WikiDiscuss

pc:
> & says:
> > I'm not saying that Lojban should handle this
> > overtly in
> > terms of different worlds. I am talking about
> > different worlds
> > only as a means of explicating the different
> > readings we
> > get with intensional sumti-places. And I'm
> > suggesting that
> > Lojbanists might want a robust way to express
> > the readings
> > distinctly on occasion. Is that reasonable?
>
> I gather that the distinction is something like
> this: "I drew a picture of a unicorn" might mean
> that a) there is a unicorn — in the same world
> as the one in which "I" refers to me and in which
> I did this action of drawing a picture of it or
> b) I drew a picture in this world which
> represented the salient visible properties
> ascribed to unicorns and either 1) in some other
> world there is a unicorn that this is an accurate
> depiction of (or would be if it were in that
> world) or 2) whether this is a depiction of some
> real or not unicorn is irrelevant so long as this
> does indeed display the relevant visual
> prperties.

Yes!

> The first seems to be covered by "There is a
> unicorn and I painted a picture of it," if we
> identify the u/d with a world, rather than
> insisting on a physical restriction.

Yes, but there's no guarantee that the u/d is
identified with a world, so ideally there should
be a way to mark that explicitly,

> The third
> is in Lojban the standard dodge "I drew a
> picture of
> the event/property/some relevant abstraction of
> something being a unicorn" ("drew a picture of"
> will need a careful definition in Lojban of
> course).

Assuming that event abstractions don't have to be
events (i.e. don't have to fasnu). (That is indeed
the traditional Lojban position. I was never very
happy with it, but only because it seems, as you
say, to be a dodge.)

> The middle case is harder, since
> presumably we want a quantifier of unicorns that
> is clearly not in the world of the picture and
> the picturer and most of the easy moves with
> worlds (or without for that matter) don't
> distinguish out the base world (the real is
> possible). Calling the unicorn mythical doesn't
> do it since it is not in the world where it
> exists. Maybe the best move is to add the "which
> exists in some situation other than this one" or
> the like. How do we make it clear that the
> doctor we need is one in Chelm?

I concur with your statement of the problem.

--And.