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TECH(?): can everyone write impeccably grammatical Lojban?



>Date:         Wed, 23 Sep 1992 23:37:40 BST
>From: Ivan A Derzhanski <iad%COGSCI.ED.AC.UK@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU>

>>  Date:        Wed, 23 Sep 1992 17:23:23 -0400
>>  From: "Mark E. Shoulson" <shoulson@EDU.COLUMBIA.CTR>
>>
>>  {zoi .gy. The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dogs .gy.}

>Actually, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog".

Details, details.  Both have the whole alphabet.  Actually, I usually
prefer your version, since it's marginally shorter, but for some reason my
fingers typed the other.  Shortest one I know is the grammatically marginal
"Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz."  Or maybe "Zing! Vext cwm fly jabs Kurd
qoph."  At 26 letters, those don't get any shorter, but their English is
less than helpful.  All the words did manage to get into some respected
dictionaries, though.

>>  is
>>  grammatical Lojban, but then "He said, 'Ani holech l'beit ha-sefer.'" is
>>  grammatical English, and equally unhelpful in getting accross the import of
>>  what's quoted.

>That "he" is going to the library?  Granted, it is not a very
>sophisticated message, but it does come across.

It came across to *you* (incorrectly: "beit ha-sefer" ("house of book") in
Modern Hebrew is actually "school", not "library".  That would be
"sifriah"), but it wouldn't to Joe-English-Speaker on the street.  Nor
would {ko'a bacru zoi .gy. Yo, dude, what's happenin'? .gy.} mean much to
la djos.-Lojban-Speaker on the klaji, beyond "he/she/it/they made some
weird noises."

>Ivan

~mark