Does Lojban have an equivalent of 萬/만/万 (10 thousand)?

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Zilong Lee

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Oct 25, 2014, 2:36:19 AM10/25/14
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I'm a native Mandarin speaker. In East Asia, we have different number scales than the West, especially when the number gets bigger than 10 thousand, we use another word, namely '萬/万(wan4)' in Chinese, '만/萬(man)' in Korean and '万'(man) in Japanese(I'm not sure whether it exists in other East Asian languages like Vietnamese and Mongolian, etc.), instead of keeping using thousand. So to a Chinese/Korean/Japanese ear, '17 thousand' sounds very confusing. 

If Lojban is truly culturally neutral, I think we should have an equivalent word of 10-thousand. Is it already there? or that it has never been thought about?

Jorge Llambías

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Oct 25, 2014, 7:49:56 AM10/25/14
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On Sat, Oct 25, 2014 at 3:36 AM, Zilong Lee <mrka...@gmail.com> wrote:

If Lojban is truly culturally neutral, I think we should have an equivalent word of 10-thousand. Is it already there? or that it has never been thought about?

As a brivla, we could use "ctocto". As a PA cmavo, perhaps "ki'o'o", suggesting one more zero than "ki'o".  

mu'o mi'e xorxes

Ilmen

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Oct 25, 2014, 9:03:11 AM10/25/14
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On 25/10/2014 08:36, Zilong Lee wrote:
I'm a native Mandarin speaker. In East Asia, we have different number scales than the West, especially when the number gets bigger than 10 thousand, we use another word, namely '萬/万(wan4)' in Chinese, '만/萬(man)' in Korean and '万'(man) in Japanese(I'm not sure whether it exists in other East Asian languages like Vietnamese and Mongolian, etc.), instead of keeping using thousand. So to a Chinese/Korean/Japanese ear, '17 thousand' sounds very confusing. 

If Lojban is truly culturally neutral, I think we should have an equivalent word of 10-thousand. Is it already there? or that it has never been thought about?

您好!

Lojban numbers are represented with the positional notation: in base ten, the ten primary digits {no, pa, re, ci, vo, mu, xa, ze, bi, so} (= 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9) are enough for encoding any positive integer: 10 is {pa no}, 100 is {pa no no}, 1000 is {pa no no no}, and so on. As a result, there is no need for number words such as "hundred", "thousand", "billions" etc.

In Lojban, 万 is expressed as {pa no no no no}, or {pa se gei vo} (1×10^4, scientific notation).

It is also possible to specify the number base/radix by using the particle {ju'u}, which allows for example to express numbers in base two, base twelve, base sixteen etc.

mi'e la .ilmen. mu'o

Pierre Abbat

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Oct 25, 2014, 9:33:21 PM10/25/14
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I don't know if any Lojbanist has thought about it, but East Asia is not the
only place where this system has been used. Ancient Greek used the myriadic
system. Aramaic (and probably also Hebrew, the words are cognate) also used
the myriadic system; the number in Revelation 9:16 is δυο μυριαδες μυριαδων
(with lots of variations, some dropping "two") in Greek and תרתין רבו רבון
(tarteyn rebu rebwan) in Aramaic, both meaning "two myriad myriads". Modern
Greek, though, uses εκατομμυριο (hundred myriad) for million and bases the
words for bigger numbers on that.

Among the six source languages, there's another that uses a different system.
Hindi and other Indic languages have words for ten times the powers of a
hundred: hazar, lakh, crore, abaj, sankh. A big number is written as
4,29,49,67,296.

Pierre
--
La sal en el mar es más que en la sangre.
Le sel dans la mer est plus que dans le sang.

MorphemeAddict

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Oct 26, 2014, 1:29:38 AM10/26/14
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How does {pa se gei vo} mean (1×10^4, scientific notation)? 
My listing gives the definition of {gei} as 'exponential order of magnitude/value/base; [b * (c to the a power)]'. 
Using {gei} and 1×10^4, a=4, b=1, c=10. How does "se" rearrange the parts of {gei}? 

stevo


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Gleki Arxokuna

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Oct 26, 2014, 6:44:58 AM10/26/14
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So what roots do we have?
10^2:
Hindi hazar
10^4:
man/van/wan for East Asia,
r?b for Aramaic
miriad for Ancient Greek
Hindi lax
10^6:
Hindi tcrore
10^8:
Hindi abadj
10^10:
Hindi sanx

?
ju'o i determined hindi numbers incorrectly.


Pierre
--
La sal en el mar es más que en la sangre.
Le sel dans la mer est plus que dans le sang.

Ilmen

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Oct 26, 2014, 9:47:15 AM10/26/14
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On 26/10/2014 06:29, MorphemeAddict wrote:
How does {pa se gei vo} mean (1×10^4, scientific notation)? 
My listing gives the definition of {gei} as 'exponential order of magnitude/value/base; [b * (c to the a power)]'. 
Using {gei} and 1×10^4, a=4, b=1, c=10. How does "se" rearrange the parts of {gei}? 

stevo

You can find an example of SE+VUhU at CLL Chapter 18 Verse 21.1.

“se” can be used to convert an operator as if it were a selbri, so that its arguments are exchanged. For example:

21.1)  li ci se vu'u vo du li pa
       The-number three (inverse) minus four equals the-number one.
       3 subtracted from 4 equals 1.

MorphemeAddict

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Oct 26, 2014, 11:39:33 AM10/26/14
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You're asking me to figure it out on my own, and I already tried that. 

stevo

Jorge Llambías

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Oct 26, 2014, 11:53:33 AM10/26/14
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On Sun, Oct 26, 2014 at 12:39 PM, MorphemeAddict <lyt...@gmail.com> wrote:
You're asking me to figure it out on my own, and I already tried that. 

