Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

[Gleki Arxokuna]

Continuation of http://www.lojban.org/tiki/mu'ei

Note:This topic should be analysed from the Trivalent logic point of view as the latter also deals with Possible worlds.

But let's get started with more simple stuff.

mu'ei has always been a problem for me. Although the wiki was simple in describing it I felt something incomplete or illogical there.

Luckily, Lojbanistan has some authority and one can always ask how others solve the same problem.

Here is the log.

<gleki> Do you use mu'ei in real life? Do you have any thoughts of making a more generalised abstraction that will include both mu'ei and ba'oi?

<robin>I did for a bit and then stopped; I just use {da'i} tricks now.

<gleki>!!! just da'i or pada'i, su'oda'i, roda'i? how can you distinguish between ba'oi and mu'ei then?

<robin>I don't find ba'oi useful at all. Just da'i.

<gleki>but how can we distinguish two meanings? i just wanna some examples how we can use da'i for each case. If i can't use conditionals then i cant speak this language. Conditionals are the basics. What are your solutions for su'omu'ei, romu'ei, mu'ei. I can clearly see differences in their meaning important when speaking. Regardless the theory of alternate realities behind MUhEI I need words with such semantics. ko sidju mi

<robin>So use mu'ei ? There's nothing wrong with them. su'o mu'ei is clearly ka'e. I have no idea what use ro mu'ei has; it looks totally pointless to me. Erm, as a bridi tag; as a sumti tag it's fine. Looking at http://www.lojban.org/tiki/mu'ei , for "If the train breaks down I'll be late" is {da'i mi lerci ri'a lo nu le trene cu spofu} "If the train breaks down I might be late" is not a structure I usually have to produce, but if I did I would just use cumki ; {lo nu mi lerci cu cumki lo nu le trene cu spofu}

So having this absolution granted from lojbo nolraitru I started revising mu'ei.

Here is what I came up with.

(if you can't see the image look here).

We have two layers. One describes alternate (possible worlds). And it's {ka'e}.

If you have balls of one color only there are no alternate worlds. i.e. only bag in the middle has more than one output at M-level.

Therefore I opine that mu'ei is not a good cmavo as it's trying to express two levels and therefore two meaning at once. But cmavo should express one meaning each (being more close to semantic prims).

Strangely enough {pu'i} was out of consideration on mu'ei pages on lojban.org wiki. That's why mu'ei scheme is not complete and comprehensive.

Other issues including unsettled.

romu'ei is absurd.

bi'ai is described as naka'ena which in my scheme is equal to {ca'a}. But actually in the examples from the wiki bi'ai is used more like {pu'i}. In any case it's meaning is covered by the existing cmavo.

ba'oi has extra meaning of alternate world identical to This World up to the present. This meaning is yet to be defined using new cmavo if my criticism of mu'ei is accepted.

da'i and va'o look like non-logical conditionals. Their meaning is out of my understanding. But I'm gonna use da'i more like Robin in those cases when I'm not sure what alternate-world-cmavo to use or in order to reach ambiguity.

ka'e is used more like an abbreviation of kakne. If the latter meaning of ka'e is fixed we need to find another cmavo for that purpose (for A-level).

naka'e has no cmavo for the output at M-level. Luckily naka'e is short enough to be used on it's own.

Conclusion.

mu'ei is not needed. If you wanna describe potential i.e. alternate worlds at A-level use naka'e, ka'e or naka'ena=ca'a.

If in possible worlds some balls are black and some are white then it's ka'e that can result either in nu'o or in pu'i.

You can use all those cmavo as sumtcita as well which staisfies the need in most conditional sentences 

(conditionals are sentences like "If I hadn't swum I would have been healthy" or similar).

[Jorge Llambías]

On Sun, Aug 5, 2012 at 2:16 PM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> bi'ai is described as naka'ena which in my scheme is equal to {ca'a}.

I can't see your scheme without registering to Facebook, but "ca'a"
("actually") is not the same as ""bi'ai"="naka'ena" ("necessarily").

If something is necessarily the case, then it must be actually the
case, but not the other way around. You may hold a philosophical
position that says that everything that is the case is necessarily so
(i.e. it could not have been any different), but linguistically it
doesn't work, because we can and do talk about how things could have
been different. If everything necessarily had to be the way it is,
nothing could have been different.

mu'o mi'e xorxes

[John E Clifford]

No, trivalent (and other multivalent) logic does not deal with possible worlds, it is entirely cisworld, not transworld.  You could combine the two, allowing multivalence in each possible world and perhaps even get some explanations of  one logic in terms of the other, e.g, that a sentence gets the value 1 in a world just in case it got the value 2  in some world alternate to that one.   But multivalent logics do not depend on such notions, nor reflect them very well at all (the metatheorem just cited doesn't go over to a theorem very well).

"Possible worlds" covers a multitude of different systems, not all of which can be conveniently brought into a single scheme, the Lewis series, say, or the slightly more generous Kripke one, or the Prior tense-based sets.  Some things are common to all (possible worlds, I suppose, for one) but techniques appropriate in one area, temporal modalities, say, do not apply in deontic or epistemic modalities nor in the various subjunctive realms: fiction, representation, contrary-to-fact conditionals, etc. For one major example, the role of the "real world" (the world of primary evaluation) in very different in these, critical in some cases, irrelevant in others, one world among many in still others.  Similarly, the metrics which may be laid upon the the world-connecting vectors, have a variety of different rules, ranging from highly complex to non-existent.  The genesis of the possible worlds is important in some cases, irrelevant (indeed, unaskable) in others. Lojban provides AT MOST a way of starting to talk in some of these ways, but nothing like the a fully functioning language for any of them.

I am not sure whether Lojban has even a fully functional trivalent language, though I suspect that xorxes six unary functions and an appropriate understanding of the given connectives would permit us to build up something, a la Guzman.  But it would be, at best, a very poor substitute for any possible world system or even the small practical parts, like the various subjunctives.

---

From: Gleki Arxokuna <gleki.is...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, August 5, 2012 12:16 PM
Subject: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

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[Jonathan Jones]

I had no idea what any of you were talking about until I realized this was a trinary discussion.

--
mu'o mi'e .aionys.

.i.e'ucai ko cmima lo pilno be denpa bu .i doi.luk. mi patfu do zo'o
(Come to the Dot Side! Luke, I am your father. :D )

[John E Clifford]

Quaternary is good, too; do join in.

---

From: Jonathan Jones <eye...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, August 5, 2012 7:02 PM
Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

I had no idea what any of you were talking about until I realized this was a trinary discussion.

On Sun, Aug 5, 2012 at 5:32 PM, John E Clifford <kali9...@yahoo.com> wrote:

No, trivalent (and other multivalent) logic does not deal with possible worlds, it is entirely cisworld, not transworld.  You could combine the two, allowing multivalence in each possible world and perhaps even get some explanations of  one logic in terms of the other, e.g, that a sentence gets the value 1 in a world just in case it got the value 2  in some world alternate to that one.   But multivalent logics do not depend on such notions, nor reflect them very well at all (the metatheorem just cited doesn't go over to a theorem very well).

"Possible worlds" covers a multitude of different systems, not all of which can be conveniently brought into a single scheme, the Lewis series, say, or the slightly more generous Kripke one, or the Prior tense-based sets.  Some things are common to all (possible worlds, I suppose, for one) but techniques appropriate in one area, temporal modalities, say, do not apply in deontic or epistemic modalities nor in the various subjunctive realms: fiction, representation, contrary-to-fact conditionals, etc. For one major example, the role of the "real world" (the world of primary evaluation) in very different in these, critical in some cases, irrelevant in others, one world among many in still others.  Similarly, the metrics which may be laid upon the the world-connecting vectors, have a variety of different rules, ranging from highly complex to non-existent.  The genesis of the possible worlds is important in some cases, irrelevant (indeed, unaskable) in others. Lojban provides AT MOST a way of starting to talk in some of these ways, but nothing like the a fully functioning language for any of them.

I am not sure whether Lojban has even a fully functional trivalent language, though I suspect that xorxes six unary functions and an appropriate understanding of the given connectives would permit us to build up something, a la Guzman.  But it would be, at best, a very poor substitute for any possible world system or even the small practical parts, like the various subjunctives.

---

From: Gleki Arxokuna <gleki.is...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, August 5, 2012 12:16 PM
Subject: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

Continuation of http://www.lojban.org/tiki/mu%27ei

[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Sunday, August 5, 2012 9:38:56 PM UTC+4, xorxes wrote:

On Sun, Aug 5, 2012 at 2:16 PM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> bi'ai is described as naka'ena which in my scheme is equal to {ca'a}.

I can't see your scheme without registering to Facebook,

Can you see it here in Google Groups? https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/lojban/8dgqqPo_36g

but "ca'a"
("actually") is not the same as ""bi'ai"="naka'ena" ("necessarily").

OK. I agree. Can you somehow add ca'a to this or any other scheme describing possible worlds?

[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Monday, August 6, 2012 8:41:37 AM UTC+4, Gleki Arxokuna wrote:

On Sunday, August 5, 2012 9:38:56 PM UTC+4, xorxes wrote:

On Sun, Aug 5, 2012 at 2:16 PM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> bi'ai is described as naka'ena which in my scheme is equal to {ca'a}.

I can't see your scheme without registering to Facebook,

Can you see it here in Google Groups? https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/lojban/8dgqqPo_36g

but "ca'a"
("actually") is not the same as ""bi'ai"="naka'ena" ("necessarily").

OK. I agree. Can you somehow add ca'a to this or any other scheme describing possible worlds?

http://www.lojban.org/tiki/%27%27ca%27ai%27%27%2C+%27%27ka%27ei%27%27+and+%27%27nu%27oi%27%2C+and+%27%27nau%27a%27%27

says that ca'a = 2. "In some possible worlds (in which q is the case), including This World, p" 

but in my scheme it's {pu'i}.

What's your opinion about that?

Either {ca'a} or {pu'i} can't fit into the scheme according to your understanding.

[Jorge Llambías]

On Mon, Aug 6, 2012 at 1:41 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Can you see it here in Google Groups?
> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/lojban/8dgqqPo_36g

No, but I can see the one you sent directly to me. Your description of
black/white seems to be reversed from what's in the pictures, unless
what I'm seeing is a negative of what you intended.

