response to korant on loopholes

[lojbab (Bob LeChevalier)]

>A one-to-one meaning - brivla pairing seems simpler to me

My philosophy of semantics is that there is no word in any language that means
the same thing exactly to two different people.  Their differing experiences
will render the significance of the meaning different to each.  Indeed, a word
may mean something different to the same person, following some event which
changes the color of the meaning.  To use an obvious example, "dead" meant 
something different to me the day I saw my dad in a casket, and ever since,
as compared to before, but since it has been 4+ years and memory has fuzzed, 
the meaning for me now of the word is not what it was then.  To those who
ahve never lost a parent or other close relative, "dead" cannot mean anything
like the same thing to you as to me.

Thus we cannot even truly make a brivla have a single exact meaning - we can
only strive for a generally consistent range of meanings, with the possibility
of calling out significant personal distinctions via tanru or lujvo available
to restrcit said meaning "parent-dead"?

Going the other way os truly impossible.  korant can invent a word for a
concept in Boston, Nick a different one in Australia, and me a third here in Washington.

Untile we talk to each other about the words, we don;t even know the other words
exist.  How can we possibly then decide which one is 'the' word, especially 
since, based on the other direction, we cannot be absolutely sure we have the
same concept.

Note that there is far more to having the same meaning than having the same
place structure - all of the colors have identical place strcutures.  To
people from cultures with only two color words, Lojban will have multiple
roots for the same color.  xlali (bad) and xamgu (good) have identical place
structures, but are not hte same concept.  Can you say that to'erxamgu
(the polar opposite of good) is identical in meaning to xlali?  I can't.

lojbab