abstractors

[And Rosta <a.rosta@UCLAN.AC.UK>]

Chris:
> On Thu, 16 Oct 1997, JORGE JOAQUIN LLAMBIAS wrote:
> > >3. Are ni and ka redundant, strictly speaking? Given du`u and nu
> > >   and ce`u, is there anything that they can't do but ni and ka
> > >   can?
> >
> > Well, du'u would be redundant to ka, since ce'u is supposed
> > to be used with ka. And yes, ni is definitely redundant.
>
> Could {nu} be defined as {ka fau makau}?

I don't think so. John has very elegantly proposed treating
du`u as a variant of ka that indicates no implicit ce`u.
A du`u/ka is an abstract object, like a number, that is not
part of the material world. But a nu is a portion of the
material world: {nu broda} is that portion of the material
world that is sufficient to make {broda} true.

Jorge:
> >2. If {ni} was "clarified" to Option 2, could {jei} be redefined
> >   as "whether"? At the moment {jei} is parallel to option 1,
> >   but Option 2 seems usefuller.
>
> I suppose I agree. But I've been complaining about this
> dichotomy for years without much success. Both modalities
> of jei and ni made it to the refgram examples. Personally
> I never use {jei}, and I think I will abandon {ni} as well,
> which I haven't used much anyway.

If {jei} meant "whether", then it would be straightforward to
do subordinate interrogative clauses by means of quantifiers
rather than by means of Q-kau. Thus instead of

   {djuno le du`u ma kau klama}

you could have

    {ro da zo`u djuno le jei da klama}

I would like to be able to do that.

........................

BTW, does li`i involve a ce`u too?

--And.