response to Nick and Mark on ba'i and BAI in general

[lojbab (Bob LeChevalier)]

Nick says in response to Mark Shoulson:
>{ti xatra be'i la lojbab.} is wrong, and {ti ne be'i la lojbab. xatra}
>is right.

I disagree.  Both are acceptable, and I prefer the former.  They have some
semantic differences as predicates.  The first is a 2-place predicate
relating la lojbab. and ti.  This is a valid semantic relation, and is
certainly tied to xatra.  It seems quite reasonable to tie an author onto
the letter concept expressed by xatra.  The second is a 1-place predicate
with subordinate information.

The second is more glico, but not necessarily mal-.  You could argue
based on Nick's reasoning (which I won;t repeat) that all secondary
places of English nouns in Lojban selbri could be expressed as
non-restrictive information on the x1 place which is the 'noun' proper.
But this is less-Lojbanic, as it asserts a non-equality in the nature of
the relationship between the sender and the letter.  The sender is
incidental information that is less important.

Thus  "mi bajra seka'a le zarci"  (I run with-destination the store)
can be expressed as "mi ne seka'a le zarci cu bajra" (I, with destination
the store, run/am-a-runner).  The latter better supports English nounal
phrasing.

The real difference lies in the truth conditions.  In the former version
the bridi is false if either this is not a letter or la lojbab sis not
send it.  In the latter, since the sender is information incidental to
the claim, its truth or falsity has no bearing on that of the main
bridi.  It can have a separate and clear truth value if expanded to the
corresponding noi relative clause, but a 'ne BAI' phrase is so
incomplete and non-specific as an implied bridi that I can see lots of
ways to weasel the truth value of the subordination.

For this reason, I tend to avoid ne/pe usage except for certain BAI
members like mau and me'a, using the noi/poi instead.  But I still
prefer working at the grammatically simpler main bridi level when I can.
It seems more Lojbanic to me.


lojbab