>> but "ca'a"
>> ("actually") is not the same as ""bi'ai"="naka'ena" ("necessarily").
>
> OK. I agree. Can you somehow add ca'a to this or any other scheme describing
> possible worlds?

I think in your scheme "ca'a" corresponds to an event-colour ball, but
without reference to the bag it came from, so it's pure M-level, just
like "ka'e" is pure A-level.

[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Monday, August 6, 2012 3:57:17 PM UTC+4, xorxes wrote:

On Mon, Aug 6, 2012 at 1:41 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Can you see it here in Google Groups?
> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/lojban/8dgqqPo_36g

No, but I can see the one you sent directly to me. Your description of
black/white seems to be reversed from what's in the pictures, unless
what I'm seeing is a negative of what you intended.

Sorry, really white ball is non-event, black is event. Although, it doesnt' matter what is event and what is anti-event. But thanks, I'll correct it.

>> but "ca'a"
>> ("actually") is not the same as ""bi'ai"="naka'ena" ("necessarily").
>
> OK. I agree. Can you somehow add ca'a to this or any other scheme describing
> possible worlds?

I think in your scheme "ca'a" corresponds to an event-colour ball, but
without reference to the bag it came from, so it's pure M-level, just
like "ka'e" is pure A-level.

OK. If no other criticism I'll correct it and post it to lojban.org wiki.

Are there still other voices for mu'ei? 

[Jorge Llambías]

On Mon, Aug 6, 2012 at 9:44 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> OK. If no other criticism I'll correct it and post it to lojban.org wiki.

Strictly speaking, "ka'e" only says that the bag contains black balls.
It doesn't say whether it also contains white balls or not, although
pragmatically one expects that it will, just as when someone says
"some" one pragmatically expects "but not all" to be true as well.

Similarly "ka'e na" would say that the bag contains white ball, saying
nothing about whether it contains black ones as well.

In order to say that it contains both black and white balls you may
need something like "su'opame'iro mu'ei", "in some but not all
worlds". "May or may not", as opposed to just "may".

I'd put "bi'ai" at the same level as "ka'e", it's not really about
materialization. That the ball picked is black is just a consequence
of all of them being black in that bag, so of course the one that
materializes will be as well, but "bi'ai" has nothing to do with the
materialization itself. Similarly it's not all that relevant to "na
ka'e" that the ball picked is white, it's just a consequence of all of
them being white in that bag.

> Are there still other voices for mu'ei?

"mu'ei" allows a more fine grained description of the contents of the
bags, "so'u mu'ei", "so'o mu'ei", "so'i mu'ei", "so'e mu'ei", "so'a
mu'ei", "du'e mu'ei", "rau mu'ei", "mo'a mu'ei".

[John E Clifford]

I've lost something here, I think.  'mu'ei' doesn't say anything about any particular bag, only about the universe of bags (if I am right of thinking of bags as worlds).  So to say it is possible that a ball selected from a selected sack in that universe is black doesn't get beyond saying that some balls in some bags are black.  If we get to a particular bag, saying that a selected ball might be black merely means that some balls in that bag are black, but this is no longer a modal claim (as the other might well not be, if the supply of bags is fixed.  (If the bags are not the worlds, then I don't follow what is going on, if itis meant to be about possible worlds.)

---

From: Jorge Llambías <jjlla...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Monday, August 6, 2012 5:34 PM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

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[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 6:20:01 AM UTC+4, clifford wrote:

I've lost something here, I think.  'mu'ei' doesn't say anything about any particular bag, only about the universe of bags (if I am right of thinking of bags as worlds).  So to say it is possible that a ball selected from a selected sack in that universe is black doesn't get beyond saying that some balls in some bags are black.  If we get to a particular bag, saying that a selected ball might be black merely means that some balls in that bag are black, but this is no longer a modal claim (as the other might well not be, if the supply of bags is fixed.  (If the bags are not the worlds, then I don't follow what is going on, if itis meant to be about possible worlds.)

Bag is a set of possible worlds. One ball is one possible world. Bag is present at A-level only.

When you extract one ball (and you can extract one ball only) it becomes This World with no alternatives.

I agree that mu'ei describe A-level and that mu'ei is more precise due to implementing PA.

To unsubscribe from this group, send email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.

[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 2:34:44 AM UTC+4, xorxes wrote:

On Mon, Aug 6, 2012 at 9:44 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> OK. If no other criticism I'll correct it and post it to lojban.org wiki.

Strictly speaking, "ka'e" only says that the bag contains black balls.
It doesn't say whether it also contains white balls or not, although
pragmatically one expects that it will, just as when someone says
"some" one pragmatically expects "but not all" to be true as well.

Similarly "ka'e na" would say that the bag contains white ball, saying
nothing about whether it contains black ones as well.

I believe that here we must postulate the meaning of {ka'e}.

Yes, we don't mean that the must be at least one white ball. We don't know it.

And in this scheme we probably even don't want to determine the number 

of white balls.

However, {bi'ai} and {naka'e} speak about the probability =1 of balls of one color present in the bag.

In order to say that it contains both black and white balls you may
need something like "su'opame'iro mu'ei", "in some but not all
worlds". "May or may not", as opposed to just "may".

I'd put "bi'ai" at the same level as "ka'e",

OK. done. 

it's not really about
materialization. That the ball picked is black is just a consequence
of all of them being black in that bag, so of course the one that
materializes will be as well, but "bi'ai" has nothing to do with the
materialization itself. Similarly it's not all that relevant to "na
ka'e" that the ball picked is white, it's just a consequence of all of
them being white in that bag.

mi tugni 

> Are there still other voices for mu'ei?

"mu'ei" allows a more fine grained description of the contents of the
bags, "so'u mu'ei", "so'o mu'ei", "so'i mu'ei", "so'e mu'ei", "so'a
mu'ei", "du'e mu'ei", "rau mu'ei", "mo'a mu'ei".

.ie 

mu'o mi'e xorxes

The new version of the scheme attached in two formats. Now it includes F-level where {ca'a} is placed.

Is everyone able to open this file?

[John E Clifford]

Well, now I am more confused than before.  What is the role of the second level here, where the universe of worlds is also selected from a universe of universes?  Is there another sense of possibility involved here that is not obtainable in the ordinary one-tier system?  Partly, this all seems backward to me.  We generally start from the given world (obviously) and then work outward to possibilities in various ways: changing circumstances, changing history, changing laws, and so on.  These are covered by different interworld connections, typically, or (what probably amounts to the same thing) by different structures placed on the universe. So, I suppose the different bags correspond to these different structures, but, unlike the case in the usual theories, there does not seem to be a systematic way of distinguishing them.  To say that an event is necessary in a universe in which it occurs in every world is not very illuminating -- unlike saying it is necessary in every universe in which all the present laws of physics hold, say. But then, rather than one notion of possibility applied in different universes, I would explain matters in terms of different notions of possibility applied to one universe -- not that it probably makes any difference in results.

---

From: Gleki Arxokuna <gleki.is...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Tuesday, August 7, 2012 7:47 AM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

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[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 7:34:28 PM UTC+4, clifford wrote:

Well, now I am more confused than before.  What is the role of the second level here, where the universe of worlds is also selected from a universe of universes?  Is there another sense of possibility involved here that is not obtainable in the ordinary one-tier system?  Partly, this all seems backward to me.  We generally start from the given world (obviously) and then work outward to possibilities in various ways: changing circumstances, changing history, changing laws, and so on.  These are covered by different interworld connections, typically, or (what probably amounts to the same thing) by different structures placed on the universe. So, I suppose the different bags correspond to these different structures, but, unlike the case in the usual theories, there does not seem to be a systematic way of distinguishing them.  To say that an event is necessary in a universe in which it occurs in every world is not very illuminating -- unlike saying it is necessary in every universe in which all the present laws of physics hold, say. But then, rather than one notion of possibility applied in different universes, I would explain matters in terms of different notions of possibility applied to one universe -- not that it probably makes any difference in results.

Let me try to explain. There is a set of alternative worlds. Let's take the middle set where we have both white and black balls. It means that it's us who chose exactly this set of balls and put them into the bag, i.e. into consideration. We don't know which of the balls represents Our World. Our World doesn't exist yet. Still we believe that there is a possibility for a black ball to be extracted. This is what we call {ka'e} i.e. possibility or probability of being extracted.

In case when we extract a black ball all Alternative Worlds immediately disappear and we have only one world, Our World, This World. This state is called {pu'i} i.e. demonstrated potential.

In case when we extract a white ball this potential hasn't been realized and this situation is called {nu'o}.

In other bags where we have white balls only there is no choice. As .xorxes. said the result at M-level is " just a consequence of all of them being white in that bag. "

The same in case of black balls, i.e. {bi'ai}.

In other words, when we move down to M-level the previous A-level disappears. It is actually similar to quantum physics theories where alternative realities collapse to one reality only in the moment of observation by the observer. So Lojban looks like an up-to-date instrument :)

As for F-level it's just another philosophy. At first glance {pu'i} is like {ca'a} but {ca'a} doesn't make any assumptions about the probability of such event.

Both philosophies are important.

John, sorry for your confusion. I knew only popular descriptionsof quantum physics when started drawing this scheme.

Probably we speak different languages. I just invented my own in this scheme as I knew no other. .a'o this is the only reason for misunderstanding.

I started with revising mu'ei. Yes, mu'ei due to PA can be much more precise. I just don't feel I wanna be so precise in my speech. Probably it's my feeling. May be others would still like to use mu'ei.

No problem. We can fill A-level with complex cmavo that include mu'ei and announce {ka'e, bia'i} as obsolete cmavo.

But it won't affect M-level and F-level. mu'ei isn't enough. It describes A-level only. This is what I came to.

To unsubscribe from this group, send email to lojban+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.

