Re: A question about space tenses

[Chris A Bogart <cbogart@INDRA.COM>]

On Tue, 28 Jan 1997, Jorge J. Llambias wrote:

> According to the gismu list, farna means "x1 is the direction of x2
> from origin x3". I really don't want to turn this into another
> what-does-the-English-word-means, but my dictionary has for "direction"
> (besides some other irrelevant stuff):
>
> direction: the line or course on which something is moving or is aimed
>            to move or along which something is pointing or facing.
>
> I understood "farna" to mean that x2 is moving/aimed/pointing/facing
> in the direction that goes from x3 to x1. Is my understanding wrong?
> If so, how do I get this meaning in Lojban?

Since x1 is glossed as "direction", I imagine it to be "north" or
something, not "the store".  The definition sounds more natural
substituting North for x1:

  "North" is the direction of "the store" from origin "my house"

(which to me implies nothing about how the store or the house
are facing)

It's less plausible with x1 and x3 being endpoints of a line
parallel to the way x2 is facing:

  "Mecca" is the direction of "Jorge" from origin "New York City"

Does this mean that you're facing the same direction that a New
Yorker would have to face to face Mecca?  Or that you are facing
Mecca and happen to be in NYC?  If the latter, I strongly
disapprove of x3 as a superfluous place.  The former could
work, but I don't get it from the definition, and it doesn't
seem intuitive to me.

In short, I think the "direction" line is from x3 to x2, and
x1 is the name of the direction.  An orientation gismu
would have a place structure like "x1 is facing in direction
x2", with no separate "origin" point (since x2 is the origin!).

Chris