romance words,
I often mix them up; it works the other way too, with me coming out with a
gismu when trying to speak Italian.]
> at first glance means that the archetype or ideal lion, which is an
> imaginary one, has four real legs, which doesn't make sense. Another
example
> is {lo'e ornitorinku na'o se jbena re sovda}.
I can see some straightforward ways of logicalizing:
1. Every x, a member of Y, is typical of Y iff x has property Z
[Where "typical" means "unexceptional in terms of default
characteristics"]
=Everything that has default properties of Y-hood is Z.
2. Property Z is typical of the membership of set Y.
3. Where "most" is a quantifier making default/typicality-based
generalizations
rather than statistical ones:
On most occasions, X has property Z. [Where X can be Mr Bird]
Most Y have property Z.
(2) is incompatible with the syntax of {lo'e}, which leaves (1) and (3),
which each involve quantification and hence scope-sensitivity. (1) fits
the syntax of {lo'e} better, since it is more suited than (3) to being
the meaning of a gadri rather than a quantifier.
(1) makes "lo'e US president is a white male" true, but I think that is
consistent with the spirit of lo'e, for it is indeed characteristic of
US presidents to be white males. If you're looking for the Ideal US
president (who is of neutral sex, race and pigmentation) you want Mr
US President, which I am now convinced should be {lo US president}.
--And.