Lujvo paper part 2 of 4

[Nick Nicholas <nsn@MULLIAN.EE.MU.OZ.AU>]

relativised qualities.

2.2.2. SE + gismu lujvo place elimination.

With {laurba'u}, we eliminated place information from the seltanru; this
is not problematical. With {tciterjai} we have also eliminated information
from the tertanru, and this is somewhat more worrisome. There are many
concepts which, if expressed as predicates, differ from each other by
the presence or absence alone of one place.

A good example of this is
the distinction between {cliva} and {klama}: their only difference is
that {cliva} lacks a destination ({lo se klama}). Something similar
seems to be happening with {tciterjai} and lujvo like it. We have used
{terjai}, in effect, to denote a different concept from {te jgari}: one
in which the {le jgari} place is absent. And there are many such examples:
"text" seems to be like {se tcidu}, but without needing an actual {le
tcidu} (reader). "treasury" seems to be like {sorcu be loi jdini}, but
without needing a {te sorcu} (container).

Or consider {se citka}. All places of any bridi are considered to be
implicitly filled by *some* value, so when we say {le snuji cu se citka},
we do not merely say that the sandwich is food, but that it is being
eaten (or will be eaten, or may be eaten, or can be eaten, or is fit
to be eaten) by *somebody*: {le snuji cu se citka ba'e zo'e}. But
food can be considered as such independently of any entity eating it.
Food can go uneaten, and can be prepared without ever being intended to be
eaten.

The claim {da se citka}, inherently identical to {da se citka zo'e},
is not true of such food, but it is food nonetheless; the eater of the food
is not part of the *definition* of food. We can say that the display sandwich
at the deli {cu se citka xo'e}, is eaten --- but don't consider the eater
at all: the eater doesn't "enter into the equation". In doing so, we've
effectively recovered the place structure of {cidja}, which does not have a
sumti place for an eater. (It does have a place for who the food is fit for,
but that isn't the same thing).

({xo'e} is an experimental cmavo proposed for this purpose; it is not
officially part of the language.)

We can do the same for "beverage": {se pinxe} implies something actually
drunk by someone; {se pinxe be xo'e} is closer to "beverage" as we
know it, in that stuff poured down the drain doesn't cease being a
beverage, though it does cease being a {se pinxe} (noone's drinking it).

So can a lujvo consisting of just SE and a gismu have a different place
structure to its corresponding tanru? Can a {selpinxe} mean "beverage",
where the drinker place is either absent or denotes a class of potential
drinkers --- something completely different to a {se pinxe}? Our position
in compiling lujvo place structures has been conservative: we have not yet
considered this distinction as valid. The deletion of places advocated is
unpredictable and unsystematic; it is reading in much more information
in building the lujvo than a naive reader would have access to.
But we are aware that this process may turn up in future
research, if the language heads in that direction. For now, lujvo
like {selpinxe} have not been listed separately in the jvoste.

The danger with lujvo with tertanru place deletion in general is that
the veljvo selected is simply wrong. Different place structures imply
different concepts, and the lujvo maker may be trying to shoehorn the
wrong concept into the place structure of their choosing. This is
obvious when someone tries to shoehorn a {klama} tertanru into a {litru}
or {cliva} concept. It is not as obvious for a {seltcidu} tertanru, where
no other bridi seems to supply the concept of "text"; a {se tcidu} is
the closest we can come to "text", but in being read by some reader,
it is still not really a "text". A solution akin to {xo'e} may prove
necessary; for now, we will have to bear in mind that such shoehorning will
happen.

2.2.3. Lean Lujvo.

Another important issue is: how much information should be
contained in a lujvo which could just as conveniently be given by a
gismu? Consider {brulu'i}, to sweep. Its component gismu have the
following place structures:

{burcu}: x1 is a brush for purpose x2 (event) with bristles x3
{lumci}: x1 (agent) washes/cleanses x2 in/with cleaning material x3

We eiliminate the obvious redundancies: the {se burcu} is {lenu lumci},
and can be omitted altogether; the {te lumci} is the {burcu}. We can
also omit the {te burcu} information as defining the broom rather than the
sweeping, analogously to {tciterjai} earlier. We are left with the place
structure: l1 l2 l3=b1.

