#826
5:38 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At the risk of putting my foot in my miouth (usual when I argue with Jorge)

At 09:27 AM 2/27/99 -0300, =?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?= wrote:
>can i give
>>a bridi more than one tense?
>
>Yes, and the way to do it is what you have above. It is also possible
>to join tenses with logical connectors, but that gives a different
>meaning. For example: {ko'a mi puzu je bazu xanjai} means
>"she held my hand long ago and she will hold my hand in the
>future", i.e. possibly two separate events, whereas {ko'a mi
>puzuku bazuku xanjai} describes a single event, which is,
>I believe, what you want in this case.

Not knowing what he wanted, this seems to be a compound tense involving an
imaginaryjouney a long way into the past and then relative to that, a long
way into the future - in short back to the present - maybe soemthing like
"a long time ago was eventually going to do/be X"

You can also use non-logical connectives.  "once and future king" as pujeba
or as pujoiba gives a different flavor.

>>& can i attach an attitudinal to a tense?)
>
>Yes, attitudinals can be attached to most anything.

But technically, if in the middle of a stream of compound tenses, you
should insert an attitudinal only after breaking the compound into pieces
with ku

lojbab

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#827
5:41 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At 01:55 PM 2/28/99 -0500, SwiftRain wrote:
>"Jorge J. Llambas" wrote:
>> Yes, and the way to do it is what you have above. It is also possible
>> to join tenses with logical connectors, but that gives a different
>> meaning. For example: {ko'a mi puzu je bazu xanjai} means
>> "she held my hand long ago and she will hold my hand in the
>> future", i.e. possibly two separate events, whereas {ko'a mi
>> puzuku bazuku xanjai} describes a single event, which is,
>> I believe, what you want in this case.
>
>i see.  but what does it mean to say that a single event is both puzu
>and bazu?

By the imaginary jounrney metaphor, there is vector motion in time in the
tense order presented.

>  does that mean that it stretches from far past to far future

no - you would need the interval connective bi'i for this

>-- does "puzuku bazuku broda" assert that "caku broda"?

No.  Because "zu" is an indefinite interval and may not have identical
values in the two tense occurances.  Thus as I answered Jorge, I would read
the above as "a long time ago was eventually going to"

lojbab

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#828
5:46 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At 11:05 AM 2/27/99 -0300, Jorge J. Llambas wrote:
>>From: SwiftRain swiftrai-@geocities.com
>>i see.  but what does it mean to say that a single event is both puzu
>>and bazu?  does that mean that it stretches from far past to far future
>>-- does "puzuku bazuku broda" assert that "caku broda"?
>
>I would say at least it strongly suggests it, yes.

I disagree per my post

> I can't see how one
>single event could be both in the past and in the future without it being
>in the present.

One can look at two apparently separate events as being a single continuous
event with an interruption.  For example if a multiday race is stopped for
the night (I think that's the way Grand prix races work), then at night you
can talk about pujoiba litru as a simultaneously past and future event.

You can also use such a tense in a looping concept of time where the future
indeed is the past, or in a time travel scenario, or...  Use your
imagination %^)

lojbab

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#829
5:47 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  SwiftRain
From: SwiftRain swiftrai-@geocities.com

"Jorge J. Llambas" wrote:
>
> I would say at least it strongly suggests it, yes. I can't see how one
> single event could be both in the past and in the future without it
> being in the present. You are not stating it directly though, we have
> to deduce it from our knowledge of the world.

ki'anai .i ku'i ra'unai mi na krici le du'u lo'e temci cu muvdu fo lo
sirji

i understand, but incidentally i don't believe that time moves in
straight lines.

> >.i mi na djica le nu cusku le du'u la djes. mi ca xanjai .imu'i mi la
> >djes. .iu caze'aca na kansa ja viska .uinai
>
> i ki'anai i ku'i ki'u ma do pacna le nu dy do bazu jenai bazi xanjai

mi na krici le du'u lakne fa le nu mi bazi kansa dy. .i mi bazu kansa
dy. ca le nu mi klama le mi crisa ginka .i ku'i se'o le nu bazi viska la
djes. ka'e se gleki mi

i don't believe it's likely that i'll be with her soon.  i'll be with
her in a while when i go to summer camp.  but i would be happy to see
her sooner.

(how can i say "sooner"?)

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#830
5:53 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Attn: John Cowan  (was Re: [lojban]  Grammar versi
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At 09:45 PM 2/26/99 +0000, Richard Curnow wrote:
>From: Richard Curnow richar-@rrbcurnow.freeserve.co.uk
>
>I've noticed that the parsing software available on the FTP site
>corresponds to version 233 of the grammar, but there is a version 300 of
>the grammar available for download too.  Is there a parser for this
>version available, or is/has anyone doing/done any work on such a thing?

John Cowan put together a beta version of a 300 parser, but has not
released it.  I don't remember what he was waiting for, but Nora was at the
the same time working on a version 300 glosser with enhancements.  The
latter will place-structure-smart for gismu (i.e. English glosses will use
prepositions).  I was also working on a random sentence generator that was
going to be used to bang on the parser - generally a good way to test
obscure cases.  Nora and my efforts got sidetracked by "real life" (Nora by
Y2K, myself by childrearing and perpetual Lojban order and paperwork
backlogs that I am finally starting to get a handle on again).

John?

lojbab

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#831
8:09 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Hello. (me newbie)
 From:  Robin Turner
From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr





la .alyn.graimz. cusku di'e







#832
9:31 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Grammar versions  and parsing software
 From:  John Cowan

From: John Cowan cowa-@locke.ccil.org

Richard Curnow wrote:

> I've noticed that the parsing software available on the FTP site
> corresponds to version 233 of the grammar, but there is a version 300 of
> the grammar available for download too.  Is there a parser for this
> version available, or is/has anyone doing/done any work on such a thing?

I'm the one responsible for it, but I haven't had time to work on
it lately.

--
John Cowan      http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowa-@ccil.org
        You tollerday donsk?  N.  You tolkatiff scowegian?  Nn.
        You spigotty anglease?  Nnn.  You phonio saxo?  Nnnn.
                Clear all so!  'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)

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#833
9:55 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  John Cowan

From: John Cowan cowa-@locke.ccil.org

SwiftRain wrote:

> i see.  but what does it mean to say that a single event is both puzu
> and bazu?  does that mean that it stretches from far past to far future
> -- does "puzuku bazuku broda" assert that "caku broda"?

No.  puzuku bazuku means the same as puzubazuku, because the first
tense sets an offset reference for the second tense.  So it means
an event far in the future of some event far in the past; whether
before, after, or just at the present is quite indeterminate.
It does *not* refer to a long interval; the length of the interval
is also completely indeterminate.  A long interval centered
on the present would be ze'uca.

--
John Cowan      http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowa-@ccil.org
        You tollerday donsk?  N.  You tolkatiff scowegian?  Nn.
        You spigotty anglease?  Nnn.  You phonio saxo?  Nnnn.
                Clear all so!  'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)

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#834
10:56 AM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Hello. (me  newbie)
 From:  John Cowan
From: John Cowan cowa-@locke.ccil.org





la robin. cusku di'e:







#835
4:32 PM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar



>From: SwiftRain swiftrai-@geocities.com

>
>ki'anai .i ku'i ra'unai mi na krici le du'u lo'e temci cu muvdu fo lo
>sirji


i ue mi na krici le du'u lo'e temci cu muvdu  i xu do go'i

>mi na krici le du'u lakne fa le nu mi bazi kansa dy. .i mi bazu kansa
>dy. ca le nu mi klama le mi crisa ginka .i ku'i se'o le nu bazi viska la
>djes. ka'e se gleki mi

i u'i le nu do jinvi le du'u lo masti be li so'u cu clani temci cu stidi
le nu do mutce citno i a'u do ma nanca

> but i would be happy to see her sooner.
>
>(how can i say "sooner"?)

Maybe {ca lo lirmau}, "at an earlier time".

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#836
4:32 PM Mon 1 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar


la lojbab cusku di'e

>>{ko'a mi puzuku bazuku xanjai}
>
>Not knowing what he wanted, this seems to be a compound tense involving an
>imaginaryjouney a long way into the past and then relative to that, a long
>way into the future - in short back to the present - maybe soemthing like
>"a long time ago was eventually going to do/be X"

You and John seem to agree that {puzuku bazuku} is the same as {puzubazuku}.
I checked the refgram and I can't find this mentioned there.

The problem with this view is that it doesn't work in general. For example,
{puco'aku baco'uku} cannot be welded into a single tense. I think an
interpretation that works for all cases is better than one that only works
for some.

>One can look at two apparently separate events as being a single continuous
>event with an interruption.  For example if a multiday race is stopped for
>the night (I think that's the way Grand prix races work), then at night you
>can talk about pujoiba litru as a simultaneously past and future event.

Yes, If you can view one single event as happening discontinuously
then of course it can be in the past and in the future and not in the
present.

>You can also use such a tense in a looping concept of time where the future
>indeed is the past, or in a time travel scenario, or...  Use your
>imagination %^)

You certainly can. I still think that if one single event is both in the
past
and in the future, it is most likely also in the present. I'm sure there
are contexts where this is not so. That's why I said "it strongly
suggests", and "you are not actually stating it", because it really
depends on the context.

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#837
9:38 AM Tue 2 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)

From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

>From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar
>la lojbab cusku di'e
>>>{ko'a mi puzuku bazuku xanjai}
>>
>>Not knowing what he wanted, this seems to be a compound tense involving an
>>imaginaryjouney a long way into the past and then relative to that, a long
>>way into the future - in short back to the present - maybe soemthing like
>>"a long time ago was eventually going to do/be X"
>
>You and John seem to agree that {puzuku bazuku} is the same as {puzubazuku}.
>I checked the refgram and I can't find this mentioned there.

Start with example 13.5), pg 234, combining with the discussion on page
216, section 1 on the equivalence of tense+ku with selbri tense.  The use
of sequential tenses as being vector additive is the essential paradigm of
both the imaginary journey metaphor and the storytime convention.

>The problem with this view is that it doesn't work in general. For example,
>{puco'aku baco'uku} cannot be welded into a single tense.

?pau It cannot grammatically, ?ji it cannot logically be so welded

was starting the event of later ending X?

>I think an
>interpretation that works for all cases is better than one that only works
>for some.

You could use a nonlogical interval connective to get an interval starting
in the past and ending in the future.  pubi'iba?  (I'm very rusty.)



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#838
3:17 PM Tue 2 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  SwiftRain

From: SwiftRain swiftrai-@geocities.com

"Jorge J. Llambas" wrote:
>
> i ue mi na krici le du'u lo'e temci cu muvdu  i xu do go'i

ni'o
.i lu "muvdu fa lo lanci" li'u
.i lu "na go'i .i muvdu fa lo brife" li'u
.i lu "na go'e ja go'i .i muvdu fa lo menli" li'u

no'i
.i cumki fa le nu mi na satci cusku .i mi na djuno le du'u makau temci
muvdu .i paunai xu muvdu fa lo lifre? .i paunai xu muvdu fa lo munje?

> i u'i le nu do jinvi le du'u lo masti be li so'u cu clani temci

well, lojban tenses are relative... .i ku'i jo'a loi masti ca simlu le
ka clani kei fi mi

> cu stidi le nu do mutce citno i a'u do ma nanca

li pabi

> Maybe {ca lo lirmau}, "at an earlier time".

that might work... it seems it's always hard to tell what lojban will
give the right sense, since there's so little idiom.


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#839
4:38 PM Tue 2 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar


>>You and John seem to agree that {puzuku bazuku} is the same as
{puzubazuku}.
>>I checked the refgram and I can't find this mentioned there.
>
>Start with example 13.5), pg 234, combining with the discussion on page
>216, section 1 on the equivalence of tense+ku with selbri tense.

That explains what {puzubazuku} means. Nowhere does it say what
to do when you have two separate ku tenses.

>The use
>of sequential tenses as being vector additive is the essential paradigm of
>both the imaginary journey metaphor and the storytime convention.

That's how you construct one compound tense. It doesn't tell you
what to do when you have two non-compoundable tenses.

>>The problem with this view is that it doesn't work in general. For
example,
>>{puco'aku baco'uku} cannot be welded into a single tense.
>
>?pau It cannot grammatically, ?ji it cannot logically be so welded

Neither grammatically nor, as far as I can see, logically.

>was starting the event of later ending X?

The start of the end is {co'a co'u}. That could either be in the
past or in the future. I don't understand what you mean by
"was starting the event of later ending X". Did the ending of X
start in the past or in the future?

And of course, you'd still have to give explanations for more
complex non-compoundable posibilities, like
{puzu'aku caga'uku bari'uku}.

The imaginary journey works well for single compound
tenses. I don't see the need to force it when you have not
one compond tense but several distinct tenses.

>>I think an
>>interpretation that works for all cases is better than one that only works
>>for some.
>
>You could use a nonlogical interval connective to get an interval starting
>in the past and ending in the future.  pubi'iba?  (I'm very rusty.)

Yes, I never said you couldn't, but that doesn't address what I said.
And {puku baku}, in my interpretation, does not describe an interval.
It describes only two time points.

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#840
5:12 PM Tue 2 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar



>From: SwiftRain swiftrai-@geocities.com

>
>ni'o
>.i lu "muvdu fa lo lanci" li'u
>.i lu "na go'i .i muvdu fa lo brife" li'u
>.i lu "na go'e ja go'i .i muvdu fa lo menli" li'u


i pe'i muvdu fa lo brife i lo lanci ka'e muvdu da de di va'o
le nu bevri ly da de di  i le menli cu muvdu ca le nu le
se menli cu muvdu

>no'i
>.i cumki fa le nu mi na satci cusku .i mi na djuno le du'u makau temci
>muvdu .i paunai xu muvdu fa lo lifre? .i paunai xu muvdu fa lo munje?


i na vajni i do te smuni ma le du'u lo'e temci na ba'e sirji muvdu
i xu do te smuni fi le du'u lei fasnu cu krefu fi li ci'i i xu cukla muvdu

>well, lojban tenses are relative... .i ku'i jo'a loi masti ca simlu le
>ka clani kei fi mi

i ki'anai i le prami na nelci le nu denpa

>> cu stidi le nu do mutce citno i a'u do ma nanca
>
>li pabi


i je'u do citno i mi nanca li cire i mi ji'a citno ui

>> Maybe {ca lo lirmau}, "at an earlier time".
>
>that might work... it seems it's always hard to tell what lojban will
>give the right sense, since there's so little idiom.

I find that's one of the interesting things about Lojban, we have
the opportunity to create the idioms. BTW, your Lojban is very good!

i ma cmene do bau la lojban
co'o mi'e xorxes





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#841
8:43 PM Tue 2 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)

From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At 12:16 AM 2/28/99 -0300, you wrote:
>From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar
>>>You and John seem to agree that {puzuku bazuku} is the same as
>{puzubazuku}.
>>>I checked the refgram and I can't find this mentioned there.
>>
>>Start with example 13.5), pg 234, combining with the discussion on page
>>216, section 1 on the equivalence of tense+ku with selbri tense.
>
>That explains what {puzubazuku} means. Nowhere does it say what
>to do when you have two separate ku tenses.

By the text and examples on pg 216, 13.5) on pg 234 is equivalent to
puku mi baku klama le zarci.

You actually have to go one step further to combine them by making
mi puku ba klama le zarci
and assuming that this becomes
mi puba klama le zarci
and only then can you say
mi pubaku klama le zarci

Introducing zu or co'a or co'u should not change how this works, though the
backwardsness of some of the tense/modals when used as sumti tcita might
cause them to need to be reversed in some cases.

>>The use
>>of sequential tenses as being vector additive is the essential paradigm of
>>both the imaginary journey metaphor and the storytime convention.
>
>That's how you construct one compound tense. It doesn't tell you
>what to do when you have two non-compoundable tenses.

"Noncompoundable" is a grammatical issue arising solely from what John had
to do to make the grammar work under YACC and stay simple.  I think it has
been clearly stated on the List, if not explicitly in the Book, that two
adjacent "noncompoundable" or "compoundable" for that matter tenses should
be treated as if they were compounded.  I am only unsure whether this was
stated for particular kinds of noncompoundables or as a general case.


Example 14.1) pg 236 has two tenses, but one is a sumti tcita with elided
ku.  If you ellipsized the sumti, you would have puzukiku ne'ikiku.  Here
again, I am not sure whether these are compoundable in this order pending a
current parser.

>>>The problem with this view is that it doesn't work in general. For
>example,
>>>{puco'aku baco'uku} cannot be welded into a single tense.
>>
>>?pau It cannot grammatically, ?ji it cannot logically be so welded
>
>Neither grammatically nor, as far as I can see, logically.
>
>>was starting the event of later ending X?
>
>The start of the end is {co'a co'u}. That could either be in the
>past or in the future. I don't understand what you mean by
>"was starting the event of later ending X". Did the ending of X
>start in the past or in the future?

Take an imaginary journey to the past and we have an initiation of an event.
That event is the future (relative to the pu offset already stated)
conclusion of X.

It is not clear whether or not that conclusion is in the past or future of
the space time reference.  puzuco'aku bazico'uku would be in the past of
the reference whereas puzico'aku bazuco'uku would be inthe future of the
reference.

>And of course, you'd still have to give explanations for more
>complex non-compoundable posibilities, like
>{puzu'aku caga'uku bari'uku}.

Is this a challenge?

From the space time reference go to the past then to the right, then remain
in the then-time and go up and then go to the future and then go to the right.

Seems perfectly clear to me, though it would make a rather awful English
tense.

Back then to (my) left, he was then above going to X on the right.

>The imaginary journey works well for single compound
>tenses. I don't see the need to force it when you have not
>one compond tense but several distinct tenses.

I'm not sure if any other interpretation makes sense, so I don't see how it
is "forced".  Certainly not an implicit logical connective, since that can
so easily be made explicit with a multiple compound tense.  It's just
carrying a logical pattern to a rather extreme conclusion that probably
will never be useful (but pc could probably come up with an example if Nora
or John couldn't).

>>You could use a nonlogical interval connective to get an interval starting
>>in the past and ending in the future.  pubi'iba?  (I'm very rusty.)
>
>Yes, I never said you couldn't, but that doesn't address what I said.
>And {puku baku}, in my interpretation, does not describe an interval.
>It describes only two time points.

If they are two time points relative to the reference, then that would be
puku pe'eje baku or pujebaku.  A single bridi does not describe two events
unless you have a roi tense or a logical connective.  If you are describing
a set of points for an intermittent event, you should use something like
nonlogical connective ce or joi

lojbab

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#842
8:53 AM Wed 3 Mar 99
 Subject:  Lojban Adventure - volunteer  wanted
 From:  Bob LeChevalier-Logical Langu

From: Bob LeChevalier-Logical Language Group lojba-@lojban.org

A long time ago Nick Nicholas translated the classic Adventure game
(colossal cave) text into Lojban, but modifying the program to take Lojban
commands was never completed.

I've been contacted by someone in the Interactive Fiction community who
would like to see us complete the game as an example of language teaching
using interactive fiction, totally independent of its obvious value in
actually helping people learn Lojban.  He has suggested that rather than
fiddling with archaic programs, that we use one of the modern tools for
interactive fiction.  Anyone interested can see rec.games.int-fiction
(there is an FAQ), and he suggested Inform in particular


http://www.gnelson.demon.co.uk/inform.html

and


ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive/infocom/compilers/inform6/

as places to start.

Anyone interested who has seriously checked out what it will take to
complete the job and test it, given that all the text of the classic data
file is translated, but the commands would have to be modified as well as
perhaps some small amounts of text that were hard-coded in the original
program, can contact me.

This is not a small job - the text file is around 100K of Lojban, and may
need some fiddling with to fit the current file models - which look like
they are based on C code.

lojbab
----
lojbab                     ***NOTE NEW ADDRESS***           lojba-@lojban.org
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA               703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban:
  see Lojban WWW Server: href=" http://xiron.pc.helsinki.fi/lojban/ "
  Order _The Complete Lojban Language_ - see our Web pages or ask me.


