Re: observatives (was JimC on Colin on ....... ad nauseam)

[John Cowan <cowan@SNARK.THYRSUS.COM>]

la kolin. cusku di'e

> But  I had taken [the term "observative"] to have some special
> semantic connotation (that
> I've never been quite happy about) - perhaps an implied "ju'i" or "ko zgana
> lenu".

I suppose the word has now become a kind of metonymy -- certainly not
every x1-less bridi is literally intended as being a Quine-style
observation sentence like "Lo, a rabbit".

However, it remains true, as jimc has said recently, that every bridi
is intended to call the hearer's attention to something: either the fact
of a relation, or something which bears a certain property.  I do not,
however, draw from this the same conclusions that he does about the
propriety of using a simple sumti to call attention to its referent:
the orthodox view remains that a simple sumti is radically incomplete
and serves only conversational purposes such as answering "ma" questions.

> The point I intended to make was that, though omission of the x1 was
> facilitated to allow observatives in that latter sense, it is in fact being
> used much more widely.

True.  In particular, true observation sentences are rare in writing,
but are quite common in conversation.

--
John Cowan      cowan@snark.thyrsus.com         ...!uunet!lock60!snark!cowan
                        e'osai ko sarji la lojban.