BPFK Checkpoint: Aspect

Book cover

Lojban for Newbies. Edition 2.0 alpha (not ready)

la .lojban. pe lo nintadni Published 2013

Preface — lidne prosa

This tutorial gives a gentle introduction to the structure of Lojban, a logical language. 15 lessons of this course should be sufficient to allow the learner to understand most of the Lojban they are likely to see in the online Lojban discussion groups, or in the publications of the Logical Language Group.

Lojban is an international language the grammar of which is based on so called predicate logic which makes it universal. The language fully implements the principle of facultative precision which means that you can freely control the vagueness or on the contrary preciseness of your speech. Also it has unprecedented tools to express human emotions. It is also the best tool for implementing machine automatic translation. So it's a kind of bridge between different languages and cultures. Still it's a speakable language.

Lojban is clean, simple, general, and, by the very virtue of all these, powerful language. Lojban constitutes a strikingly thorough working-out of its creators' goals, and its design is responsive to a rich, subtle understanding of linguistics and philosophical logic.

Lojban is going to change the way you look at verbal communication. Learning Lojban is much more than just learning its words and grammar. Learning Lojban is more about understanding it. You will need to understand many things about the way languages work. If you are not a linguist, it will be new to you. If you are a linguist it'll strike you how different ideas and philosophies you familiar with can be directly uttered in the flow of normal speech.

Lojban will make you think about the ways you express ideas in words. Something that you learned and used every day but never tried to understand how it works.

If you are deciding which language to learn or whether to learn any at all, you need to define your goals. Being able to understand what is spoken/written and/or speak/write so that other speakers understand is a good reason to learn most other languages. Learning new ways of thinking and expression of thoughts is a good reason to learn Lojban.

Lojban is likely to be very different to the kinds of languages you are familiar with — which certainly include English. Learning Lojban may be easy or hard, depending on how well you understand the ideas behind it. There are not many words and rules that you need to learn to get into a basic level. You will get there rather quickly if you put a systemic effort. On the other hand, if you fail to understand some basic point, memorizing things will not help you much. You will have to return to it until you get it. If a point of grammar or logic seems inscrutable at first, don't hesitate to move on, and come back to it later. Likewise, some of the exercises are trickier than others (particularly the translation exercises at the end of each lesson.) If you can't work out the answer to a particular question, feel free to skip it — but do look at the answer to the question, as there are often useful hints on Lojban usage in there. The answers to the exercises are at the end of each lesson.

The following conventions are used in this book:

• Examples are indented.

This is an example of case study sentence.

• Side notes and tips are in blue boxes.

• Lojbanic text is always in bold.
• Translations of Lojbanic sentences are in italic.
• Brackets are used to clarify the grammatical structure of Lojban in examples. These brackets are not part of official Lojban orthography[, and are included only for academic purposes].

For more information on Lojban, please contact the Logical Language Group:

[email protected]

[email protected]

Bob LeChevalier

The Logical Language Group, Inc.

2904 Beau Lane

Fairfax, VA 22031

U.S.A.

(+1 703) 385-0273

http://www.lojban.org

This course is based on the book "Lojban For Beginners" — velcli befi la .lojban. bei loi co'a cilre that has been first authored by Robin Turner and Nick Nicholas. Robin authored lessons 1–8 and 10–11 in 1999; Nick added to the existing lessons, and authored lessons 9 and 12–15, in 2001. Other improvements have been added by the Lojban community throughout year 2013.

Chapter 1. Letters and sounds

The first thing you need to do when you learn a foreign language is to become familiar with the sounds of the language and how they are written, and the same goes for Lojban. Fortunately, Lojban sounds (phonemes) are fairly straightforward.

Vowels

There are six vowels in Lojban.

a	as in father (not as in hat)
e	as in get
i	as in machine or (Italian) vino (not as in hit)
o	as in bold or more — not as in so (this should be a ‘pure’ sound).
u	as in cool (not as in but)

These are pretty much the same as vowels in Italian or Spanish. The sixth vowel, y, is called a schwa in the language trade, and is pronounced like the first and last A's in America (that's English America, not Spanish.) It's the sound that comes out when the mouth is completely relaxed.