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#843
1:08 PM Wed 3 Mar 99
 Subject:  xa'unro'axivo
 From:  michael helsem

From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com


ko'a goi lemi pendo pu'o bredi le mubysti pe le cfipu bolci
(My friend is preparing for the end of the world.) .i ko'a
ba'o pleji fo le vi'orzda vi le ru'u tumla gi'e ca'o sorcu
jmaji lo cidja (She bought a house in the country, & is
stocking up food.) .i pe'i ba'ucu'i xarci ponse (I think she
even has a gun.) .i ku'i se'i ku mi na'e terpa la .yburekyz.
ki'u di'e tu'e (Me, i have nothing to fear from "Y2K".) .i
ganai la ciste cu fliba gi zu'i ba tcidu xagji ba'e mau le
purci (If the System fails, people will want something to
read even more than before.) .i ganai le dikca munje co'a
morsi pe'a gi leimi dejni nei ji'a tu'u (And if the
electronic world dies, so will my debts.)


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#844
4:55 PM Wed 3 Mar 99
 Subject:  UNCLASSIFIED:-Re: [lojban] Lojban  Adventure - vol
 From:  taro.ogawa.7343985-

From: taro.ogawa.7343985-@navy.gov.au




> interactive fiction.  Anyone interested can see rec.games.int-fiction
The correct group is rec.arts.int-fiction (which deals with the design and
programming of IF) [r.g.i-f deals with playing and help with playing IF]

> (there is an FAQ), and he suggested Inform in particular
Inform is suited for this since it allows _relatively_ easy replacement of
the grammar.

> Anyone interested who has seriously checked out what it will take to
Steps:
1/ Download Inform (The newest version is somewhat of a pain to use -
you're better
off using the older one ... 6.15 I think until the newer one stabilises),
the
libraries and the manuals from ftp.gmd.de.
2/ Download the Inform version of Adventure (Advent.inf)
3/ Case and paste Lojban text over English text (trivial =)
4/ Copy English.h into Lojban.h and edit LibraryMessages() to return Lojban
text, change language constants, etc.
5/ Copy Grammar.h to GLojban.h (or whatever) and fix every action.
6/ Fix advent.inf's special grammar lines.

The advantage of this method is that once it is done, other Lojban
adventures
would be easier to create as the general-purpose files will be done. There
are
quite a few Inform adventures whose source code has been released. and
these could
also be translated at some point.

Good luck to whoever undertakes it ... the int-fiction community is
friendly and
helpful, and there are people with experience in translating Inform to
other
languages that may be able to provide assistance.

--OH.



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#845
6:01 PM Wed 3 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

>By the text and examples on pg 216, 13.5) on pg 234 is equivalent to
>puku mi baku klama le zarci.

Example 13.5) suggests that, I agree.

>Introducing zu or co'a or co'u should not change how this works,

I agree about {zu}, but introducing {co'u} does necessarily change
how it works, because {puco'uba} is not a permissible Lojban tense.

> though the
>backwardsness of some of the tense/modals when used as sumti tcita might
>cause them to need to be reversed in some cases.

This is certainly a problem, but I think it doesn't affect this discussion.
I suppose that {mi ba'oku klama le zarci} is the same as
{mi ba'o klama le zarci} and not {mi ba'o zo'e klama le zarci}, right?

>"Noncompoundable" is a grammatical issue arising solely from what John had
>to do to make the grammar work under YACC and stay simple.

That surely must be wrong. The simplest grammar would have been
to make all tense cmavo part of the same selmaho and allow any
and all combinations. That would certainly work under YACC.
If the complex tense grammar has any reason of being is
precisely to _prevent_ some combinations from happening.

> I think it has
>been clearly stated on the List, if not explicitly in the Book, that two
>adjacent "noncompoundable" or "compoundable" for that matter tenses should
>be treated as if they were compounded.

That doesn't make sense. If they're noncompoundable they can't be treated
as if they were compounded, by definition.

> I am only unsure whether this was
>stated for particular kinds of noncompoundables or as a general case.

I don't remember it ever being discussed. Maybe it was before my
joining the list.

>>>>{puco'aku baco'uku}
>
>Take an imaginary journey to the past and we have an initiation of an
event.
>That event is the future (relative to the pu offset already stated)
>conclusion of X.

I'm afraid I can't make sense of that. Let's make it more concrete. Let's
say I have been painting my house, and painting the door will be the
conclusion of the larger event of painting the whole house. Then I
might say:

                mi pu co'a co'u cintypu'i le zdani ca le cerni
                I started the conclusion of painting the house this morning.

meaning that I started to paint that last door this morning. What could
the additional {ba} possibly mean? That the painting of the door was
in the future of its start? How could it be in the future, since it has to
start there? Does it mean that a part of it was in the future? And to make
it more confusing still, what about something like {puco'aku puco'uku}?
Starting of the conclusion that happened earlier?

>It is not clear whether or not that conclusion is in the past or future of
>the space time reference.  puzuco'aku bazico'uku would be in the past of
>the reference whereas puzico'aku bazuco'uku would be inthe future of the
>reference.

In any case, the conclusion would have to start in the past, wouldn't it?

>>I don't see the need to force it when you have not
>>one compond tense but several distinct tenses.
>
>I'm not sure if any other interpretation makes sense, so I don't see how it
>is "forced".  Certainly not an implicit logical connective, since that can
>so easily be made explicit with a multiple compound tense.

Certainly not. I explained in my first answer why logical connection is
different. For example: {mi pu je ba citka lo plise} means that I ate
an apple in the past, and I will eat an apple in the future. Probably not
the same one. {mi puku baku citka lo plise} would mean that my eating
an apple was taking place in the past and will be taking place in the
future, the same event, and thus the same at least one apple.

>  It's just
>carrying a logical pattern to a rather extreme conclusion that probably
>will never be useful (but pc could probably come up with an example if Nora
>or John couldn't).

I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean here. An example of what?

>>And {puku baku}, in my interpretation, does not describe an interval.
>>It describes only two time points.
>
>If they are two time points relative to the reference, then that would be
>puku pe'eje baku or pujebaku.

See above why logical connection not always works.

> A single bridi does not describe two events
>unless you have a roi tense or a logical connective.

That's exactly my point. I'm not describing two events.

>If you are describing
>a set of points for an intermittent event, you should use something like
>nonlogical connective ce or joi

Not necessarily intermitent. I just choose to mention those particular
points. Just as when you say {mi ba klama le zarci} you are not denying
that the event might already be going on, when you give two points you'd
not be saying anything about the rest of the time.

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#846
8:11 AM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Lojban Adventure - volunteer  wanted
 From:  Daniel Biddle

From: Daniel Biddle delta-@ps.cus.umist.ac.uk

coi ro do
.i de'i 1999-03-03 la lojbab. cusku

> From: Bob LeChevalier-Logical Language Group lojba-@lojban.org
>
> A long time ago Nick Nicholas translated the classic Adventure game
> (colossal cave) text into Lojban, but modifying the program to take Lojban
> commands was never completed.
>
> I've been contacted by someone in the Interactive Fiction community who
> would like to see us complete the game as an example of language teaching
> using interactive fiction, totally independent of its obvious value in
> actually helping people learn Lojban.  He has suggested that rather than
> fiddling with archaic programs, that we use one of the modern tools for
> interactive fiction.  Anyone interested can see rec.games.int-fiction
> (there is an FAQ), and he suggested Inform in particular
:
> Anyone interested who has seriously checked out what it will take to
> complete the job and test it, given that all the text of the classic data
> file is translated, but the commands would have to be modified as well as
> perhaps some small amounts of text that were hard-coded in the original
> program, can contact me.

Indeed, translating the Inform libraries would provide a very good base
for Lojbanic interactive fiction (.i.e'u lo'u cpedu skami lisri bau la
lojban. le'u tanru mapti pei ra) - which, hopefully, there will be more of
in the future.

Adapting Inform to handle Lojban will be an interesting challenge: on the
one hand, Lojban does not have gender, number, or animation, so those can
be ignored. However it has many more anaphora than Inform currently
handles, and other features that will need more than superficial changes
to the parsing code. I think it's well worth supporting these features: it
annoys me when a game misunderstands what I mean by 'he' or 'it', and then
complains that I'm trying to do something nonsensical. Being able to
assign my own choice of pronoun could save me a lot of typing.

So, to start considering these problems: what should be the general form
of a player command, given that some player input is clarification or
correction of a previous entry, or the answer to a question from the
computer? Should every command start with 'ko', and if so, should that be
the prompt (to save on typing)?

> This is not a small job - the text file is around 100K of Lojban, and may
> need some fiddling with to fit the current file models - which look like
> they are based on C code.

I'd be interested in seeing it.

.i.o'a le nu mi cusku bau la lojban. xlali
.i co'o mi'e la deltab.


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#847
11:48 AM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra  selgusni ninmu
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)

From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

>From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar
>>By the text and examples on pg 216, 13.5) on pg 234 is equivalent to
>>puku mi baku klama le zarci.
>
>Example 13.5) suggests that, I agree.
>
>>Introducing zu or co'a or co'u should not change how this works,
>
>I agree about {zu}, but introducing {co'u} does necessarily change
>how it works, because {puco'uba} is not a permissible Lojban tense.

Well it raises the questioned dealt with below.

>> though the
>>backwardsness of some of the tense/modals when used as sumti tcita might
>>cause them to need to be reversed in some cases.
>
>This is certainly a problem, but I think it doesn't affect this discussion.
>I suppose that {mi ba'oku klama le zarci} is the same as
>{mi ba'o klama le zarci} and not {mi ba'o zo'e klama le zarci}, right?

I hesitate to say, because John and I have answered the question before,
and it might even be in the Book.  My interpretation barring John saying
otherwise, however, would be that the ku form presumes the ellipsized
sumti.  The paradigm that had us add puku for example was originally that
of ellipsized sumti, and not as a semantics-free transformational grammar
maneuver.  It just was convenient and logical to make puku adjacent to the
selbri be equivalent to pu in the selbri.  But I think that
transformability need not be so for ba'o.

>>"Noncompoundable" is a grammatical issue arising solely from what John had
>>to do to make the grammar work under YACC and stay simple.
>
>That surely must be wrong. The simplest grammar would have been
>to make all tense cmavo part of the same selmaho and allow any

>and all combinations. That would certainly work under YACC.

The goal of the tense system grammar was not the simplest grammar, but one
which described the tense system.  That system went through 3 major
evolutionary stages during development, and all specified the grammar in
considerable detail based on PC's presentation to me and later John of the
logic of tense.  The current system is simplified to remove constraints,
but we don't want random strings of tense-related cmavo to be legal - we
want things that we can interpret via grouping rules etc.  (Originally PA
also had sub-grammar so that not just any old string of numbers and
semi-numbers could be legal, but we found that too many of the possibility
had usable meanings and chose to stop trying to specify them all, which was
impossible using LALR1 by that point.)

I know that in support of the compounding interpretation, there were some
things that could not be said with a single tenseconstruct because
ungrammatical, which John said would be expressed using two consecutive
tenses.  For example,

mi baki ne'iki klama

parses by inserting a ku after the baki but

mi ba ne'iki klama
and
mi ba ne'i klama

parse with both together in a compound selbri tense

Clearly the baki[ku] ne'iki is the same construct, but using the ku to
avoid the grammaticality problem, which means in turn that it should be the
same as
baki [ku] ne'iki [ku] because I can always stick a third ki tense in there.

Now this might override what I said above about the desirable
interpretation of ba'oku, since the grammatical generation of ba'oki ku is
inevitable at some point.  Which is why I will defer to John if he decides
one or the other should take precedence.  He has dominated the tense
grammar since he came up with the imaginary journey metaphor and wrote the
definitive tense paper - I only invented the grammar concept %^)


>If the complex tense grammar has any reason of being is
>precisely to _prevent_ some combinations from happening.

Indeed that is the intent, but especially to prevent ambiguous groupings.
However the necessities of LALR1 made very complex tenses easier to deal
with as multiple tenses especially with the imaginary jounreys metaphor and
the related storytime convention that preceded it and thereby gave a basis
for interpreting compounds.

Remember that for a long time you could not have both orders
space time
and
time space

The reason was that I had never figured out a way to get YACC to accept
either unambiguously and hence required the illegal one to be stated using
a ku separator (that this was indeed the solution du jour for that problem
is why I am sure that successive ku tenses are treated as sequential
elements in a hyper compound)

It was a late modification that John made that allowed both orders to be
possible without a ku.

>> I think it has
>>been clearly stated on the List, if not explicitly in the Book, that two
>>adjacent "noncompoundable" or "compoundable" for that matter tenses should
>>be treated as if they were compounded.
>
>That doesn't make sense. If they're noncompoundable they can't be treated
>as if they were compounded, by definition.

Grammatically noncompoundable.  Semantically, we can do whatever seems
necessary, and "as if compunded" seems like the simplest interpretation
(and I am not sure you have presented an alternative one).

>> I am only unsure whether this was
>>stated for particular kinds of noncompoundables or as a general case.
>
>I don't remember it ever being discussed. Maybe it was before my
>joining the list.

I am sure it was afterwards, since you joined while the imaginary journey
was still young and the reversability of space and time tenses did not yet
exist.  That changed, as I recall vaguely, after a discussion you started,
possibly even with a comment on the paper.

>>>>>{puco'aku baco'uku}
>>
>>Take an imaginary journey to the past and we have an initiation of an
>event.
>>That event is the future (relative to the pu offset already stated)
>>conclusion of X.
>
>I'm afraid I can't make sense of that. Let's make it more concrete. Let's
>say I have been painting my house, and painting the door will be the

>conclusion of the larger event of painting the whole house. Then I
>might say:
>
>                mi pu co'a co'u cintypu'i le zdani ca le cerni
>                I started the conclusion of painting the house this morning.
>
>meaning that I started to paint that last door this morning. What could
>the additional {ba} possibly mean? That the painting of the door was
>in the future of its start? How could it be in the future, since it has to
>start there? Does it mean that a part of it was in the future? And to make
>it more confusing still, what about something like {puco'aku puco'uku}?
>Starting of the conclusion that happened earlier?

You are using the ZAhO tenses that are points to make things more difficult
than they might otherwise be, resulting in semantic nonsense.

Given enough torturous thinking, I may be able to come up with an
interpretation that makes sense, but not online when I am trying thus far
unsuccessfully to be brief today so I can prepare some orders.

>>It is not clear whether or not that conclusion is in the past or future of
>>the space time reference.  puzuco'aku bazico'uku would be in the past of
>>the reference whereas puzico'aku bazuco'uku would be inthe future of the
>>reference.
>
>In any case, the conclusion would have to start in the past, wouldn't it?

I think that the use of the imaginary journey metaphor is such that once
you have moved away from the reference on the journey, it ceases to be a
very useful reference for that bridi.

>>>I don't see the need to force it when you have not
>>>one compond tense but several distinct tenses.

>>
>>I'm not sure if any other interpretation makes sense, so I don't see how it
>>is "forced".  Certainly not an implicit logical connective, since that can
>>so easily be made explicit with a multiple compound tense.
>
>Certainly not. I explained in my first answer why logical connection is
>different. For example: {mi pu je ba citka lo plise} means that I ate
>an apple in the past, and I will eat an apple in the future. Probably not
>the same one. {mi puku baku citka lo plise} would mean that my eating
>an apple was taking place in the past and will be taking place in the
>future, the same event, and thus the same at least one apple.

Remember that it is not necessarily the case that logical connectives
expand into separate bridi. I am not sure what has been said about tense
logical connection.  But nonlogical connection in any event is not
expandible, so pu joi ba should work.

>>  It's just
>>carrying a logical pattern to a rather extreme conclusion that probably
>>will never be useful (but pc could probably come up with an example if Nora
>>or John couldn't).
>
>I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean here. An example of what?

An example parallel to your house painting stumper above that makes sense
and justifies my interpretation as useful without going into time travel
scenarios (which were BTW envisioned as the ultimate interpretation of
nonsensical imaginary journeys in time).

lojbab

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#848
11:58 AM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  xa'unro'axire
 From:  michael helsem

From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

ki'e xorxes. .i je'e


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#849
2:13 PM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  tense tenseness
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

I have been reading with interest the debate on "stacking"
complex tense cmavo. I like journeying-imaginarily as much
as anyone, but i wonder if it is even necessary to do this
at all. (I'm trying to write using only "aspects" as much
as possible, as a stylistic exercize--BTW, when English
stacks them ["have had", "was going to" & the like], that's
usually what we're trying to express, not the future of a
past or such...) Why not put some of this information
somewhere else--a BAU, or on one of the gismu? Is there
anything you want to SAY with the conventions suggested
either by Jorge or Lojbab? Is the thought in SwiftRain's
poem so very hard to express?

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#850
2:16 PM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  John Cowan

From: John Cowan cowa-@locke.ccil.org

la lojbab. cusku di'e

> >I suppose that {mi ba'oku klama le zarci} is the same as
> >{mi ba'o klama le zarci} and not {mi ba'o zo'e klama le zarci}, right?
>
> I hesitate to say, because John and I have answered the question before,
> and it might even be in the Book.  My interpretation barring John saying
> otherwise, however, would be that the ku form presumes the ellipsized
> sumti.

No, actually the Codex Woldemar does say otherwise: tense+KU is equivalent
to tense+selbri, no matter whether it is before the selbri or not:
they are explicitly declared so at the beginning of Section 10.12.

> The paradigm that had us add puku for example was originally that
> of ellipsized sumti, and not as a semantics-free transformational grammar
> maneuver.  It just was convenient and logical to make puku adjacent to the
> selbri be equivalent to pu in the selbri.  But I think that
> transformability need not be so for ba'o.

Perhaps it should not have been so, but it is so as of today.

> I know that in support of the compounding interpretation, there were some
> things that could not be said with a single tenseconstruct because
> ungrammatical, which John said would be expressed using two consecutive
> tenses.  For example,
>
> mi baki ne'iki klama

This whole example is rather pointless, I think, unless the ki's
are subscripted, because the second ki will override the first,
so this is the same as bane'iki.

There are other examples that make somewhat more sense, though.

> It was a late modification that John made that allowed both orders to be
> possible without a ku.

Basically requiring fe'e to flag *every* TAhE, ROI, or ZAhO that
was about space eliminated the ambiguity.  (Previously a fe'e
was needed to *separate* time and space interval qualifiers,
which meant they had to be in a fixed order.)

> Remember that it is not necessarily the case that logical connectives
> expand into separate bridi. I am not sure what has been said about tense
> logical connection.

Tense logical connection is expandable: only tanru logical connection
is not.

--
John Cowan      http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowa-@ccil.org
        You tollerday donsk?  N.  You tolkatiff scowegian?  Nn.
        You spigotty anglease?  Nnn.  You phonio saxo?  Nnnn.
                Clear all so!  'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)

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#851
3:20 PM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni ninmu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar



>The current system is simplified to remove constraints,
>but we don't want random strings of tense-related cmavo to be legal - we
>want things that we can interpret via grouping rules etc.

You do realize that this goes against your <tense>ku interpretation,
don't you? With your interpretation, any random string of tense
related cmavo can be used  "as if compounded", so the restriction
on some types of direct compounding becomes an unnecessary
burden.

>>If the complex tense grammar has any reason of being is
>>precisely to _prevent_ some combinations from happening.
>
>Indeed that is the intent, but especially to prevent ambiguous groupings.

Can you give an example of an ambiguous grouping? Whatever
example you give will be grammatical with ku, so that must mean
that those ambiguities are still present with your interpretation.

>Grammatically noncompoundable.  Semantically, we can do whatever seems
>necessary, and "as if compunded" seems like the simplest interpretation
>(and I am not sure you have presented an alternative one).

But I have presented an alternative one: treat each full tense as a
separate entity. In fact, I'm not proposing anything that is not already
doable by other means. What I'm saying is, treat every <tense>ku as
being the same as <tense>zo'e. For single tenses this is already the
case  (ignoring for the moment the anomalous ZAhOs).

Indeed, having more than one tense in the same bridi is very
simple to do: {mi klama le zarci ca le cerni ba le nu mi do vitke kei
pu le nu do klama le briju}, those tenses don't stack up, so there's
nothing novel in what I'm saying.

Allowing different ku tenses to be read as one single compound
tense makes the whole complexity of the tense grammar pointless.

co'o mi'e xorxes



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#852
3:42 PM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: tense tenseness
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar



>From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com
>
>I have been reading with interest the debate on "stacking"
>complex tense cmavo. I like journeying-imaginarily as much
>as anyone, but i wonder if it is even necessary to do this
>at all. (I'm trying to write using only "aspects" as much
>as possible, as a stylistic exercize--BTW, when English
>stacks them ["have had", "was going to" & the like], that's
>usually what we're trying to express, not the future of a
>past or such...)

