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A>Well, that is never what I meant by {lo broda naku brode}, nor does it seem to be what CLL nor common sense would have it mean. The {na'e} doesn't work since {na'e} is not contradictory negation but only contrary (well, you can change that too, but then you have to get a new contrary and on and on).

B> See above. I never can figure out what I mean by {ta brode naku}; I tend to take it as the same as {ta na brode} (i.e. {naku ta cu brode}) when there is nothing following it in the sentence and to negate only what follows it if there is something there. Your way of soing things makes life a lot easier, fo course, but it ain't Lojban and it leaves a lot unsaid. I say: suck it up and learn how to do quantifiers (I know you do, so the point is merely rhetorical).

C>Well, we have been through this way too often. Suffice to say, I am here borrowing from logic books and so keep the assumptions of logic. I think it is probably the case that I need that for some of the details in the application of the theory as well, but I suspect I could work arounf that if there were any reason to.

I am hoping to see a similarly throrough (and probably clearer) version of this for xorlo (but I have been asking for that for years now).
Jorge Llambías <jjllambias2000@yahoo.com.ar> wrote:
pc:
> Negation. Species are virtually a stone wall to negation. The fact that lo
> broda does not mingle with lo brode does not mean that it mingles with the
> complement of lo brode, for it may have no specimens at all. Similarly, the
> fact that lo broda does not intersect with lo brode – even if it does have
> specimens – does not mean that it intersects with the complement, for
> neither side may have made it up to the break point for either species (the
> rules require that zero specimens mingling cannot be intersection and all
> specimens mingling is intersection, but does not limit the choices in
> between). In the opposite direction, the fact that lo broda mingles or
> intersects with the complement of lo brode does not mean that it may not do
> so with le brode itself; the break point may be below 0.5. So, negation
> passes through species talk in neither direction.

That's all unobjectionable, but we may be thinking of different
things by "pass through negation".

A>All I mean by that is that ordering the terms {lo broda naku brode}
and {naku lo broda cu brode} gives both times the same meaning,
namely that lo broda does not mingle with brode. "brodas don't brode",
"it is not the case that brodas brode").

To say what lo broda does with the complement of brode I have
to use {na'e brode}, i.e. lo broda does/doesn't mingle with
non-brode. ("brodas are/aren't non-brodes".)

B>You seem to be taking {naku brode} as equivalent to {na'e brode}.
Do you extend that to {brode naku} as well? How do you read
{lo broda cu brode naku}? I take {naku}, wherever it occurs, as
a negation that the relationship brode holds, not as modifying the
relationship.

My other objection is the ever recurring one about existential import:

> First, quantifiers apply only to existents; an unnegated quantifier on a
> species that has no specimens automatically generates falsehood.

C>I would say "a particular quantifier" instead of "an unnegated
quantifier", but it doesn't really matter in practice. We hardly
ever quantify over nonexistents in contexts where they are
nonexistents.

Other than that, nice story!

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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