Two vowels together are pronounced as one sound (diphthong). Some examples are:

ai	as in high
au	as in how
ei	as in hey
oi	as in boy
ia	like German Ja
ie	like yeah
iu	like you
ua	as in waah!, or French quoi
ue	as in question
uo	as in quote
ui	like we, or French oui

Double vowels are rare. The only examples are ii, which is pronounced like English ye (as in “Oh come all ye faithful”) or Chinese yi, and uu, pronounced like woo.

Consonants

Most Lojban consonants are the same as English, but there are some exceptions:

g	always g as in gum, never g as in gem
c	sh, as in ship
j	as in measure or French bonjour
x	as in German Bach, Spanish Jose or Arabic Khaled

The English sounds ch and j are written as tc and dj.

Lojban doesn't use the letters H, Q or W.

Special Characters

Lojban does not require any punctuation, but some special characters (normally used in punctuation in other languages) affect the way Lojban is pronounced.

The only one of these characters which is obligatory in Lojban is the apostrophe; in fact the apostrophe is regarded as a proper letter of Lojban. An apostrophe separates two vowels, preventing them from being pronounced together (as a diphthong); it is itself pronounced like an h. For example, ui is normally pronounced we, but u'i is oohee.

A full stop (period) is a short pause to stop words running into each other. The rules of Lojban make it easier for one word to run into another when the second word begins with a vowel; so any word starting with a vowel conventionally has a full stop placed in front of it.

Commas are rare in Lojban, but can be used to stop two vowels blurring together when you don't want to use an apostrophe (which would put a h between them). No Lojban words have commas, but they're sometimes used in writing non-Lojban names, for example .pi,ER. (Pierre), as opposed to .pier. (P-yerr), .pi.ER. (Pee; Ehr), or .pi'ER. (Piherr).

Capital letters are not normally used in Lojban. We use them in non-Lojban words (like Pierre) when the stress of a word is different from the Lojban norm. The norm is to put the stress on the last-but-one syllable; so, for example, kujmikce - ‘nurse’ is kujMIKce, not KUJmikce. The name Juliette would be written .DJUli,et. if pronounced in an English way, but .juLIET. if pronounced as in French.

Alphabet

In most language textbooks, you get the alphabet of the language together with its sounds. Letters (lerfu) turn out to be even more important than usual in Lojban, so we might as well go through their names quickly.

Consonants are straightforward: the name of a consonant letter is that letter, plus y. So the consonant letters of Lojban, b, c, d, f, g ..., are called by., cy., dy., fy., gy.... in Lojban (using the full stop as we've just described).

As fror vowels they are handled by following the vowel sound with the word bu, which basically means 'letter'. So the vowels of Lojban are: .abu, .ebu, .ibu, .obu, .ubu, ybu.

The apostrophe is regarded as a proper letter in Lojban, and is called .y'y.. To some people, this sounds like a cough; to other, like uh-huh (when it means ‘Yes’ rather than ‘No’).

Lojban has ways of refering to most letters you can think of; see The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 17 for details. If you have the urge to spell out your name in Lojban and have an H, Q, or W to deal with, you can use .y'y.bu, ky.bu and vy.bu. So Schwarzenegger is spelt in Lojban as:

sy. cy. .y'ybu vybu. .abu ry. zy. .ebu ny. .ebu gy. gy. .ebu ry.

And spelling that is a task the equal of anything the Terminator ever did!

Exercise 1

Spell your name in Lojban (or at least something close enough to it to use the twenty-six letters of English we have learned, and the apostrophe.) No peeking at the back — we don't have the answer to this exercise there!

'Correct' pronunciation

You don't have to be very precise about Lojban pronunciation, because the phonemes are distributed so that it is hard to mistake one sound for another. This means that rather than one ‘correct’ pronunciation, there is a range of acceptable pronunciation — the general principle is that anything is OK so long as it doesn't sound too much like something else. For example, Lojban r can be pronounced like the r in English, Scottish or French.

Two things to be careful of, though, are pronouncing Lojban i and u like Standard British English hit and but (Northern English but is fine!). This is because non-Lojban vowels, particularly these two, are used to separate consonants by people who find them hard to say. For example, if you have problems spitting out the zd in zdani (house), you can say zɪdani — where the ɪ is very short, but the final i has to be long.

Chapter 2. Relationships and Places

Relationships

Now let's turn to constructing our first sentences in Lojban.

Of course one of your first thoughts might be "Where are nouns and verbs in Lojban?"

Let's start from verbs. Those words that are called brivla in Lojban grammar can be safely called verbs.