This is exactly right. I have never yet found an occasion
where I needed to combine more than one {pu, ca, ba}
(and usually not even one of them is needed).

Combining aspects, on the other hand, does yield
interesting things, like {co'aco'u}, "the beginning of the
end", or {ba'oco'a}, "having already started", {pu'omo'u},
"on the verge of being completed", etc.

>Why not put some of this information
>somewhere else--a BAU, or on one of the gismu? Is there
>anything you want to SAY with the conventions suggested
>either by Jorge or Lojbab?

I think it's mostly a theoretical discussion of principle,
it probably doesn't affect any actual usage. But I don't like
it when inconsistent conventions are introduced in
Lojban, because internal consistency is one of its strong
points.

>Is the thought in SwiftRain's
>poem so very hard to express?

As it turned out, what he meant would best be translated
with a logical connective. Neither interpretation of
multiple tenses was what he wanted.

co'o mi'e xorxes



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#853
6:37 PM Thu 4 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  SwiftRain
From: SwiftRain swiftrai-@geocities.com

"Jorge J. Llambas" wrote:
>
> >.i lu "muvdu fa lo lanci" li'u
> >.i lu "na go'i .i muvdu fa lo brife" li'u
> >.i lu "na go'e ja go'i .i muvdu fa lo menli" li'u
>
> i pe'i muvdu fa lo brife i lo lanci ka'e muvdu da de di va'o
> le nu bevri ly da de di  i le menli cu muvdu ca le nu le
> se menli cu muvdu

.u'i, that's another perspective.  if you don't know, that's a
translation of part of a zen koan: two zen students & a zen master are
looking at a flag... the first student: "it is the flag that moves" --
the second student: "no, it is the breeze that moves" -- the master
replies: "no, you are both wrong.  it is the mind that moves."

> i na vajni i do te smuni ma le du'u lo'e temci na ba'e sirji muvdu
> i xu do te smuni fi le du'u lei fasnu cu krefu fi li ci'i i xu cukla
> muvdu

mi na jetnu djuno .i mi na zgana lo tarmi be le temci .i mi jinvi le
du'u le pensi be ro prenu cu na'e banzu le nu skicu le munje temci .i
.ai mi na skicu le munje ja jetnu temci .i .ai mi skicu le se lifre be
mi temci

> i ki'anai i le prami na nelci le nu denpa

.i se'o mi ka'e frili denpa .i se'o mi so'i lo prenu cu prami .i se'o mi
na'e cafne pensi la djes. .iu

ni'o ca le cabdei ku mi mutci pensi lo drata pendo be mi be'o noi se
cmene la djEsikas. .a'uro'u .i .ue .uisai mi caca'o tavla ko'a .i ti'e
le'e citno cu fenki zifre

> i je'u do citno

.i ti'e mi citno .ui

> I find that's one of the interesting things about Lojban, we have
> the opportunity to create the idioms.

.iesai

> BTW, your Lojban is very good!

ki'esai zenba xamgu .ie

> i ma cmene do bau la lojban

so'eroi la bret. .ija la mYngodjel. va'o la .ibu ry. cy.

> co'o mi'e xorxes

co'o mi'e bret.

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#854
1:45 AM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Lojban Adventure  - volunteer wanted
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la deltab cusku di'e

> .i.o'a le nu mi cusku bau la lojban. xlali

Me too!  But I think it should be {xlali lojban.} "bad-type-of Lojban", not
{lojban. xlali} "lojbanic badness".  Not sure where the article should go'
though.

>
> .i co'o mi'e la deltab.

You don't need {la} here.  Think of {mi'e} like a self-referential vocative
(?!).


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#855
7:42 AM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

>From: John Cowan cowa-@locke.ccil.org
>la lojbab. cusku di'e
>> >I suppose that {mi ba'oku klama le zarci} is the same as
>> >{mi ba'o klama le zarci} and not {mi ba'o zo'e klama le zarci}, right?
>>
>> I hesitate to say, because John and I have answered the question before,
>> and it might even be in the Book.  My interpretation barring John saying
>> otherwise, however, would be that the ku form presumes the ellipsized
>> sumti.
>
>No, actually the Codex Woldemar does say otherwise: tense+KU is equivalent
>to tense+selbri, no matter whether it is before the selbri or not:
>they are explicitly declared so at the beginning of Section 10.12.

Fine.  I defer to the Codex.  I figured you had said it somewhere.

>> The paradigm that had us add puku for example was originally that
>> of ellipsized sumti, and not as a semantics-free transformational grammar
>> maneuver.  It just was convenient and logical to make puku adjacent to the
>> selbri be equivalent to pu in the selbri.  But I think that
>> transformability need not be so for ba'o.
>
>Perhaps it should not have been so, but it is so as of today.

Either/or, doesn't much matter - I argued only from history in case you had
not said anything.  You said it; the Book is baselined.

>> I know that in support of the compounding interpretation, there were some
>> things that could not be said with a single tenseconstruct because
>> ungrammatical, which John said would be expressed using two consecutive
>> tenses.  For example,
>>
>> mi baki ne'iki klama
>
>This whole example is rather pointless, I think, unless the ki's
>are subscripted, because the second ki will override the first,
>so this is the same as bane'iki.

Hey, it's the same as your example 14.1).

>> It was a late modification that John made that allowed both orders to be
>> possible without a ku.
>
>Basically requiring fe'e to flag *every* TAhE, ROI, or ZAhO that
>was about space eliminated the ambiguity.  (Previously a fe'e
>was needed to *separate* time and space interval qualifiers,
>which meant they had to be in a fixed order.)

Ah, now I remember.

lojbab

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#856
8:14 AM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  "bad Lojban" [was: Re Lojban  adventure - voluntee
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

Further to my comments about what "bad Lojban" would be in
Lojban, and whether or not {la lojban. xlali} would a Lojbanic
evil, I've just noticed in Nick's lujvo list {zirjbo} for "bad
Lojban."  I note he describes this as a "Helsemism" - could you
clarify, Mike?

co'o mi'e robin.


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#857
8:40 AM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: bad lojban
 From:  michael helsem

From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

i used to use "zirjbo", "jbozi'e" & suchlike, to refer to
my usage such as took undue liberties either grammar- or semantics-wise;
particularly when not marking figurative
usages with "pe'a". little did i imagine this would become
my sole contribution to the lujvo dictionary... of course,
"pevzirjbo" requires some jboklu background to appreciate,
but at least it's kosher (zo'o).


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#858
8:57 AM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: bad lojban
 From:  Bob  LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At 08:39 AM 3/5/99 -0800, michael helsem wrote:
>From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com
>
>i used to use "zirjbo", "jbozi'e" & suchlike, to refer to
>my usage such as took undue liberties either grammar- or semantics-wise;
>particularly when not marking figurative
>usages with "pe'a". little did i imagine this would become
>my sole contribution to the lujvo dictionary... of course,
>"pevzirjbo" requires some jboklu background to appreciate,
>but at least it's kosher (zo'o).

The main reason it is the only word of yours in the lujvo dictionary is
that Nick was working only from my online archive of the time (1993).  Many
others will likely be considered if/when we get people willing to undertake
massive lujvo reviewing and place structure analysis  (and volunteers can
start with the word frequency list and tackle the massive number of lujvo
not yet written up - Michael's offline stuff will have to come later, alas,
unless he wants to type or scan it in).

lojbab

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#859
11:07 AM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  Hot potatoes
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

To answer my own question about cloze-test software, you can get
a wonderful program called "Hot potatoes" which will not only
write cloze tests but also multiple choice test, jumbled
sentences, crosswords - you name it.  The URL is

http://web.uvic.ca/hrd/halfbaked

And it's freeware!

co'o mi'e robin.


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#860
3:58 PM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: lo lunra selgusni  ninmu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar



la bret cusku di'e

>.u'i, that's another perspective.  if you don't know, that's a
>translation of part of a zen koan: two zen students & a zen master are
>looking at a flag... the first student: "it is the flag that moves" --
>the second student: "no, it is the breeze that moves" -- the master
>replies: "no, you are both wrong.  it is the mind that moves."

That doesn't work so well in Lojban, because {muvdu} is much
more restricted than "moves". The flag flapping in the wind would
not be a {muvdu}, which is something that moves from one place to
another along some path. Probably {le lanci cu desku} is better.

As for the mind...Metaphorically, we could use {muvdu} for the
mind wandering from thought to thought, but obviously that's not
what the zen master meant. I suppose he meant that it is
the mind that "creates" the movement, being the one that
observes and names it, or something like that.

>mi na jetnu djuno .i mi na zgana lo tarmi be le temci .i mi jinvi le
>du'u le pensi be ro prenu cu na'e banzu le nu skicu le munje temci .i
>.ai mi na skicu le munje ja jetnu temci .i .ai mi skicu le se lifre be
>mi temci

i li'a i cu'u do le se lifri be do temci na sirji i mi na jimpe le du'u
do te smuni di'u makau i xu do na jinvi le du'u le temci cu purci
gi'a cabna gi'a balvi

>.i se'o mi ka'e frili denpa .i se'o mi so'i lo prenu cu prami .i se'o mi
>na'e cafne pensi la djes. .iu

i ki'anai i mi pu krici le du'u do dy pamrai

>ni'o ca le cabdei ku mi mutci pensi lo drata pendo be mi be'o noi se
>cmene la djEsikas. .a'uro'u .i .ue .uisai mi caca'o tavla ko'a .i ti'e
>le'e citno cu fenki zifre


i xamgu i a'o do joi la djEsikas cu nelsi'u ro'u i funza'a ko

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#861
4:09 PM Fri 5 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Lojban Adventure - volunteer  wanted
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la robin cusku di'e
>la deltab cusku di'e
>
>> .i.o'a le nu mi cusku bau la lojban. xlali
>
>Me too!  But I think it should be {xlali lojban.} "bad-type-of Lojban", not
>{lojban. xlali} "lojbanic badness".  Not sure where the article should go'
>though.

Actually, his sentence is grammatically correct. {xlali} is the selbri
of the main clause: le nu mi cusku bau la lojban kei cu xlali
Both {kei} and {cu} are elidable there.
{xlali lojban} is not grammatical, you can't modify a name with a brivla.
I'm not sure I understand {o'a} there. I don't think his Lojban is bad,
but if he he does, why feel proud about it? Maybe {o'anai} was meant?

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#862
11:35 AM Sun 7 Mar 99
 Subject:  Jorge's poem
 From:  Robin  Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

I finally got round to looking up the words I didn't understand
in Jorge's Thanksgiving sonnet (which had gone into my file of
"difficult-looking Lojban texts for further study").  Very nice
it is too.

A few things I still don't understand, though ...

{xukydei} - should this be {xrukydei}?
{le ciromoi masti pe le critu} - "every third month of Autumn"??
{ro lanzu lo ri xruki cu jmaji} - "all familial turkeys gather"??

co'o mi'e robin.


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#863
2:19 PM Sun 7 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Jorge's poem
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la robin presku di'e

>{xukydei} - should this be {xrukydei}?

i mintu i zo xuk cu rafsi zo xruki

>{le ciromoi masti pe le critu} - "every third month of Autumn"??

This I admit is not very conventional. {cimoi} means "third" and
{romoi} means "last", so I meant it to be "third and last".

>{ro lanzu lo ri xruki cu jmaji} - "all familial turkeys gather"??

{ro lanzu} is the first sumti, {lo ri xruki} is the second. It's the
same as {ro lanzu cu jmaji lo ri xruki}, "all families gather
around their turkey".

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#864
10:38 PM Sun 7 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Jorge's poem
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la xorxes cusku di'e

>
> la robin presku di'e
>
> >{xukydei} - should this be {xrukydei}?
>
> i mintu i zo xuk cu rafsi zo xruki
>

Ah, the web-glosser read it as {xu ky dei} - "is this the K-day?"!

>
> >{le ciromoi masti pe le critu} - "every third month of Autumn"??
>
> This I admit is not very conventional. {cimoi} means "third" and
> {romoi} means "last", so I meant it to be "third and last".
>

Didn't know this. {romoi} for "last" strikes me as a bit odd - I would have
read it as "every one in turn".  Must admit I didn't read the chapter on
numbers very carefully.

>
> >{ro lanzu lo ri xruki cu jmaji} - "all familial turkeys gather"??
>
> {ro lanzu} is the first sumti, {lo ri xruki} is the second. It's the
> same as {ro lanzu cu jmaji lo ri xruki}, "all families gather
> around their turkey".
>

The absence of an article in the first sumti threw me, though I assumend
this was the intended meaning.

co'o mi'e robin.


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#865
6:43 PM Mon 8 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Jorge's poem
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la robun cusku di'e

>> >{xukydei}
>
>Ah, the web-glosser read it as {xu ky dei} - "is this the K-day?"!

There's a problem with the glosser, then. But {dei} in that case
would be "this sentence", not "day":  "K, this sentence?"

>{romoi} for "last" strikes me as a bit odd - I would have
>read it as "every one in turn".

I suppose it's not obvious, but it does make some kind of sense:
1, 2, 3, ... all; first, second, third, ... last. I'm not sure I can get
"every one in turn" from it.

>The absence of an article in the first sumti threw me, though I assumend
>this was the intended meaning.

Yes, a number in front of a selbri makes it into a sumti, just as if
there was a {lo}. {ro lanzu} is by definition the same as {ro lo lanzu}.

co'o mi'e xorxes



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#866
4:23 AM Tue 9 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Jorge's poem
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la xorxes. cusku di'e

li'o

> Yes, a number in front of a selbri makes it into a sumti, just as if
> there was a {lo}. {ro lanzu} is by definition the same as {ro lo lanzu}.

Well, that seems to make sense, given that a number in front of a selbri
would have to be tensed, IIRC.  As I said, not being a mathematical type, I
read the chapters on numbers in both the draft textbook and the refgram very
quickly in order to get the minimum I need to get by.  In fact the only
regular use I make of Lojban numbers is starting letters to my parents with
{coi redoi}.  I suppose that's one of the nice things about the language -
you can concentrate on the areas that interest you, and in cases like {ro
lanzu} you can usually get by with the help of context.

co'o mi'e robin.


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#867
2:05 PM Tue 9 Mar 99
 Subject:  1999 Language weights (very long)
 From:  Bob LeChevalier-Logical Langu

From: Bob LeChevalier-Logical Language Group lojba-@lojban.org

The 12 most spoken languages - 1999 Loglan/Lojban Project baseline values

Following is data derived from the 1999 Encyclopedia Brittanica Book of
the Year regarding language populations for the top 12 languages, which
are the baseline set for the Loglan/Lojban project (only the top 6 are
used for Lojban gismu making).  For comparison, summary numbers from
1995 are also shown, along with amount of change, as well as the numbers
used in the original 1987 Lojban word-making.  I think that these
numbers serve as a fairly authoritative estimate of the number of
speakers of the 12 languages, and unlike other published estimates, my
methodology in generating the numbers is open to inspection, along with
the source data I used for individual countries.

The number of 2nd language speakers is determined by taking actual
counts of such 2nd language (or creole) speakers generated by official
sources and reported in the Brittanica.  An increment is added to
reflect 2nd language literacy in the official language of a country,
presuming that all official languages of the country are taught in the
schools, based on official-source literacy figures.  Finally, for
officially Arabic/Moslem countries, the status of Arabic as a religious
language that is taught to believers is used to generate an additional
increment.  This is most significant for Iran where the religion is
heavily state supported even though the official language is not Arabic,
and there are few native speakers of that language.

Having determined these numbers, the Lojban gismu-making weights are
determined by summing the number of native speakers and 1/2 the total
from all 3 methods of estimating 2nd language speakers (since these 3
methods include an elimination of overlap in the calculation).  The
total of 1st and all 2nd language speakers is not used in the Lojban
algorithm.

The 1999 numbers are summarized as follows (in millions).  Note that
Arabic has now passed Russian and moved into 5th place among the
languages used.  This, in addition to Hindi passing English several
years ago, suggest that the gismu list would look somewhat different if
remade from scratch today, since when languages are close together in
population, a change in order will significantly affect tie-breaking
results in scoring of words.

Given that the Lojban gismu list is baselined, these numbers are
primarily for academic interest.  However, they can be used in making
fu'ivla (borrowings) where it is not clear that a particular language
root is appropriate.  Using an algorithm like the gismu algortihm
(though not necessarily with the same constraints on word form, would
give an "international" or "Lojbanic" root to use as the basis of a
fu'ivla.


             native          2nd/creole+literacy+religion   Total speakers
             native+1/2*2nd
             normalized weight for 6 languages based on 1.0 total.
             (change from 1995)  (change from 1987)

Chinese      837.161         349.964+21.529                 1208.654
            1022.908
             .334   (-.013) (-.026)

Hindi        455.352         221.315+61.362                  738.029
             596.690
             .195   (-.001) (+.039)

English      346.126         381.337+69.936                  797.399
             571.763
             .187   (+.027) (-.021)

Spanish      341.977         15.686+13.891                   371.553
             356.765
             .116   (-.007) (+.000)

Arabic       230.533         0+25.387+50.801                 306.721
             268.627
             .088   (+.003) (+.015)

Russian      204.517         0+86.956                        291.473
             247.995
             .081   (-.008) (-.006)


Bengali      205.66          0+1.104                         206.764
             206.212
Portuguese   169.154         12.048+7.070                    188.272
             178.713
Japanese     126.407         0+1.118                         127.525
             126.966
French       80.077          60.391+24.105                   164.573

             122.325
Malay-Indon. 40.439          0+157.457                       197.896
             119.167
German       92.247          2.168+10.019                    104.434
             98.340

The 1995 numbers are summarized as follows (in millions):

             native          2nd/creole+literacy+religion   Total speakers
             native+1/2*2nd
             normalized weight for 6 languages based on 1.0 total.

Chinese      801.552         314.039+25.225                 1140.816
             971.184
             .347

Hindi        413.231         66.39+206.000                   685.621
             549.426
             .196

English      334.786         187.907+59.895                  582.588
             448.343
             .160

Spanish      330.999         12.644+11.531                   355.174
             343.086
             .123

Russian      210.948         0+77.965                        288.913
             249.930
             .089

Arabic       205.272         0+19.705+46.991                 271.968
             238.620
             .085


Bengali      183.860         0+.927                          184.787
             184.323
Portuguese   166.662         6.294+10.028                    182.984
             174.823
Japanese     125.086         0                               125.086
             125.086
French       74.529          41.198+29.477                   145.204
             109.866
Malay-Indon. 37.752          137.526                         175.278
             106.515
German       94.768          1.714+8.511                     104.993
             99.880

For comprison, here is the total speakers from the 1987 World Almanac,
the comparable figures from the 1997 World Almanac, and the numbers used
in the 1987 original Lojban gismu-remaking effort, which were based on
the 1985 Brittanica BotY.  Note that Hindi passed up English in about
1989 due to rapidly increasing numbers of native speakers along with a
major increase in literacy which is continuing.  A significant part of
the drop in native English, French, German, and Indonesian speakers is
due to the switching of creole speakers and some estimates of non-native
official language speakers (especially in Africa) from native to 2nd
language totals.

             1987 1997          1987 gismu-remaking                   1999
             World Almanac      native  2nd     n+1/2s  weight       weight
Chinese      788  853/999       752.1   319.1   911.7   .360         .334
English      420  330/487       366.5   322.4   527.7   .208         .187
Hindi        382  348/457       294     200.3   394.2   .156         .195
Spanish      296  346/401       264.7   58.2    293.8   .116         .116
Russian      285  168/280       164.3   109.7   219.12  .087         .081
Arabic       177  195/230       155.9   57.7    184.8   .073         .088

Bengali      171  197/204       87      80.8    127.4
Portuguese   164  173/188       110.4   45.5    133.2
Malay/Indon. 128   54/164       121.1   39.5    140.9
Japanese     122  125/126       120.1   0.6     120.4
German       118   98/124       105.4   18.3    114.6
French       114   74/126       81.1    75.5    118.9


Following are the 6 columns of 1999 raw data, by language, by country.

