Re: LE and VOI

[John Cowan <cowan@locke.ccil.org>]

la .and. cusku di'e

> So the following combos are useful:
> 
> 1 nonspecific, veridical
> 2 specific, veridical, "indefinite" (= referent not (necessarily)
>    identifiable by addressee)
> 3 specific, nonveridical, "definite" (= referent not (necessarily)
>    identifiable by addressee)
> 
> Function 1 is performed by {lo}. Functions 2 & 3 are both
> performed by {le}. Both 2 & 3 are useful, & it wd be nice to
> think of an easy way to distinguish them.

The closest analogue is "lebi'u" for 2 and "lebi'unai" for 3.
"bi'u" signals "new information", so "lebi'u nanmu" = 
"a man, a certain man", whereas "lebi'unai nanmu" =
"the (previously mentioned) man".

-- 
John Cowan	http://www.ccil.org/~cowan		cowan@ccil.org
			e'osai ko sarji la lojban