tech:logical matters

[ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>]

> &: I think it's likely that people who thought they were arguing with
> you about existential import were in reality arguing about restricted
> quantifiers. - That is, there really was a communication failure.
> pc: I don't think so.

Oh well. It at least reports how I was understanding the debate.

> Looking back at the record, I see that I was always careful to
> distinguish between Ax:Fx => Gx and (AxFx)Gx,

which wd have gone right past me if I wasn't concentrating

> between _ro da poi broda cu brode_ and all the other forms, between
> AxFx and (AxFx)Gx, and to say what the differences were. And, so far
> as I can tell, everyone else in the discussion followed my lead in
> making those distinctions, except that they insisted that
> 1) _ro da poi broda_ did not mean anything different from _ro broda_
> (etc.),
> 2) AxFx did not entail ExFx,
> 3) (AxFx)Gx did not entail (ExFx)Gx,
> 4) (AxFx)Gx did not mean anything different from Ax:Fx=>Gx and
> 5) that only the latter form was a correct symbolization of "All F are
> G."
> and I repeatedly pointed out that 1) might be true now but was
> historically inaccurate and left a major gap in the the Lojban system,
> that 2) was simply false, that 3)& 4) were generally taken to be false
> (though the symbolism was used by all sorts) and that 5) was flat false
> (with citations).

(1) may not be true; rather it may just be thought to be true, because
noone but you has felt a need for restricted quantifiers. Why would the
truth of (1) leave a major gap?

For (2-4) I am happy to take your word.

For (5), I'm not happy to believe you (or disbelieve you). I don't think
we should get bogged down by a discussion of English semantics. The
issue is whether Ax:Fx=>Gx is the correct symbolization of {ro broda
cu brode} and of {ro da poi kea broda cu brode}. I would still vote
that it should be, but maybe there are great virtues to restricted
quantification that I am failing to recognize.

> (BTW, the discussion started from my saying that, if the implicit
> internal quantifier in _lo broda_ was _ro_, then logically all forms
> of _lo broda_ required that there be brodas.

Well, {lo broda} says there are brodas, because it is {suo pa lo broda}.
But why should {suo no lo ro broda} mean that there are brodas?
But that inner quantifier with {lo} is irksome anyway.

> For those who denied that -- most people in the discussion, I think
> -- there is no way to get existential import (without adding "and there
> are brodas" somewhere) because, while _(su'o) lo (ro) broda_ does say
> there are brodas, because of the _su'o_, _ro lo (ro) broda_ would not,
> for neither _ro_ would have that implication).

The method is {suo lo suo broda} - that guarantees there are brodas.

> I take it that the fact that my say-so was not enough to even get
> someone to check whether there was something more in that note they
> half remembered and generalized upon is a reductio ad absurdum on any
> claim that I have some influence around here.

In the days when you weren't on the list, invocation of your name
constituted recourse to the ultimate authority, on pertinent matters -
and lojbab's reports on "phonecons" with pc, the gospel.

But for authority to keep its force it must remain distant & cloaked in
mystery. When the high priest comes under the gaze of the public he is
liable to be presumed fallible.

coo, mie and