In the raw data, Column 1 is native speakers of the language from the
Britannica BotY.  Column 2 is non-native speakers, speakers of the
language as a lingua franca, and speakers of creoles and other
significantly non-standard dialects (e.g.  Catalan and Galician for
Spanish, Luxembourgish for German, and non-Mandarin Chinese.)  These
numbers also come straight from the BotY.  Ukrainian and Belarussian are
considered native Russian speakers, since the differences are more
political than linguistic (though in the longer term, Ukrainian speakers
probably should be switched into the 2nd language column).  Urdu is
considered a native dialect of Hindi.

What is rarely carried in the BotY are speakers of the official language

of a country as a second language.  For example, how many
non-native-English speakers in the UK speak English as a second
language.  The answer is something less than 100%; so I used the
percentage literacy multiplied by the number of non-native-or-creole
speakers of an official language.  For European countries, literacy is
close to 100%, but for 3rd world countries, the number is far less.  For
countries with 2 official languages, I further reduced the result of the
above calculation by the ratio of the speakers of the official language
divided by the total speakers of all official languages.  The result of
this calculation is considered as an increment to any number of 2nd
language speakers given in column 2. That increment is shown in column
3, and the data used in the calculation is shown in column 4.

(In previous iterations of these statistics, I have used variations on
this method to estimate 2nd language speakers.  Creole speakers were
originally treated as native speakers, though I have since learned that
the creoles are sufficiently different from the standard language that a
native speaker level of knowledge of the standard language is
improbable.)

The former Soviet states are a special case, in that Russian (or a
dialect) is an official language in only 3 of the current countries, but
the educational system up to a couple of years ago was built around
Russian as the official language.  Because of this, I calculated 2nd
language Russian speakers, as if it *were* the official language, but
then subtracted the number of native Russian speakers in the country
from this total to determine the column 3 number.  In future years, this
number may need to be slowly prorated downward as a new education system
supplants the Russian one, but this should not have significant effect
for at least a decade, as the older 2nd language Russian speakers will
probably retain their educated knowledge of the language for as long as
Russia is the dominant economic power of the region.

Columns 5 and 6 exist for Arabic only, and are an increment based on
countries in which Arabic is the official language or the Muslim
religion is militantly supported by the government (Iran being the major
example).  In this case, I determined if there was an excess of
followers of the Muslim religion above the total number of 1st and 2nd
language speakers of Arabic determined in columns 1-4.  This excess was
then multiplied by the literacy rate to get a guesstimate of non-Arabic
native speakers who might still have considerable knowledge of the
Arabic language through religious training.  I did not calculate a
religion-based number for countries that are Muslim, but which are
unlikely to have government-sponsored teaching of the language (e.g.
Indonesia).

Chinese (Mandarin)         Cantonese/undiff.    other
Australia       .098            .214
Brunei          .051
Cambodia        .330
Canada          .322
China        817.000         325.990           21.184    (1242.980-817.0) *
.815 - 325.99
Costa Rica      .007
Fr. Polynesia   .013
Guam            .002
HongKong        .074           6.454             ---     (6.66-0.074) *
7.59/(7.59+2.1)* .922 - 6.454
Japan           .240
N.Korea         .030
S.Korea         .050
Macau           .005            .410                     (.426-.005) *
.415/.425) *.895  -.410
Malaysia       2.000
Mauritius       .004
Nauru           .0009
N. Marianas I.  .0047
Palau           .0003
Panama          .008
Phillipines     .070
Reunion         .020
Singapore      1.371           1.070             .345    (3.164-1.371) *
3.812/(1.183+.446+2.441+.235) * .891 -1.070
Taiwan         4.390          16.970              ---    (21.843-4.390) *
.940 - 16.97
Thailand       7.420
USA            1.520
Vietnam        1.070
             837.161         349.964           21.529
            1022.908         185.747

Hindi/Urdu                    (Nepali Pahari/Bhojpuri/Malthili in
Mauritius/Nepal/Bhutan)
Bhutan          .220

Fiji            .347
India        442.620          206.78           11.798     (984.004-442.62)
* 649.4/(649.4+187.0) *.520 - 206.78
Jamaica         .050
Mauritius       .021             .245
Nepal           .880           14.29
Pakistan      10.780                           49.563     (141.900-10.78) *
.378
Trinidad        .044
USA             .390
             455.352          221.315          61.362
             596.690          141.338

English
Amer. Samoa     .002            .061
Antigua         .066            .003
Aruba           .008
Australia     15.204           2.896             .607    (18.725-15.204) *
.995 - 2.896
Bahamas         .260                             .032    (.293-.260) * .982
Bangladesh                     3.300
Barbados                        .252 creole      .006    .265 * .974  -.252
Belize          .119            .061 creole      .021    (.235-.119) * .703
-.061
Bermuda         .062
Botswana                        .580             .431    1.448 * .698 - .580
Brunei          .120
Cameroon                       7.500            2.028    15.029 * .634 - 7.500
Canada        19.328                            7.842    (30.677-19.328) *
19.328/(19.328+7.693) * .966
Colombia                        .050 creole
Costa Rica                      .071 creole
Denmark         .024
Dominica                        .076 creole
Fiji                            .160             .566    .793 * .916 - .160
France          .080
Gambia                                           .499    1.292 * .386
Ghana                          1.290           10.641    18.497 * .645 - 1.29
Gibraltar       .024                             .003    (.0271-.024) * .99
Grenada         .100
Guam            .055            .092              ---    (.148-.055) * .99
- .092
Guernsey        .062
Guyana          .746                             .035    (.782-.746)  * .981
Honduras                        .011 creole
Hong Kong       .147           1.953
India           .210         186.790              ---    (984.004-.210) *
187/(187+649.4) * .520 -186.79
Ireland        3.590                             .043    (3.647-3.590) *
3.590/(3.590+1.190)  * 1.000
Isle of Man     .073
Jamaica        2.400
Japan           .080
Jersey          .086
Kenya                          2.600             .193    28.337 * 2.6/20.6
* .781 - 2.6
Kiribati                        .021             .055    .084 * .900 - .021
Lesotho                         .500              ---    2.09 * .713 *
.5/2.28 - .5
Liberia                         .55+2.222 creole
Luxembourg      .004
Macau           .002
Malawi                          .510            5.040    9.84 * .564 - .51
Malaysia        .360           6.340
Malta           .008                             .008    (.377-.008) *
.008/.369 * .96
Marshall Isl                    .0628
Mauritius       .002
Micronesia      .0005
Monaco          .002
Namibia         .013            .297
Nauru           .0008           .0096
Nepal                          6.500
Nether Antill   .017
New Zealand    3.457                             .329    (3.801-3.457) *
3.457/(3.457+.161) * 1.0
Nicaragua                       .027 creole
Nigeria                       50.0 creole      13.114    110.532 *.571 - 50.0
N Mariana Isl   .0032           .0571            .004    (.0666-.0032) *
.963 - .0571
Norway          .024
Pakistan                      16.000
Palau           .0006           .0174
Panama                          .387 creole
Papua New Guin                  .07+2.990 creole .261    4.60 * .722 - 3.060
Phillipines                   38.000            6.243    73.131 * .946 *
38.0/(38.0+21.42) - 38.0
Puerto Rico    1.794
St Kitts Nevis  .042
St Lucia        .157
St. Vincent     .112                             .001    (.113-.112) * .960
Samoa           .090
Seychelles      .003            .025
Sierra Leone                   4.400              ---    4.577 * .314 - 4.4
Singapore                      1.183              ---    3.164 *
1.183/(1.183+.446+2.441+.235) * .891 - 1.183

Solomon Isl                     .158             .072    .426  * .541 - .158
South Africa   3.990                            3.013    (42.835-3.99) *
3.99/(3.99+6.47+.64+1.11+7.5+9.6+4.2+2.96+3.08+1.8+.73) * .818
Sri Lanka      1.930
Surinam                         .400
Swaziland                       .040             .701    .966 * .767
Sweden          .032
Tanzania                       3.300                      30.609 *
3.3/(2.2+28.0) * .678 -3.3
Tonga                           .029             .062    .098 * .928 - .029
Trinidad                       1.235 creole      .013    1.275 * .979 - 1.235
Tunisia         .300
Tuvalu                                           .010    .0104 * .950
Uganda                         2.400
Unit Kingdom  57.520                            1.606    (59.126-57.52) * 1.0
USA          232.910          29.090            6.581    (270.262-232.91) *
.955 - 29.09
Vanuatu         .060            .120
Virgin Isl      .096                             .020    (.118-.096) * .897
Zambia          .100           1.700            5.620    (9.461 - .1) *
.782 - 1.7
Zimbabwe        .250           4.950            4.236    (11.044 -.25) *
.851 - 4.95
             346.126         381.337           69.936
             571.763         225.636

                             2nd includes
Spanish                      Catalan/Galician
Andorra         .030            .020
Argentina     34.980                            1.101    (36.125-34.98) * .962
Aruba           .007
Australia       .098
Belgium         .050
Belize          .074            .056
Bolivia        6.980                             .492    (7.957-6.98) *
6.98/(6.98+1.82+2.71) * .831
Canada          .101
Chile         13.290                            1.458    (14.822-13.29) * .952
Colombia      37.320                             .333    (37.685-37.32) * .913
Costa Rica     3.445                             .083    (3.533-3.445) * .948
Cuba          11.116
Dominican Rep  7.730                             .126    (7.883-7.73) * .821
Ecuador       11.320                             .770    (12.175-11.32) * .901
El Salvador    5.752
Equat. Guinea                                    .178    .454 * .785 * 1/2
France          .220            .260
Guatemala      6.990                            2.119    (10.802-6.990) * .556
Honduras       5.752                             .121    (5.919-5.752) * .727
Italy                           .030
Mexico        88.270           6.150             .624    (95.830-88.27) *
.896 - 6.15
Nicaragua      4.648                             .076    (4.763-4.648) * .657
Panama         2.125                             .583    (2.767-2.125) * .908
Paraguay       2.879                             .827    (5.223-2.879) *
2.879/(2.879+4.636) * .921
Peru          19.790                            3.599    (24.801-19.79) *
19.79/(19.79+4.65) * .887
Puerto Rico    3.718                             .041    (3.786-3.718) *
.897 * 3.718/(3.718+1.794)
Spain         29.290           9.170             .558    (39.371-29.29) *
.965 - 9.17
Sweden          .056
USA           20.340
Uraguay        3.080                             .132    (3.216-3.08) * .973
Venezuela     22.510                             .667    (23.242-22.51) * .911
Virgin Islands  .016
             341.977          15.686           13.891
             356.765          14.788

Russian/Ukrainian/Belarusian
Armenia                                         3.754    3.800 * .988
Australia       .034
Azerbaijan      .230                            7.622    8.070 * .973 - .23
Belarus       10.120                             .113    (10.235-10.12) * .979
Canada          .283
Czech           .013
Estonia         .470                             .973    1.447 *.997 - .47
Finland         .018
Georgia         .480                            4.924    5.431 *.995 - .480
Israel          .520
Kazakhstan     6.430                            8.972    15.797 *.975 - 6.43
Kyrgyzstan      .840                            3.710    4.691 *.970 - 0.84

Latvia          .970                            1.463    2.445 *.995 - 0.97
Lithuania       .390                            3.295    3.704 *.995 - .39
Moldova         .458                            3.645    4.243 *.967 - .458
Poland          .420
Romania         .094
Russia       129.480                           17.033    (146.861-129.48) *
.98
Slovakia        .034
Tajikistan      .590                            5.381    6.112 *.977 - .590
Turkmenistan    .343                            4.279    4.731 *.977 - .343
Ukraine       49.200                            1.084    (50.302-49.20) * .984
USA             .390
Uzbekistan     2.710                           20.706    24.091 *.972 - 2.71
             204.517                           86.956
             247.995          43.478

Arabic
Algeria       25.840                            2.590    (30.045-25.84) *
.616                     .979   30.02 religion-25.84-2.590 * .616
Australia       .182
Bahrain         .430                             .173    (.633-.43) * .852
                       .0     .520 religion-.430-.173 * .852
Belgium         .160
Cameroon        .150
Canada          .049
Chad           1.920                            1.219    (7.360-1.92) *
1.92/(1.92+2.2) * .481     .395   3.96 religion-1.92-1.219 * .481
Comoros         .009                             .004    (.546-.009) *
.009/(.543+.009+.110) *.573 .303   .542 religion-.004-.009 * .573
Denmark         .024
Djibouti        .070                             .111    (.652-.070) *
.070/.170 *.462             .209   .634 religion-.111-.070 * .462
Egypt         62.500                             .391    (63.261-62.50) *
.514                     .0     56.30 religion-62.5-.391 *.514
Eritrea         .010
                       .530   2.66 religion -.010 * .200
France         1.490
Gaza           1.076                             .006    (1.082-1.076) *
1.076/1.082 * .956        .0     1.068 religion
Gibraltar       .002
Iran           1.330
                     43.000   60.97 religion-1.33 * .721
Iraq          16.750                            2.884    (21.722-16.750) *
.580                    .833   21.07 religion-16.75-2.884 * .580
Israel         1.030                             .997    (5.740-1.03) *
1.03/(1.03+3.62) * .956
Jordan         4.590                             .080    (4.682-4.59) *
.866                              4.52 religion-4.59-.080
Kenya           .070
Kuwait         1.460                             .319    (1.866-1.46) *
.786                              1.59 religion-1.46-.319
Lebanon        3.260                             .227    (3.506-3.26) * .924
Libya          5.460                             .176    (5.691-5.46) *
.762                       .0     5.52 religion-5.46-.176
Mali            .160
Mauritania     2.050                             .174    (2.511-2.05) *
.377                       .104   2.50 religion-2.05-.174 * .377
Mayotte
                       .119   .130 religion *.919
Morocco       18.050                            4.249    (27.772-18.05) *
.437                    2.374   27.73 religion-28.05-4.249 * .437
Netherlands     .140
Niger           .030
Nigeria         .300
Oman           1.810                             .326    (2.364-1.81) *
.588                       .0     2.08 religion-1.81-.326 *.588
Panama          .015
Qatar           .230                             .277    (.579-.230)  *
.794                       .034   .550 religion-.230-.277 * .794
Saudi Arabia  19.750                             .651    (20.786-19.750) *
.628                    .0     20.09 religion-19.75-.651 * .628
Somalia                                          .027    (6.842-6.730
Somali) * .240              1.633   6.83 religion -.027 * .240
Sudan         16.560                            7.833    (33.551-16.56) *
.461                     .045   24.49 religion-16.56-7.833 * .461

Sweden          .068
Syria         13.800                            1.087    (15.335-13.80) *
.708                     .0     13.19 religion-13.8-1.087 *.708
Tunisia        9.330                             .033    (9.380-9.33) *
.667                              9.33 religion-9.33-.033 *.667
Turkey          .880
UAE            1.150                            1.262    (2.744-1.15) *
.792                       .156   2.61 religion-1.15-1.262 * .792
USA             .420
West Bank      1.740                             .124    (1.881-1.74) *
1.74/(1.74+.15) * .956            1.54 religion-1.74-.124
Western Sahara  .288
                              .288 religion
Yemen         16.000                             .168    (16.388-16.00) *
.432                     .087   16.37 religion-16.0-.168 * .432
             230.533                           25.387
                     50.801
             268.627          38.094

Bengali
Bangladesh   124.670                            1.104    127.567-124.67 *.381
India         80.920
Nepal           .030
USA             .040
             205.660                            1.104
             206.212            .552

Portuguese
Andorra         .007
Angola                         3.800             .731    10.865 * .417 - 3.8
Australia       .027
Brazil       157.800                            3.304    (161.766-157.80)
*.833
Canada          .187
Cape Verde                      .400
France          .680
Guinea-Bissau   .124            .411 creole      .318    (1.206-.535) * .549
Luxembourg      .054
Macau           .010
Mozambique      .230           4.800            2.583    (18.641 -.230) *
.401 - 4.8
Paraguay        .165
Portugal       9.870                             .084    (9.964-9.87) * .896
Sao Tome                        .117             .0      .136 * .542 - .117
Spain                          2.520 (Galician)
USA             .500
             169.154          12.048            7.070
             178.713           9.559

Japanese
Brazil          .610
Guam            .003
Hong Kong       .013
Japan        125.280                            1.118    126.398-125.28 * 1.0
N.Marianas I.   .0013
USA             .500
             126.407                            1.118
             126.966            .559

French
Algeria                        6.000
Andorra         .004
Australia       .043
Bahamas                         .030 creole
Belgium        3.340                            2.420    10.208-3.340 *
3.34/(3.34+6.05+.09)  *1.0
Benin                           .600            1.657    6.101 *.370 -.600
Burkina Faso    .030           4.570              ---    11.266-.03 *.192 -
4.57
Burundi                         .520            1.435    5.537 *.353 -.520
Cameroon                       4.500            2.316    10.751 *.634 -4.50
Canada         7.693                            6.307    30.677-7.693
*7.693/(7.683+19.388) *.966
Cent Afr Rep                    .800             .076    3.376 *.600
*.8/3.8 -.35
Chad                           2.200              ---    7.360 *.481 *
2.2/4.12 - 2.2
Comoros         .091            .019             .043    .546-.091 *
.110/(.543+.110+.009) *.573 -.019
Congo Rep                      1.400             .591    2.658 *.749 - 1.4
Congo (Zaire)                  3.800              ---    49.001 *.773 *
3.8/77.8 (other lingua franca) - 3.8
Ivory Coast                    7.700              ---    15.446 *.401 -7.7
Djibouti                        .100             .077    .652 *.462 *
.10/.17 -.10
Dominica                        .069 creole
Dominican Rep                   .160 creole
Egypt                           .260
Equ. Guinea                                      .178    .454 * 1/2 * .785
France        55.100                            3.251    58.390 -55.1 *.988
French Guiana                   .159 creole      .008    .169-.159 *.830

Fr Polynesia    .184                             .042    .228-.184 *.950
Gabon                          1.000              ---    1.208 *.632 -1.000
Guadaloupe      .413                             .019    .434-.413 *.901
Guinea                          .700            1.984    7.477 *.359 -.7
Guinea-Bissau                   .120
Haiti          6.180
Italy           .310
Jersey                          .006             .080    .0856*1.0  -.006
Lebanon                         .840
Luxembourg      .016
Madagascar                     2.200              ---    14.463 *
2.2/16.51 * .802 -2.2
Mali                           1.000            2.134    10.109 * .310 - 1.0
Martinique      .385                             .012    .398-.385 * .925
Mauritania                      .250
Mauritius       .040            .817 creole
Mayotte                         .056             .067    .134 * .919 - .056
Monaco          .013                             .019    .032 -.013 * 1.0
Morocco                       11.100
New Caledonia   .070                             .078    .204-.070 * .579
Niger                          1.500              ---    9.672 * .136 - 1.5
Reunion                         .630 creole      .048    .692-.63 * .782
Rwanda                          .600
St. Lucia                       .121 creole
Sao Tome & Pr   .001
Senegal                        3.400              ---    9.723 *.331 - 3.4
Seychelles      .001            .074 creole      .004    .0794-.075 * .842
Switzerland    1.370                            1.223    7.118-1.37  *
1.37/(1.37+4.53+.54) * 1.0
Togo                           2.500             .036    4.906 * .517 - 2.5
Tunisia        2.760
USA            2.000            .220 creole
Vanuatu         .030
Vietnam                         .370
Virgin Islands  .003
              80.077          60.391           24.105
             122.325          42.248

Malay-Indonesian
Australia       .029
Brunei          .249                             .058    .315-.249 * .878
Indonesia     24.580                          149.480    202.957-24.58 * .838
Malaysia      12.900                            7.668    22.083-12.90 * .835
New Caledonia   .005
Singapore       .446                             .251    3.164-.446 *
.446/(1.183+.446+2.441+.235) *.891
Thailand       2.230
              40.439                          157.457
             119.167          78.728

German
Australia       .109
Austria        7.424                             .646    8.070-7.424* 1.000
Belgium         .090                             .096    10.208-.09 *
.09/9.48 * 1.000
Belize          .003
Brazil          .890
Canada          .531            .028 (Yiddish)
Czech           .048
Denmark         .027
France                         1.510
Germany       74.830                            7.318    82.148-74.83 * 1.000
Hungary         .040
Italy           .310
Kazakhstan      .480
Kyrgyzstan      .030
Liechtenstein   .028                             .003    .0314-.028 *1.0
Luxembourg      .010            .280 (Lux'ish)   .135    .425-.010 *1.0  -.280
Namibia         .015
Paraguay        .045
Poland          .500
Romania         .097
Russia          .350
Slovakia        .005
Sweden          .045
Switzerland    4.530                            1.820    7.118-4.530 *
4.530/6.440 *1.0
USA            1.810            .350 (Yiddish, PA Dutch)
              92.247           2.168           10.019
              98.340           6.093

----
lojbab                     ***NOTE NEW ADDRESS***           lojba-@lojban.org
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA               703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban:
  see Lojban WWW Server: href=" http://xiron.pc.helsinki.fi/lojban/ "
  Order _The Complete Lojban Language_ - see our Web pages or ask me.