But what information do we gain in saying {mi brulu'i le loldi le xekri
burcu}, that isn't already given by {mi lumci le loldi le xekri burcu}?
According to a certain school of thought, which we will call Lean Lujvo
({si'o toltiljvo}), we often make lujvo to blindly match the lexicon of our
native languages, where a gismu by itself (given the appropriate context) is
sufficient. For example, we can talk of a waiter as a {djabeipre}, a
food-carrying-person. But once it's obvious we are talking about a worker in
a restaurant, Lean Lujvo would prefer that we refer to her as a {bevri},
instead of blindly translating "waiter" wherever it occurs by {djabeipre},
giving redundant information.

This affects place structures significantly:
in this school of thought, {mi brulu'i fi le xekri burcu} says as much as {mi
lumci fi le xekri burcu}.  So if we want to relate {mi} and {le xekri burcu},
it seems pointless to use {brulu'i} as the bridi, when {lumci} will do the job
just as well, and with no redundancy. But one could ask whether this means
we need the {burcu} place of {brulu'i} at all: perhaps only the x1 and x2
places need be left in.

This issue is pervasive with be-lujvo. Typically, the x2 of the tertanru
is described by the seltanru. One can argue in some cases, that the x2 is so
well described by it, that it needn't appear in the final place structure
at all; including it would be redundant. A good example of this is one
of the most widely-known lujvo: {lobypli}, "lojbanist". It seems ridiculous
to include a place for {le se pilno}, when we know perfectly well that
what is being used is lojban. {mi lobypli lenu cilre fi loi gerna}, "I
use-lojban/am-a-Lojbanist to learn about grammar", makes much more sense
than {mi lobypli la lojban. lenu cilre fi loi gerna}, "I
use-lojban/am-a-Lojbanist using Lojban to learn about grammar".

But as we alluded above, a case can be made for retaining the seltanru
place, by interpreting x2 to be a generic, rather than specific, entity.
Take {gerzda}: if we interpret the place structure as: x1 is-a-house-for-a-dog
for a dog (x2), we could be redundant, because we already know x2 is a dog
from the seltanru. If we make (x2) a specific dog, then our predicate has the
same place structure as {zdani} itself. We need then to show that {gerzda}
conveys significantly more information, nonetheless, than {zdani}, and thus
deserves to exist. An underhand way of doing so would be to make x2 the dog
breed, rather than the specific dog. We would then have two rather distinct
concepts: {la monrePOS. cu gerzda lai sankt. bernard gi'e zdani la spat.}:
"Mon Repos is a doghouse for Saint Bernards, and is Spot's house". Something
like this has actually happened at times in the jvoste.

Body part lujvo give support to the Lean Lujvo case. Take
the lujvo for "skull", {sedbo'u}. There are four places involved: the
bone (b1), the system of which the bone is a part (b2), the head (s1), and
the system of which the head is part (s2). b2 can either be a person or a
body part. If a person, then s2=b2 (since s2 is obviously a person); if a
part, the s1=b2. In either case, though, do we really need a separate
place for the head? x1 is the skull of the head x2 of person x3? Obviously
not: we know that the bone is a head-bone, so we don't need a place in
the place structure telling us so. The final structure can only be: x1 ({le
bongu}) is the skull of x2 ({le se stedu}) --- which is the place structure
desired from the start.

Or take {jbogerna}, "Lojban grammar". {gerna} has three places: grammar g1,
language g2, and text g3. We already know the language to be Lojban;
so, as with {lobypli}, we delete the place for language. But things
are not as clear-cut for {gicygerna}. It is reasonable to claim there are
different Englishes (dialectical variants), and place ge2 might be kept
to denote the particular form of English specified by the grammar. (This
is another instance where an otherwise redundant place is kept in the place
structure by undergoing a meaning shift.) We
will probably decide, though, that such a nicety is best served by a form
like {nort,mbria. zei gicygerna}, which will still have just two sumti
(unless you start concentrating on idiolects of Northumbrian for ge2,
but that is probably going too far). {gicygerna} itself, in the
interest of compact place structures, will probably also have just two
arguments: grammar and text.

There are far-reaching implications here as to what precision we wish to
invest our lujvo with. No categorical verdict would be helpful at this stage
of development of the language. To help keep place structures as small and
manageable as possible, we have cautiously supported Lean Lujvo in our
proposed place structure list. But the judgement typically needs to be made
independently for each individual lujvo, and there are many other factors
involved.