[John E Clifford]

Let me try to pin down where I am hsving problems:

---

From: Gleki Arxokuna <gleki.is...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com

Cc: John E Clifford <kali9...@yahoo.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 7, 2012 12:09 PM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 7:34:28 PM UTC+4, clifford wrote:

Well, now I am more confused than before.  What is the role of the second level here, where the universe of worlds is also selected from a universe of universes?  Is there another sense of possibility involved here that is not obtainable in the ordinary one-tier system?  Partly, this all seems backward to me.  We generally start from the given world (obviously) and then work outward to possibilities in various ways: changing circumstances, changing history, changing laws, and so on.  These are covered by different interworld connections, typically, or (what probably amounts to the same thing) by different structures placed on the universe. So, I suppose the different bags correspond to these different structures, but, unlike the case in the usual theories, there does not seem to be a systematic way of distinguishing them.  To say that an event is necessary in a universe in which it occurs in every world is not very illuminating -- unlike saying it is necessary in every universe in which all the present laws of physics hold, say. But then, rather than one notion of possibility applied in different universes, I would explain matters in terms of different notions of possibility applied to one universe -- not that it probably makes any difference in results.

Let me try to explain. There is a set of alternative worlds. Let's take the middle set where we have both white and black balls.

So we have a set of balls (or bags of balls? I'm sticking with balls for the moment) and we take a subset (how specified? random? saying it is the middle makes no sense in a set, which is unordered).  This set has both black and white balls (how do we know this?  If we picked it by this, then it is hard to see what it is going to have to do with possibility, since that is exactly about not picking). 

It means that it's us who chose exactly this set of balls and put them into the bag, i.e. into consideration.

See above.  I am not clear to what in the calculation of possibility this correlates with,

We don't know which of the balls represents Our World. Our World doesn't exist yet. Still we believe that there is a possibility for a black ball to be extracted. This is what we call {ka'e} i.e. possibility or probability of being extracted.

OK.  Now this looks like standard possibility, given that we know that neither black nor white is impossible (by whatever means). By the way, I would leave probability out of this, since that is a metrical notion that requires a much more complex world structure.

In case when we extract a black ball all Alternative Worlds immediately disappear and we have only one world, Our World, This World. This state is called {pu'i} i.e. demonstrated potential.

Well, strictly, this looks like ca'a, since pu'i seems to me to have past reference, but since we seem to have is an English perfect aspect, the difference is minor.  But, in what sense do the other worlds disappear?  They must still be there to support the notion of potential, which can't be present (in any usual system) in a single world, and to block off the notion of necessity.

In case when we extract a white ball this potential hasn't been realized and this situation is called {nu'o}.

Again, presumably the other worlds disappear and so we just have a non-occurrence but not a potential occurrence to go unrealized.

In other bags where we have white balls only there is no choice. As .xorxes. said the result at M-level is " just a consequence of all of them being white in that bag. "

The same in case of black balls, i.e. {bi'ai}.

That is, if we pick a universe with only white balls, then whatever ball we pick is white.  I guess that is bi'ai, although xorxes points to an obvious more clear reading.  But what, in the end, does this have to do with possibility, since here we have fixed the case so that the desired result is impossible given the initial conditions -- but the initial conditions are just that the desired case be impossible, which makes for an uninteresting situation.

In other words, when we move down to M-level the previous A-level disappears. It is actually similar to quantum physics theories where alternative realities collapse to one reality only in the moment of observation by the observer. So Lojban looks like an up-to-date instrument :)

But here, of course, the "observer" has been mucking about from the get-go, choosing which bag to make the pick from.  And the others don't disappear, if we are really doing modals here.

As for F-level it's just another philosophy. At first glance {pu'i} is like {ca'a} but {ca'a} doesn't make any assumptions about the probability of such event.

Nor does pu'i; it only talks about possibilities (or potentials, which might be somewhat different, but that is not the present problem).  What philosophies?  I don't even see two interpretations of possibility, let alone probability, here.

Both philosophies are important.

John, sorry for your confusion. I knew only popular descriptionsof quantum physics when started drawing this scheme.

Probably we speak different languages. I just invented my own in this scheme as I knew no other. .a'o this is the only reason for misunderstanding.

I think this is largely true, but I don't see how quantum physics got into this brew in the first place. In one way of working out Prior (temporal modalities) the multiple worlds interpretation of the probabilities involved in quantum physics is taken as a model for the structure of time (without all the details, of course, or much of the understanding of what is happening in quantum physics) and that projects a certain range of modal theories.  But the association is merely handy and nowise essential to modal logic.

I started with revising mu'ei. Yes, mu'ei due to PA can be much more precise. I just don't feel I wanna be so precise in my speech. Probably it's my feeling. May be others would still like to use mu'ei.

mu'ei seems a fairly pointless notion for modalities, since the count of possible worlds is rarely (if ever) a factor.  It won't help a lot for probability, either, since it is relative sizes, not absolute one that play there (and the apparatus of logic, per se, is not up to messing with that.

No problem. We can fill A-level with complex cmavo that include mu'ei and announce {ka'e, bia'i} as obsolete cmavo.

But it won't affect M-level and F-level. mu'ei isn't enough. It describes A-level only. This is what I came to.

OK.  I just don't see the need for A level at all.  M and F seem to do all that is needed.  What have I missed?

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[Jorge Llambías]

On Tue, Aug 7, 2012 at 6:46 PM, John E Clifford <kali9...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> mu'ei seems a fairly pointless notion for modalities, since the count of
> possible worlds is rarely (if ever) a factor.

You don't need a count for the modals, just the basic quantifiers:

su'o mu'ei = ka'e = na bi'ai na
no mu'ei = na ka'e = bi'ai na
ro mu'ei = bi'ai = na ka'e na
me'i mu'ei = na bi'ai = ka'e na

"mu'ei" may be pointless here in the sense that we already have
"ka'e", which is simpler. If we had had "bi'ai" from the start,
"mu'ei" would have been even less necessary. But it's still nice to
have the relationship between them clearly spelled out.

> It won't help a lot for
> probability, either, since it is relative sizes, not absolute one that play
> there (and the apparatus of logic, per se, is not up to messing with that.

But that's what the so'V series is for, relative quantifiers, just
what's needed for (vague, impressionistic) probabilities. When you say
that something is true in most possible worlds (of the relevant set),
you are saying that it is probable, so you can go from "so'u mu'ei"
(possible but highly ulikely) to "so'a mu'ei" (almost but not quite
certain). You don't really need a fully specified metric for these
words to be useful.

[John E Clifford]

So, the logic of "probably" but not of probability.  Reasonable and interesting to tie in.

---

From: Jorge Llambías <jjlla...@gmail.com>

To: loj...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, August 7, 2012 6:52 PM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

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[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Wednesday, August 8, 2012 1:46:31 AM UTC+4, clifford wrote:

Let me try to pin down where I am hsving problems:

---

From: Gleki Arxokuna <gleki.is...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com
Cc: John E Clifford <kali9...@yahoo.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 7, 2012 12:09 PM
Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 7:34:28 PM UTC+4, clifford wrote:

Well, now I am more confused than before.  What is the role of the second level here, where the universe of worlds is also selected from a universe of universes?  Is there another sense of possibility involved here that is not obtainable in the ordinary one-tier system?  Partly, this all seems backward to me.  We generally start from the given world (obviously) and then work outward to possibilities in various ways: changing circumstances, changing history, changing laws, and so on.  These are covered by different interworld connections, typically, or (what probably amounts to the same thing) by different structures placed on the universe. So, I suppose the different bags correspond to these different structures, but, unlike the case in the usual theories, there does not seem to be a systematic way of distinguishing them.  To say that an event is necessary in a universe in which it occurs in every world is not very illuminating -- unlike saying it is necessary in every universe in which all the present laws of physics hold, say. But then, rather than one notion of possibility applied in different universes, I would explain matters in terms of different notions of possibility applied to one universe -- not that it probably makes any difference in results.

Let me try to explain. There is a set of alternative worlds. Let's take the middle set where we have both white and black balls.

So we have a set of balls (or bags of balls?

We have  a set of balls. Bag is just a visualised idea of a set of balls. Each ball is one world that differs from the others in this set in only one parameter: either the event happens or does not happen.

I'm sticking with balls for the moment) and we take a subset (how specified? random?

It's only you who decides what balls of what color in what number are present in the set. If you wanna be more precise use {mu'ei} which allows specifying the number of black balls but it's not how most languages work.

saying it is the middle makes no sense in a set, which is unordered).  This set has both black and white balls (how do we know this?

I guess one white ball and at least one black ball is enough  to make {ka'e} work. Only in this case {ka'e} can result in {pu'i}.

  If we picked it by this, then it is hard to see what it is going to have to do with possibility, since that is exactly about not picking). 

It means that it's us who chose exactly this set of balls and put them into the bag, i.e. into consideration.

See above.  I am not clear to what in the calculation of possibility this correlates with,

No calculations of possibility. Just a very rough estimate that says that {ka'e broda} = "this event is possible, can happen"

{pu'i broda} = "well, this event happened as it could happen at this time and, yes, it happened".

We don't know which of the balls represents Our World. Our World doesn't exist yet. Still we believe that there is a possibility for a black ball to be extracted. This is what we call {ka'e} i.e. possibility or probability of being extracted.

OK.  Now this looks like standard possibility, given that we know that neither black nor white is impossible

only in {ka'e} case of course. 

(by whatever means). By the way, I would leave probability out of this, since that is a metrical notion that requires a much more complex world structure.

I'm not against mu'ei. Robin just stopped using it so I decided that it was something too complex for colloquial lojban. 

In case when we extract a black ball all Alternative Worlds immediately disappear and we have only one world, Our World, This World. This state is called {pu'i} i.e. demonstrated potential.

Well, strictly, this looks like ca'a, since pu'i seems to me to have past reference, but since we seem to have is an English perfect aspect, the difference is minor.

I strongly believe that there should be no tense aspects here. All cmavo of CAhA set should have one meaning each. Otherwise, {pu'i} must be removed from the language

  But, in what sense do the other worlds disappear?

When the event happens or doesnot happen then all the other  worlds disappear. If this event happens again we just apply identical sets of balls etc. as in the case of the previous event but anyway it's a new event. A-level collapses into M-level. But usually even M-level is just a single moment in time.

So we can only refer to it in our discourses.

  They must still be there to support the notion of potential, which can't be present (in any usual system) in a single world, and to block off the notion of necessity.

Well, you may imagine that white balls being disappointed that one of the black balls has been extracted leave the bag and move into another bag of a new event in a hope that next time one of them will be extracted. :D 

In case when we extract a white ball this potential hasn't been realized and this situation is called {nu'o}.

Again, presumably the other worlds disappear and so we just have a non-occurrence but not a potential occurrence to go unrealized.

We don't forget about A-level even after it disappears. 