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#868
1:04 PM Wed 10 Mar 99
 Subject:  xa'unro'a ximu
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

di'e zo'u so'o le selpei poi mo'i fasnu mi ze'a le li'i denci
mikce mi vau (Some of the things that went through my head
while i was in the dentist's chair.) .i tu'e sliri spoja cmana
tu'i la .ai,on. no'u pa le  vo barda mluni be la mumplini
(Sulfur-erupting volcanoes on Io, which is one of the moons of Jupiter.)
.i se xanri lenu vofli mo'izo'i le ca'o sliri farlu
(I imagine flying into the falling sulfur.) .i da'i viska (What
i would see.) .i vlile tcima pelxu mo'ivi'u (Storms of yellow
moving in every direction.) .i lu'e pinji joi vlagi vau
(Penetration.) .i barna le drudi (Markings on the ceiling) .i
la'edi'u so'amei simlu lo lerfu (that almost look like letters.)
.i la .ai,on. vau (Io.) .i gletu (Sex.) .i valsi (Words.) .i
le munje cu cukta pe'a (The world is a book.) .i su'oroi tcidu
(We can sometimes read it.) .i moklu cortu (Mouth pain.) .i
jdini .i jdini .i jdini (Money, money, money.)
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#869
2:48 PM Wed 10 Mar 99
 Subject:  xa'unro'a ximu
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

di'e zo'u so'o le selpei poi mo'i fasnu mi ze'a le li'i denci
mikce mi vau (Some of the things that went through my head
while i was in the dentist's chair.) .i tu'e sliri spoja cmana
tu'i la .ai,on. no'u pa le  vo barda mluni be la mumplini
(Sulfur-erupting volcanoes on Io, which is one of the moons of Jupiter.)
.i se xanri lenu vofli mo'izo'i le ca'o sliri farlu
(I imagine flying into the falling sulfur.) .i da'i viska (What
i would see.) .i vlile tcima pelxu mo'ivi'u (Storms of yellow
moving in every direction.) .i lu'e pinji joi vlagi vau
(Penetration.) .i barna le drudi (Markings on the ceiling) .i
la'edi'u so'amei simlu lo lerfu (that almost look like letters.)
.i la .ai,on. vau (Io.) .i gletu (Sex.) .i valsi (Words.) .i
le munje cu cukta pe'a (The world is a book.) .i su'oroi tcidu
(We can sometimes read it.) .i moklu cortu (Mouth pain.) .i
jdini .i jdini .i jdini (Money, money, money.)
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#870
5:04 PM Sat 13 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: xa'unro'a ximu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

coi maikl

i ranji fa le nu lei do xa'unro'a cu pluka i a'o do mi fraxu le
nu mi roroi te pinka le bangu noi ju'o do ke'a certu pilno

>tu'i la .ai,on. no'u pa le  vo barda mluni be la mumplini

i oi zo ai,on cu malglico cmene i u'i ckire fi le nu do na pilno
zo djupytyr le nu cmene le plini

>la'edi'u so'amei simlu lo lerfu (that almost look like letters.)

i di'u se smuni le du'u so'a lei barna cu simlu lo lerfu
i lu so'amei li'u zoi gy almost gy na drani munmi'u
i pe'i lu jibni simlu le ka lerfu li'u cu dramau

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#871
10:30 AM Tue 16 Mar 99
 Subject:  le djica prijyske
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

coi rodoi

Further to earlier discussions about the desirability of writing
a
philosophical text directly in Lojban, rather than translating
from a natlang,
I'm attempting to do just that.  The following is my attempt at a
first
paragraph - apologies for my usual mangled Lojban.  {prijyske} is
yet
another of my attempts to coin a catchy lujvo for "philosophy".
I'm not
sure if it's legitimate, though, since the web-glosser refuses to
analyse it.
{le djica prijyske} would thus be something like "the philosophy
of
desire", though it's not intended to have the Blakean/Nietzschean

overtones that the English phrase suggests!

le djica prijyske

.ia lesi'o djica cu vajrai  velciste pe leka lifri prijyske ki'u
lesi'o marde cu
nibli lesi'o djica  .i piso'i le prenu cu jinvi du'u leka djica
.e leka marde cu
simfapro .i ku'i le prenu poi na'e djica ku na'e se mukti leka
vrude .i mu'a
pa le prenu goi ko'a cu krici du'u lenu sarje le pindi cu vrude
.i ku'i ko'a
sarje le pindi .ijo ko'a djica lenu sarje .a leka vrude .i li'a
le prenu poi xebni
leka vrude na'e bilga lenu vrude gasnu ku vo'a

co'o mi'e robin




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#872
11:33 AM Tue 16 Mar 99
 Subject:  Introductory text
 From:  Robin Turner
A while back some of the good folks on the AUXLANG list asked if
I could write a "user-friendly" introduction to Lojban - i.e.
linguistic knowledge not required, native-speaker English not
required, no getting bogged down in the details of the language
etc. etc.  I've finally got round to writing it, and the result
is attatched here (as an HTML document).  I'd be grateful if
people could check it for Lojbanic inaccuracies, silly ideas etc.
before I put it on the web.

co'o mi'e robin.







 Lojban - a logical language


1. Welcome to Lojbanistan!
Lojban, in Lojban, means logical language (the j is pronounced
as in French bonjour)  Lojbanistan is both an imaginary country
where Lojban is spoken and, in practice, the international community of
Lojban-speakers.
Lojban itself came out of an earlier language project called Loglan,
and it shares Loglans interest in the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis -
the idea that the language you speak affects the way you think.  Most
people who have learnt a foreign language, or have grown up speaking two
languages, will be familiar with this idea, having found themselves thinking
and speaking in one language or the other because something is easier to
say in that language.  One of the main ideas behind the Loglan/Lojban
project was to create a language which is both highly expressive and as
culturally neutral as possible, then see what people from different cultures
do with it.  To give an example, in most European languages time and
gender are very important  you can say She goes, It went,  Hell
go and so on, but just to say She/he/it go, with no particular gender
or time in mind, sounds strange.  In Chinese, on the other hand, ta
qu (he/she/it go) is perfectly normal.  In Lojban there are plenty
of words to show the time of an action, its length, how it happens and
so on  but you dont have to use any of them.  If I really wanted
to, I could say:



 koa puzuzeudii klama


 she/he/it past-long-time-distance-long-time-interval-regularly go


 A long time ago, for a long time, she went regularly.


But normally Id just say:



koa klama


she/he/it go.


Notice that you can translate the first example into English (more-or-less)
but the second one just wont go into English, or most European languages.
If youre European and this strikes you as odd, you may have just witnessed
a Sapir-Whorf effect!
However, if Lojban only existed as some kind of experiment to test the
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, probably very few people would bother to learn
it.  In fact, Lojbans other uses have taken over so much that quite
a few Lojbanists who dont believe much in Sapir-Whorf still use the language
because of its other benefits.  Some that Ive heard are:


It encourages you to think clearly and logically.


It lets you express ideas precisely, but allows you to be vague when you
want to.


It can easily express a much wider range of emotions than most natural
languages.


It helps you step out of your cultural conditioning.


Computers can understand it.


Its good for discussing philosophy.


Its good for writing poetry 

 and so on.  Not all Lojbanists would agree with all of these statements
 we are not language missionaries  but theres something in the language
for almost everyone.
In the long-term, Lojban has more ambitious goals.  Some ways that
people have suggested Lojban can be used are:


As a language for human-computer interaction and artificial intelligence
research.


As an interlanguage for translation  it would probably be easier and more
accurate to translate from, say, Korean into Lojban then from Lojban to
German, than directly from Korean to German.


As a meta-language i.e. a language for describing languages.


As a language for international law.


As a way of improving our understanding of different cultures.


As a tool in psychotherapy and other forms of self-development.


As an international language.

This last point needs some clarification.  There are already dozens
of international languages, the most famous being Esperanto.  Although
Lojban can (and in my opinion, should) be used as an international language,
it is not in direct competition with any of these, because it is not only
an international language.  Of course it would be nice if the whole
world started speaking Lojban, but if the United Nations decided to adopt
Esperanto or Interlingua or whatever, most inhabitants of Lojbanistan would
rush out and learn that language  and still go on using Lojban for its
other benefits.


2. Lojban Words
Constructed languages create words in two main ways.  There are some,
mainly fictional languages like Elvish or Klingon, which make up all the
words from scratch.  Most international languages, however, take their
vocabulary from existing languages (in practice, European languages) and
sometimes modify them to suit the spelling and grammar of the new language
 Esperanto is a good example.  Lojban falls half way between the
two.
The root words (gismu in Lojban) were created by a computer from
words in the six most widely-spoken languages in the world:  Chinese,
Hindi/Urdu, English, Spanish, Arabic and Russian.  This is one of
the advantages of Lojban  it doesnt give a privileged position to European
languages.  These are also languages that have had a lot of words
in common other languages; for example, French and Italian share a lot
of words with Spanish, and although Turkish is not on the list, I found
in Lojban a lot of elements of Turkish which had come in from Arabic and
Persian (which is quite close to Urdu).  And of course English words
like television and taxi have spread all over the world.
All root words have five letters.  For example:


prenu - person


hirma  horse


vanju  wine

Although these dont look much like any particular word in any language,
you can see bits of different languages in each of them.  For example,
prenu
has the per of English person and the ren of Chinese.
hirma
has the h and r of English horse and Chinese ma. vanju
is like French vin and Chinese jiu.  This makes learning
words easier for the largest number of people.
There are 1,300 root words.  This might sound like a lot, but it
is nothing compared to the roughly 20,000 words a native speaker of a natural
language knows.  Because you cant say everything you want with such
a small number of words, Lojban allows compound words (lujvo in
Lojban).  For example, there is no root word for nurse, so I created
a compound, kurmikce (c is like English sh) from kurji
(take care of) and mikce (medic).  Lojban speakers have the
freedom to create these compound words to express anything they want to
say  if it catches on, it passes into the general Lojban vocabulary, and
might even make it into the dictionary.  The important thing is that
somebody learning Lojban doesnt have to learn every lujvo someone
makes up, because you can nearly always guess what they mean (if you cant
guess, theres a neat little program on the Web which does it for you 
remember what I said about computers being able to read Lojban?).
This leaves the cmavo, or structure words.  Many languages
put their grammar into their words, so that, for example, in Latin you
have amo, amas, amat, amamus, amantis, amant.  This kind of
thing comes naturally to native speakers, and is horribly difficult for
the rest of us.  Lojban (like Chinese) makes every part of the grammar
a separate word.  In English you have to change go to went to
put it in the past, but in Chinese you just say qu le, and in Lojban
you just say pu klama.  This brings us to 


3. Lojban Grammar
Grammar is a word with painful memories for many of us.  I learnt
German at school, and was constantly amazed at how complicated and illogocal
the grammar was (not that English is much better!).
Lojban grammar seems strange at first sight, but is actually quite simple.
It is based on a system called predicate logic, which states that in any
sentence you have a function (selbri in Lojban) which says
something about its arguments (sumti).  To give an example,
the English sentence
         Robin adores Juliette
Binoche
has a function, adore, which describes a relationship between two
arguments, Robin and Juliette Binoche.  In Lojban this would be
         la robin. prami
la julIET.binOC
or, if you prefer,
         la robin. la juliIET.binOC
prami
(the capital letters show non-Lojban stress for foreign words, the full
stops mean that you have to pause slightly to separate the words  anythingelseinLojbancanberuntogetherwithoutbeingmisunderstood).
You might be thinking Well in that case a function is a verb and an
argument is a noun, so why bother with special terminology like selbri
and whatnot?  However, in Lojban I might describe my feelings about
Juliette like this:



 koa melbi


 She/he/it is-beautiful

In English you have a verb (doing word), is and an adjective (describing
word), beautiful.  In Turkish, you would say O g&uuml;zel,
which is a noun and an adjective, with no verb required.  In Chinese
you would say Ta meili, with meili being classed as a stative
verb  but enough!  In Lojban you dont need all this.
A philosophical/psychological point: some people (such as the philosopher
Alfred Korzybski and the psychologist Albert Ellis) have claimed that the
English verb be has a bad effect on our thinking.  For example,
if I say He is bad (or good, or a Communist or whatever) it implies,
if only subconsciously, that there is something bad about his very essence,
that he always has and always will be bad, and that everything he does
is bad.  More Sapir-Whorf effects, perhaps. In Lojban, there is a
different word for is (du) meaning the same as (as in Three
and four is seven or That is the Eiffel Tower).  To say koa
du xlali would be meaningless in Lojban, and even koa xlali
would be pretty bad Lojban  you would have to say:


 le nu koa gasnu cu xlali


 the event-of he/she/it do [cu] is-bad


 He does something bad(ly)

 or be more specific and say, for example, le nu koa darxi le ninmu
cu xlali  the event of his hitting the woman is bad.  Note
that cu does not translate as is, or indeed as anything in English.
It is simply there to separate the function xlali from what goes
before: le nu koa gasnu xlali would be her/his/its doing-kind-of
bad-event, just as le lunra gusni would be the moon-kind-of light,
or moonlight.
Getting back to my obsession with a certain French actress, if there
are no nouns, verbs, subjects or objects in Lojban, how do we know that
la
robin. la julIET.binOC prami means that I adore Juliette and not the
other way round (a nice thought, but not realistic).  Different languages
handle this problem differently.  In English it is done with word
order, and when that isnt enough, with prepositions (words like at,
from, to, with and so on).  In other languages, like Latin or
Turkish, its done by changing the form of the words e.g. Juliettei
Robin sever means Robin loves Juliette, not Juliette loves Robin.
In Lojban this is built into the meaning of the word.  For example,
the word dunda means give, but its full meaning is:
        x1 gives x2 to x3
So mi pu dunda le cuska le ninmu  means I gave the book
to the woman not  I gave the woman to the book (of course).
But enough of grammar for now.  The important point is that Lojban
has a lot of what we would call grammar, but nearly all of this is contained
in the cmavo (structure words), and you can use as many or as few
of them as you want.


4. Lojban is not Vulcan
As Ive said, Lojban means logical language.  Unfortunately, in
many cultures we have the idea that being logical means having no emotions,
rather like Mr. Spock in Star Trek.  In fact logical is not the
opposite of emotional, but of illogical  in other words, saying things
that dont make sense.
In Lojban you can of course use emotional words like prami
(love/adore) but there is also a special class of words set aside for
expressing feelings.  Some examples are:


.ao  hope (pronounced aho)


.ui  happiness (wheee!)


.oi - complaint (like Oy vey!)


.uu  regret (and the normal Lojban way to say, Im sorry)

Each of these has a negative - .uinai means unhappy  and degrees
of feeling - .uicai means extremely happy or delighted.
You can also combine the words in any way you like, which means you can
invent words for emotions that dont have a word in your native language.
For example, to express the feeling in a lot of Turkish pop songs (arabesk),
I invented the word .iucai.uinaicai (pronounced you-shy-we-nigh-shy)
meaning something like I am deeply in love and deeply unhappy.
It doesnt stop there, though.   .iu means love,
but love can mean a lot of things.  If we need to, we can modify
these basic emotions.  .iuroi is emotional love, what we most
commonly understand by the word.  .iuro'a is social love -
what you might feel for a good friend.   .iurou, however,
is definitely sexual, while .iuree is spiritual love, the kind
of thing mystics feel, maybe.  You can even have .iuro'e -
mental or intellectual love - if, for example, you had a passion for physics.
Lojban also has a lot of words for handling the general business of
conversation.  Some examples are:


 coi - hello


 coo  goodbye


 mie  this is (+ your name)


 peu  please


 tao -  by the way


 mua -  for example


 zoo  humorously, just kidding,  ;-)

Because there are no native speakers of Lojban (well, not yet) there are
very few rules for Lojban conversation and writing.  Anyone who has
tried speaking in a foreign language will know how easy it is to be rude
without intending to.  In English, for example, you have to choose
between Can you come over here? Could you possibly come here, please?
Come here, will you? or even Hey you!  Lojban simplifies this
considerably by separating the emotional and social content of a sentence
from its literal meaning.  I can just say:


 ko klama ti


 you! come here

or I can make it polite by saying peu ko klama ti -  I dont
have to disguise it as a question about your ability to come.


5. The State of the Art
Lojban is a fairly new language, and it is possible that as it is used
more, and used by more people, some parts of it will change.  However,
to avoid the endless discussions about how to improve the language that
have plagued some other constructed languages (including Lojbans predecessor,
Loglan), it was agreed, after an a long initial period of developing and
testing Lojban, that absolutely no changes to the language would be made
for at least five years after the publication of The Complete Lojban
Language (which eventually came out in 1998).  Because the language
was tested and debated so much before this baseline, it is also unlikely
that any major changes will occur after that period  what will probably
happen instead is that people develop the language by creating new lujvo
(compound
words) and exploring some of the less-used aspects of Lojban grammar. There
are also a few areas of the language that have been deliberately left open
for future developments.
In addition to the published The Complete Lojban Language, there
is an HTML version of an earlier draft of the book, which is essentially
the same.  Other materials available from the Lojban website are wordlists,
a draft textbook, and a large number of Lojban texts, both original and
translated.  There is also a small but rapidly developing body of
Lojban software.  The main plans afoot in Lojbanistan at the time
of writing this are:


to publish the English-Lojban dictionary;


to publish a selection of Lojban texts;


to write a textbook;


to start translating Lojban materials into other languages.

If you feel motivated by any of this to start learning Lojban, please check
out the Lojban homepage at http://www.lojban.org
.


coo mie robin.
4/3/99







#873
11:01 AM Wed 17 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: xa'unro'a ximu
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

.io pinka ckire (Thanks for the comments.) .i mi na morji
ledu'u le makaumoi mluni du la'e zo .i,on. (I didn't remember
which-th moon Io was.) .i xu le pavybramluni vau (First big
one?) ni'o .e'u zo piso'amei vau (Suggest "mostlysome-ly".)
.i na'e kufra pilno pa valsi le smuni be zo jibni be'o poi
linji kamymre zi'a poi ckaji nunsmi bau la glico (Not
comfortable using one word for the meaning of the word "near",
that is linear-measureness or quality-similarness in English.)
.i .e'uru'e zo jibni .onai zo pevjbi nu'o remei fi le pamoi
.e le remoi (Suggest "near" or else "as-if near" for the pair.)
.i ju'enai pilno ba'e zo kaismi le smuni be zoi .gy. almost
.gy. vau .e'usai (Wait! What about "quality-similar"?) .i .ua
na glijbo .i peipe'i (Not anglicized, eh?)
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#874
7:16 AM Thu 18 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Always the same?
 From:   Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

Zeno wrote:
[cut]

> If someone could show
> that Lojban is useable by the average human and can survive realistic
> practical and playful abuse of real-world users, Bill Gates would mail
> a few mil to the copyright holders that afternoon, and we would all be
> chatting happily with our computers inside of three months.  (You put
> that phrase in the same sentence as "Lojban", so don't blame me for
> the retort.)

zo'o .aucainai .i pe'i lenu la maikrysaft. sarji la lojban. ka'e rinka lenu lei
prenu .e lei skami cu frili si'uxlajmi

[humour] [desire-extreme-negative] . [opinion] {the-event-of (that-named
Microsoft) support (that-named Lojban)} can cause {the-event-of
(the-mass-of human and the-mass-of computer) easy mutually-misunderstand)}

> A man is in the mall with his gal and they look in the jewelry store
> window, and the woman says in perfect Lojban, "Ooh, what a beautiful
> necklace!".  The man replies also in perfect Lojban while looking
> across the aisle at the lingerie store, "What I really like is that
> garter belt and bra set in that store over there."

le ninmu: .u'e.au melbi nebja'i

the woman: [wonder - desire] beautiful necklace

le nanmu: mi sezynelci le smoka jinsru .e le tatyta'u tu'i le tu zarci

the man: I self-like {(the stocking belt and the bra) with-site-as (the yonder
market)}

le skami pe la maikrysaft: le nebja'i .e le tatyta'u cu si'unalmapti .i pe'u ko
terve'u le samselpa me'e la'o copin.plys

the computer related-to that-named Microsoft: (the necklace and the bra)
mutually-incompatible.  [please] {you-imperative buy (the program
with-name 'Shopping Plus!')}

co'o mi'e robin.


