Re: LE and VOI

[JORGE JOAQUIN LLAMBIAS <jorge@INTERMEDIA.COM.AR>]

And:
>>     xy mlatu gi'e xekri
>
>Isn't {xy} anaphoric?

I suppose, yes.

>What I really want to say is something like {le co`e cu
>mlatu gi`e xekri} or {le broda cu mlatu gi`e xekri} - I
>want to refer to something without giving a description of
>it.

{le co'e} works great. I think that {ko'a} means {le co'e}
when it is not goied.

 >Anyway, here's an example of a specific veridical "indefinite":
>"I will show John a book". I want this claim to be false if I will
>not show John _War & Peace_, even if I do show him _Madame
>Bovary_. That is, I want "a book" to refer to W&.teoP, but I don't
>want to bother saying this (perhaps it's not relevant to do so).

That is not the most normal interpretation for that sentence in
English, though. I think I kind of get an idea of what you mean,
but then for me the intentionality of "will" gets in the way. I tend
to understand your sentence as "there is a book such that
I intend to show it to John", then it is false if you show him
a different one from the one you intended. But if "will" is
only working as a future marker, then I don't see how your
truth conditions can work for that sentence. If you change
it to past tense: "I showed John a book", I can't get that
sentence to be false if you didn't show him the book that
you have in mind but another one: to your audience the
sentence is true even if you are lying to yourself in your
own mind.

>The only sure way of saying this that I know of is to use:
>"le meaningless-brivla cu ge ba se jarco mi la djon gi cukta".

Yes, that's how it should be, since you're really making the two
claims about your referent. I think that
                    ko'a ge ba se jarco mi la djon gi cukta
works for that.

 Jorge