"gei" is a function with three arguments (a=exponent, b=coefficient, c=base). "se gei" is the same function with its arguments in a different order (coefficient, exponent, base). The letters a, b, c in the ma'oste definitions of mex functions indicate the order of the arguments, similar to x1, x2, x3, x4, x5 for predicates.

Pierre Abbat

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Oct 26, 2014, 3:47:29 PM10/26/14
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The Hindi numbers are all off by a factor of 10 (hazar=10^3, lax=10^5, kyrod or
whatever=10^7, abadj=10^9, sanx=10^11). "Crore" is the English spelling. In
Hindi, the first r is a normal tap r, but the second is some sort of rhotic
which developed from a retroflex stop. In Gujarati it is still a stop. Hindi
also has an aspirated version of this rhotic in "Garhwal".

MorphemeAddict

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Oct 26, 2014, 8:24:05 PM10/26/14
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Thanks, xorxes.

stevo

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TR NS

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Nov 2, 2014, 12:33:00 PM11/2/14
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On Saturday, October 25, 2014 9:33:21 PM UTC-4, Pierre Abbat wrote:
On Friday, October 24, 2014 23:36:18 Zilong Lee wrote:
> I'm a native Mandarin speaker. In East Asia, we have different number
> scales than the West, especially when the number gets bigger than 10
> thousand, we use another word, namely '萬/万(wan4)' in Chinese, '만/萬(man)' in
> Korean and '万'(man) in Japanese(I'm not sure whether it exists in other
> East Asian languages like Vietnamese and Mongolian, etc.), instead of
> keeping using thousand. So to a Chinese/Korean/Japanese ear, '17 thousand'
> sounds very confusing.
>
> If Lojban is truly culturally neutral, I think we should have an equivalent
> word of 10-thousand. Is it already there? or that it has never been thought
> about?


Loglan had a word for 100 and 1000, `ma` and `mo` respectively. You could string them together to get multiples. So `mama` would mean 10,000. I am surprised to see nothing like this was brought over to Lojban ?

 

Gleki Arxokuna

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Nov 2, 2014, 1:36:53 PM11/2/14
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loglan had other problems with them namely that those words had multiple meaning and a pause rule had to be ilmplemented. mi'a discussed that ,see loglanists mailing list archives.

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Michael Turniansky

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Jan 29, 2015, 1:55:17 PM1/29/15
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On Sat, Oct 25, 2014 at 7:05 PM, Pierre Abbat <ph...@bezitopo.org> wrote:
On Friday, October 24, 2014 23:36:18 Zilong Lee wrote:
> I'm a native Mandarin speaker. In East Asia, we have different number
> scales than the West, especially when the number gets bigger than 10
> thousand, we use another word, namely '萬/万(wan4)' in Chinese, '만/萬(man)' in
> Korean and '万'(man) in Japanese(I'm not sure whether it exists in other
> East Asian languages like Vietnamese and Mongolian, etc.), instead of
> keeping using thousand. So to a Chinese/Korean/Japanese ear, '17 thousand'
> sounds very confusing.
>
> If Lojban is truly culturally neutral, I think we should have an equivalent
> word of 10-thousand. Is it already there? or that it has never been thought
> about?

I don't know if any Lojbanist has thought about it, but East Asia is not the
only place where this system has been used. Ancient Greek used the myriadic
system. Aramaic (and probably also Hebrew, the words are cognate)

  Yes,  
רבבה (singular; more usually in the plural רבבות) appears in places like Judges 20:10, Gen. 24:60, Song of Songs 5:10, etc.

         --gejyspa

MorphemeAddict

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Jan 29, 2015, 2:12:35 PM1/29/15
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Could 10000 be shortened even more to just "se gei vo", where both the coefficient, 1, and the base, 10, are assumed? 

stevo

On Sun, Oct 26, 2014 at 11:53 AM, Jorge Llambías <jjlla...@gmail.com> wrote:
--

Michael Turniansky

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Jan 29, 2015, 2:25:48 PM1/29/15
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  I don't see why not.

  Don't forget though, that if you want to use it as a quantifiier, since it is a makso, you have to enclose it in vei...ve'o
(vei pa se gei vo ve'o gerku cu klama lo zarci) 

          --gejyspa

Michael Turniansky

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Jan 29, 2015, 2:26:15 PM1/29/15
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errr vei  se gei vo ve'o gerku cu klama

Michael Turniansky

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Jan 29, 2015, 2:27:28 PM1/29/15
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(whereas panononono or panoki'o would not have to be)

MorphemeAddict

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Jan 29, 2015, 3:03:41 PM1/29/15
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Okay, thanks.

stevo

Jorge Llambías

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Jan 29, 2015, 4:15:26 PM1/29/15
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On Thu, Jan 29, 2015 at 4:12 PM, MorphemeAddict <lyt...@gmail.com> wrote:
Could 10000 be shortened even more to just "se gei vo", where both the coefficient, 1, and the base, 10, are assumed? 

Just "gei vo" (or "vei gei vo" if you want to use it as a quantifier), no "se", since the exponent is the first argument. 

When operators are used in forethought mode (which you have to do in the case of "gei" if you want to use all three arguments or just one, because the infix form and reverse Polish notation form can only be used with exactly two arguments), the operand that follows the operator is the first argument, it's not like with selbri. So it's "gei vo", "gei vo boi pa" or "gei vo boi pa boi pa no boi" for 1x10^4;
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