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#875
4:27 PM Thu 18 Mar 99
 Subject:  ti preti lojban
 From:  Kevin Turner
From: Kevin Turner kevin.turne-@oberlin.edu

coi lojbanistan

Hi.  My name is Kevin Turner (no relation to Robin).  I am a native
speaker of American and am studying Espaol, but have found myself more
interested with the idea of learning languages than with learning any
language in particular.  And so it was that I discovered constructed
languages and lojban, which I have now embarked on learning.  I've been
reading the first lesson of the draft textbook and parts of the
reference grammar, and have come up with some questions.

Is there any constistancy of sumti order for gismu?  The first place is
seems very regular (as the-thing-which-is-to-be-related), but beyond
that...  For example tavla and dunda.  Tavla has x2 being the recipient
of the talking while x3 is the thing which is being talked about, while
dunda has x3 being the recipient of the giving while x2 is the thing
which is given.

Also, it seems to be common to for gismu definitions to have a "made of
material" simtu tacked on at the end, but this is not universal.  I can
specify the material for a bottle by supplying the third sumti to botpi,
but it seems to me such a sumti would be frequently ellipsed, thus
making it difficult to remeber if it was defined.

In contrast, another method is required to say "Adobe, the car that's
made out of clay," as karce has no such material-sumti place defined.
So I imagine there is a selbri for "x1 is constructed of material x2"...
But I am curious, what was the rationale for occasionally defining these
"made of" placements?

My bridi of the day:  I had to interrupt my afternoon's study of lojban
to go to my psychology class, of which today's topic was language.  On
my way there, I discovered that I did not yet have the vocabulary to say
"the class of mind-study," but I could probably say that I was going to
"the one who talks about small heads".  I came up with

mi klama le te le stedu cpana ku tavla ku

Is this correct?

mi cikrie
 - keven.
(or is it geven.?)

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#876
1:08 AM Fri 19 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: ti preti lojban
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la kevyn. cusku di'e

>
> I've been
> reading the first lesson of the draft textbook and parts of the
> reference grammar, and have come up with some questions.
>

I'll have a go at answering these, but as I'm not one of the elders of
Lojbanistan, take my comments with a pinch of salt.  {ba'a} more definitive
pronouncements will be forthcoming from Lojbab, Jorge, cowan et al.

>
> Is there any constistancy of sumti order for gismu?  The first place is
> seems very regular (as the-thing-which-is-to-be-related), but beyond
> that...  For example tavla and dunda.  Tavla has x2 being the recipient
> of the talking while x3 is the thing which is being talked about, while
> dunda has x3 being the recipient of the giving while x2 is the thing
> which is given.
>

AFAIK, there is no absolute order for sumti places, but there are a few
general principles, the main one being how likely you are to use a
particular sumti place.  Thus although the most common order corresponds
approximately to nominative, accusitive, dative, ablative, there are a few
exceptions, like {tavla}.  This is socially determined, I think - who you
talk to is generally regarded as as, if not more, important than what you
talk about.  Compare {tavla} with {cusku}, which has a different place
structure (and is the default for reporting communication).

>
> Also, it seems to be common to for gismu definitions to have a "made of
> material" simtu tacked on at the end, but this is not universal.  I can
> specify the material for a bottle by supplying the third sumti to botpi,
> but it seems to me such a sumti would be frequently ellipsed, thus
> making it difficult to remeber if it was defined.
>

I was originally in favour of dropping a lot of these "minor sumti", but now
I'm not so sure.  I take your point that we might forget whether something
is defined, but I think in practice it wouldn't be a problem.  Let's say
that speaker A is under the false impression that a selbri has a sumti place
for "made of material x4", and puts it in his/her sentence.  Speaker B my be
a bit puzzled by this, but would almost certainly realise that in putting
{lei tinsypelji} there, he/she was trying to say "made of cardboard".

>
> In contrast, another method is required to say "Adobe, the car that's
> made out of clay," as karce has no such material-sumti place defined.
> So I imagine there is a selbri for "x1 is constructed of material x2"...
> But I am curious, what was the rationale for occasionally defining these
> "made of" placements?
>

Convenience, I suppose.  There is a gismu

zbasu [ zba ] make
x1 makes/assembles/builds/manufactures/creates x2 out of
materials/parts/components x3

so " X is constructed of Y" could be X{se zbasu fi}Y  (X{se zbasu}Y would be
"X is made by Y).

For extra places not handled in the definition, Lojban uses "modal selbri"
(the term "modal" is a hangover from Loglan, IIRC, and has very little to do
with the normal use of this term in linguistics).  The modal for "made of"
is {ma'e} (from {marji} - "matter, material").  Thus, to translate your
example of a clay car, you could have:

la .adob. karci ma'e loi kliti

but I would probably just make a tanru and say {staku karci} - ceramic car.

>
> My bridi of the day:  I had to interrupt my afternoon's study of lojban
> to go to my psychology class, of which today's topic was language.  On
> my way there, I discovered that I did not yet have the vocabulary to say
> "the class of mind-study," but I could probably say that I was going to
> "the one who talks about small heads".  I came up with
>
> mi klama le te le stedu cpana ku tavla ku
>
> Is this correct?
>

The nested sumti look a bit dodgy to me, though normally when I say
something is bad Lojban, Jorge or Cowan point out that it's perfectly OK!  I
would say

mi klama le menske ctufau kumfau
I go the mind-science lesson room

>
> mi cikrie
>  - keven.
> (or is it geven.?)
>

Only if you've got a cold!

co'o mi'e robin.



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#877
7:02 AM Fri 19 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: ti preti lojban
 From:  John Cowan

From: John Cowan cowa-@locke.ccil.org

Kevin Turner wrote:

> And so it was that I discovered constructed
> languages and lojban, which I have now embarked on learning.  I've been
> reading the first lesson of the draft textbook and parts of the
> reference grammar, and have come up with some questions.\

Welcome.  BTW, your use of "ti" in the subject line is problematic
(a natural error), since "ti" refers only to things that can be
pointed at.  Also, names need the article "la".

> Is there any constistancy of sumti order for gismu?  The first place is
> seems very regular (as the-thing-which-is-to-be-related), but beyond
> that...  For example tavla and dunda.  Tavla has x2 being the recipient
> of the talking while x3 is the thing which is being talked about, while
> dunda has x3 being the recipient of the giving while x2 is the thing
> which is given.

Not much pattern to it, but some of what there is is explained in
Section 12.16 of the reference grammar
(http://www.lojban.org/files/reference-grammar/chap12.html#s16).

> Also, it seems to be common to for gismu definitions to have a "made of
> material" sumti tacked on at the end, but this is not universal.  I can
> specify the material for a bottle by supplying the third sumti to botpi,
> but it seems to me such a sumti would be frequently ellipsed, thus
> making it difficult to remeber if it was defined.

Lojbab probably knows what the rationale was for this.

> In contrast, another method is required to say "Adobe, the car that's
> made out of clay," as karce has no such material-sumti place defined.
> So I imagine there is a selbri for "x1 is constructed of material x2"...
> But I am curious, what was the rationale for occasionally defining these
> "made of" placements?

That was a vexed problem (x1 is made of x2) but I forget the resolution.

> mi klama le te le stedu cpana ku tavla ku

"Te" has to be tightly bound to its corresponding brivla.
There are several ways to say what you are trying for, but you
probably don't have the grammar for them yet: probably the
simplest is "le tavla be fi le stedu cpana", where "be fi" means
in effect "Put this in the 3rd place of the description selbri
without terminating the description."


> mi cikrie
>  - keven.
> (or is it geven.?)

Your choice.

--
John Cowan      http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowa-@ccil.org
        You tollerday donsk?  N.  You tolkatiff scowegian?  Nn.
        You spigotty anglease?  Nnn.  You phonio saxo?  Nnnn.
                Clear all so!  'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)

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#878
9:56 AM Fri 19 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: ti preti lojban
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At 06:27 PM 3/18/99 -0500, Kevin Turner wrote:
>From: Kevin Turner kevin.turne-@oberlin.edu
>Is there any constistancy of sumti order for gismu?  The first place is
>seems very regular (as the-thing-which-is-to-be-related), but beyond
>that...  For example tavla and dunda.  Tavla has x2 being the recipient
>of the talking while x3 is the thing which is being talked about, while
>dunda has x3 being the recipient of the giving while x2 is the thing
>which is given.

Robin Turner has given a pretty good answer.  The order of places was
arbitrary but determined by our perception of what was most likely to be
included in a sentence.  Then in later passes, we tended to look for places
where ordering was inconsistent among words in similar semantic domains,
and try to make them consistent.

So far as I know, no one tries to actually memorize place structures.  You
learn them by using them, and the patterns tend to grow on you.

>Also, it seems to be common to for gismu definitions to have a "made of
>material" simtu tacked on at the end, but this is not universal.  I can
>specify the material for a bottle by supplying the third sumti to botpi,
>but it seems to me such a sumti would be frequently ellipsed, thus
>making it difficult to remeber if it was defined.
>
>In contrast, another method is required to say "Adobe, the car that's
>made out of clay," as karce has no such material-sumti place defined.
>So I imagine there is a selbri for "x1 is constructed of material x2"...
>But I am curious, what was the rationale for occasionally defining these
>"made of" placements?

I believe we left "material" places out where 1) there is a likelihood that
more than one kind of material would be used and 2) the material is not
generally essential to the nature of the thing.  The material that a bottle
is made of is quite frequently vital to its serving its function, with
different materials leading to different functions in terms of the contents
x2 place.  So far as I know, cars used as cars per se are all made of metal
and/or plastic in mixed amounts, and changing the material does not tend to
affect the nature of car-ness.

>My bridi of the day:  I had to interrupt my afternoon's study of lojban
>to go to my psychology class, of which today's topic was language.  On
>my way there, I discovered that I did not yet have the vocabulary to say
>"the class of mind-study," but I could probably say that I was going to
>"the one who talks about small heads".  I came up with
>
>mi klama le te le stedu cpana ku tavla ku
>
>Is this correct?

It doesn't parse.  Perhaps you wanted

mi klama le le stedu cpana ku te tavla ku

I go to the head-upon-ones' talked-about-thing
I go to the thing the one who stood on his head was talking about?

I see "small head" and which would be cmalu stedu or studu cmalu, and guess
that you are referring malglico to "shrinks", i.e. psychiatrists, and then
grabbed cpana instead of cmalu accidentally.

mi klama le le stedu cmalu ku te tavla ku

I go to the thing the head-small one talked about.

And I get the idea for something that barring the malglico metaphor might
get the point across:

mi klama le cmalu stedu te tavla nu tavla [ku]
I go to the small-head-subject event-of-talking.
I go to where someone is talking about "small-heads".

But Robin's solution is certainly better.

lojbab

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#879
5:49 PM Fri 19 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Always the same?
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la robin cusku di'e

>zo'o .aucainai .i pe'i lenu la maikrysaft. sarji la lojban. ka'e rinka lenu
lei
>prenu .e lei skami cu frili si'uxlajmi

i lu lei prenu e lei skami cu frili si'urxlajmi li'u cu smuni mintu
lu lei prenu cu frili si'urxlajmi ije lei skami cu frili si'urxlajmi li'u
i pe'i do skudji lu lei prenu ku joi lei skami cu frili si'urxlajmi li'u

i ta'o mi zmanei zo xlajmisi'u zo si'urxlajmi ki'u le du'u lujvo
le du'u simxu le ka xlajmi

>le ninmu: .u'e.au melbi nebja'i
>le nanmu: mi sezynelci le smoka jinsru .e le tatyta'u tu'i le tu zarci

i ki'a sezynelci i di'u se smuni le du'u le nanmu cu nelci ri
i e'u lu mi zu'unai nelci le smoka jinsru e le tatyta'u li'u

i ji'a lu mi nelci da tu'i de li'u cu se smuni le du'u de stuzi
le nu mi nelci da kei i na se smuni le du'u de stuzi da

>le skami pe la maikrysaft: le nebja'i .e le tatyta'u cu si'unalmapti .i
pe'u ko
>terve'u le samselpa me'e la'o copin.plys

i si'a lu le nebja'i ku ba'e joi le tatyta'u cu simxu li'u i lu ko terve'u
le samselpla po'u la copin plys li'u i lu copin plys li'u na cmene
le nu terve'u

i ni'o le do lojbo selci'a cu so'amei drani doi robin i a'o lei mi
pinka be lei tcila cu sidju gi'enai fanza

co'o mi'e xorxes






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#880
8:53 PM Fri 19 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: xa'unro'a ximu
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la maikl cusku di'e

>ni'o .e'u zo piso'amei vau (Suggest "mostlysome-ly".)

I don't know, I guess this brings us back to the fuzzy logic
discussion. I just don't see how {mei} can work here.
a {so'amei} is a group consisting of almost all members
of the relevant set, a {piso'amei} is about the same thing,
a group consisting of a fraction that is almost the total.

I would use it for example in {lei selci'a cu so'amei drani},
"the writings are mostly correct", meaning that almost
all of them are correct, not that they are all almost correct.

{lei barna cu [pi]so'amei simsa loi lerfu}, to me, means
that the marks are mostly similar to letters, i.e. that
almost all of the marks look like letters, not that the
marks look all approximately similar to letters.

>.i na'e kufra pilno pa valsi le smuni be zo jibni be'o poi
>linji kamymre zi'a poi ckaji nunsmi bau la glico (Not
>comfortable using one word for the meaning of the word "near",
>that is linear-measureness or quality-similarness in English.)

But that's how {jibni} is defined, it has an x3 for the property.

            i le ckule cu jibni le zarci le ka ce'u stuzi makau
            The school is close to the market in where they are located.

            i le ckule cu darno le zarci le ka pilno ce'u makau
            The school is far from the market in what they're used for.

>.i .e'uru'e zo jibni .onai zo pevjbi nu'o remei fi le pamoi
>.e le remoi (Suggest "near" or else "as-if near" for the pair.)

It seems to me that {jibni} and {darno} have as their primary
meaning the extended meaning of English "near" and "far",
so I don't think {pe'a} is necessary here. The x3 of {jibni}
would have no use if it was always for the physical location.

>.i ju'enai pilno ba'e zo kaismi le smuni be zoi .gy. almost
>.gy. vau .e'usai (Wait! What about "quality-similar"?) .i .ua
>na glijbo .i peipe'i (Not anglicized, eh?)

Yes, I think the meanings are similar/close:

        lei marna loi lerfu cu jibni le ka tarmi
        The marks are close to letters in shape.

        lei marna loi lerfu cu simsa le ka tarmi
        The marks are similar to letters in shape.

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#881
9:40 AM Sat 20 Mar 99
 Subject:  Third International  Workshop on Human-Computer Co
 From:  Robin Turner
Thought some of you might find this interesting ...

http://www.dcs.shef.ac.uk/research/units/ilash/Meetings/bellagio99/













Bellagio,
Italy, 12-13-14 July 1999

Call For Papers And Registration

We have received many expressions of interest in the above workshop,
due to the success of the First
and Second
International Workshop in 1997 and 1998. As a result we are now pleased
to announce that the Third International Workshop will take place on the
above dates. The spirit
of the meeting will be like the others. Please email y.wilks@dcs.shef.ac.uk
immediately if you are interested in attending. The emphasis this year
will take note of the CE Fifth Framework
calls announced under Human Language Technology and in particular
the emphasis on interactivity. We also plan to emphasise (in
invited talks) the issue of politeness and whether it is
crucial or dispensible to conversation, as well as recent
results on statistical/empirical work on dialogue corpora,
and on deriving marked up dialogue corpora.


Conference Venue

The conference venue is the Grand
Hotel Villa Serbelloni in Bellagio, Italy, on Lake Como, the legendary
site of Pliny's villa where the two arms of the lake meet. Bellagio is
one of the most beautiful spots in the world and is easily reached from
Milan. Please
click here for details on how to reach Bellagio

Workshop organisers

The workshop is being organised by Intelligent Research Ltd of London,
who will assist participants with room reservations at hotels in all price
categories, as well as with transportation (if required) from the nearest
airports.

Forthcoming
volume from the meeting in 1997.

Further Details

Further details for the Third International Workshop on human-computer
conversation can be obtained from:



        Professor Yorick Wilks
        AI and NN Research Group
        Department of Computer Science
        University of Sheffield
        Regent Court
        211 Portobello Street
        Sheffield S1 4DP
        UK

        phone: (44) 114 222 1804
        fax:   (44) 114 222 1810
        email: yorick@dcs.shef.ac.uk
        www:   http://www.dcs.shef.ac.uk/~yorick/
#882
8:17 PM Sun 21 Mar 99
 Subject:  Find Out What The Future Holds For  You?
 From:  silvia_brown-

LIVE PERSONAL PSYCHIC!     (as seen on T.V.)


  LEARN TODAY WHAT YOUR FUTURE HOLDS
  FOR LOVE, FAMILY, AND MONEY.


  ASTROLOGY   CLAIRVOYANCY
  NUMBEROLOGY   TAROT

  ALL QUESTIONS ANSWERED IMMEDIATELY!

  REALIZE YOUR DESTINY! CALL RIGHT NOW!

  1-900-226-4140 or 1-800-372-3384 for VISA, MC

  (These are not sex lines!)

This message is intended for Psychic Readers, Psychic Users and people who are
 involved in the $1 Billion Dollar a year Psychic Industry. If this his message
 has reached you in error, please disregard it and accept our apoligies. To be
 removed from this list, please respond with the subject  "remove". Thank You.

Stop Unsolicited Commercial Email - join CAUCE
(http://www.cauce.org)
Support HR 1748, the anti-spam bill.
















  LIVE PERSONAL PSYCHIC!     (as seen on T.V.)




 LEARN TODAY WHAT YOUR FUTURE HOLDS

 FOR LOVE, FAMILY, AND MONEY.
#883
10:02 PM Sun 21 Mar 99
 Subject:  Find Out What The  Future Holds For You?
 From:  silvia_brown-

LIVE PERSONAL PSYCHIC!     (as seen on T.V.)


  LEARN TODAY WHAT YOUR FUTURE HOLDS
  FOR LOVE, FAMILY, AND MONEY.


  ASTROLOGY   CLAIRVOYANCY
  NUMBEROLOGY   TAROT

  ALL QUESTIONS ANSWERED IMMEDIATELY!

  REALIZE YOUR DESTINY! CALL RIGHT NOW!

  1-900-226-4140 or 1-800-372-3384 for VISA, MC

  (These are not sex lines!)

This message is intended for Psychic Readers, Psychic Users and people who are
 involved in the $1 Billion Dollar a year Psychic Industry. If this message has
 reached you in error, please disregard it and accept our apoligies. To be
 removed from this list, please respond with the subject  "remove". Thank You.

Stop Unsolicited Commercial Email - join CAUCE
(http://www.cauce.org)
Support HR 1748, the anti-spam bill.























  LIVE PERSONAL PSYCHIC!     (as seen on T.V.)




 LEARN TODAY WHAT YOUR FUTURE HOLDS
#884
11:34 PM Sun 21 Mar 99
 Subject:  Find Out What The  Future Holds For You?
 From:  silvia_brown-

LIVE PERSONAL PSYCHIC!    (as seen on T.V.)

LEARN TODAY WHAT YOUR FUTURE HOLDS
FOR LOVE, FAMILY AND MONEY.

ASTROLOGY    CLAIRVOYANCY

NUMEROLOGY    TAROT

ALL QUESTIONS ANSWERED IMMEDIATELY!

REALIZE YOUR OWN DESTINY!    CALL RIGHT NOW!

1-900-226-4140 or 1-800-372-3384 for VISA, MC

   (These are not sex lines!)

This message is intended for Psyhic Readers , Psychic Users and people who are
involved in the $1 Billion Dollar a year Psychic Industry. If this message
has reached you in error,  please disregard it and accept our apoligies. To be
removed from this list, please respond with the subject  "remove". Thank you.

