Re: "Transferral" verb form in LC-01

On Tue, Jun 25, 2002 at 12:13:43AM +0100, Tim May wrote:
[snip]
> PPH aspect
>
> All nouns and verbs inflect for aspect, either perfective (state
> described by root is considered as a single action), progressive
> (state is in progress when something else happens), habitual/intrinsic
> (state is something which patient does often, or is in by its nature).
This is very interesting. Ebisedian also considers the perfective aspect
as a complete, unit action, and also has a progressive which is used only
for interrupted actions and actions in progress when something else
happens. It doesn't have a habitual aspect, though. Its other verb aspect
is the inceptive, describing the state just before, or at, the start of an
action.

[snip]
> If this infix is applied, the word describes a change in the state of
> the patient.  It may be inceptive (entering the state), cessative
> (leaving the state), evolutive (becoming more in the state), or
> devolutive (becoming less in the state).
Nice distinctions. :-)

> Generally, verbs can be intransitive, transitive or ditransitive.  In
> LC-01, I am trying to eliminate transitive and ditransitive roots as
> much as is practical, preferring to derive them from more fundamental
> roots.  This is desirable for a number of reasons.  It reduces the
> number of roots required, freeing up space for other concepts.  It
> reduces the number of roots which must be learnt for basic understanding
> (although it requires a greater knowlege of morphology from a
> student).
[snip]

Hmm, interesting. When I confronted the problem of indirect objects and
passives in Ebisedian, I went for the opposite solution: I created a
semantic model with five generic roles of equal standing, that nouns can
play w.r.t. to a verb. In other words, every verb potentially have 5
(fixed) roles, though most of the time you only use a few. But because the
roles are semantic, there are no ambiguities with arbitrary grammatical
assignments of nouns as objects or indirect objects. Nouns always fit
nicely into one of the five roles.

This way, I got rid of passives (which I never liked), and the distinction
between transitive/intransitive/ ditransitive verbs. All verbs are equal
in terms of the number of possible arguments -- as long as the final
result makes sense. All noun cases are equal too -- there is no
subject/object/indirect object arbitrarily decided grammatically; nouns
just appear in the slot most appropriate for their semantic function.

[snip]
> The first tactic along these lines was to add a causative suffix.
> This allows many words which have seperate roots in, say, English to
> be derived in LC-01.  For example, a verb "to kill" may be derived
> from the verb "to live", in the cessative aspect, plus a causative.
Nice idea. Maybe I'll adapt it for Ebisedian :-)

[snip]
> Now suppose that these two events occur as part of the same action,
> that there is a transferral of ownership from A to B.  This is the
> transferral form that I just made up.  I haven't decided on the nature
> of the transferral infix yet, so I'll represent it as X.
>
> A B C tX&vid.
> Ownership of C is transferred from A to B.
>
> Now I'm not sure exactly what the case roles of A and B are here...
Interesting concept. Although I haven't yet made a verb for "to assume
ownership" in Ebisedian, such a verb X would take a conveyant case for the
thing being owned (conveyant because it is the thing whose ownership is
being transferred), and the receptive case for the owner.

To cease to own, the owner just changes to the originative case: now the
verb X indicates that ownership of the conveyant noun has passed from it
to somebody else.

To transfer ownership, we just have both cases present: the original owner
in the originative case, the thing being transferred in the conveyant, and
the new owner in the receptive.

So effectively, the *same* verb X has acted as both transitive and
ditransitive.

[snip]
> Now, if A and B can be marked as more than one case at the same time,
> and we make the verb causative...
[snip]

Ebisedian has a way of marking two noun cases on the same noun, and it is
used for connecting verbs. Using the previous example, we can have the
second owner transfer the ownership to a third party. In such a case, we
would have:

A(org) own(verb) THING(cvy) B(rcp)+(org) own(verb) C(rcp)

The first owner A (originative) transfers ownership of THING to B
(receptive), but B is dually marked as an originative as well, so it acts
as an originative argument to the second verb. So B plays an originative
role to the second verb, and hence B transfers ownership of THING to C
(receptive), who receives the ownership.

(Grammatically these are *two*" sentences, adjoined, but that's just a
technicality. You can string together a chain of verbs like this using
the dual-inflection mechanism.)


T

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