pc tackles an aphorism

[Logical Language Group <cbmvax!uunet!GREBYN.COM!pucc.PRINCETON.EDU!lojbab>]

Surprisingly, at the same time the LA group attempted
  "Not to decide is to decide"

John Parks-Clifford (pc) also was attempting the same aphorism, which
discussion I (lojbab) just received Monday (my notes in brackets []):

"
        The obvious translation is

        lenu na jdice cu nu jdice
        le  nu       na  jdice    cu    nu       jdice
        The event of not deciding is an event of deciding

This may be adequate, but it leaves uncertain in Lojban many things
which are relatively clear in English, with its well-developed habits of
implications.

For example, in English, it is clear that both the subject and the topic
of the decision are the same in both cases:  who makes the decision and
what the decision is about.  Whether that is true in Lojban is not
clear, so to be on the safe side, we should probably put them in:

        lenu da na jdice fi de cu nu da jdice fi de
        lenu da  na  jdice    fi    de cu nu da jdice    fi    de
             x's not deciding about y  is    x  deciding about y

with the paradox fully displayed.

What is decided (x2) is, of course, omitted in both cases - and it needs
must be different.  For what one refuses to decide is not what one
decides.  Indeed, one decides not to decide and, thus, allows the status
quo to go on without one's having decided to do so (at least that is the
secret hope behind not deciding).  I think making all that explicit is
going to far.  Surely the conventions in Lojban can carry this freight,
and putting it in ruins the gnomic quality.  The same is true for the
explicit universal quantifiers on da and de, which are understood as
prenex to the whole utterance (but aren't they always in proverbs?)

[What pc is saying is that the x's and y's are by implication true for
all x's and y's in the above, because proverbs tend to make universal
statements.  The unquanitifed da and de as used actually claim only the
existential:  for some x and y, x not deciding about y is an event of x
deciding about y. Bob, Nora, and Athelstan agree that we would prefer
the explicit quantifier to be included whereever possible.]

Another possible translation is
        le na jdice (befi da) cu jdice (fi da)
        le  na  jdice    befi  da cu jdice befi   da
        the not decider (about x) decides  (about x)

This is snappier than the earlier version (even with the x parts added)
but it less clearly forces the intended reading:  "one who does not
decide thereby decides".  It could just be "One who does not decide
finally does decide", or even "Old Wishy-washy finally made up his mind
for once."  So barring something explicit of the form
    da poi na jdice cu jdice pu'e lenu da na jdice
    da poi na      jdice  cu jdice     pu'e              lenu da na  jdice
    x  who doesn't decide is a decider by the process of      x  not deciding

the earlier one seems better.

[For the following bear in mind that Lojban subcategorizes event
abstracts as being 'states', 'processes', 'achievements' (point events),
or 'activities'.]

But it could be sharpened a bit.  After all, "nu" is very vague and
different kinds of events behave very differently.  What kind of event
is not deciding - or deciding for that matter?  Not deciding pretty
clearly goes on, so it is not an achievement.  Deciding is in one sense
an achievement "reach/make a decision".  But it also has its extended
side, a process, apparently, since it has a goal, a definite end with a
product:  the decision.  Not deciding, then, is at least partly going
through bits and pieces of that process without completing it - an
activity at least.  Indeed, an activity altogether, since, unlike a
process, you can be said to have completed it in miniature as soon as
you can be said to be doing it at all.  [i.e., even a brief moment of
'not making' a decision' involves doing something we can still call 'not
making a decision', even though we are continuing 'not making a decision
for a much longer time - this situation is part of the definition of an
Aristotelian 'activity'.] And like all activities, it is made up of
little pieces of different sorts, processes and activities, more or less
cyclically:  thinking about the topic, avoiding thinking about the
topic, forgetting about the topic, putting off thinking about the topic,
putting off deciding (achievement) about the topic, and so on.

Now all of that would alllow Cox's gnomon to be just the triviality that
the activity of not deciding is (a part of) the process of deciding -
deliberately (or not) cut off from reaching a conclusion.  But I suspect
that the intended force is just the opposite, that the activity is
completely the achievement and its afterglow, the stae of having
achieved the goal [the decision]):

le zu'o da na jdice fi de cu mu'e da jdice fi de
le  zu'o       da na  jdice    fi    de cu   mu'e          da jdice    fi    de
The activity of x not deciding about y is an achievement of x deciding about y
Not deciding is having decided.

But - most unfittingly for a proverb - this just ain;t true in general.
Not deciding is often a legitimate part of the decision process and does
not preempt its completion.  Until, that is, the decisive time, the
turning point, the right moment to decide ("once to every man or nation
..").  To keep on not deciding at or after THAT point IS to have
rendered a decision and be living in its afterglow (or shadow, as the
case may be).  But this is not a matter of types of activity but of
their relations to time, in particular, as the words used show - of
extensional aspect:  superfective not deciding, going on beyond its
proper bound, amounts to the perfective of deciding, done but not done
with,

le za'o zu'o da na jdice fi de cu ba'o mu'e da jdice fi de

le  za'o                zu'o       da na  jdice    fi    de cu
the continuing too long activity of x not deciding about y  is the
ba'o      mu'e          da jdice    fi    de
aftermath achievement of x deciding about y

To keep on not deciding (too long) is to have decided.

[to which you can add that universal prenex pc says he left out:

roda       rode      zo'u
for all x, for all y :
"

[Bob responds:  this shows how much thought can be put into translation.
Most will be satisfied with the simple, glico and possibly malglico form
that pc started with, which is similar to or identical with what the LA
group came up with.  But Lojban is capable of much richer expression,
and a Lojbanic aphorism will undoubtedly use Lojban's strong points, as
the English writer (Cox) used English's strongpoints in the original. pc
shows one way to accomplish this - through Lojban's tenses and
abstractors.

But remember, there is no right or wrong answer - as long as it means to
the listener what you intended it to mean - that is the art of
communication.  Myself, I think, all of pc's attempts miss the mark
because he tried too hard to go from the English "is to decide" into
some form of jdice as the main selbri of the sentence.  I see the
aphorism as saying that either "not deciding is the equivalent of
deciding" or a causal such as "not deciding results in deciding".  I will
however retain his elaborate tense/event analysis:

le za'o zu'o da na jdice fi de cu se jalge le mu'o da jdice fi de

le  za'o                zu'o    da na  jdice    fi   de cu se jalge  le
the continuing-too-long activity x not deciding about y gives result the
mu'o       da jdice   fi    de
achievement x decides about y

and an 'equivalence' interpretation, using a 'state' abstractor - pc did
not discuss this kind, but it sees an event as a relatively unchanging
amorphous continuing event.  In te following, there is the implication
that each state continues/lasts as long as the other does.

le za'i da na jdice fi de cu mintu le za'i da jdice fi de

le  za'i    da na  jdice    fi    de cu mintu        le  za'i     da
the state of x not deciding about y  is identical to the state of x
jdice    fi    de
deciding about y
]

John Parks-Clifford, Philosophy Dept. University of Missouri, St. Louis
         (not on net)
c/o lojbab = Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
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