Stop Unsolicited Commercial Email-join CAUCE
(http://www.cauce.org)
Support HR 1748, the anti-spam bill.













LIVE PERSONAL PSYCHIC!    (as seen on T.V.)
#885
2:21 AM Tue 23 Mar 99
 Subject:  spam
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

Is anyone else here getting tons of spam about psychic services
relayed through lojban list?  I can cope with a moderate amount
of spam in my life, but this woman's sent me the same advert five
times, which is pretty psychically inept.

This makes me wonder - maybe we should allow internet companies
to use lojban list for advertising IFF all adverts are entirely
in Lojban - might promote the language  ;-)

co'o mi'e robin.


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#886
4:56 AM Tue 23 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: spam
 From:  Daniel  Biddle

From: Daniel Biddle delta-@ps.cus.umist.ac.uk

coi rodo

On Tue, 23 Mar 1999, Robin Turner wrote:

> Is anyone else here getting tons of spam about psychic services
> relayed through lojban list?  I can cope with a moderate amount
> of spam in my life, but this woman's sent me the same advert five
> times, which is pretty psychically inept.

I received three copies of the same message. It appears to come from a GTE
user: as GTE say (at http://www.gte.net/hotlinks/policies/spamming.html)
that "By no means will Spamming be tolerated over our network", I have
forwarded the messages to abus-@gte.net.

.eizo'u la lojban. [ObLojban?] Is there a lujvo for 'spam'?

> This makes me wonder - maybe we should allow internet companies
> to use lojban list for advertising IFF all adverts are entirely
> in Lojban - might promote the language  ;-)

Well, the list is for messages about or in Lojban, is it not?

> co'o mi'e robin.

co'o mi'e deltab.


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#887
7:55 AM Tue 23 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: spam
 From:  Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)
From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" lojba-@lojban.org

At 12:20 PM 3/23/99 +0200, you wrote:
>From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr
>
>Is anyone else here getting tons of spam about psychic services
>relayed through lojban list?  I can cope with a moderate amount
>of spam in my life, but this woman's sent me the same advert five
>times, which is pretty psychically inept.

The spam seems to have been sent at least three times to the old Columbia
list, a few hours apart.

lojbab

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#888
11:44 AM Tue 23 Mar 99
 Subject:  (no subject)
 From:  Pablo Stafforini
coi rodo

.i mi klama fi lai .europas. .i mi gleki le nu se krefu tcidu fi le jboste
.i uinai zo'o mi na pu tavla fo la lojban .i ru'a lo lojbo cecmu cu na tcidu
ba'e bau la lojban .i pe'i mi'o troci le si'o go'i .i le nu vrici tavla fo
la lojban. kei cu zmadu le nu lojbo tavla fi le vrici .i xu do tugni

.i mu'onai

co'o mi'e pablov

to ta'o coi xorxes toi
#889
2:43 PM Wed 24 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: spam
 From:  michael  helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

'spam': NALNOI

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#890
6:47 PM Thu 25 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

coi pablov. (Hi Pablo.)

i .uenai cecmu ju tcidu (Members need not be readers.) .i to'u
si'a jikykei najo jigykei (In short, it's like those who play
for fun or those who play to win...) .i .u'ocu'i mi kaismi
zukyka'e bau la lojban. (Me, i can almost use Lojban.) i xu
do tcidu lei puzi jbopemci po'u mi (Have you read the recent
Lojban poems i did?) .i baziku ra cukta (Soon they'll be a
book.) co'o mi'e maiky'elsym. (Bye, Michael Helsem.)
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#891
10:58 PM Thu 25 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  Pablo Stafforini

From: "Pablo Stafforini" cancrian-@iname.com

coi maikl.

i. mi na pu drani jimpe le do mupli to to'u si'a jikykei najo jigykei toi .i
di'u valsi ma .i .ui mi pu tcidu pisu'o le do jbopemci cukta noi ke'a la
xorxes. cu ponse .i .u'i melbi kacmyxra .i .uinai ku'i le ka mi lojbo jimpe
cu na xamgu .i u'ocu'i mi tadni la lojban .i mi gleki le nu do ba prinyci'a
le jbopemci

co'o mi'e. pablov.

i. ta'o .ue mi pu zgana le nu le nixli jbotadni cu na zasti .i xu mi drani


> -----Original Message-----
> From: michael helsem [mailto:graywyver-@hotmail.com]
> Sent: Thursday, March 25, 1999 11:47 PM
> To: lojba-@onelist.com
> Subject: [lojban] Re: nu lojbo tavla
>
>
> From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com
>
> coi pablov. (Hi Pablo.)
>
> i .uenai cecmu ju tcidu (Members need not be readers.) .i to'u
> si'a jikykei najo jigykei (In short, it's like those who play
> for fun or those who play to win...) .i .u'ocu'i mi kaismi
> zukyka'e bau la lojban. (Me, i can almost use Lojban.) i xu
> do tcidu lei puzi jbopemci po'u mi (Have you read the recent
> Lojban poems i did?) .i baziku ra cukta (Soon they'll be a
> book.) co'o mi'e maiky'elsym. (Bye, Michael Helsem.)
> Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
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#892
7:19 AM Fri 26 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  michael helsem

From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com




drani fa lenu zo co balvi zo kaismi
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#893
8:46 AM Fri 26 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

coi pablov. (Hi Pablo.)

ta'unai lo cecmu jenai tcidu cu lojbo jikykei pe'a (Expanding:
one who is a member but not a reader is "playing for fun" at
Lojban.) .i lo cecmu jo tcidu cu lojbo jigykei pe'a (One who
is a member only if also a reader, is "playing to win" at
Lojban.) ni'o ba'anai puzuku su'o ninmu ze'a jbotadni semau la noras.(I
remember we used to have some Lojban women students,
besides Nora.).i caku mi na djuno ki'u makau (I don't know why
it is, now.).i .i'e so'o ninmu cu tadni co ba'e runbau (There
sure are some women conlangers, though.) no'i .o'aru'e le remoi
cukta ba se tcita lu luryri'e li'u (--The second book will be
titled, "Lunar River".) co'o mi'e maikl. (Bye, Michael.)

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#894
1:15 PM Fri 26 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: le djica  prijyske
 From:  michael helsem

From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com


ju'a ko'a goi lezu'ojasu'u menli kei ka'e se ckiski ji'u lo pamei noi
vrici (The mind may be analyzed according to one principle, in various
ways.) .i si'a le ratni saske ka'e se ckiski ji'u le kantu .a le boxna
.a le datni (Just as physics analyzes in terms of particles, waves or
information.) .i ku'i ko'e goi le du'uke le go'e cu jetnu ke'e kei cu se
ckaji le ckiski .enai ko'a (But that that is true, is a property of the
analyzer & not the human mind.) .i ko'e nibli lenuke le ckiski ba'o
cuxna levi skicmu .enai leva skicmu ke'e kei po'o (It only entails, that
the analyzer chooses one principle over another.) .i .ia le prijyske cu
frica le skiske leka bilga co zukte ce'u (...I believe philosophy
differs from physical science in what they obligate you to do.)
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#895
1:18 PM Fri 26 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: le djica prijyske
 From:  michael helsem

From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com


ju'a ko'a goi lezu'ojasu'u menli kei ka'e se ckiski ji'u lo
pamei noi vrici (The mind may be analyzed according to one
principle, in various ways.) .i si'a le ratni saske ka'e se
ckiski ji'u le kantu .a le boxna .a le datni (Just as physics
analyzes in terms of particles, waves or information.) .i ku'i
ko'e goi le du'uke le go'e cu jetnu ke'e kei cu se ckaji le
ckiski .enai ko'a (But that that is true, is a property of the analyzer
& not the mind.) .i ko'e nibli lenuke le ckiski ba'o
cuxna levi skicmu .enai leva skicmu ke'e kei po'o (It only
entails that the analyzer chooses one principle over another.)
.i .ia le prijyske cu frica le skiske leka bilga co zukte ce'u
(...I believe philosophy differs from physical science in what
they obligate you to do.)
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#896
7:39 PM Fri 26 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  Pablo Stafforini

coi .maikl.

.i mi ca jimpe le do mupli .i ku'i mi na jimpe le nu le se cuxna pe lo cecnu
jenai tidu prenu .i ri gunka la lojban ma .i le nu lo jboce'u cu claxu lo
ninmu tadni cu cizra .i mi pacna le nu le do cukta ba prici'a fi la
internet.

co'o mi'e. pablov.

I want to clarify these sentences, since I'm not sure about the
construction. What I WANTED to say is this:

Hi Michael,
Now I understand your example. However, I don't understand the choice of the
"member but not reader" people. What do they study lojban for?
The fact that there are no female students of lojban is strange. I hope your
book is published through the internet.
Bye, Pablo.

(these questions are for all, not only Michael)

-How would you say "online"?
-I'm not sure about the order of the arguments on {prici'a} (intended lujbo
for  "publish")
-If you find any big mistakes, could you tell me? In fact, I think this
would be good for all  conversations in lojban: whenever someone finds a
mistake, he would tell the person in question.

Bye

By the way (ta'o), how do you translate the subjunctive in lojban? In the
present or in the future? For example, in the last sentece

i mi pacna le nu le do cukta BA prici'a fi la internet.

should I have written

i mi pacna le nu le do cukta prici'a fi la internet. ?

In spanish (as in many other languages) we have a special declension for
this case.



> -----Original Message-----
> From: michael helsem [mailto:graywyver-@hotmail.com]
> Sent: Friday, March 26, 1999 1:46 PM
> To: lojba-@onelist.com
> Subject: [lojban] Re: nu lojbo tavla
>
>
> From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com
>
> coi pablov. (Hi Pablo.)
>
> ta'unai lo cecmu jenai tcidu cu lojbo jikykei pe'a (Expanding:
> one who is a member but not a reader is "playing for fun" at
> Lojban.) .i lo cecmu jo tcidu cu lojbo jigykei pe'a (One who
> is a member only if also a reader, is "playing to win" at
> Lojban.) ni'o ba'anai puzuku su'o ninmu ze'a jbotadni semau la noras.(I
> remember we used to have some Lojban women students,
> besides Nora.).i caku mi na djuno ki'u makau (I don't know why
> it is, now.).i .i'e so'o ninmu cu tadni co ba'e runbau (There
> sure are some women conlangers, though.) no'i .o'aru'e le remoi
> cukta ba se tcita lu luryri'e li'u (--The second book will be
> titled, "Lunar River".) co'o mi'e maikl. (Bye, Michael.)
>
> Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
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#897
7:47 PM Fri 26 Mar 99
 Subject:  la gines. buk. of. records.
 From:  Pablo Stafforini
Hi,

Yesterday I read in the "Guinness Book of Records" that the hardest word to
define is "mamihlapinatapai" which means:

"To look each other, hoping the other to offer something that both wish, but
that no one is willing to give"

Of course the sole concept of  the "hardest word to define" is ridiculous in
itself, but I think it's interesting to try to trasnlate the definition to
lojban. It's a nice challenge...
#898
11:28 AM Sat 27 Mar 99
 Subject:  xa'unro'a xixa
 From:  michael helsem

From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com


viska so'i janco ja jaftu'e xadysfe bo vi'orxinmo (I see a lot of ankle
& shoulder tattoos.) .i ri se jarco po'o (They're only
for display.) .i ku'i mi se barna co mipri (I am marked
secretly.) .i lei prami cu viska (My lover sees.) .i le ba'e
mulno lisri ba'onai seljmi ko'a goi lemi prami je bavyspe (Not
even she knows the whole story.) .i puzukiku mi cairprami le
fenki (Long ago i loved very much a disturbed person.) .ijebabo
go'i le drata fenki (And then another.) .i .a'onaicai prami
morna (It was a pattern (despair!).) .i cnicortu dukse (Too
much pain.) .ijenai cumki nu zifre (And no chance of escape.)
.i jinvi ledu'u mi djica lemu'e mi broda cei sisti co jmive
(I thought that i wanted to die.) .i broda kaismi vu'enai (I
nearly did.) .ijebabo cuxna cenba (Then i changed my mind.) .i
mu'i lenu djica co morji ce'u za'o kei kuku (Because i wanted
always to remember,) re'enai mi rinka lemu'e vi'orxinmo ciska
fi levo'a mipri xadysfe fe le sinxa be le nunmro mibjbi (i got
a tattoo signifying my near-death.) .iki ri'e tavla najenai
jarco (I don't talk about it or show it to people.) .i calenu
vrucau kei kuku mi ru'inai pensi le smuni be le ranji jonai
sisti seljdi (Sometimes when it's quiet i think about what it
means to live or die.) .isemu'ibo lei ca'o nandu lei milxe cu
simlu (And then my present troubles don't seem like so much.)
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#899
1:08 PM Sat 27 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

ui coi fi'ike'u doi pablov

i a'o do pu zanfri le nu litru bu'u le ropno i lei do lojbo
selci'a cu mutce xamgu i xu do tadni ze'a le nu litru
i no'i ca'a zasti fa loi fetsi tadni be la lojban i ku'i ra
jikte'amli gi'enai sezyjarco

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#900
1:46 PM Sat 27 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la pablov presku di'e

>-How would you say "online"?

One possibility: {samci'e selcpaka'e} = "computer-network available".

>-I'm not sure about the order of the arguments on {prici'a} (intended lujbo
>for  "publish")

{prina} is about the same as {ciska} minus the x1 place. I think
{prigau} is a close synonym of {ciska}. I would say the
place structure of {prici'a} is the same as that of {ciska}:
"x1 prints x2 on x3 using x4".

For "publish" I have used {gubgau} = "x1 makes x2 publicly
available to x3".

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#901
2:12 PM Sat 27 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: la gines. buk. of. records.
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar


>Yesterday I read in the "Guinness Book of Records" that the hardest word to
>define is "mamihlapinatapai" which means:
>
>"To look each other, hoping the other to offer something that both wish,
but
>that no one is willing to give"


{simxu le ka ce'u catlu ce'uxipa gi'e pacna le nu ce'uxipa friti da ce'u kei
gi'enai djica le nu ce'u friti da ce'uxipa}

"... are such that one looks at the other and hopes that the other will
offer something to him and doesn't want to offer it to the other."

Or we could make a lujvo: {ctajveterfitpa'ajvenarfitydjisi'u}.

co'o mi'e xorxes






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#902
4:53 PM Sat 27 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: la gines.
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

pe'i zo selfityborpa'arjevnardudbortugykemctasi'u co lujvo
fo lu selfriti bo pacna jenai dunda bo tugni ke catlu simxu
li'u ([Offer-hoping but not give-agreeingly] mutually-looking.)

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#903
5:52 PM Sat 27 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

da'i lo lojbo cecmu jenai tcidu ka'e se cinri le sidbo .a le
stura (Perhaps nonreading Lojbanists could be interested in
the idea or the structure.) ni'o .e'u ge pilno lu samymri
kakne li'u lenu cusku zoi .gy. online .gy. kei gi pilno zo
da'i .a zo pu'o .a zo nu'o lenu cusku lo cumki fasnu (Suggest
using "electric-message able" to express  'online', &
"hypothetical-discursive" or "inchoative-tense" or
"potential-tense" to express possible states.)

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#904
9:03 PM Sat 27 Mar 99
 Subject:  la zen.
 From:  Pablo Stafforini
coi rodo

This is my humble attempt to translate a very short zen story. The english
text between parenthesis supplies those words I couldn't translate to
lojban.

.i ko'a goi le tadni be la tenDAIS. noi ku'o selpijyska skule fi le budjo pu
klama le lijd,r,zena tercnizda po la gasan. va'o le tadni .i ko'a mo'i pu
cliva [a few yeras later] vau la gasan. cu kajde ko'a le lu zo'onai le nu
menmre tadni cu snada le nu [preaching] jmaji .i ku'i ko morji le nu ganai
do mutce nonmempei ginai le do jetnu gusni ba canci li'u

A student of Tendai, a philosophical school of Buddhism, came to the Zen
abode of Gasan as a pupil. When he was departing a few years later, Gasan
warned him: "Studing the truth speculatively is useful as a way of
collecting preaching material. But remember that unless you meditate
constantly your light of truth may go out".

1- How can I assign the {noi} to {la tenDAIS} only, and not to the full
sumti {le tadni be la tendais}?
2- Conversely, I'm assuming that the {ko'a]  assignation goes to the full
sumti and not just to {le tadni}
3- How can I say "A few years later"?
4- In the second sentence there are two bridi: "When he was departing a few
years later" and "Gasan warned him..." Is this approach correct? If so,
should I connect the two bridi in a certain way (so as to keep the intended
meaning)?
5- A lujbo for "preach"?
6- And, finally, he he, who dares to give a lujbo for "zen"? That's almost a
paradox!

Corrections are welcome.

co'o mi'e. pablov
#905
10:42 AM Sun 28 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: la zen.
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

>1- How can I assign the {noi} to {la tenDAIS} only, and not to the full
>sumti {le tadni be la tendais}?

The way you have it is right, {noi} applies to the immediately preceding
sumti, in this case {la tendAis}. For it to apply to {le tadni} you'd have
to say, for example: {le tadni be la tendAis be'o noi ke'a pendo mi} =
"the student of Tendai, who is a friend of mine".

But is Tendai a {se tadni}, something to be studied, or a {ckule},
a place where one studies?

>2- Conversely, I'm assuming that the {ko'a]  assignation goes to the full
>sumti and not just to {le tadni}

That's right, but in any case {le tadni} is equivalent to the full sumti
{le tadni be la tendAis noi ke'a selpijyska ckule fi le budjo}. One is
just a more complete description than the other. You couldn't
assign {ko'a} to one but not the other.

>3- How can I say "A few years later"?

I would say {baza loi nanca} or {baza lo nanca be li so'u}. The
term tagged with ZA would be the magnitude of the time offset.
The book has a different method, using termsets. It's explained
in pages 250-251.

>4- In the second sentence there are two bridi: "When he was departing a few
>years later" and "Gasan warned him..." Is this approach correct? If so,
>should I connect the two bridi in a certain way (so as to keep the intended
>meaning)?

You can't have two bridi in one just putting one after the other.
There are different ways to do what you want. The simplest is
probably to use two sentences:

    i baza loi nanca ko'a puca'o cliva  icabo la gasan cu jdesku
    lu li'o li'o li'u
    "After some years, he was leaving. When that was happening,
    Gasan warned: "...".

You can also put everything in the same sentence:

    i baza loi nanca ca le nu ko'a puca'o cliva kei la gasan
    cu jdesku lu li'o li'o li'u
    "After some years, as he was leaving, Gasan
    warned: "...".

>5- A lujbo for "preach"?

    I don't know, {sidycaita'a}?

>6- And, finally, he he, who dares to give a lujbo for "zen"? That's almost
a
>paradox!

You missed the discussion on how to translate "the Tao" while you
were away. No consensus was reached, I think.

co'o mi'e xorxes



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#906
4:40 AM Mon 29 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: la zen.
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la xorxes. cusku di'e

> >6- And, finally, he he, who dares to give a lujbo for "zen"? That's almost
> a
> >paradox!
>
> You missed the discussion on how to translate "the Tao" while you
> were away. No consensus was reached, I think.

{.u'i drani}  In general I'm against coining fu'ivla rather than searching for a
really appropriate lujvo, but there are some words that seem to defy semantic
analysis.  To coin a lujvo for "Zen", "Tao" or "Sufi" would imply that you
really understood the meaning of these terms, and would be a bad case of hubris,
I think (this is why I coined {pruxrsufi}).  I would suggest either leaving it
as a cmene or coining something like {pruxrzeni} or {bujrzeni}.  Perhaps {la
zen.} is best when you're talking about zen as a spritiual/aesthetic concept (as
in "he/she/this painting has zen", and {bujrzeni} when you're talking about Zen
as a school of Buddhism.  The third option, to make a cmene from a
transliteration doesn't work with "Zen" because "meditation" would be too vague
(and there isn't a gismu for "meditate" anyway, so you'd have to coin a lujvo as
well).

co'o mi'e robin.



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#907
7:16 AM Mon 29 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Always the same?
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

coi xorxes. noi cusku di'e
[is the above grammatical, I wonder?]

