Re: gadri

[Logical Language Group <cbmvax!uunet!grebyn.com!lojbab>]

"le ratcu" would do for "the so-called rat" - the essential thing is that
the speaker and the listener agrre to a >specific< that is being described
as a rat, and not that it be a rat.

"lo ratcu" is not necessarily non-specific; it IS veridical - it claims
that whatever is described REALLY IS a rat, and is not, say, merely being
described as one for convention or convenience (which might be the case
with "le").  It is the implicit quantifier on "lo" that makes it indefinite
AND non-specific - the outer "su'o" means that ANY thing meetin the
description will do.  If the outer quantifier is "ro", the result is quite
definite: you are claiming about every single thing meeting the (possibly
restricted by a relative clause) description.  Similarly, if you use a
relative clause with "voi", then you remain veridical on the main
description, but the restriction is to a definite/specific subset.

lojbab