re: Semantics

[And Rosta <cbmvax!uunet!UCL.AC.UK!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!ucleaar>]

Bruce writes:
> This is not specific to Lojban. _Any_ conlang is going to have this problem.
> English uses the word "water" to denote at least two things:
> 1. A chemical substance that could be more systematically designated as
>    "dihydrogen oxide," and
> 2. The substance referred to in 1. when in its liquid form.
>
> I do not know if any conlang up to now distinguishes them (Language X will,
> if I get my way, which I think will be the case) but neither of these meanings
> quite corresponds to that of Japanese "mizu," which often is glossed as
 "water"
> in translations. "Mizu" in fact, is best translated "cold water," though most
[...]
> Given Loglan's origin in SWH speculations, it is probably more imperative that
> Lojban semantics devisors be aware of these problems than it is for people
> working on other conlangs. But this is really a point for _all_ language con-
> structors to wory about.

If I was criticizing Lojban for a deficiency in semantics, I would
criticize other conlangs a hundred times more on this score. I have great
admiration for the work that has already been done on Lojban's semantics.
John Cowan's stuff on masses versus sets has informed my understanding of
*natural language* semantics too.

My point was that Lojban - whose grammar is, unlike other conlangs, not
derisory - should make the effort to extend the semantics and define the
senses of le'avla.

Mark writes:
> This is just the "color" argument in not-very new clothing.  To an English
> speaker, "green" and "blue" are as different as could be wished, but a
> language foo speaker might have the same word and not see the difference.
> Even so the distinction between "cold-water" and "hot-water" where English
> uses just "water".  *Any* language, and any conlang, has to draw its line,
> and that line will be arbitrary, and that's just the way it is.

The line may indeed be arbitrary, but it ought to be drawn, and we should
be given some indication of where it is drawn - or at least where the
prototypical colours are.

When, many months ago on Conlang, I suggested defining colours by use
of Munsell chips, this was wrongly interpreted to mean I advocated
rigid boundaries between colours. Rather, I meant to suggest that the
typical instances of each colour be specified by referring to their
Munsell number.

From: Chris Handley <CHandley@NZ.AC.OTAGO.GANDALF>
> There are, as you say, always going to be problems mapping semantic
> spaces on to each other. English and Dutch have about 300 different
> words for things that float on water and carry people and/or goods;
> most other languages have fewer than a dozen.
>
> What this means is that the foo/lojban/foo dictionary will have to
> be produced by native foo speakers, who will have to decide how to
> do the mapping in terms of foo.

This is unnecessary if going only from foo into lojban. If the typical
features of the sense of each lojban word are listed, then the foo
speaker can decide for themself which lojban word best matches the
foo word to be translated.

---
And.