> la robin cusku di'e
>
> >zo'o .aucainai .i pe'i lenu la maikrysaft. sarji la lojban. ka'e rinka lenu
> lei
> >prenu .e lei skami cu frili si'uxlajmi
>
> i lu lei prenu e lei skami cu frili si'urxlajmi li'u cu smuni mintu
> lu lei prenu cu frili si'urxlajmi ije lei skami cu frili si'urxlajmi li'u
> i pe'i do skudji lu lei prenu ku joi lei skami cu frili si'urxlajmi li'u
>

Yes, this was what I intended - I wasn't aware of {joi} - a very useful cmavo.

>
> i ta'o mi zmanei zo xlajmisi'u zo si'urxlajmi ki'u le du'u lujvo
> le du'u simxu le ka xlajmi
>

I was thinking "mutual type of bad type of understanding".

>
> >le ninmu: .u'e.au melbi nebja'i
> >le nanmu: mi sezynelci le smoka jinsru .e le tatyta'u tu'i le tu zarci
>
> i ki'a sezynelci i di'u se smuni le du'u le nanmu cu nelci ri
> i e'u lu mi zu'unai nelci le smoka jinsru e le tatyta'u li'u

Yes, this occurred to me just after I posted this.  I think the sense is
captured better by {zu'unai} which seems a bit like English "as for me" or
French "moi" (starting a sentence).  {sezynelci} would be more like "lking
oneself", I suppose.

>
>
> i ji'a lu mi nelci da tu'i de li'u cu se smuni le du'u de stuzi
> le nu mi nelci da kei i na se smuni le du'u de stuzi da

I don't quite understand this.

>
> >le skami pe la maikrysaft: le nebja'i .e le tatyta'u cu si'unalmapti .i
> pe'u ko
> >terve'u le samselpa me'e la'o copin.plys
>
> i si'a lu le nebja'i ku ba'e joi le tatyta'u cu simxu li'u i lu ko terve'u
> le samselpla po'u la copin plys li'u i lu copin plys li'u na cmene
> le nu terve'u

"Shopping Plus" is the name of the program - surely this is what {po'u} implies
here?

>
> i ni'o le do lojbo selci'a cu so'amei drani doi robin i a'o lei mi
> pinka be lei tcila cu sidju gi'enai fanza
>

.i'o ze'eku lei do pinka roroi sidju gi'e noroi fanza

co'o mi'e robin.


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#908
9:08 AM Mon 29 Mar 99
 Subject:  Questions ...
 From:  c.d.wrigh-

From: c.d.wrigh-@solipsys.compulink.co.uk


I was going to say all this in lojban, but it
is becoming clear that while my reading skils
are improving rapidly, my synthesis skills are
woeful.

At work we have a "chat" system, and one of my
colleagues and I are starting to use lojban on
it as practice.  I have been teaching Neil as
best I can, but there are things we both want
to say that we just can't work out how.  Some
things are easy ...

  xu do djica lo tcati
  mi caca'a klama do
  mi bazi litru fi le relxilma'e

and so on.  However, how about:

  He made three CDs (le zgike cukla)

or even,

  Where I work we have a "chat" system.


Thanks.


cdw.

Dr C.D.Wright
.sig under constru...

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#909
1:25 PM Mon 29 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Questions ...
 From:  Pablo Stafforini

From: "Pablo Stafforini" cancrian-@iname.com



> -----Original Message-----
> From: c.d.wrigh-@solipsys.compulink.co.uk
> [mailto:c.d.wrigh-@solipsys.compulink.co.uk]
> Sent: Monday, March 29, 1999 2:12 PM
> To: lojba-@onelist.com
> Subject: [lojban] Questions ...
>
>
> From: c.d.wrigh-@solipsys.compulink.co.uk
>
>
> I was going to say all this in lojban, but it
> is becoming clear that while my reading skils
> are improving rapidly, my synthesis skills are
> woeful.
>
> At work we have a "chat" system, and one of my
> colleagues and I are starting to use lojban on
> it as practice.  I have been teaching Neil as
> best I can, but there are things we both want
> to say that we just can't work out how.  Some
> things are easy ...
>
>   xu do djica lo tcati
>   mi caca'a klama do
>   mi bazi litru fi le relxilma'e
>
> and so on.  However, how about:
>
>   He made three CDs (le zgike cukla)
>

coi. sidirait.

In Lojban you don't have an exact word for the pronouns "he/she". Instead,
you have several different options. You can use the {ko'a} series. For
example:

{ko'a pu zbasu ci le zgike cukla}

It-1 made three CDs.

That, however, would be very vague, because {ko'a} can work both as "he" and
"she", and even "it"! The solution is to "assign" the pronoun, i.e. you
state to which element do you want {ko'a} to refer. For example, assuming
"he" represented your friend Neil:


la neil goi ko'a cu pendo mi .i ko'a pu zbasu ci le zgike cukla

Neil, also known as it-1, is my friend. It-1 made three CDs.

There are other ways also, but this the one lojbanists would use more
frequently (I suppose!). Check chapter 7 of the "Complete Lojban Language",
esp pp 150-151 (it's available online, on case you don't have it).


> or even,
>
>   Where I work we have a "chat" system.
>

{le briju pe mi gunka ke'a cu ponse le samta'a ciste}

The office where I work has a computer-talking system

or, to be more precise

{le briju pe mi gunka ke'a cu ponse le samta'a ciste pe mi'o}

In case you wanted to state that the "chat" system can be accessed by a
certain group of people.

{pe} is a relative clause that specifies association. For example, to say
"your book":

{le cukta pe do}

After {pe} you can have also a bridi-type structure, as in the original
phrase:

{le briju pe mi gunka ke'a}

{ke'a} represents the sumti which the relative phrase modifies (le briju).

There are more specific types of cmavo. {po} specifies possession, {po'e}
restrictive possession, and so on. {pe} is the most vague one, and therefore
can be used wherever the others appear (for instance, in the example I could
have used {le cukta po do}. This section of the grammar is explained in
chapter 8.

The lujbo for "chat" is not very good, but I think that was not the point of
your question.


I'm by no means an expert, anyway, so be prepared to find mistakes ;)

co'o mi'e. pablov.


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#910
4:44 PM Mon 29 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Always the same?
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?US-ASCII?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

>coi xorxes. noi cusku di'e
>[is the above grammatical, I wonder?]

Yes it is.

>> i ta'o mi zmanei zo xlajmisi'u zo si'urxlajmi ki'u le du'u lujvo
>> le du'u simxu le ka xlajmi
>>
>I was thinking "mutual type of bad type of understanding".

It's no big deal, but I think {simxu} makes more sense as
a suffix than as a prefix. I'm changing the example because
{jimpe} is not very good for this, it means "person x1
understands fact x2" and what we really need here
is "person x1 understands person x2", so using either
{jmisi'u} or {si'ujmi} for "understand each other" is
stretching the meaning of {jimpe}.

But consider for example {tavla}, "x1 talks to x2 (about x3)".
I can explain what {ta'arsi'u} means:

                la djan joi la alis cu ta'arsi'u
                John and Alice talk to each other.

                la djan joi la alis cu simxu le ka ce'u tavla ce'uxipa
                John and Alice are mutual in one talking to the other.

You could say that {simta'a} works just as well, "mutual type
of talking", but how do you explain it in Lojban? How do you
expand the lujvo, with {tavla} as the primary component?
You end up with something like:

               la djan joi la alis cu tavla gi'e simxu le ka tavla
               John and Alice are talking, and are mutually talking.

I don't think that's wrong, but I think it's a less straightforward
order for Lojban.

>> i ji'a lu mi nelci da tu'i de li'u cu se smuni le du'u de stuzi
>> le nu mi nelci da kei i na se smuni le du'u de stuzi da
>
>I don't quite understand this.

You had something like:

        mi nelci le smoka jinsru .e le tatyta'u tu'i le tu zarci

I suppose you wanted to say that {le tu zarci} was the
location of {le jinsru e le tatyta'u}. But as it stands it is the
location of the nelci event. There is nothing binding
{tu'i le zarci} to {le jinsru e le tatyta'u} or to {mi} or to any
other sumti of that bridi. It modifies the selbri. You need
{pe} to bind it to the sumti, and in this case {vu'o pe} so
that it covers both items.

>> >.i pe'u ko terve'u le samselpa me'e la'o copin.plys
>>
>> i lu ko terve'u
>> le samselpla po'u la copin plys li'u i lu copin plys li'u na cmene
>> le nu terve'u
>
>"Shopping Plus" is the name of the program - surely this is
>what {po'u} implies here?

Yes, but you had {me'e} at bridi level. It was not associated
to {le samselpla} anymore than to {ko}. What you had means
something like "Let Shopping Plus be the name of your buying
the program".

You could have used {pe me'e lu copin plys li'u}. After {me'e} you
need something in quotes, not a name used as a reference.
{lu copin plys li'u cu cmene la copin plys}.

co'o mi'e xorxes


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#911
5:15 PM Mon 29 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Questions ...
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb

From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la pablov cusku di'e

>{ko'a pu zbasu ci le zgike cukla}
>
>It-1 made three CDs.

{ci le zgike cukla} really menas "three of the CDs", i.e. there
is a certain number of CDs under discussion, and we are
saying that koha made three of them.

{ko'a pu zbasu ci zgike cukla} means that he made three
CDs (out of all CDs that there are, there's no implicit restrictions).
That's by definition the same as {ko'a pu zbasu ci lo zgike cukla}.

{ko'a pu zbasu le ci zgike cukla} means that he made the
three CDs, i.e he made all of the three CDs under discussion.

In all cases we are talking about making the CDs out of plastic,
or whatever material they're made of. If you mean that he recorded
three CDs, then something like {rejgau} should be used.

>{le briju pe mi gunka ke'a cu ponse le samta'a ciste}
>
>The office where I work has a computer-talking system

Use {poi} instead of {pe} there. {poi} is for relative clauses,
{pe} is used to attach another sumti.

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#912
5:48 AM Tue 30 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Questions ...
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la xorxes. cusku di'e

> >{le briju pe mi gunka ke'a cu ponse le samta'a ciste}
> >
> >The office where I work has a computer-talking system
>
> Use {poi} instead of {pe} there. {poi} is for relative clauses,
> {pe} is used to attach another sumti.

AFAIK {le briju poi mi gunka ke'a} would mean "the office that I work", i.e.
"office" is some job I'm doing, rather than the place I'm doing it.  I think
you'd need to say {le briju poi mi gunka tu'i ke'a}.

However, this stikes me as unnecessarily "English-to-Lojban".  I would scrap
the relative clause and say {le briju setu'i lenu mi gunka} - the office
as-location-of the-event-of I work.  I might also consider just saying {le
mi briju}, since office implies a place of work - I would only need to be
specific if I wanted to indicate that I did a particular kind of work there,
or that I do something other than work there, e.g. {le briju setu'i lenu mi
samci'a} or, if I had no professional ethics, {le briju setu'i lenu mi gletu
le mi tadni}

Incidentally, to anyone who is starting out with Lojban and gets confused by
the way asking a supposedly simple question raises a whole lot of other
questions and debates - don't worry!  Most of these threads arise from
trying to translate things from natlnags into Lojban, and tend to arise from
the ambiguity of the natlang in question (usually English) rather than of
Lojban.  For example, we only got into the question of relative clauses here
because the English suggests a relative clause, which is not actually
necessary in Lojban.

My advice, for what it is worth, is, when trying to find a Lojban equivalent
for a natlang expression, first think carefully about what you're trying to
express in the natlang, independent of the expression's grammatical
structure.  Eliminate any extra information conveyed by the expression that
is not absolutely necessary (e.g. tense).  Then choose the simplest Lojban
form that expresses the same thing. In particular, with grammatically
complex English sentences, I generally employ the following principles in
order:

1.  If you can find a tanru that conveys the information without too much
ambiguity, use it.  For example, "the room where the students talk" can be
simply {le tadni tavla kumfa}.

2.  If there's a suitable BAI cmavo, use it.  For example "the woman who is
going to Istanbul" would be {le ninmu seka'a la .istanbul}.

3.  If you can attatch a sumti with {pe} without losing important
information, do so.  Much information can be condensed into "tenses" e.g.
{pe vi} {pe ba} etc. For example, "the book which is on the table" is {le
cukta pe vi le jubme} (this is what I should have done in my earlier
shopping example!)

4.  Then, and only then, use a relative clause with {poi} or {po'u}.

co'o mi'e robin.


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#913
6:35 AM Tue 30 Mar 99
 Subject:  le fetsi lojbo [was Re: nu lojbo  tavla]
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la xorxes cusku di'e

>
> i no'i ca'a zasti fa loi fetsi tadni be la lojban i ku'i ra
> jikte'amli gi'enai sezyjarco

This applies to most e-mail lists, which tend to have a "masculine" (note
scare quotes) discourse style (for more on gender and discourse, see Robin
Lakoff and/or Deborah Tannen).  However, dialogue on the Lojban list isn't
nearly as bad in this respect as many others - at least we have no flame
wars here!

I was wondering if the overall image of Lojban might also be off-putting,
which gets us back to the "logical language" point.  There is an (illogical)
association in many cultures along the lines of logic-male / emotion-female,
which may result in Lojban having a bit of a "masculine" image, or a desexed
Mr. Spock-like one (for more of my thoughts on gender and logic, see
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/8309/malelogic.html ).  However, I
don't think the answer to this problem is to try and present Lojban in a
more "touchy-feely" way (though one could) but to challenge those ideas in
society at large.

co'o mi'e robin.


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#914
6:36 AM Tue 30 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la xorxes. cusku di'e


> i a'o do pu zanfri le nu litru bu'u le ropno

Doesn't {bu'u} imply that Pablo's travelling is coincident with Europe, i.e.
that he covered every square inch of the continent?  However, I'm not sure
which spatial tense goes best here, {ne'i} or {vi'a}.

co'o mi'e robin.


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#915
11:24 AM Tue 30 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: le fetsi lojbo [was Re: nu  lojbo tavla]
 From:  xod
From: xod xo-@bway.net





On Tue, 30 Mar 1999, Robin Turner wrote:






#916
7:20 PM Tue 30 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: nu lojbo tavla
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la robin cusku di'e

>> i a'o do pu zanfri le nu litru bu'u le ropno
>
>Doesn't {bu'u} imply that Pablo's travelling is coincident with Europe,
i.e.
>that he covered every square inch of the continent?  However, I'm not sure
>which spatial tense goes best here, {ne'i} or {vi'a}.

{bu'u} is the space equivalent of {ca}, you only need one point of
coincidence.

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#917
7:27 PM Tue 30 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Questions ...
 From:  Jorge_J._Llamb=E

From: "=?us-ascii?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" jorg-@intermedia.com.ar

la robin cusku di'e

>> >{le briju pe mi gunka ke'a cu ponse le samta'a ciste}
>>
>> Use {poi} instead of {pe} there. {poi} is for relative clauses,
>> {pe} is used to attach another sumti.
>
>AFAIK {le briju poi mi gunka ke'a} would mean "the office that I work",
i.e.
>"office" is some job I'm doing, rather than the place I'm doing it.  I
think
>you'd need to say {le briju poi mi gunka tu'i ke'a}.

Right!

>2.  If there's a suitable BAI cmavo, use it.  For example "the woman who is
>going to Istanbul" would be {le ninmu seka'a la .istanbul}.

That would be {le ninmu pe seka'a la .istanbul}. Otherwise, they're just
two terms of the main bridi, not directly related one with the other.
This is an important difference between BAIs and English prepositions.
Prepositions work sometimes to modify nouns and sometimes to
modify the whole phrase. BAIs by themselves always modify the bridi,
you need {pe} to attach them to a particular sumti.

co'o mi'e xorxes




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#918
6:01 AM Wed 31 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: Questions ...
 From:  Robin Turner

From: Robin Turner robi-@bilkent.edu.tr

la xorxes cusku di'e

> la robin cusku di'e

>
> >2.  If there's a suitable BAI cmavo, use it.  For example "the woman who is
> >going to Istanbul" would be {le ninmu seka'a la .istanbul}.
>
> That would be {le ninmu pe seka'a la .istanbul}. Otherwise, they're just
> two terms of the main bridi, not directly related one with the other.
> This is an important difference between BAIs and English prepositions.
> Prepositions work sometimes to modify nouns and sometimes to
> modify the whole phrase. BAIs by themselves always modify the bridi,
> you need {pe} to attach them to a particular sumti.

Ooops!  You're dead right, it is all too easy to use BAIs (incorrectly) as
prepositions, and in forgetting the {pe} I was falling into the very trap I was
warning against i.e. making Lojban mimic English.  I plead in defence of this
lapse, that it probably came about through analogy with the example in the book
{bloti teka'a la nu,IORK.} , which works because it's an observative, not a
sumti phrase.  Thus, if I have understood correctly, {ninmu seka'a la
.istanbul.} is OK, meaning something like "There's a woman going to Istanbul"
(something exists such that it is a woman and it has the destination named
Istanbul).

On reflection, stages 2. and 3. of my "translation guide" should probably be
reversed i.e. first try to do it with tenses (time or space), then try a BAI
modal.

co'o mi'e robin.


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#919
1:36 PM Wed 31 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: la zen.
 From:  michael helsem
From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com

norbu'o norjda
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

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#920
6:14 PM Wed 31 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: la zen.
 From:  Pablo Stafforini

From: "Pablo Stafforini" cancrian-@iname.com

        For me, making a lujbo for "zen" would imply puting together contradictory
words. In fact, I wonder if one could not make a *sintactically* incorrect
lujbo so as to approximate its meaning... ;)

        That said, I think that lujbo constructions in general should strive at
giving only a close idea of the original meaning. I constantly see postings
to the list discussing or proposing one lujbo over another. I perceive that
behind this there is a belief in the fact that one could eventually find a
"perfect" lujbo for every word. The problem is, words aquire their meaning
by their everyday use, and not so much by their definition, so if one should
try to create a meaning from scratch, I think it's pointless to go beyond a
certain point. It's up to "wear and tear" to do the rest (and for that, we
must wait until the number of lojban speakers increses considerably).

co'o mi'e. pablov.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: michael helsem [mailto:graywyver-@hotmail.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 1999 6:37 PM
> To: lojba-@onelist.com
> Subject: [lojban] Re: la zen.
>
>
> From: "michael helsem" graywyver-@hotmail.com
>
> norbu'o norjda
> Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
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#921
8:20 PM Wed 31 Mar 99
 Subject:  Tagged termsets and errata
 From:  Clark & Janiece Nelson
From: Clark & Janiece Nelson cjnelso-@cybcon.com

Jorge J. Llambas wrote:
> >3- How can I say "A few years later"?
>
> I would say {baza loi nanca} or {baza lo nanca be li so'u}. The
> term tagged with ZA would be the magnitude of the time offset.
> The book has a different method, using termsets. It's explained
> in pages 250-251.

Well, yes, so it is. According to le cukta, "It is grammatical for a
termset to be placed after a tense or modal tag rather than a sumti,
...."

Unfortunately, the grammar(s) in the very same book say otherwise. In a
term, a tag (or FA) can precede either a simple sumti or a KU. A term
can also be an unadorned termset. It can't be a tagged termset.

Since le cukta is self-contradictory, this qualifies as an erratum.
Several interesting questions suggest themselves:

1. Which way should the conflict be resolved? I remember some of the
discussions pointing out the need for a facility like this, and I
acknowledge the lack without it. On the other hand ... well, it's rather
unfortunate to have to modify the grammar after the baseline.

2. Is there a compendium of errata on some web site somewhere? I
remember there being a few Official Errata Announcements on the list
quite a while back, but either they're not collected on the Web or
they're hidden.

3. Is there an ETA for the baseline parser? The lack of it made
impossible the obvious quality assurance step of confirming the
grammaticality of all the examples. For instance, both the examples in
the section under discussion use "lu'a" for "la'u". That's a nit, but it
would be nice to be sure there aren't other nits lying around.

--
Clark Nelson

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#922
11:10 PM Wed 31 Mar 99
 Subject:  Re: la zen.
 From:  c.d.wrigh-

From: c.d.wrigh-@solipsys.compulink.co.uk


From: "Pablo Stafforini" cancrian-@iname.com

> For me, making a lujbo for "zen"

Do you mean "lujvo" ??

And, I dn't understand the discussions about Zen.
"Zen" is a name, and it often has subtly different
meanings to different people.  Surely it is a label,
in just the same way that "English" is a label.


cdw.
" If you never go off at a tangent
  you will forever run in circles. "

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