3. Lujvo place ordering.

If we aim to make predictably understandable lujvo, we must have the order
of places in
the place structure follow some conventions. If this does not occur,
very real ambiguities can turn up. Take for example the lujvo {jdaselsku},
"prayer". In the phrase {di'e jdaselsku la dong.}, is Dong the person making
the prayer, or the entity prayed to? We could resolve such
problems on a case-by-case basis for each lujvo. But this makes the
task of learning lujvo place structures unmanagable. People need
consistent patterns, to make sense of what they learn. Such patterns can be
found across gismu place structures, and are even more necessary in lujvo
place structures. Case-by-case consideration is still necessary; lujvo
creation is a subtle art, after all. But it
is helpful to take advantage of any available regularities.

Gismu place structures tend to be ordered according to importance. There is
an implication in the place structure of {klama}, for example, that {lo
klama} will be talked about more often, and is thus more important, than
{lo se klama}, which is in turn more important than {lo xe klama}. A similar
tendency may be observed in lujvo; but this criterion is too subjective and
context-dependent to use by itself as the primary ordering criterion.
After all, it presumes the lujvo place structure has no relation with its
component gismu --- a position we have rejected.

Instead, we use the following guidelines:

3.1. Gismu place ordering consistency.

The places of the component gismu appearing in the final lujvo should not
be arbitrarily re-ordered. Rather, they should appear in the order they have
in the original gismu, allowing for interleaving with places from other
gismu.

To illustrate this, let us consider the lujvo {jdaselsku} again. The places
of {jdaselsku} deemed relevant are: {le cusku}, {le se cusku}, {le te cusku},
{le ve cusku}, {le lijda}. (One could argue that prayers needn't be associated
with a specific religion. We would counterargue that, in that case, it
isn't a 'religious' {selsku} in the {lijda} sense, and some other term
indicating
spirituality should be used in the veljvo. Similarly, we could argue for
maintaining {le ve cusku} by saying that, if we drop it, the prayer is no
longer really a {selsku}, and another tertanru should be selected. As often
happens, the veljvo
you use could be expressing a quite different concept to what you intended.)
We presume {le cusku} is equivalent to
{le se lijda}. Now the component gismu {selsku} has its arguments appear in
the following order:

{le se cusku cu selsku le cusku le te cusku le ve cusku}.

The GDS of {jdaselsku} will be something like:

{le se cusku cu selsku le se lijda be le lijda be'o je cusku le te cusku le
ve cusku}.

Based on this, in the final lujvo, {le cusku} (the person making the prayer)
should precede {le te cusku} (the entity to which the prayer is addressed),
and the place structure we have proposed is: c2 c1=l2 c3 c4 l1. (We will
see why l1 is tagged on at the end shortly.)

Interestingly, the lujvo was first proposed in the phrase {le jdaselsku be la
jegvon.} That is, the {te cusku} was the *second* argument of the lujvo, which
would presumably have the place structure c2 c3 c1 c4 l1.
Such a structure may make some sense: "a prayer to X by Y" may order its
arguments more familiarly
than "a prayer by X to Y". But we contend such rearrangement from the GDS
place order is usually unneccesary and confusing, and it has no substantial
advantage over the order we propose, which follows the place order of
{selsku}, and is thus more predictable.

The ordering principle should be maintained even if places from other gismu
are interleaved with the gismu being considered.

Thus in {jditadji} "policy", we decidced the relevant places were: t1, t3, j1,
j3. The GDS is: {le tadji cu tadji lenu le jdice cu jdice zo'e le te jdice kei
le te tadji}. To reflect this place structure, and to have consistent
ordering, the places should appear in the order: t1 j1 j3 t3. t1 precedes
t3, and j1 precedes j3.

There are cases where the component gismu have many places in common,
and each gismu orders these places differently. To be consistent with GDS,
we choose the tertanru of the veljvo (by default, the rightmost gismu) as
the selbri whose
place structure is used. This is because the place structure of a tanru
is based on that of its tertanru.

For example, in {ctucku}, "textbook", we have the following places:
ct1=cu3, ct2=cu4, ct3, ct4=cu2, ct5, cu1, cu5. We could order the places
based on the place structure of {ctuca}, as given above, or based on
{cukta}, as follows: cu1, cu2=ct4, cu3=ct1, cu4=ct2, cu5, ct3, ct5.

Since a {ctucku}, a {ctuca cukta}, is a kind of {cukta}, the GDS will look
like this: {le cukta cu te ctuca be le ve cukta bei le te ctuca bei le se
cukta bei le xe ctuca be'o gi'e cukta le se cukta le te cukta le ve cukta le
xe cukta}. So it makes sense to use the latter place structure.