In other bags where we have white balls only there is no choice. As .xorxes. said the result at M-level is " just a consequence of all of them being white in that bag. "

The same in case of black balls, i.e. {bi'ai}.

That is, if we pick a universe with only white balls, then whatever ball we pick is white.

It depends on what you call an event. In my scheme {bi'ai} is black balls only. Therefore, {naka'e} is white balls only.

  I guess that is bi'ai, although xorxes points to an obvious more clear reading.  But what, in the end, does this have to do with possibility, since here we have fixed the case so that the desired result is impossible given the initial conditions -- but the initial conditions are just that the desired case be impossible, which makes for an uninteresting situation.

Exactly. {naka'e} and {naka'ena=bia'i} cases describe necessity therefore no speculations about the outcome. As both cmavo start with {naka'e...

In other words, when we move down to M-level the previous A-level disappears. It is actually similar to quantum physics theories where alternative realities collapse to one reality only in the moment of observation by the observer. So Lojban looks like an up-to-date instrument :)

But here, of course, the "observer" has been mucking about from the get-go, choosing which bag to make the pick from.  And the others don't disappear, if we are really doing modals here.

Other bags? Only a given number of balls were chosen and put into the bag. Probably there are other balls that don't get into the bag. They even don't get into the discourse.

Only the balls that we put get into the discourse.

Only one ball out of them that we pick out of the bag is something that we observe.

 

As for F-level it's just another philosophy. At first glance {pu'i} is like {ca'a} but {ca'a} doesn't make any assumptions about the probability of such event.

Nor does pu'i; it only talks about possibilities (or potentials, which might be somewhat different, but that is not the present problem).  What philosophies?  I don't even see two interpretations of possibility, let alone probability, here.

I think that {pu'i} is a former {ka'e} i.e. the result of taking a black ballout of a {ka'e} bag.

{ca'a} doesn't deal with any bags.

anyway, what is in your opinion the difference between {pu'i} and {ca'a}?

Both philosophies are important.

John, sorry for your confusion. I knew only popular descriptionsof quantum physics when started drawing this scheme.

Probably we speak different languages. I just invented my own in this scheme as I knew no other. .a'o this is the only reason for misunderstanding.

I think this is largely true, but I don't see how quantum physics got into this brew in the first place. In one way of working out Prior (temporal modalities) the multiple worlds interpretation of the probabilities involved in quantum physics is taken as a model for the structure of time (without all the details, of course, or much of the understanding of what is happening in quantum physics) and that projects a certain range of modal theories.  But the association is merely handy and nowise essential to modal logic.

That's what I wanted to hear. Please, draw new "logical" schemes classifying CAhA. By far I haven't seen any. Robin seems to have been confused as well.

I started with revising mu'ei. Yes, mu'ei due to PA can be much more precise. I just don't feel I wanna be so precise in my speech. Probably it's my feeling. May be others would still like to use mu'ei.

mu'ei seems a fairly pointless notion for modalities, since the count of possible worlds is rarely (if ever) a factor.  It won't help a lot for probability, either, since it is relative sizes, not absolute one that play there (and the apparatus of logic, per se, is not up to messing with that.

No problem. We can fill A-level with complex cmavo that include mu'ei and announce {ka'e, bia'i} as obsolete cmavo.

But it won't affect M-level and F-level. mu'ei isn't enough. It describes A-level only. This is what I came to.

OK.  I just don't see the need for A level at all.  M and F seem to do all that is needed.  What have I missed?

Where are you going to put {ka'e}? 

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[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Wednesday, August 8, 2012 3:52:50 AM UTC+4, xorxes wrote:

On Tue, Aug 7, 2012 at 6:46 PM, John E Clifford <kali9...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> mu'ei seems a fairly pointless notion for modalities, since the count of
> possible worlds is rarely (if ever) a factor.

You don't need a count for the modals, just the basic quantifiers:

su'o mu'ei = ka'e = na bi'ai na
no mu'ei = na ka'e = bi'ai na
ro mu'ei = bi'ai = na ka'e na
me'i mu'ei = na bi'ai = ka'e na

"mu'ei" may be pointless here in the sense that we already have
"ka'e", which is simpler. If we had had "bi'ai" from the start,
"mu'ei" would have been even less necessary. But it's still nice to
have the relationship between them clearly spelled out.

If more lojbanists use them IRL the better for {mu'ei}.

I can't see anyone except Robin to tell what to do with CAhA, mu'ei, da'i, ganai...gi, bai and va'o.

doi xorxes mi ckire do lo nu do setca so'i jufra fi la tatoebas

i xu do ba'e ka'e zo'o finti za'u jufra be zo mu'ei e ma'oi ca'a

i e'o ko punji lo jufra lo vi casnu stuzi

[John E Clifford]

Rather than continuing to try to ferret out what gleki has in mind, I will try to lay out what I take to be Lojban's (and occasionally logic's) position on part of the range of intensional propositional operators (modals, etc.)

To begin the extensional, {ganai... gi ...} is the standard logical and Lojban "if ..., then ...", which is perfectly serviceable so long as no one tries to win points by pointing out that the antecedent ("if" clause) is in fact false or the consequent ("then" clause) true.   When those factors come into play, we have to move to something other than the present "real world" (the current array of functions or relations assigning individuals to names, classes to properties and so on -- not necessarily the present external world, but the one currently under discussion or presentation), to "possible worlds" (functions -- or relations -- that do as the real world does but perhaps for different individuals and certainly different assignments in some cases).  The details of what these other sets of assignments are like is generally irrelevant to using Lojban, we need only know that where we wander can eventually be projected back onto the present world suitably marked as alternative.  For the notions we are mainly be concerned with, the only systematic notion that rises to practical importance is that the alternate assignments are "suitably" like the present world -- say, roughly, as realistic as a novel in some genre (which genre says something about how far afield we may roam).  We may also want to specify, in some cases, just how the alternatives are to differ from the present case.

The simplest way to move to an alternate world logically is to postulate, suppose, a situation, which does not hold in the real world (I'll skip the scare quotes).  In English we can do this directly, by saying "Suppose/assume that" or the like, or by beginning an obvious tale "Once upon a time, ..." or, rather more complexly, by starting a subjunctive conditional "If I were to...,".  The explicit Lojban equivalent of these moves is {da'i}, a free marker that indicates that the current sentence sets up a world and all that follows (down to {da'i nai} or some other convention) is to be about that world.  In the casual way, {da'i} is used with {ganai ... gi ...} to make the antecedent the establishing characteristic and the consequent the resulting situation (and the {da'inai} is omitted, with some resulting confusion, some times).  Note this world specification tends to be rather weak, so specifying not one alternate assignment but many.  So arguments can ensue about what happens in the hypothetical case.  some are relatively easy arguments to judge: "If I were to relaease this pencil, it would fall" is clearly tied to the present situation and thus assumes the worlds involved differ from the present one mainly in adding that I release the pencil.  On the other hand, "If all unicorns were blue, My Pretty Little Uni would be topaz" doesn't have much to hang an argument on (except maybe whether topaz is a shade of blue) and so matters can go on for a while. 

Often, however, we are less concerned about what happens in a particular (sort of) alternate world as about whether such an alternate world exists at all (within the parameters we have set up in our present assignment for  suitable alternate worlds).  Something is not the case, but is it possible?  That is, in this way of thinking, is there a suitable world in which it does occur?  If there is, then it is possible, though not actual.  So, we can say, in Lojban {ka'e}. We also have its variants with {na} and {nai}, to say there is not such alternative or  the event might not occur or even, combining them, that the event must occur (its non-occurrence is in no suitable alternate world).  Occasionally, we want to say something more than that it is possible, but to stress either that it has happened at least once, so may again {pu'i} or that it hasn't yet but still might {nu'o} and {ca'a} which stresses that it is not merely possible but not actual.  These three are mainly rhetorical; they add nothing to the claim of possibility but merely help the argument along, one way or another (the mixture with tense -- another modal notion -- is incidental and generally a bad idea, though there are cases where the mixture makes important points).

Notice that, while I have talked about these features in terms of alternative assignments (possible worlds, etc.), talk in Lojban says nothing about these notions.  Statements about possibility could, for all the language shows (until crunchy cases turn up), be just about this world (and, in the official reading of {ka'e}, "innately capable", are.  Ignoring this gloss will save a lot of headaches.).  Lojban does, for whatever reason, have a direct reference to alternate assignments, in that they can counted off using {mu'ei} with a PA prefix.  In this way, {ka'e} has an equivalent in {su'omu'ei} and its dual in {romu'ei}.  This also provides an expression for one form of "probably" without going through {lakne}and for other loose probabilistic expressions.  On the whole though, this bringing of worlds from the metalanguage into the object language seems a bad idea.  Better to make do the usual notions (some probabilistic terms in CAhA would be nice, though). 

That's enough for one round.  Note, only modals of truth have been touched on (well, tense, which is also a truth modality, has been mentioned). 

---

[Jorge Llambías]

On Wed, Aug 8, 2012 at 1:35 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> anyway, what is in your opinion the difference between {pu'i} and {ca'a}?

In my opinion "pu'i" should be (re)defined as "actually but not
necessarily". My reasoning is as follows:

"ka'e" and "ca'a" have basic meanings, while "pu'i" and "nu'o"
correspond to certain conjunctions of them plus negation. "ka'e" can
produce 4 different meanings when combined with negation:

ka'e
na ka'e
ka'e na
na ka'e na

"ca'a" can produce 2 different meanings:

ca'a (= na ca'a na)
ca'a na (= na ca'a)

By combining the 4 ka'e-meanings with the 2 ca'a-meanings we could in
principle achieve 8 new meanings, however 2 of them are contradictory,
and 4 of them logically reduce to a non-combined form, due to ca'a
entailing ka'e:

ka'e je ca'a (reduces to ca'a)
na ka'e je ca'a (contradictory)
ka'e na je ca'a
na ka'e na je ca'a (reduces to "na ka'e na")
ka'e je na ca'a
na ka'e je na ca'a (reduces to "na ka'e")
ka'e na je na ca'a (reduces to "na ca'a")
na ka'e na je na ca'a (contradictory)

That leaves two interesting meanings without a simple form, that we
can assign to "pu'i" and "nu'o":

ka'e na je ca'a = pu'i
ka'e je na ca'a = nu'o

The official English glosses for "pu'i" and "nu'o" are somewhat
misleading because they seem to mix them up with tense and/or aspect,
but modality should be kept separate from tense and aspect, so I think
these glosses are better:

pu'i: "actually, but not necessarily" or "actually, but possibly not"
nu'o: "actually not but possibly" or "actually not, but not necessarily not"

[Jorge Llambías]

On Wed, Aug 8, 2012 at 7:24 PM, Jorge Llambías <jjlla...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 8, 2012 at 1:35 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
> <gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> anyway, what is in your opinion the difference between {pu'i} and {ca'a}?

