<xoi> and fuzzy models

["Steven M. Belknap" <sbelknap@UIC.EDU>]

la kris cusku di'e
>We definitely should not selectively apply a notion like this to some scales
>and not others.  Rating beauty is clearly a controversial subject, and even
>within the US, never mind other places, some subcultures like to do it and
>some are appalled by it.  The lojbanic thing to do, pe'i, is to allow
>everything and let cultures use the parts they like.  Personally I won't be
>holding up signs in Lojban that rate the pretty boys; maybe rowdy students
>at Lojbo U. will.  A real language should be able to express anything,
>including crap.


Absolutely!! I strongly agree. I was not objecting to other people rating
human beauty; in fact I would not object if anyone else did, particularly
if it made some important point about lojban usage. I would absolutely,
positively be opposed to any attempts to restrict *potential* utterances in
lojban. In fact, my entire point with all this fuzzy stuff is that my
preferred mode of thinking is obstructed by the aristotlean bias of lojban
as currently used. As Jorge pointed out, this may be largely because we
have not yet discovered capabilities lojban already possesses. However, it
appears so far that something like <xoi> would be a valuable addition to
lojban.

In my message, I was objecting to someone else forcing *me* to do this, for
reasons I gave. Jorge suggested I use roses instead of people which was an
excellent suggestion:

le rozgu pafi'uci xoi barda le melbi le cnano

"The rose is 1/3 fuzzily more beautiful than normal."

I predict Jorges will object to this and will prefer to say something like,

le rozgu pafi'uci xoi melbi ke le cnano

co'o mi'e. la stivn.


Steven M. Belknap, M.D.
Assistant Professor of Clinical Pharmacology and Medicine
University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria

email: sbelknap@uic.edu
Voice: 309/671-3403
Fax:   309/671-8413