3.2. belenu-lujvo place structure ordering.

In a belenu-lujvo, place structure ordering is simple, and reflects that in
the GDS: the seltanru places appear nested amongst the tertanru places,
in the place of the tertanru abstraction place they describe.

For example, {posydji}, "to want something for oneself", has places d1=p1, d3,
p2. d2 is {lenu ponse}, and is thus redundant; we have decided that p3, the
law of ownership, is an irrelevant detail in an expression of desire. We have
also decided that {posydji} should express wanting something for oneself.
Wanting something for someone else (namely, for {le ponse} to
be different to {le djica}) is a less frequent concept, and we will relegate
it to a longer expression.

This occurs frequently with lujvo: leaving in many places makes
the concept more general; leaving out certain places, eg. by overlap as above,
makes the concept more specific. Since we usually want to express this more
specific concept, we feel it deserves its own 'word' more than the more
general concept. 'To want something for oneself', for example, does have
its own word in English: 'to want X'. 'To want something for someone else',
on the other hand, does not get compressed in that way. For that reason,
we will say {ko'a posydji le solji}, instead of {ko'a posydji ko'a le solji},
for "he wants the gold [for himself]", and {ko'a djica lenu ko'e ponse le
solji}, instead of {ko'a posydji ko'e le solji}, for "he wants her to have
the gold, he wants the gold for her".

As we have outlined, the places of {ponse} should be nested in the d2 place
of {djica}. Thus, the GDS of {posydji} is:

{le djica cu djica lenu le djica cu ponse le se ponse zo'e kei le te djica}

and it makes sense to put the {ponse} places in place of the redundant {lenu}
place in {djica}:

{le djica cu posydji le se ponse le te djica}

which matches what we'd expect in English (X wants to own Y for purpose Z).

belenu-lujvo place structure ordering can be applied to be-lujvo as well.
Typically, however, so few seltanru places remain after place
selection (thanks to Lean Lujvo), that the effect is imperceptible. Thus
{ninpe'i}, "to be introduced to, to meet for the first time", is a be-lujvo:
{le se cnino je penmi cu penmi le se penmi je cnino le te penmi}. The places
are: p1=c2, p2=c1, p3. belenu-lujvo ordering will place {le cnino} "in place"
of {le se penmi}. But leaving the places in the order they have in the
tertanru, {penmi}, has the same effect: p1=c2, p2=c1, p3.

An interesting example of a be-lujvo is {xandegycalku}, "fingernail". The
seltanru of this lujvo is {xandegji}, "finger". The relevant places here are
d1 and x2=d2. {xandegji} is a quasi-be-lujvo; if we reinterpret {le se degji}
to indicate the body part the digit is part of, then the GDS becomes

{le degji cu degji le xance be le se xance},

where {le xance} is omitted as irrelevant. Now {calku} has three places:
the shell itself, what the shell encases, and what the shell consists of.
Treating {xandegycalku} as a be-lujvo, the {se calku} is the {xandegji},
and its places substitute c2 in the final lujvo. So the place structure is:
c1 d1 x2 c3. But the same reasoning which led us to discard {le xance}
from the place structure of {xandegji} makes us drop {le degji} from the
place structure of {xandegycalku}, leaving the place structure:

x1 is a fingernail of entity x2, made of x3.

3.3. je-lujvo place structure ordering.

Most lujvo in our list of proposed place structures have their place
structures ordered by je-lujvo ordering. In this scheme, the selected places
of the tertanru are followed by the selected places of the seltanru. This
ordering makes sense if we consider the seltanru and tertanru in the GDS
linked by a {gi'e}. (If linked by {je}, nesting problems make the sequence
of places obscure.) Besides being useful for je-lujvo themselves,
this ordering is also natural for those lujvo which do not fall into a
well-defined seltanru-tertanru relationship. If the relationship isn't
like {be}, then the seltanru places can't be placed in any tertanru place
slot, and it is safer to dump them at the end.

As an example of a je-luvo, consider {tinju'i}, "to listen". Its places are:
j1=t1, j2=t2, t3. The places of the tertanru appear first, and the remaining
places of the seltanru follow: {le jundi cu tinju'i le se jundi le te tirna}.