[...]

> That leaves two interesting meanings without a simple form, that we
> can assign to "pu'i" and "nu'o":
>
> ka'e na je ca'a = pu'i
> ka'e je na ca'a = nu'o
>

> pu'i: "actually, but not necessarily" or "actually, but possibly not"
> nu'o: "actually not but possibly" or "actually not, but not necessarily not"

I forgot to mention that this corresponds well with your diagrams:
"pu'i" is a black ball that comes from a bag also containing white
balls, and "nu'o is a white ball that comes from a bag also containing
black balls, so they make reference both to the ball and the bag,
while "ca'a" is just a black ball, and "ka'e" is just a bag containg
black balls.

[John E Clifford]

But this is a total reworking of {pu'i} and {nu'o}, and {ca'a}, for that matter.  To be sure, they appear to be mixing aspects and modals, but in fact hey are just rhetorical flourishes.  Their logical role ({ca'a} doesn't really have one, since it is just {ca}, logically -- or rather the lack of a modal component) is best shown by the conjunctions, since they are hardly common enough logically to need separate forms.  The logical (and usually language as well) is is whether the event is possible or not, not whether it is instantiated or not, and, if the event is occurring, even that interest drops out.

While I am ignoring it, I still wish someone would explain the bags to me, especially what they have to do with anything interesting.

---

From: Jorge Llambías <jjlla...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Wednesday, August 8, 2012 5:54 PM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

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[Gleki Arxokuna]

Your scheme is excellent, doi xorxes. Yes, there is not much difference between your scheme and mine.

Probably, because I based mine on your notes in lojban.org wiki pages on mu'ei, conditionals and CAhA :-)

The wiki doesn't mention {pu'i}. That's why {ca'a} is

http://www.lojban.org/tiki/''ca'ai'',+''ka'ei''+and+''nu'oi',+and+''nau'a'' 

not defined correctly (is it {ka'e je ca'a} or {ka'e na je ca'a}?).

But your new scheme is pretty clear.

I wish we could add {da'i} to this scheme.

Anyway, I'm sure that redefining CAhA as xorxes just suggested is a must.

I don't know how to explain my scheme better

but the shortest version of it would be

A-level. {ka'e}

M-level. {nu'o,pu'i}

F-level. {ca'a}

Other topics relating to conditionals are:

1. Relation between {ni'i} and {ganai ... gi}. Needs to be clarified. What are your thoughts, John?

2. {va'o} which as wiki mentions is more vague and therefore powerful than {ganai ...gi}.

[la .lindar.]

Before you get too far, please consider whether or not an idiot can understand this. If you cannot adequately explain this to me, the dumbest genius in Lojban-central, you cannot possibly hope to get anybody else to understand this. I have a feeling that, based on what little I've read, you've nitpicked the semantics and come up with some massive overhaul that requires a BA in physics to understand to any decent degree the changes you've made.

If you can explain this in terms that a reasonably smart eight-year-old can understand, then please do that once you've all figured out what you're doing. If you can't, then please reconsider what you're doing because you're going to severely alienate at least one reasonably important member of the community.

[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Thursday, August 9, 2012 9:25:42 AM UTC+4, la .lindar. wrote:

Before you get too far, please consider whether or not an idiot can understand this. If you cannot adequately explain this to me, the dumbest genius in Lojban-central, you cannot possibly hope to get anybody else to understand this. I have a feeling that, based on what little I've read, you've nitpicked the semantics and come up with some massive overhaul that requires a BA in physics to understand to any decent degree the changes you've made.

Taking into account that I'm not a physicist..... no, you don't have to. 

If you can explain this in terms that a reasonably smart eight-year-old can understand,

Yes, i have a feeling that i said that already but mentioned 5-year old. But probably it was in #lojban chat.

then please do that once you've all figured out what you're doing. If you can't, then please reconsider what you're doing because you're going to severely alienate at least one reasonably important member of the community.

The best policy is the following:

One or two nice sentences illustrating each CAhA. Period.

That's what I wanted to see when I started digging into {mu'ei} but I couldn't put all cmavo in one scheme. I asked Robin for help and you can see his reply.

Probably in order to help everyone I'll make another version of the scheme based on latest xorxes' explanations.

But please everyone do something yourself too. We all speak different sub-languages, i.e. something that is clear to be may not be so for you.

[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 2:34:44 AM UTC+4, xorxes wrote:

On Mon, Aug 6, 2012 at 9:44 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> OK. If no other criticism I'll correct it and post it to lojban.org wiki.

Strictly speaking, "ka'e" only says that the bag contains black balls.
It doesn't say whether it also contains white balls or not, although
pragmatically one expects that it will, just as when someone says
"some" one pragmatically expects "but not all" to be true as well.

Similarly "ka'e na" would say that the bag contains white ball, saying
nothing about whether it contains black ones as well.

In order to say that it contains both black and white balls you may
need something like "su'opame'iro mu'ei", "in some but not all
worlds". "May or may not", as opposed to just "may".

Indeed. That's what I still might like.

If {ka'e} = {su'opame'iro mu'ei} then the scheme will get symmetry.

{su'opame'iro mu'ei} stretches across the scale not touching it's borders.

If {su'opame'iro mu'ei} = {ka'e} then {ka'ena} and {ka'e} are the same. They differ probably in accenting either the presense of white or black balls respectively. So "I could sleep"="I could be awake" as we don't specify what is more likely. We just state something in between {bi'aina} and {bi'ai}.

In a passage to the limit {su'opame'iro mu'ei} becomes equal to either {bi'ai} or {bi'aina}.

But if we assume that {ka'e}={su'o mu'ei} then in some cases it can be equal to {bi'ai} which is nonsense.

"I could swim" doesn't imply that "I necessarily swim". So stronlgy believe that {ka'e} must not include the case of {bi'ai} and {bi'ai na}.

[Jorge Llambías]

On Thu, Aug 9, 2012 at 7:45 AM, Gleki Arxokuna
<gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 2:34:44 AM UTC+4, xorxes wrote:
>>
>> In order to say that it contains both black and white balls you may
>> need something like "su'opame'iro mu'ei", "in some but not all
>> worlds". "May or may not", as opposed to just "may".
>
> Indeed. That's what I still might like.
> If {ka'e} = {su'opame'iro mu'ei} then the scheme will get symmetry.

I don't think that's a good idea. ka'e and bi'ai are the basic modal
operators (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modal_logic
they even have the customary symbols □ for Necessarily and ◇ for
Possibly). "su'opame'iro mu'ei" may facilitate your drawing, but it
has a more complex logic, for example it is no longer the dual of
bi'ai. If what you want is a simple drawing for "ka'e" in your scheme,
I suggest a bag with at least one black ball and the other balls drawn
in dotted lines, suggesting that we don't know or don't care what
color they are, as long as one of them is black.

> {su'opame'iro mu'ei} stretches across the scale not touching it's borders.
> If {su'opame'iro mu'ei} = {ka'e} then {ka'ena} and {ka'e} are the same. They
> differ probably in accenting either the presense of white or black balls
> respectively. So "I could sleep"="I could be awake" as we don't specify what
> is more likely. We just state something in between {bi'aina} and {bi'ai}.

If you want a word for that, I suggest coining a new one ("ka'ei"?)
but leave "ka'e" for the basic modal meaning.

> In a passage to the limit {su'opame'iro mu'ei} becomes equal to either
> {bi'ai} or {bi'aina}.
>
> But if we assume that {ka'e}={su'o mu'ei} then in some cases it can be equal
> to {bi'ai} which is nonsense.
>
> "I could swim" doesn't imply that "I necessarily swim". So stronlgy believe
> that {ka'e} must not include the case of {bi'ai} and {bi'ai na}.

"I can swim" doesn't imply "I necessarily swim", but "I necessarily
swim" does imply "I can swim". "bi'ai" does not imply "ka'ei", in fact
it implies "na ka'ei".

[John E Clifford]

{ni'i} and {va'o} are new to this discussion and seem to be foreign to it.  {ni'i} indicates that the marked statement follows logically (from the preceding, usually) and can take the name of a logic to be more specific (default among the all unnamed possibilities to standard bivalent logic).  Nothing overt to do with necessity or possibility here, though, if "follows" means "by a valid inference", the marked sentence must be true if all the premises are.  This is thus not about the necessity of the marked sentence but only about the relation.  This is peripherally related to the modals, but obviously closer to various other  "because"s.

{va'o} is even more remote, forming part of a complex predicate, indicating that the core predicate is active when the event {va'o} introduces occurs.  Nothing is said about whether the core event might occur otherwise or whether the core event always accompanies the condition.  So, this relates to even {ganai ... gi ...} in no particular way, all possibilities -- except that on an occasion the two coincided -- are possible. In short, this does not belong in the same semantic domain as the connective, and certainly not of the modals.

---

From: Gleki Arxokuna <gleki.is...@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Thursday, August 9, 2012 12:08 AM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

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[And Rosta]

I only found out in the last couple of years that {mu'ei} had ever attracted any attention, and I was rather surprised by that, because in the era in which they were proposed, nobody paid any attention to experimental cmavo proposals, and the notion of seeking to make Lojban a logical language was deeply marginalized.

The rationale for {mu'ei} is this:

It allows the lexicosyntactic form of conditionals to be homomorphous with the semantic form of conditionals. In particular, the PA element makes explicit the fractional quantification underlying the could/probably/would (some/most/all) scale, and the sumti it governs expresses the restriction on the set of states of affairs ("possible worlds") being quantified over, which is the protasis. The contrast between different sorts of modality (epistemic, deontic, counterfactual, noncounterfactual, futurate) could be expressed within the protasis-expressing sumti or could be lexicalized (as in the case of the ba'oi proposal).

