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Re: demuan identifiers re-visited

From:Christophe Grandsire <grandsir@...>
Date:Wednesday, August 25, 1999, 6:27
Fabian wrote:
> > As you know if you remember my ancient posts, demuan identifiers hold teh > key to whether their nouns are singular or plural. I just discovered soem > interesting consequences of this in the quantifiers subgroup: > > This four is teh original group of quantifiers: > > bama - every ; all ; both > nani - a few ; either > nene - no ; neither > lama - the category of things known as... > > The following pairs are a logical consequence: > > bama meta - all of the city ; the entire city > bamer meta - all of the cities ; every city > > nani meta - a part of the city > naner meta - a few of the cities > > nene meta - no part of the city > nener meta - none of the cities > > This nene/nener distinction is rather vague, and there is no possible > distinction for lama/lamer. I think I will drop lama from teh vocabulary > entirely, which is a shame, as I am fond of that word. >
Don't do this! It is normal that there be no distinction between lama and lamer, as it seems that the meaning of lama gives no place to plural. So just make it an exception or, if you don't have exceptions, and don't want to have them, remove it from the quantifier subgroup. By the way, how do you use it normally? I can't understand why you put it into the quantifier subgroup. I don't find the distinction between nene and nener vague. On the contrary, it is clear. 'In "nene meta"' (I don't know how you translate 'in') refers to only one city, and says that nowhere in it (something can happen). 'In "nener meta"' refers to a group of cities, and says that nowhere in all of them (something can happen).
> Sample sentences: > > naner sking du inglan-de i naner sking du franse-de > Some of us are English and some of us are French. > > nene sking du inglan-de i nene sking du franse-de > We are part English and part French. >
Shouldn't it be "nani" instead of "nene"? Or is it an idiomatic use?
> --- > Fabian > I know you understand what you thought I said, > But I'm not sure you understand that what you > thought I said is not what I meant to say.
-- Christophe Grandsire Philips Research Laboratories -- Building WB 145 Prof. Holstlaan 4 5656 AA Eindhoven The Netherlands Phone: +31-40-27-45006 E-mail: grandsir@natlab.research.philips.com