Re: Cowan's summary: opacity and sumti-raising
Logical Language Group
> > I don't know about "seek", but "look for" doesn't have to involve an
> > abstraction. "I am looking for my book" is perfectly transparent, and
> > I don't see why {sisku} can't be used for it.
The point is that "sisku" doesn't mean "seek/look for", but rather
"seek/look for something with a specified property". The reason for doing
this is that seeking very frequently involves something that is -specific
but where we do not wish to commit ourselves with a +existent locution.
The degenerate case "I'm looking for my book (+specific)" becomes "I'm looking
for something with the property of being my book", i.e.
mi sisku le ka du le mi cukta
mi sisku tu'a le mi cukta
However, if we say "I'm looking for an English translation of Jorge de
Montemayor's >Diana<", the "le ka" formulation saves us from error even
if there is no such translation.
--
John Cowan sharing account <loj...@access.digex.net> for now
e'osai ko sarji la lojban.
Jorge Llambias
> The point is that "sisku" doesn't mean "seek/look for", but rather
> "seek/look for something with a specified property". The reason for doing
> this is that seeking very frequently involves something that is -specific
> but where we do not wish to commit ourselves with a +existent locution.
And frequently it does not. Why can't the unmarked case be left transparent?
> The degenerate case "I'm looking for my book (+specific)"
Why degenerate? I often find myself looking for things that I forgot where
I left. I don't see what is so exceptional about this circumstance.
> becomes "I'm looking
> for something with the property of being my book", i.e.
>
> mi sisku le ka du le mi cukta
Why add this {le ka du}, when the unmarked case would naturally mean that?
Very unzipfist.
> mi sisku tu'a le mi cukta
Which could also mean "I'm looking for something to write on my book" or
any of a million other things related to my book. It is vague
> However, if we say "I'm looking for an English translation of Jorge de
> Montemayor's >Diana<", the "le ka" formulation saves us from error even
> if there is no such translation.
Here I would use {lo'e}:
mi sisku lo'e xe fanva be la'o sy Diana sy bei la gliban
{lo'e broda} doesn't claim that {lo broda} exists, does it?
Jorge
ucleaar
> > > I don't know about "seek", but "look for" doesn't have to involve an
> > > abstraction. "I am looking for my book" is perfectly transparent, and
> > > I don't see why {sisku} can't be used for it.
> >
> > ----
> > And
>
> I don't understand. Are you agreeing or disagreeing? Your sentence doesn't
> involve opacity either.
>
> Do you agree that I can say {mi sisku le mi cukta}, where {le mi cukta}
> is not a property but an object?
Sorry, I seem to have sent a truncated version of the message. I mean
that "seek" means "X try to bring about the event of X finding Y" -
that is, there is an abstraction that can give rise to opacity, but
in your example it is transparent.
As for whether "mi sisku le mi cukta" should be possible, I think
either
(a) it is possible & means "try to find" & because the event
abstraction is implicit the Lojban rules mean that it is
always transparent, so "mi sisku lo cukta" must mean
"there is a book I'm trying to find".
(b) it is impossible, and the x2 must be a "lenu...".
I prefer (b), but the status quo wd appear to be either (a) or
confusion.
----
And
Logical Language Group
lojbab
Logical Language Group
> > The degenerate case "I'm looking for my book (+specific)"
>
> Why degenerate? I often find myself looking for things that I forgot where
> I left. I don't see what is so exceptional about this circumstance.
It is admittedly a common case, but it is not the general case.
> > becomes "I'm looking
> > for something with the property of being my book", i.e.
> >
> > mi sisku le ka du le mi cukta
>
> Why add this {le ka du}, when the unmarked case would naturally mean that?
> Very unzipfist.
It's natural for "seek", but "sisku" is something different.
> > mi sisku tu'a le mi cukta
>
> Which could also mean "I'm looking for something to write on my book" or
> any of a million other things related to my book. It is vague
If you don't like vagueness, use "le ka du". Only one syllable longer than
"tu'a", and perfectly precise. Precision and verbosity are in inverse
proportion, as usual.
> > However, if we say "I'm looking for an English translation of Jorge de
> > Montemayor's >Diana<", the "le ka" formulation saves us from error even
> > if there is no such translation.
>
> Here I would use {lo'e}:
>
> mi sisku lo'e xe fanva be la'o sy Diana sy bei la gliban
>
>
> {lo'e broda} doesn't claim that {lo broda} exists, does it?
I don't know that that has been settled. But I find the idea of an
archetype of a non-existent (in the appropriate universe of discourse) thing
rather problematic. What could be predicated of this {lo'e xe fanva}, other
than what we say in the embedded place structures?
Logical Language Group
is not inconsistent with "lo ka ..."
lojbab
Jorge Llambias
> > being looked for, but it does make sense, so I don't see the need
> > to forbid this simple expression.