{mu'ei} makes {ka'e} et al redundant, with {ka'e} et al merely being very slightly shorter alternatives to {mu'ei} with implicit sumti.

If you find {romu'ei} absurd, then you must have misunderstood it somehow.

I didn't really understand your remarks, but it seems to me firstly that you didn't apprehend the basic rationale for mu'ei (i.e. what its syntax makes possible) and secondly that you're erroneously trying to see it as involving not only possible worlds (your A-level) but also the actual world (your M-level), when in fact it involves only possible worlds. The structure of mu'ei is "PA mu'ei (lo du'u p is the case kei), q is the case", and mu'ei doesn't specify whether p or q are the case in the actual world. That doesn't rule out having another 8 variants of mu'ei to specify whether or not p and q are actual, tho; but maybe ca'a could be used for that -- i.e. ca'a(nai) in the protasis and/or in the apodosis.

The use of {da'i} is interesting. For a logical language it's completely deplorable, because there's a complete mismatch between the lexicosyntactic form and the logical form, and no explicit rule about how to get from one to the other -- it works by mere stipulated magic. But it caught on among those impatient to be actively using the language, and nicely illustrated the fundamental incompatibility between a loglang and a language governed by the principle of "let usage decide".

--And.

Gleki Arxokuna, On 05/08/2012 18:16:
> Continuation of http://www.lojban.org/tiki/mu'ei
> Note:This topic should be analysed from the Trivalent logic point of view as the latter also deals with Possible worlds.
> But let's get started with more simple stuff.
> mu'ei has always been a problem for me. Although the wiki was simple in describing it I felt something incomplete or illogical there.
>
> Luckily, Lojbanistan has some authority and one can always ask how others solve the same problem.
> Here is the log.
>
> /<gleki> Do you use mu'ei in real life? Do you have any thoughts of making a more generalised abstraction that will include both mu'ei and ba'oi?/
> /<robin>I did for a bit and then stopped; I just use {da'i} tricks now./
> /<gleki>!!! just da'i or pada'i, su'oda'i, roda'i? how can you distinguish between ba'oi and mu'ei then?/
> /<robin>I don't find ba'oi useful at all. Just da'i./
> /<gleki>but how can we distinguish two meanings? i just wanna some examples how we can use da'i for each case. //If i can't use conditionals then i cant speak this language. //Conditionals are the basics. //What are your solutions for su'omu'ei, romu'ei, mu'ei. //I can clearly see differences in their meaning important when speaking. //Regardless the theory of alternate realities behind MUhEI I need words with such semantics. //ko sidju mi/
> /<robin>So use mu'ei ? There's nothing wrong with them. su'o mu'ei is clearly ka'e. I have no idea what use ro mu'ei has; it looks totally pointless to me. Erm, as a bridi tag; as a sumti tag it's fine. Looking at http://www.lojban.org/tiki/mu'ei , for "If the train breaks down I'll be late" is {da'i mi lerci ri'a lo nu le trene cu spofu} //"If the train breaks down I might be late" is not a structure I usually have to produce, but if I did I would just use cumki ; {lo nu mi lerci cu cumki lo nu le trene cu spofu}/
>
>
> So having this absolution granted from lojbo nolraitru I started revising mu'ei.
> Here is what I came up with.
> (if you can't see the image look here <https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.233361103451814.50762.100003337779349&type=1>).
>
>
> <https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-opUzSZGQJJM/UB6pRylT1AI/AAAAAAAAB94/F4vX6jWZkDo/s1600/ka%27e.png>We have two layers. One describes alternate (possible worlds). And it's {ka'e}.
> If you have balls of one color only there are no alternate worlds. i.e. only bag in the middle has more than one output at M-level.
> Therefore I opine that mu'ei is not a good cmavo as it's trying to express two levels and therefore two meaning at once. But cmavo should express one meaning each (being more close to semantic prims).
>
> Strangely enough {pu'i} was out of consideration on mu'ei pages on lojban.org wiki. That's why mu'ei scheme is not complete and comprehensive.
>
> *Other issues including unsettled.*
> romu'ei is absurd.
> bi'ai is described as naka'ena which in my scheme is equal to {ca'a}. But actually in the examples from the wiki bi'ai is used more like {pu'i}. In any case it's meaning is covered by the existing cmavo.
> ba'oi has extra meaning of alternate world identical to This World up to the present. This meaning is yet to be defined using new cmavo if my criticism of mu'ei is accepted.
> da'i and va'o look like non-logical conditionals. Their meaning is out of my understanding. But I'm gonna use da'i more like Robin in those cases when I'm not sure what alternate-world-cmavo to use or in order to reach ambiguity.
> ka'e is used more like an abbreviation of kakne. If the latter meaning of ka'e is fixed we need to find another cmavo for that purpose (for A-level).
> naka'e has no cmavo for the output at M-level. Luckily naka'e is short enough to be used on it's own.
>
> *Conclusion.*
> mu'ei is not needed. If you wanna describe potential i.e. alternate worlds at A-level use naka'e, ka'e or naka'ena=ca'a.
> If in possible worlds some balls are black and some are white then it's ka'e that can result either in nu'o or in pu'i.
> You can use all those cmavo as sumtcita as well which staisfies the need in most conditional sentences
> (conditionals are sentences like "If I hadn't swum I would have been healthy" or similar).

>
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[Gleki Arxokuna]

On Tuesday, August 14, 2012 8:50:51 PM UTC+4, And Rosta wrote:

I only found out in the last couple of years that {mu'ei} had ever attracted any attention, and I was rather surprised by that, because in the era in which they were proposed, nobody paid any attention to experimental cmavo proposals, and the notion of seeking to make Lojban a logical language was deeply marginalized.

The rationale for {mu'ei} is this:

It allows the lexicosyntactic form of conditionals to be homomorphous with the semantic form of conditionals. In particular, the PA element makes explicit the fractional quantification underlying the could/probably/would (some/most/all) scale, and the sumti it governs expresses the restriction on the set of states of affairs ("possible worlds") being quantified over, which is the protasis. The contrast between different sorts of modality (epistemic, deontic, counterfactual, noncounterfactual, futurate) could be expressed within the protasis-expressing sumti or could be lexicalized (as in the case of the ba'oi proposal).

{mu'ei} makes {ka'e} et al redundant, with {ka'e} et al merely being very slightly shorter alternatives to {mu'ei} with implicit sumti.

If you find {romu'ei} absurd, then you must have misunderstood it somehow.

Tell that to Robin :) 

I didn't really understand your remarks, but it seems to me firstly that you didn't apprehend the basic rationale for mu'ei (i.e. what its syntax makes possible) and secondly that you're erroneously trying to see it as involving not only possible worlds (your A-level) but also the actual world (your M-level), when in fact it involves only possible worlds.

Actually I didnt touch {mu'ei} here. It's clearly A-level. I was studying CAhA selmaho instead. {ca'a,pu'i,nu'o} have been of much more interest to me.

I wish Robin started using {mu'ei} again but it's really when usage decides. May be human brain just doesn't want to deal with A-level at such level of precision. May be {ka'e/na ka'e/ka'ei/bia'i} or even {bi'ai} is enough.

Lastly, there is absoultely no contrdiction between mu'ei and my schemes.

The structure of mu'ei is "PA mu'ei (lo du'u p is the case kei), q is the case", and mu'ei doesn't specify whether p or q are the case in the actual world. That doesn't rule out having another 8 variants of mu'ei to specify whether or not p and q are actual, tho; but maybe ca'a could be used for that -- i.e. ca'a(nai) in the protasis and/or in the apodosis.

The use of {da'i} is interesting. For a logical language it's completely deplorable, because there's a complete mismatch between the lexicosyntactic form and the logical form, and no explicit rule about how to get from one to the other -- it works by mere stipulated magic. But it caught on among those impatient to be actively using the language, and nicely illustrated the fundamental incompatibility between a loglang and a language governed by the principle of "let usage decide".

May be we can determine the most common usage of {da'i} and redefine it from the point of view of A/M/F-level scheme?

May be we should perform analysis of Lojban corpus and tatoeba sentences?

[And Rosta]

Gleki Arxokuna, On 14/08/2012 18:23:

> I wish Robin started using {mu'ei} again but
> it's really when usage decides. May be human brain just doesn't want
> to deal with A-level at such level of precision. May be {ka'e/na
> ka'e/ka'ei/bia'i} or even {bi'ai} is enough.

The evidence of natural language is to the contrary. The could/probably/would contrast is the some/most/all contrast.

> The use of {da'i} is interesting. For a logical language it's
> completely deplorable, because there's a complete mismatch between
> the lexicosyntactic form and the logical form, and no explicit rule
> about how to get from one to the other -- it works by mere stipulated
> magic. But it caught on among those impatient to be actively using
> the language, and nicely illustrated the fundamental incompatibility
> between a loglang and a language governed by the principle of "let
> usage decide".
>
> May be we can determine the most common usage of {da'i} and redefine
> it from the point of view of A/M/F-level scheme? May be we should
> perform analysis of Lojban corpus and tatoeba sentences?

{da'i} is in UI, isn't it? So it doesn't have the right grammatical properties.

The purest ways to proceed would be either (1) to define things so that they're logical and regular, regardless of usage, i.e. basically just implement all xorxes's proposals, or (2) to treat the language as an inchoate natlang, a la Lojbab, and abduce grammar out of usage as linguistics of natlangs does.

--And.

[And Rosta]

Jorge Llamb�as, On 05/08/2012 18:38:

> On Sun, Aug 5, 2012 at 2:16 PM, Gleki Arxokuna
> <gleki.is...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> bi'ai is described as naka'ena which in my scheme is equal to {ca'a}.
>

> I can't see your scheme without registering to Facebook, but "ca'a"

> ("actually") is not the same as ""bi'ai"="naka'ena" ("necessarily").
>

> If something is necessarily the case, then it must be actually the
> case, but not the other way around. You may hold a philosophical
> position that says that everything that is the case is necessarily so
> (i.e. it could not have been any different), but linguistically it
> doesn't work, because we can and do talk about how things could have
> been different. If everything necessarily had to be the way it is,
> nothing could have been different.

"If p is the case then q is necessarily the case" doesn't entail that q is the case; only when p is the case does it entail that q is the case.