Let’s take some brivla. The word

mlatu

is roughly translated as “cat” but it’s more correctly to say that it means

to be a cat

It’s a brivla, or in other words, a verb.

pinxe

to drink

And

ladru

is roughly translated as “milk”. But it’s rather

to be a quantity of milk

It might sound strange how milk can be a verb but in fact this makes Lojban very simple.

Let’s imagine we want to say A cat drinks milk.

In order to convert a verb into a noun we put the short word lo in front of it. And in order to show a verb we put the word cu in front of the verb.

lo mlatu cu pinxe lo ladru

A cat drinks milk.

Remember that c is pronounced as sh.

So we turned mlatu and ladru into nouns. We can also say that lo creates a noun from a verb with roughly the meaning of “one who does the action of the verb”.

And using cu we show that the next word, i.e. pinxe will still be a verb.

Now let’s talk about pronouns like “I” and “you”. Like their English name suggests, they are much like nouns.

mi

I

do

you

ti

this one, this object near me.

tu

that one, that object over there.

Pronouns work like nouns by default. They don’t require lo in front of them.

mi pinxe

I drink.

do pinxe

You drink.

ti ladru

This is milk.

tu mlatu

That is a cat.

We can even omit cu as we can clearly see the pronoun and the verb being separated. cu is not necessary after mi (I/me/we), do (you, the person(s) I'm talking to) or any words like this (‘pronouns’, in Lojban jargon), because they can't run over into anything else.

In such simple sentences brivla (verbs) express relationship between objects. Relationships are the key to Lojban, and words describing a relationship are said to act as predicates or selbri in Lojban terminology.

And nouns and pronouns are those objects, arguments. They are called sumti in Lojban.

For now we should just remember that only brivla (verbs) can act as selbri (predicates,relationships).

What types of brivla there are?

There are four of them:

1. gismu.

   gismu, or root-words are main building blocks of Lojban vocabulary. gismu are easy to recognise, because they always have five letters, in the form

   CVCCV — e.g. ladru, gismu, sumti

   or

   CCVCV — e.g. mlatu, cmene, bridi, klama

   where C=consonant and V=vowel.

2. cmevla.

   They are mostly used to build personal names. You can easily recognise them in a flow of text as being wrapped by one dot from both sides. Besides, if not count dots they always end in a consonant.

   Template:Talkquote

3. lujvo

   or compound words. They are created from short building blocks rafsi used for mnemonic purposes. Usually lujvo are created when gismu are not enough.

4. zi'evla

   or free words are usually created for specific concepts and things like igloo, spaghetti.

We'll talk about lujvo and zi'evla later.

Exercise 1

Which of the following Lojban words are:

a. gismu

b. cmevla (remember, they always end in a consonant)

c. neither?

Note: I've left out the full stops in the cmevla — that would make it too easy!

1. lojban
2. dunda
3. praxas
4. mi
5. cukta
6. prenu
7. blanu
8. ka'e
9. dublin
10. selbri

Interjections

If you tried pronouncing the vowel combinations above, you've already said some Lojban words. Lojban has a class of words called interjections or attitudinal indicators, which express how the speaker feels about something. The most basic ones consist of two vowels, sometimes with an apostrophe in the middle. Here are some of the most useful ones.

.a'o	hope
.au	desire
.a'u	interest
.ie	agreement
.i'e	approval
.ii	fear (think of “Eeek!”)
.iu	love
.oi	complaint
.o'u	relaxation
.ua	discovery, “Ah, I get it!”
.ue	surprise
.u'e	wonder, “Wow!”
.ui	happiness
.u'i	amusement
.u'u	repentance, “I'm sorry!”
.uu	pity, sympathy

You can make any of these into its opposite by adding nai, so .uinai means “I'm unhappy”, .aunai is reluctance, .uanai is confusion (“I don't get it”,“Duh...”) and so on. You can also combine them. For example, .iu.uinai would mean “I am unhappily in love.” In this way you can even create words to express emotions which your native language doesn't have.

Attitudinal indicators are extremely useful, and it is well worth making an effort to learn the most common ones. One of the biggest problems people have when trying to speak in a foreign language is that, while they've learnt how to buy a kilo of olives or ask the way to the post office, they can't express feelings, because many languages do this in a round-about way (outside group therapy, very few British people would say outright that they were sad, for example!) In Lojban you can be very direct, very briefly (there are ways of ‘softening’ these emotions, which we'll get to in a later lesson). In fact, these attitudinals are so useful that some Lojbanists use them even when they're writing in English, rather like smileys, emoticons (those e-mail symbols like ;-) :-( etc.).

