Chassell on BAI

[lojbab (Bob LeChevalier)]

Bob Chassell writes:

>Recently, I suggested that:
>
>    Each of the members of BAI can be expanded into a form with fi'o
>    and the member's associated gismu; each of these expansions can,
>    in turn, be expanded into a relative clause with poi:
>
>    ka'a zo'e   ->   fi'o klama zo'e   ->   poi zo'e klama
>
>Just now, I discovered the next step, which is to expand a sentence
>with a relative clause into two separate sentences.
>
>Here is an example:
>
>    le zarci    ka'a       mi   cu barda                        1.
>    le zarci    fi'o klama mi   cu barda                        2.
>    the market  gone to by me   is big.
>
>    le zarci   poi   mi klama [ke'a]  cu barda                  3.
>    the market which I  go to [it]    is big.
>
>    le zarci goi ko'o cu barda ije mi klama ko'o                4.
>    The market, X4,   is big   and I  go to it.
>
>This exercise produces several insights.

You missed something here, which I think caused your later confusion.
1 and 2 are not accurately translated to English and are not the same as
3 and 4.

A tagged sumti does not automatically attach to a particular sumti, as
you have assumed.  They 'float free' around the sentence and modify the
sentence, not the sumti.  Thus 1. is the same as:


    ka'a       mi   le zarci    cu barda                        1a.
    Gone to by me,  the market  is big.
    le zarci    cu barda ka'a       mi                          1b.
    the market  is big   gone to by me.

1b clearly makes no sense.  The similar-to-1-but the same as 3 is:

    le zarci    pe       ka'a       mi   cu barda                1c
    The market  which-is gone to by me      is-big


>As la lojbab says
>
>    BAI was formed with the intention that every place structure place
>    could be labelled more or less accurately with one of [its
>    members]
>
>But now that I have expanded modal phrases into sentences, I no longer
>think of BAI as creating new places or as labelling old ones.  Instead
>I think of BAI as creating new predications about the referent of the
>first place of the brivla, or as uncovering aspects of the predicate
>that were hidden.

The original 1. and 2. did not say anything about the first place of the
bridi, they talked about the bridi itself.  You asserted that bigness in
some way is attributed as a destination.  This would perhaps have been
more clear with a selbri that was not an adjective, wherein you would
not have been inclined to use "is" in the English translation.  (By the
way - DO NOT translate "cu" as "is".  Se what I did in 1c.  "cu" has no
meaning and we desperately want to avoid it acquiring the "tenseless
tense" connotation of Institute Loglan "ga", which is totally bogus.

When you use a sentence with "is" in it, you unfortunately tend to
associate the selbri more strongly with the x1 place than with the other
places, but a predication relates all places equally.  Only in forming
a description does x1 take a special role.


>Here is an example in which, conventionally, a member of BAI adds a
>place:
>
>    mi cusku          zu'i        bau la lojban.                5.
>    I express something-typical in-language Lojban.
>
>"bau la lojban." adds an "in-language" place to "cusku" which has the
>definition: "express/say...to...in form/media...".
>
>The sentence expands to:
>
>    mi poi la lojban. bangu          cusku   zu'i               6.
>    I  who Lojban is-the-language-of express something-typical.
>
>This expands to two sentences:
>
>    mi cusku zu'i                                               7.
>   .ije la lojban bangu mi
>
>The new place becomes a predication about the first place of the
>original brivla!
>
>What is happening here?  Am I confusing myself utterly, and
>misunderstanding Lojban, or have I found something interesting?

This is such a non-"is" example.  6. would be a rephrasing of:

>    mi ne                 bau      la lojban.   cusku   zu'i             6a
>    I, incid. assoc. with in-language Lojban    express something-typical.

It is the expressing itself that is "in language Lojban", although you
could also attach the BAI sumti to "zu'i" to get another plausible
English:

>    mi cusku          zu'i       pe              bau la lojban.         5a.
>    I  express something-typical which-is-assoc. with in-language Lojban.

A similar version to 5a, using "ne" instead of "pe" is also possible, in
which case you are providing incidental information about the expression
not identifying it.

This may lead to some changes in your conclusion, but it is essentially
correct that an added tagged sumti is implicitly adding another
predication.  However you have to use "lenu bridi", not just the x1
place of bridi "le bridi" as the implied fill-in place for the
subordinate bridi.

lojbab