>
> Quantifier error!
>
> It is false that "it never makes sense", right enough. However, it is
> also false that "it does [always] make sense".
When does it not make sense?
A different matter is whether the opaque case can be easily expressed,
but the transparent case always makes sense with sisku meaning "x1 looks
for object x2".
> In fact, it sometimes
> makes sense and sometimes not. Having places which only sometimes make
> sense is to be avoided.
I'd like to see an example of when it would not make sense.
Jorge
Logical Language Group
for this meaning. studji or stujundji or faktoi all could be appropriate,
perhaps with slightly different place structures according to the Nick
formulary.
lojbab
Jorge Llambias
> We can solve the "look for object" problem most simply by just creating a
lujvo
> for this meaning.
Ok, then that proves that there is nothing strange about a brivla meaning
"x1 looks for x2".
I find "x1 looks for something with property x2" more intricate, and so
I would prefer that this last one be handled with a lujvo based on the first
one, but that is of course my subjective judgement.
> studji or stujundji or faktoi all could be appropriate,
> perhaps with slightly different place structures according to the Nick
> formulary.
{faktoi} is "x1 tries to discover x2(du'u) about x3"
{stujundji} I suppose would be "x1 wants to know the location of x2", which
doesn't really have an active search-for component. Also, it only works
for things that have inherent locations. I suppose {studji} is meant as a
shortening of this one.
{zvajundji} would be the corresponding one for nonce location of an object.
Again, it doesn't really involve active searching. I think {zvadji} would
not serve in this case for a short form, because it seems to mean more
something like "x1 wants to be at x2".
{sisku} would be so much more useful with a simple, more basic meaning...
Jorge
Jorge Llambias
> Of course there is nothing strange about a brivla relating two objects - a
> seeker and the thing known-and-sought-after, and having a certain predicate
> relating them. The problem that I see is that there is more than one such
> predicate, and the choice is dependent on the specificity (or is that
> definiteness %^) of x2 vs. its opacity, etc., and what the desire is of the
> seeker for the final state after finding.
The problem is transparency vs opacity. Transparent references can be
specific or nonspecific, and that can be marked with the appropriate
quantifiers, but we don't have any way to mark explicitly opaque references.
The other properties that you mention, like desires of the seeker for what
to do after (or rather if) the sought after thing is found, are not really
to the point. If you want a place for them I guess you do need a lujvo.
Also, in English, the meaning of "seek an object" has been generalized
to "seek knowledge", where by "finding it", we mean that we get to
know the truth value of some utterance. (I suppose that's what you call the
seeking of science.) I don't have a problem with letting this metaphorical
extension into Lojban, but in any case this is not part of the opaque problem.
An interesting property of sisku as it is defined now, is that the lambda
variable of its property really never takes a value. Normally, the lambda
variable of a property corresponds to one or more of the places of the
selbri (for example for {zmadu}, it's the x1 and x2) but for sisku, there
is no place for the thing being sought, so there is no place that fits the
lambda variable.
> WE have other cases in Lojban where the Lojban word covers a misleading
> subset of the English meanings of the keywords ("old" and "know" being two
> cases that come to mind).
BTW, because of my mail problems a month or so ago I never found out whether
{citno} means "young", so that it only refers to living things, or whether
it is more general. Would an "old car" in lojban be a {tolcitno karce} or
a {tolcnino karce}?
> In all such casesa we have learned to live with the
> fact that the English word is tto broad and have come up with lujvo for the
> alternative meanings. Such lujvo can always exist, and if this whole
> issue of "lo" and "existence" blows away. the number of distinctions we need
to
> make may be reduced. But I remain unconvinced of this - as pc said a while
> back in this discussion - there are some predicates that embody a hidden
> abstraction involving one of the sumti, and we have to live with this
What do you mean by "some predicates"? English verbs, like "want", "need",
"look for", etc, or Lojban predicates like {djica}, {nitcu}, {sisku}, etc.?
I totally agree that the English verbs can accept opaque references as direct
objects, without any marking. They also, in other contexts, can take transparent
direct objects.
Because of the logical aspect of Lojban, this can't work like that in Lojban,
and so the arguments are always transparent.
But, the fact is that the opaque meaning is often very useful for these
predicates, so what do we do?
I propose to find one solution for all such predicates, rather than patches
for each of them. {djica}, {nitcu} and {sisku}, for example, have all been
dealt with differently: {djica} only accepts events, {nitcu} still accepts
objects, and the solution for {sisku} was the weirdest: the x2 place was
directly eliminated and replaced by only a property of some inaccesible
entity, so that {le se sisku} is not the thing looked for, but a property
of said thing.
Why not treat them all the same?