Another great thing about interjections is that you can attach them next to any sumti thus expressing your attitude towards that part of the sentence.

lo mlatu .ue cu pinxe lo ladru

A cat (surprise!) is drinking milk.

A cat (wow, how unexpected!) is drinking milk

You can as well attach interjections to the right of any selbri. Or put it in the beginning of any sentence thus changing your attitude to the whole sentence.

.o'u tu mlatu

(relaxation!) that is a cat.

Oh, that's only a cat.

In this case you probably thought that was something dangerous but it's only a cat so you are saying .o'u.

Exercise 2

Using the attitudinal indicators above (including negatives), what might you say in the following situations?

1. You've just realised where you left your keys.
2. Someone treads on your toes.
3. You're watching a boring film.
4. Someone's just told you a funny story.
5. You disagree with someone.
6. Someone's just taken the last cookie in the jar.
7. You really don't like someone.
8. You are served a cold, greasy meal.
9. Your friend has just failed a test.
10. There is a large green beetle crawling towards you.

Names. Introducing yourself

Another type of interjections are vocatives. They function exactly the same as emotional indicators we just discussed but they can have one sumti attached to them.

For example,

mi'e

self-introduction; identifies speaker.

When do we use it? Watch any film where people don't know each other's language. They start off saying things like "Me Tarzan," which is as good a place to start learning Lojban as any. So here we go.

mi'e la .robin.

I-am-named Robin

I'm Robin.

la is similar to lo but it converts brivla not to a simple noun but to a name (cmene in Lojban). Again cu does not mean ‘is’ . It's there just to indicate that there's a verb cmene coming up.

mi'e is a good example of the apostrophe separating two vowels, and sounds a bit like me heh.

Robin is lucky because his name goes directly into Lojban without any changes. However, there are some rules for Lojban names which mean that some names have to be ‘Lojbanised’. This may sound strange — after all, a name is a name — but in fact all languages do this to some extent. For example, English speakers tend to pronounce Jose something like Hozay, and Margaret in Chinese is Magelita. Some sounds just don't exist in some languages, so the first thing you need to do is rewrite the name so that it only contains Lojban sounds, and is spelt in a Lojban way.

Let's take the English name Susan. The two s's are pronounced differently — the second one is actually a z — and the a is not really an a sound, it's the ‘schwa’ we just mentioned. So Susan comes out in Lojban as .suzyn..

You may have noticed two extra full stops (periods) there. This is necessary because if you didn't pause, you might not know where the name started and ended, or in other words where the previous word ended and the next word began. For example:

.an.	Anne
.axmet.	Ahmet
.eduard.	Edward
.IBraxim. or .IBra'im.	Ibrahim
.odin.	Odin

You can also put a full stop in between a person's first and last names (though it's not compulsory), so Jim Jones becomes .djim.djonz..

An important rule for Lojbanising names is that the last letter of a cmevla must be a consonant. Again, this is to prevent confusion as to where a name ends, and what is and is not a name (all other Lojban words end in a vowel). We usually use s for this; so in Lojban, Mary becomes .meris., Joe becomes .djos. and so on. An alternative is to leave out the last vowel, so Mary would become .mer. or .meir..

The final point is stress. As we've seen, Lojban words are stressed on the penultimate syllable, and if a name has different stress, we use capital letters. This means that the English and French names Robert come out differently in Lojban: the English name is .robyt. in UK English, or .rab,rt. in some American dialects, but the French is .roBER. .

To give an idea of how all this works, here are some names of famous people in their own language and in Lojban.

English
Margaret Thatcher	.magryt.tatcys. (no th in Lojban because most people around the world can't say it!)
Mick Jagger	.mik.djagys.
French
Napoleon Bonaparte	.napole,ON.bonaPART.
Juliette Binoche	.juLIET.binOC.
Chinese
Laozi	.laudz.
Mao Zedong	.maudzyDYNG.
Turkish
Mustafa Kemal	.MUStafas.keMAL.
Erkin Koray	.erkin.korais.
German
Friedrich Nietzsche	.fridrix.nitcys.
Clara Schumann	.klaras.cuman.
Spanish
Isabel Allende	.izaBEL.aiendes.
Che Guevara	.tcegevaras.