As the blessed Jim McCawley once pointed out to me on the one occasion I had the good fortune to meet him:

(Today is Tuesday)
"If today is Thursday then tomorrow is Friday"
true if interpreted as a conditional
true if interpreted as so-called 'logical-if' (= either tomorrow is Friday or today is not Thursday)
"If today is Thursday then tomorrow is Wednesday"
false if interpreted as a conditional
true if interpreted as 'logical-if'
"If today is Tuesday then tomorrow is Wednesday"
true if interpreted as a conditional
true if interpreted as 'logical-if'
"If today is Thursday then tomorrow is wednesday"
false if interpreted as a conditional
true if interpreted as 'logical-if'

It was McCawley who explained to me the logic of conditionals.

--And.

[John E. Clifford]

As in theology v science, There is here the middle ground of guided evolution, letting usage decide but forcing some usage (and suppressing others). At the moment, the logically interesting items under consideration are so scattered in so many poorly (mis)understood categories that it is unclear what would be the proper place for most.

Sent from my iPad

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[la gleki]

On Tuesday, August 14, 2012 10:34:20 PM UTC+4, And Rosta wrote:

Gleki Arxokuna, On 14/08/2012 18:23:
> I wish Robin started using {mu'ei} again but
> it's really when usage decides. May be human brain just doesn't want
> to deal with A-level at such level of precision. May be {ka'e/na
> ka'e/ka'ei/bia'i} or even {bi'ai} is enough.

The evidence of natural language is to the contrary. The could/probably/would contrast is the some/most/all contrast.

> The use of {da'i} is interesting. For a logical language it's
> completely deplorable, because there's a complete mismatch between
> the lexicosyntactic form and the logical form, and no explicit rule
> about how to get from one to the other -- it works by mere stipulated
> magic. But it caught on among those impatient to be actively using
> the language, and nicely illustrated the fundamental incompatibility
> between a loglang and a language governed by the principle of "let
> usage decide".
>
> May be we can determine the most common usage of {da'i} and redefine
> it from the point of view of A/M/F-level scheme? May be we should
> perform analysis of Lojban corpus and tatoeba sentences?

{da'i} is in UI, isn't it? So it doesn't have the right grammatical properties.

It is in UI. If I "discovered" A and F levels why not bind {da'i} to A-level i.e. make it a synonym of {ka'e} but without changing the grammar and selmaho

and {da'inai} would be "equal" to {ca'a}.

[John E. Clifford]

But this logic: "all" and "some" belong to a very different system from "many", as do "possible" and "necessary" from "probable".  {mu'ei} may open the way to some combinations, but hasn't yet, remaining an unexplained idiom.  As for the various levels, I still don't see the point of them nor how they work, so I can't comment on their usefulness at any level.

What {da'i} was meant to do is classically done with conditional constructions, suggesting it should be in a class with conjunctions -- presumably sentential.  I think it would function more transparently, in logic and in language, as paragraph marker, setting aside a space -- perhaps many sentences long -- in which to deal with an alternate world.  In either case, UI is the wrong selma'o.

Sent from my iPad

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[And Rosta]

la gleki, On 31/08/2012 17:48:

> On Tuesday, August 14, 2012 10:34:20 PM UTC+4, And Rosta wrote:
>
> Gleki Arxokuna, On 14/08/2012 18:23:
> > I wish Robin started using {mu'ei} again but
> > it's really when usage decides. May be human brain just doesn't want
> > to deal with A-level at such level of precision. May be {ka'e/na
> > ka'e/ka'ei/bia'i} or even {bi'ai} is enough.
>
> The evidence of natural language is to the contrary. The could/probably/would contrast is the some/most/all contrast.
>
> > The use of {da'i} is interesting. For a logical language it's
> > completely deplorable, because there's a complete mismatch between
> > the lexicosyntactic form and the logical form, and no explicit rule
> > about how to get from one to the other -- it works by mere stipulated
> > magic. But it caught on among those impatient to be actively using
> > the language, and nicely illustrated the fundamental incompatibility
> > between a loglang and a language governed by the principle of "let
> > usage decide".
> >
> > May be we can determine the most common usage of {da'i} and redefine
> > it from the point of view of A/M/F-level scheme? May be we should
> > perform analysis of Lojban corpus and tatoeba sentences?
>
> {da'i} is in UI, isn't it? So it doesn't have the right grammatical properties.
>
> It is in UI. If I "discovered" A and F levels why not bind {da'i} to A-level i.e. make it a synonym of {ka'e} but without changing the grammar and selmaho
> and {da'inai} would be "equal" to {ca'a}.

Because {da'i} should be a marker of mood -- of hypothetical, unassertive mood; whereas, ka'e is a modal of possibility. Modals involve quantification over possible states of affairs of various sorts. Moods involve a relation between the speaker and the proposition -- the speaker asserts p to be true, the speaker wishes p were true, the speaker entertains the idea of p, the speaker asks whether p is true, and so forth.

(There's no harm in marking the protasis and/or apodosis of a conditional with da'i, but da'i doesn't generate conditional semantics.)

--And.

[And Rosta]

And Rosta, On 31/08/2012 20:39:

> (There's no harm in marking the protasis and/or apodosis of a conditional with da'i, but da'i doesn't generate conditional semantics.)

I should qualify that: In regular logic-driven Lojban (and in the original design of Lojban), da'i doesn't generate conditional semantics. But in usage-driven Lojban, it seems that nowadays da'i does generate conditional semantics.

--And.

[John E Clifford]

Using {da'i} with truth-functional connectives is, of course, dissonant, since a {da'i} sentence has no truth value.  But we do allow this is some other cases, so perhaps this is no harm.  While it is true that "I suppose" and the like don't generate conditionals in a direct way, the usual reasons for such suppositions is to consider what would happen if the supposition were true.  This is a longer task than can be handled in a simple conditional, although the results can be summarized in one -- and usually is.  Hence the paragraph marker suggestion (on analogy with the inset or boxing conventions of ordinary logic for reductio and conditional proof).

---

From: And Rosta <and....@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Friday, August 31, 2012 2:39 PM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

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[John E Clifford]

The point is that it is not a discursive or even an evidential, but something with a logical force.

---

From: John E Clifford <kali9...@yahoo.com>
To: "loj...@googlegroups.com" <loj...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, August 31, 2012 6:05 PM

To unsubscribe from this group, send email to lojban+un...@googlegroups.com.

[And Rosta]

John E Clifford, On 01/09/2012 00:05:

> Using {da'i} with truth-functional connectives is, of course,
> dissonant, since a {da'i} sentence has no truth value.

The propositional content of a da'i sentence does have a truth-value, and may contain truth-functional connectives. But the speaker is making no claim about what that truth value is. This holds not just for da'i but for most illocutionary UI.

--And.

[John E Clifford]

OK.  The point is that the whole {da'i} utterance has no truth value, at least not in this world.  It is foundational (and thus true) in some alternate world(s) to which {da'i} takes the discussion.  But I suspect you have something else in mind and I can't quite make out what it is.

---

From: And Rosta <and....@gmail.com>
To: loj...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Friday, August 31, 2012 6:25 PM

Subject: Re: [lojban] Revising mu'ei and CAhA once again. Possible worlds.

[la gleki]

On Friday, August 31, 2012 11:39:43 PM UTC+4, And Rosta wrote:

la gleki, On 31/08/2012 17:48:
> On Tuesday, August 14, 2012 10:34:20 PM UTC+4, And Rosta wrote:
>
>     Gleki Arxokuna, On 14/08/2012 18:23:
>      > I wish Robin started using {mu'ei} again but
>      > it's really when usage decides. May be human brain just doesn't want
>      > to deal with A-level at such level of precision. May be {ka'e/na
>      > ka'e/ka'ei/bia'i} or even {bi'ai} is enough.
>
>     The evidence of natural language is to the contrary. The could/probably/would contrast is the some/most/all contrast.
>
>      > The use of {da'i} is interesting. For a logical language it's
>      > completely deplorable, because there's a complete mismatch between
>      > the lexicosyntactic form and the logical form, and no explicit rule
>      > about how to get from one to the other -- it works by mere stipulated
>      > magic. But it caught on among those impatient to be actively using
>      > the language, and nicely illustrated the fundamental incompatibility
>      > between a loglang and a language governed by the principle of "let
>      > usage decide".
>      >
>      > May be we can determine the most common usage of {da'i} and redefine
>      > it from the point of view of A/M/F-level scheme? May be we should
>      > perform analysis of Lojban corpus and tatoeba sentences?
>
>     {da'i} is in UI, isn't it? So it doesn't have the right grammatical properties.
>
> It is in UI. If I "discovered" A and F levels why not bind {da'i} to A-level i.e. make it a synonym of {ka'e} but without changing the grammar and selmaho
> and {da'inai} would be "equal" to {ca'a}.

Because {da'i} should be a marker of mood -- of hypothetical, unassertive mood; whereas, ka'e is a modal of possibility. Modals involve quantification over possible states of affairs of various sorts.

I don't see much difference. Who counts over possible worlds? The speaker. Does {romu'ei} mean really every possible world? I think it refers to all the possible worlds that the speaker has in mind.

{da'i} doesn't count possible worlds but instead refers to their existence. May be it's not {ka'e} but {ka'ei=su'opame'iromu'ei}.

Next. Robin said that cumki and Ko could work in this field too. Then why not use {da'i} together with {ju'o, la'a} to describe those possible worlds?

I just can see the lack of a scheme. A-level is now more or less described with {mu'ei}.

la xorxes was able to describe {nu'o,pu'i} as derivations of mu'ei and ca'a if ca'a describes F-level.

Now I have questions about {cumki, lakne, kanpe} and {ju'o,la'a,ba'a}, {da'i} and probably {sruma/ru'a}, how they are related to A- and F-levels.

[selpa'i]

Am 01.09.2012 08:18, schrieb la gleki:
> I don't see much difference. Who counts over possible worlds? The
> speaker. Does {romu'ei} mean really every possible world? I think it
> refers to all the possible worlds that the speaker has in mind.

