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RE: TECH: goat's legs; quantification and restriction



Let's walk and talk.

Let's take the only example I've so far managed to track down in the
published literature.  It's on page 17 of the "Diagrammed Summary".

        re tavla cu klama

        Two [of the unspecified number who are] talkers go.

Does this mean that there are exactly two talkers who go?  Perhaps it
does, but only in a very restricted sense.  There's a lot left unspecified
in this bridi, including several sumti places, and the tense information.
THIS IS NOT A UNIVERSAL STATEMENT.  This does NOT say that out of the
set of talkers, anywhere, at any time, there are exactly two who satisfy
the predicate "go".  It says that there are two who talk about something
... who also go somewhere ... at some unspecified time.

So what does this imply for our poor goat's little legs?

        lo'e kanba cu se tuple reda ri'u ri

        The typical goat is be-legged by two things *on his right*

If I omit the spatial qualification, then I'm just being vague.  I'm not
telling you where the two legs I'm talking about are.  But why should

        lo'e kanba cu se tuple reda

be interpreted as a _universal_, any more than {re tavla cu klama}?

mi'e .i,n.