The transparent case:
{mi djica lo tanxe} = "There is a box wanted by me"
{mi nitcu lo tanxe} = "There is a box needed by me"
{mi sisku lo tanxe} = "There is a box sought by me"
and the opaque case:
{mi djica xe'e lo tanxe} = "I want a box (I don't care which)"
{mi nitcu xe'e lo tanxe} = "I need a box (I don't care which)"
{mi sisku xe'e lo tanxe} = "I seek a box (I don't care which)"
(I don't mind using {lo'e} instead of {xe'e lo}, I think it makes sense
as well.)
As things stand now, for the transparent case I have to say:
{da poi tanxe zo'u mi djica tu'a da}
{mi nitcu lo tanxe}
{da poi tanxe zo'u mi sisku le ka du da}
Why so complicated?
> mi'e la lojbab noi sisku loka lo danfu be le me zo sisku me'u nabmi
> cu mansa roda
That doesn't make much sense to me. You probably mean {noi sisku lo ka danfu
le me zo sisku me'u nabmi gi'e mansa roda}, otherwise you are saying that
you are looking for something with property an answer satisfies everyone,
but what is it that you look for? the answer, everyone? I think this is an
unnecessarily complicated way to deal with {sisku}.
Jorge
Logical Language Group
> The status quo seems to be neither of them, but:
>
> (c) it is impossible, and the x2 is a {le ka...}, where the
> meaning is x1 looks for something (not quantified, thus
> possibly an opaque reference) that has property x2.
>
> There is no place for the looked for object.
>
> I could understand this if it never made sense to have an object
> being looked for, but it does make sense, so I don't see the need
> to forbid this simple expression.
Quantifier error!
It is false that "it never makes sense", right enough. However, it is
also false that "it does [always] make sense". In fact, it sometimes
makes sense and sometimes not. Having places which only sometimes make
sense is to be avoided.
--
ucleaar
> The status quo seems to be neither of them, but:
>
> (c) it is impossible, and the x2 is a {le ka...}, where the
> meaning is x1 looks for something (not quantified, thus
> possibly an opaque reference) that has property x2.
>
> There is no place for the looked for object.
I think you're right. But "Mi sisku le cukta" could be okay if you
are merely describing some property (e.g. the size of my feet) as
a book. But it couldn't mean you were seeking _Madame Bovary_.
> I could understand this if it never made sense to have an object
> being looked for, but it does make sense, so I don't see the need
> to forbid this simple expression.
Neither x2 being an object nor x2 being a property make much sense
to me. If x2 can be an object, it doesn't make sense if x2 can also
be an event or a property: if x2 can be an object then "sisku" means
"try to locate/acquire". Then, if you used a ka or nu x2, it would
mean you're trying to locate or acquire the property or the event
- not what is wanted. And you wouldn't be able to get opaque x2:
how would you do "I seek a book, any book"? "Tu'a lo cukta", I guess,
with all its yucky vagueness, & it means "I'm seeking to acquire/locate
some abstraction of a book", where the abstraction in question is
in fact the book itself and not an abstraction at all.
I don't see that sisku is ever going to end up useful. I see it
as "troci le nu ponse" scrunched into one brivla, with all the
attendant problems.
---
And
Logical Language Group
JL>
JL>> We can solve the "look for object" problem most simply by just creating a
JL> lujvo
JL>> for this meaning.
JL>
JL>Ok, then that proves that there is nothing strange about a brivla meaning
JL>"x1 looks for x2".
JL>
JL>I find "x1 looks for something with property x2" more intricate, and so
JL>I would prefer that this last one be handled with a lujvo based on the
JL>first one, but that is of course my subjective judgement.
Of course there is nothing strange about a brivla relating two objects - a
seeker and the thing known-and-sought-after, and having a certain predicate
relating them. The problem that I see is that there is more than one such
predicate, and the choice is dependent on the specificity (or is that
definiteness %^) of x2 vs. its opacity, etc., and what the desire is of the
seeker for the final state after finding.
x1 seeks a specific (lost) x2 in order to know its location possibly, but not
necessarily to use it for some particular reason (I can get into a tizzy
looking for my checkbook, even though I have no particular use for it at the
moment - I just want to have the security of knowing where it is).
x1 is seeking that x2 specifically to use it for a purpose x3 (I distinguish
this from the former simply because x3 isn't always a part of the picture,
and thus cannot be generalized to all inst5ances of "seek", but needs to be
added as a lujvo in some circumstances.
x1 is seeking an opaque instance of x2
a. with desirer to know its location
b. with desire to learn more about x2, without realluy caring about its
location
c. with desire to possess x2
d. with desire to use x2
x1 is seeking an x2, such that he does not know that it exists, but rather
he is searching for an x2 based on the properties that it manifests. This
is the seeking of science, for example.
A variation on the latter is when x1 is seeking for a phenomenon rather than
an object. This phenomenon, if opaque, seems more clearly indicated by its
properties (lo ka) than by its eventness or stateness (lonu).