Well, since mu'ei is ROI, it only refers to PA worlds in which the
tagged event is true. Since the speaker chooses the zo'e, it does indeed
refer to worlds that the speaker chooses to include. However, if the
zo'e is very far from what the audience might expect, you should
probably indicate that explicitly. Still, you are technically right.

mi do ro mu'ei lo du'u mi .e do zasti cu prami
I love you in every possible world in which you and I exist.(which is
quite an exaggeration, but has a nice poetic effect)

mu'o mi'e la selpa'i

--
pilno zo le xu .i lo dei bangu cu se cmene zo lojbo .e nai zo lejbo

^:i \jl /flr sen |ziu \su xn go kror
^:i \sym tfn /zu viw \xn jy ^jaiw

[la gleki]

si'au It has become a bad habit to resume old infamous topics :D.

But since J.Clifford asked several weeks ago how I had solved the problem of subjunctives in Lojban I assume that our conversation here wasn't clear enough.

Besides, the following topics were ignored:

1. the topic of {cumki} wasn't touched although Robin clearly mentioned it as one of useful words. Besides, ignoring predicates is ignoring Loglandic goals  themselves.
2. Loglan. We have touched all the pages from Lojbanic twiki on subjunctiveness but haven't touched other languages. Namely, Loglan.
3. gua\spi hasn't been touched
4. Ithkuil (which is kinda The Guinness Book of Records of Rare Languages) has some solutions that are to be revised.

In this message I present the table with all parts found in Lojbanistan and in mia system of Loglan'1996.

Ithkuil and loglandic examples adapted to lojban will be presented next time (me being a lojbanist is not a paid job so i'm not thinking of lojban every minute).

In the file  attached you can see all solutions including loglandic. They wonderfully fit into one table.

Note the addition of {lakne/la'a} to the analysis.

Also note that la tsani recently suggested that {sei} should belong to the same semantic class as {fi'o}.

If it's a fate of Lojban to become as simple as gua\spi and lose attitudinals (i.e. {sei}) vs. normal brivla (i.e. {fi'o}) distinction,

well, here I am.

If you don't agree with that you may replace {sei} with experimental cmavo {xoi} that is basically {fi'o se} but a bit better defined.

[la gleki]

In order to understand what was going on in 1996 here are some examples from http://www.loglan.org/Articles/mia-subjunctives.html (most lojbanists can't read loglandic texts).

I replaced loglandic {mia} with {mi'ai} and converted all loglandic examples to lojban.

I should note that {mia} is basically {va'o} so {mi'ai} is an adhoc cmavo here.

I didn't translate sio/dau/biu words and sirto. Five Other "Auxiliary Verbs" might have other translations to lojban so i marked them with "?". Anyway their english translation is the reference for searching for lojbanic analogs.

The Basic Mi'ai Plan

1) Mi gleki mi'ai lonu mi nolraitru
I am happy in-an-imaginary-world-in-which I am king.
I would/could be happy in a world where I were king.
I would/could be happy if I were king.

2) Mi gleki mi'ai da.
I am-happy given-some-unspecified cause x (in some unmentioned imaginary world y).
I could/would be happy.

Effect Likelihood

1) ko'a sio mabru.
X must be/certainly is a mammal.

2) ko'a dau mabru.

X should be/probably is a mammal.

3) ko'a biu mabru.
X might be/possibly is a mammal.

4) lo nu ko'a mabru cu sirto(=fatci?)/lakne/cumki ti da.
The-state-of X's being-a-mammal is certain/-probable/possible given-these-conditions (those presumably present in the world of speech) and-some-unspecified-knowledge-system-x.

5) ju'o/la'a/a'o da mamla.
Certainly/Probably/Perhaps X is a mammal.

World-Likelihood

1) mi gleki mi'ai lonu mi nolraitru.
I would be happy if I were king.

How do we add the English mumble ...but I'll never be one? Actually, quite simply. By using our alphabetic anaphora, we can co-designate lonu mi nolraitru by the letter word ny (the first letter of its principal brivla) and say

2) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu mi nolraitru i je ny na cumki.

2) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu sei na cumki mi nolraitru.
I would be happy if I were king, and-jointly b (the event of my being king) is not possible.

3) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu mi nolraitru ije ny cumki jenai lakne.

3) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu sei cumki jenai lakne mi nolraitru.

I would be happy if I were king, and-jointly b (the event of my being king) is possible but not likely.

4) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu mi nolraitru, ije ny lakne jenai se nibli.
4) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu sei lakne jenai se nibli mi nolraitru.
I would be happy if I were king, and-jointly b (the event of my being king) is likely but not certain.

5) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu mi nolraitru, ije ny nibli.
5) Mi gleki mi'ai lo nu sei se nibli mi nolraitru.

I would be happy if I were king, and-jointly b (the event of my being king) is certain.

Five Other "Auxiliary Verbs"

• djica (4v) X will/intends/is motivated to do Y for motive Z
• kakne (3v) X can/is able to do Y
• ?bilga (3v) X should/ought to do Y
• ?se rinju (3v) X must/is obliged to do Y
• ?jai se curmi X may/is allowed/permitted to do Y

[la gleki]

[la gleki]

This is an abridged extract from Ithkuil grammar.

Note that Ithkuil is very precise in it's affixes and it's often impossible to drop out words that are known from context anyway. Therefore, the translations to lojban are lengthy. It's only Ithkuil that causes this.

Again note that you might wanna replace {sei} with {xoi} or {fi'o se}. I don't care.

5.2.1

FAC

The Factual

The FACTUAL mood signifies that the factuality of the speaker’s statement is certain and that there either is no underlying presupposition to the statement, or if there is, its factuality is also certain or has no bearing on the factuality of the statement. Examples:

His kids are ill. [i.e., it is known he has kids and it is known they are ill]          

{lo sei fatci panzi be do ku bilma sei fatci}

5.2.2

SUB

The Subjunctive

The SUBJUNCTIVE mood indicates that the factuality of an explicit or implicit presupposition underlying the statement is certain, but the factuality of the speaker’s statement itself is questionable or uncertain, the specific nuance of factuality intended being subject to the particular Bias and Validation associated with the verb. Corresponds roughly with English ‘may,’ ‘maybe’ or ‘might,’ with the added distinction that an explicit or implicit (i.e., underlying) presupposition is true. Examples:

Maybe his kids are ill. [i.e., it is known that he has kids but it is not known whether they are ill]

{lo sei fatci panzi be do ku bilma sei cumki}

5.2.3

ASM

The Assumptive

The ASSUMPTIVE mood functions identically to the FACTUAL except that the factuality of an underlying presupposition is unknown. It therefore conveys an act, state, or event whose factuality is dependent on whether something else is factual, thus corresponding to certain usages of English ‘maybe’ and ‘will’ (where ‘will’ primarily conveys possibility, not future tense). As with all moods, the specific translation is subject to the particular Bias and Validation associated with the verb. Examples:

His kids’ll be ill OR If he has kids, they are ill. [i.e., it is unknown whether he has kids, but if he does, they are certainly ill.]

{lo sei cumki panzi be do ku bilma sei fatci}

5.2.4

SPC

The Speculative

The SPECULATIVE mood indicates that the factuality of both the presupposition and the statement itself are unknown. Its translation into English is dependent on the specific context, sometimes corresponding to ‘may,’ ‘maybe’ or ‘might,’ and at other times corresponding to the auxiliary ‘would.’ Compare the examples below to those above:

Maybe his kids are ill [i.e., it is unknown if he has kids but if he does, they may be ill].

{lo panzi be do ku bilma sei cumki}

5.2.5

COU

The Counterfactive

The COUNTERFACTIVE mood indicates that the factuality of the underlying presupposition is false or unreal but that the factuality of the statement would otherwise be true. It thus corresponds to the English construction of auxiliary ‘would’ or ‘would have’ in its use to show counterfactuality (i.e., what would have been if a false presupposition had been true). Again, the specific translation is subject to the particular Bias and Validation associated with the verb. Compare the examples below to those above.

His kids would be (would have been) ill [i.e., if he had kids they would be ill, but he doesn’t].

{lo sei na fatci panzi be do ku bilma sei fatci}

5.2.6

HYP

The Hypothetical

The HYPOTHETICAL mood indicates that the factuality of the underlying presupposition is false or unreal and that the factuality of the statement itself is uncertain. It thus corresponds to the English construction of auxiliary ‘might have’ in its use to show possible counterfactuality (i.e., what might have been if a false presupposition had been true). Again, the specific translation is subject to the particular Bias and Validation associated with the verb. Compare the examples below to those above.

His kids might’ve been ill [if he had kids, but he doesn’t, so we’ll never know].

{lo sei na fatci panzi be do ku bilma sei cumki}

5.2.7

IPL

The Implicative

The IMPLICATIVE mood indicates that the factuality of the underlying presupposition determines the factuality of the statement and that the relationship between the two need not necessarily be a direct cause-and-effect, but merely an indirect chain of events from which the speaker infers the statement from the underlying presupposition. In grammatical analysis, this is referred to as an “epistemic conditional.” Examples are shown below.

His kids are (must be) ill [i.e., as implied by some other fact such as his staying home from work].

{lo panzi be do ku bilma sei se sinxa}

{lo panzi be do ku bilma sei se ve djuno}

5.2.8

ASC

The Ascriptive

The ASCRIPTIVE mood functions identically to the IMPLICATIVE immediately above, except that the factuality of the inference derived from the underlying presupposition is uncertain. Examples:

His kids may be ill [i.e., as implied by some other fact such as his staying home from work].

{lo panzi be do ku bilma sei se sinxa sei cumki}

{lo panzi be do ku bilma sei se ve djuno sei cumki}

[la gleki]

Sorry for formatting problems. Reposting.

[la gleki]

Important additions. During recent discussions in chat the following issues have been raised by selpa'i, tsani, latro'a.

1. da'i != su'omu'ei, even semantically.

da'i [mi ka'e snada] - Non-factual/hypothetical: I could succeed, it is possible that I succeed

da'i [ca'a snada] - Non-factual/hypothetical: I actually succeed

da'i nai [ka'e snada] - Factual: I could succeed

da'i nai [ca'a snada] - Factual: I do actually succeed

So this {da'i} it actually expands JCB's scheme.

2. {ca'a=fi'o jai fatci} (as jvs states) is wrong.

ca'a is about events. fatci is du'u-like. So may be {ca'a=fi'o fasnu} but then there is a clash with {fau=fi'o fasnu}. Do you know of any other suitable brivla? If not it's still not a problem. Many cmavo have no corresponding brivla counterparts (NU and ZAhO are another examples of such situation).