Wiki page BPFK Section: Realis Attitudinals changed by xorxes
> On 6/23/05, John E Clifford
> <clifford-j@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> > --- Jorge LlambÃas <jjllambias@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > > Besides, it would be weird to have the
> basic
> > > element
> > > indicate excess, and then add {cu'i} for
> the
> > > mean and
> > > {nai} for the lack.
> >
> > But this is just the pattern in most of
> these:
> > one extreme the neutral position and the
> opposite
> > extreme. It is hard to see how else to set up
> a
> > scale.
>
> If we were trying to replicate Aristotle's
> virtues and vices,
> the natural way to set them up would be to have
> the basic
> word for the virtue and then two affixes
> "excess of" and
> "deficit of" for the vices.
It is not clear what the excess and deficit are
of in many cases: It may be that cowardice is too
little courage (though that seems odd in some
ways) but impetuosity is not an excess of
courage. Courage is the mean on some scale and
the other ends are, by definition almost, the
extremes. But it is clar that the virtue and
vice stuff has nothing — aside from overlap of
names — to do with whatever is going on here
(easier to see than to say, apparently).
> The attitudinals are mostly not about "excess
> of" anything.
> The scales are usually X, opposite of X and in
> the middle
> lack of both X and opposite of X.
>
> > The problem seems to be (aside from the
> question
> > of what is expressed here) that there are
> often
> > not good words for the "emotion" involved,
> though
> > there are usually decent adjectives for
> someone
> > in the throws of that emotion — or so it
> seems
> > to me on a brief survey.
>
> My survey of the base VV forms gives one
> adjective (a'a: attentive)
> and 38 nouns. The adjective is the first one,
> so your survey must
> have been brief indeed. 
I meant "in English" and across the board, not
what happened to be picked for Lojban — many of
which have been seen to be poor choices anyhow.
And that was, after all, the point of the remark.
>
> (There are a few more adjectives among the
> -cu'i and -nai forms,
> but hardly enough to make up the difference.)
>