As an example of a lujvo with an obscure seltanru-tertanru relationship,
take {jdaselsku}, which we considered earlier. For this selbri, the thing
expressed is in some relationship with a religion. This relationship cannot be
expressed by either {be} or {je}; the GDS looks something like:

{le selsku cu selsku le cusku gi'e steci le lijda}

The easiest way to deal with this is simply to dump the seltanru places
after the tertanru places: {le selsku cu jdaselsku le cusku le te cusku
le ve cusku le lijda}.


4. Lujvo structuring.

4.1. Lujvo with more than two parts.

The theory we have outlined above is an account of lujvo with two parts:
a seltanru and a tertanru. But often lujvo will be made, containing more
than two parts. An example is {bavlamdei}, "tomorrow": it is composed
of the rafsi for "future", "adjacent", and "day". How does the account
we have given apply to lujvo like this?

The best way to approach such lujvo is to still classify them as based
on a binary tanru; the only difference being that the seltanru and/or
tertanru is itself a lujvo. So it is easiest to make sense of {bavlamdei}
as having two components: {bavlamji}, "next", and {djedi}. If we know
(or invent) the lujvo place structure, we compose the new lujvo's place
structure as normal.

In this case, {bavlamji} is taken as having the
place structure: b1=l1 b2=l2 (x1 is next after x2). We combine it with
{djedi}, which has the place structure: duration x1 is x2 days in duration
(default 1) by standard x3. d2 is clearly irrelevant, and is omitted.
While for je-lujvo we would normally put any trailing tertanru places before
any seltanru places, the day standard is a much less important concept
than the day the tomorrow follows, in the definition of {bavlamdei}.
(This occurs a few times in our je-lujvo. We can say that je-lujvo
ordering, having a less clear GDS motivation than belenu-ordering, needn't
be as rigidly adhered to. It can be violated, as happens here, to rank
places in order of relative importance.) The resulting place structure
is: b1=l1 b2=l2 d3.

Not all lujvo with more than two parts lend themselves to a two-part
analysis; the relation between all of them can be imprecise. Even if
a relationship is identifiable, KE-elision (which we will consider
shortly) can mean that it is quite different to what one would first
guessed. So it is useful to have a catch-all place ordering principle for
such lujvo, just as we had the je-lujvo ordering principle as a catch-all
for all two-part lujvo with an unclear interrelationship. The principle
we have used is just an extension of the je-lujvo principle: have the
places of the rightmost gismu first, then those of the second rightmost,
and so forth up to the leftmost gismu. This is consistent with applying
je-lujvo ordering if you already know the binary structure of the veljvo.

So in analysing {cladakyxa'i}, "long sword", we select the following
places as relevant: x1=c1=d1, d3, c3, x2, x3. If we dump the places in
the order we just suggested, we get: x1=c1=d1 x2 x3 d3 c3. But if we
were to analyse {cladakyxa'i} as a two-part lujvo ({cladakfu xarci}),
and apply je-lujvo ordering to it, we would get the same result. The
place structure of {cladakfu} would be: d1=c1 d2 d3 c3 (as {cladakfu} is
itself a je-lujvo). d2 is the
purpose to which the knife is used, which is obvious if it is a weapon,
so it can be left out, Dumping seltanru places after tertanru places
gives: x1=c1=d1 x2 x3 d3 c3.

4.2. Eliding SE rafsi from lujvo.

There are two ways to elide SE rafsi from a lujvo. You can drop them off
the seltanru, or the tertanru. The implications of each are quite different.

4.2.1. Eliding SE rafsi from seltanru.

SE rafsi elision in the seltanru is so common, we actually have to make an
effort to notice it's happened. Indeed, you could argue it hasn't been an
*elision* at all.

To explain what we mean by this, consider one of the most-used lujvo in
the language: {le'avla}. This lujvo expresses some relation between
a borrower ({le lebna}) and a word ({le valsi}); but what precisely this
relation is is unclear. It certainly doesn't fit into any of the schemes
we have set up: it's neither a word meaning "borrower" ({valsi be loi
lebna}), nor a word which is a borrower ({valsi je lebna}). But if we
prefix the seltanru with {se}, everything becomes clear: {selyle'avla}
has the je-lujvo interpretation {valsi je se lebna}, which is exactly
what a le'avla is. Similarly for {ti'ifla}, "bill, proposed law": the
relation between {le stidi} and {le flalu} is obscure. But {ti'ifla} can
be considered an abbreviation of {selti'ifla}, a straightforward je-lujvo,
since {le se stidi} (that suggested) is {le flalu}.