Within the opaque meanings, it is possible to express objects in terms of
the properties they manifest. It seems difficult to express abstract
properties in terms of objects (unless the predicate for the object somehow
evokes the property sought, e.g. in its description: I seek lo bardymau be lo
nanba tanxe be'o dacti).
Now let me complicate things by observing that my own concept of troci is
colored by the need to have a specific "nu troci" - if there is no specific
"attempt", then you aren;t really "trying". So "troci" to me cannot be used
in all seekings, specifically seekings after knowledge that are not broken
down into attempts, nor are an ongoing single attemmpt-state. "djica" also
seems limited to me, in that the speaker has to actually WANT to find what he
is looking for. I imagine a scientist seeking suspected evidence that the
sun will explode in the next 6 months doesn't really want to find it.
We changed the x2 of sisku in response to Iain's raising this whole issue
of opacity and existence, and I agreed based on my realizing that English
"Seek" has really a broad, non-Lojbanic range of meanings, and figuring that itr
would be possible to go from the abstract to the specific more easily than
in the other direction. So far this seems to be the case.
In addition to Iain's argument, rthough, there is the longstanding issue of
the translation of "John seeks a bicycle or a fish", a problem in intensionality
(speaker, vs. John) coupled with possible interpretation of the "or" as a
connective unknown. The unstaisfactory nature of previous discussions of this
has led me to be more accepting of a broader, more vague, sisku, that might
be more likely to cover any particular intended interpetation of the above
statement. I guess there is also a possible opaqueness issue as well - since
John may be seeking for one of these things ("or" either of them) but the
speaker may not know the definiteness of the seeking. (I hope this makes
some kind of sense - trying to keep the technical sense of "definite" and
"specific" spearate is not working for me and at 330 am, I am not going to
try ot find the deifnition.)
WE have other cases in Lojban where the Lojban word covers a misleading
subset of the English meanings of the keywords ("old" and "know" being two
cases that come to mind). In all such casesa we have learned to live with the
fact that the English word is tto broad and have come up with lujvo for the
alternative meanings. Such lujvo can always exist, and if this whole
issue of "lo" and "existence" blows away. the number of distinctions we need to
make may be reduced. But I remain unconvinced of this - as pc said a while
back in this discussion - there are some predicates that embody a hidden
abstraction involving one of the sumti, and we have to live with this (it
is possible that "opacity" is nothing more nor less than the existence of
such a hidden abstraction, in which case a "tu'a"-like mark in LAhE seems
appropriate to me even if I have trouble figuring out whether it would ever
be used or useful)
ucleaar
So it doesn't have to be "mi sisku lo ka..."?
---
And
Jorge Llambias
> >
> > mi sisku lo'e xe fanva be la'o sy Diana sy bei la gliban
> >
> >
> > {lo'e broda} doesn't claim that {lo broda} exists, does it?
>
> I don't know that that has been settled. But I find the idea of an
> archetype of a non-existent (in the appropriate universe of discourse) thing
> rather problematic. What could be predicated of this {lo'e xe fanva}, other
> than what we say in the embedded place structures?
Lots of things. It can be looked for, needed, wanted, etc. Any predicate
that makes sense with an opaque reference.
Another problem of not making the x2 of sisku the object of the search is
that it makes it very difficult to single out the looked for thing.
For example, in a game of hide-and-seek, there is {le sisku}, and what
I'd like to call {le se sisku}, but I can't with sisku as it is now.
Jorge
Jorge Llambias
> either
> (a) it is possible & means "try to find" & because the event
> abstraction is implicit the Lojban rules mean that it is
> always transparent, so "mi sisku lo cukta" must mean
> "there is a book I'm trying to find".
> (b) it is impossible, and the x2 must be a "lenu...".
>
> I prefer (b), but the status quo wd appear to be either (a) or
> confusion.
>
> ----
> And
The status quo seems to be neither of them, but:
(c) it is impossible, and the x2 is a {le ka...}, where the
meaning is x1 looks for something (not quantified, thus
possibly an opaque reference) that has property x2.
There is no place for the looked for object.
I could understand this if it never made sense to have an object
being looked for, but it does make sense, so I don't see the need
to forbid this simple expression.
Jorge
ucleaar
> The point is that "sisku" doesn't mean "seek/look for", but rather
> "seek/look for something with a specified property". The reason for doing
> this is that seeking very frequently involves something that is -specific
> but where we do not wish to commit ourselves with a +existent locution.
> for something with the property of being my book", i.e.
Quite so, given the current x2 definition. So if one wanted to say
"I'm seeking Lojbab", one would have to use a circumlocution, e.g.
"mi troci lenu mi [encounter] la lojbab"? Is that so? Or "mi sisku
le ka me la lojbab"? - that's a bit vague.
---
And