Of course, there is nothing incorrect about {le'avla} or {ti'ifla}: their
veljvo still describe the appropriate concepts. Thus a {lebna valsi} is
still a word somehow related to a borrower, and a {stidi flalu} is still
a law somehow related to a proposer. And we certainly can't eliminate
them from the language: they are a useful abbreviation, and entrenched
in many words in the language. However, they are a trap in lujvo place
ordering, as they obscure the most straightforward relation between the
seltanru and tertanru. To give our lujvo-making rules as wide an
application as possible, and to encourage analysing the seltanru-tertanru
relation in lujvo, we give lujvo like {le'avla} the place structure they
would have with the right SE added to the seltanru.

One should be aware of the inherent risk with such lujvo:
their abbreviated forms can easily be interpreted
themselves as je-lujvo or be-lujvo, rather than as abbreviations: a
{le'avla} formally is more plausibly {le valsi poi lebna} rather than
{le valsi poi se lebna}. Eliding out SE introduces an extra degree of
ambiguity in lujvo interpretation, which users should be aware of. This
is difficult, since our first impulse is to leave out any SE in making
lujvo, and have it as a relation between bare gismu.

4.2.2. Eliding SE rafsi from tertanru.

Eliding SE rafsi from tertanru gets us into much more trouble. To understand
why, consider all the tanru you know. That they all have their tertanru's
place structure is no accident: the tertanru says what kind of thing the
tanru means, and meaning in Lojban is carried by the place structure. Since
lujvo are based on tanru, this carries over to lujvo. Thus a {gerzda} is
a kind of {zdani}, a {posydji} is a kind of {djica}, and a {ctucku} is
a kind of {cukta}. A {selpinxe} may or may not be a {se pinxe} precisely;
one thing we can be sure it isn't is a {pinxe}.

Now consider how we would translate the word "two-sided". Our first impulse
might be to translate each element literally, and come up with {relmla}.
But try using this lujvo. Can we say "the board is two-sided" as {le
tanbo cu relmla}? The place structure of {mlana} has: x1 is a side of
x2. A board is not {mlana}; it is something that has sides, a {se mlana}.
If we allow sentences where we can say of {se mlana} that {le se
mlana cu relmla}, we are throwing a spanner in the works of lujvo
understanding. The one thing a naive reader can be sure of, coming
across the lujvo {relmla}, is that it is a kind of {mlana}; that's what
the veljvo ({remoi mlana}) says. To have it turn out to be a {ba'e se
mlana} is something noone could guess without a dictionary; and even
then, they'd scarcely believe it. If the lujvo has nothing to do with
its veljvo, one of the two is wrong.

All is not lost, of course; all we need do is insert the cmavo {se}: {le
tanbo cu se relmla}. While we can get away with this here, consider another
example: "dark-skinned". Let's translate this word as {xekskapi} ({manku}
means something in the dark, not something dark-coloured). As we have
seen, we cannot say {la djak. cu xekskapi}, because Jack is not skin,
but someone with skin --- a {se skapi}. So we say {la djak. cu se xekskapi}.
But look now at the place structure of {xekskapi}. {xekskapi} is a je-lujvo,
so the place structure is: x1 is the black skin of x2. But this gives us
two problems. First, the place we are interested in talking about most is
x2, not x1. Indeed, x2 was the meaning we were trying to render in the
first place.

Second, not only is the x1 place less important; it's hard to think of
a circumstance in which we'd want to speak of it at all. The jufra {la
djak. cu se xekskapi leri skapi} looks downright silly: we know that the
skin Jack has will be his own skin, so why give it a plce in the place
structure? This seems to be an instance where Lean Lujvo could be applied,
eliminating the irrelevant skin place. But doing so leaves us in an
embarrassing situation: we are left with a selbri with no x1! This doesn't
make any sense at all.

What is happening here is that we are translating the tertanru wrong, under

*******************************************************************************
 A freshman once observed to me:         Nick Nicholas am I, of Melbourne, Oz.
 On the edge of the Rubicon,             nsn@munagin.ee.mu.oz.au (IRC: nicxjo)
 men don't go fishing.                   CogSci and CompSci & wannabe Linguist.
   - Alice Goodman, _Nixon In China_     Mail me! Mail me! Mail me! Or don't!!