Exercise 3

Where are these places?

1. .nu,IORK.
2. .romas.
3. .xavanas.
4. .kardif.
5. .beidjin.
6. .ANkaras.
7. .ALbekerkis.
8. .vankuver.
9. .keiptaun.
10. .taibeis.
11. .bon.
12. .delis.
13. .nis.
14. .atinas.
15. .lidz.
16. .xelsinkis.

Exercise 4

Lojbanise the following names:

1. John
2. Melissa
3. Amanda
4. Matthew
5. Michael
6. David Bowie
7. Jane Austen
8. William Shakespeare
9. Sigourney Weaver
10. Richard Nixon
11. Istanbul
12. Madrid
13. Tokyo
14. San Salvador

Lojban words as names

You can use not only cmevla, but also other brivla to choose your nickname in Lojban. If you prefer, you can translate your name into Lojban (if you know what it means, of course) or adopt a completely new Lojban identity.

So if your name or nickname is Cat (mlatu in Lojban) you can introduce yourself as

mi'e la mlatu

However, if you just say

mi'e mlatu

it would mean

I'm a cat.

Here are a few examples of Lojbanic names:

• Fish
  • finpe - fish in Lojban
  • la finpe - your name
• Björn (means bear in Scandinavian)
  • cribe - bear in Lojban
  • la cribe - your name
• Mei Li (beautiful in Mandarin Chinese)
  • melbi - beautiful in Lojban
  • la melbi - your name

Take your places...

Now we can recognise a gismu, let's see what we can make it do. dunda means ‘give’, and it describes a relationship between a giver, something they give, and someone who receives it — in that order. (Lojban insists on the order so you can tell which is which; but that's a convention of dunda, rather than something intrinsic in the act of giving).

Let's say we have three people, Maria, Claudia and Julia, for instance. If we say

la .mari,as. cu dunda la .iulias. la .klaudias.

we mean that Maria gives Julia to Claudia.

If, on the other hand, we say

la .iulias. cu dunda la .mari,as. la .klaudias.

we mean that Maria is who is being given away, and Julia is the one who gives her to Claudia. How do we know this? English uses the word to to indicate the receiver, and in some other languages (like Latin or Turkish) the form of the words themselves change. In Lojban, as in logic, we have what is called place structure.

Place-structure means that dunda doesn't just mean give, it means

x1 gives x2 to x3

where x means someone or something. Even if we just say dunda on its own, we still mean that someone gives something to someone; we just aren't interested in (or we already know) who or what.

We can say, then, that dunda has three ‘places’. We can think of places as slots which we can, if we want, fill with people, objects, events or whatever. These places are called sumti in Lojban (easy to remember, as it sounds a bit like someone saying something and chewing off the end of the word). Again, a sumti is not a type of word, it is something a word does. The simplest Lojban sentence is a bridi, i.e. a selbri and a bunch of sumti. In other words,

bridi = selbri + sumti

How many sumti can a selbri describe? The number depends on the place structure of the word we use for the selbri. (There are ways of tagging on extra sumti, which we'll cover in later lessons). A gismu has a set number of places; as we've just seen, dunda has three. The number of places varies from one to a staggering (and rare) five. Here are some examples.

One place
ninmu	x1 is a woman (any female humanoid person, not necessarily adult)
blabi	x1 is white / very light-coloured
cmila	x1 laughs [not necessarily at someone or something; to include the object of the laughter you would use the lujvo (compound word) mi'afra — x1 laughs at x2, a slightly different concept]

Two places
cipni	x1 is a bird/avian/fowl of species x2
vofli	x1 flies [in air/atmosphere] using lifting/propulsion means x2
jungo	x1 reflects Chinese [Mandarin, Cantonese, Wu, etc.] culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
junri	x1 (person) is serious/earnest/has gravity about x2 (event/state/activity)

Three places
xamgu	x1 is good/beneficial/acceptable for x2 by standard x3
pritu	x1 is to the right of x2, where x2 is facing x3
cliva	x1 leaves x2 via route x3
kabri	x1 is a cup/glass/tumbler/mug/vessel/[bowl] containing contents x2, and of material x3

Four places
vecnu	x1 [seller] sells/vends x2 [goods/service/commodity] to buyer x3 for amount/cost/expense x4
tivni	x1 [broadcaster] televises programming x2 via media/channel x3 to television receiver x4
bajra	x1 runs on surface x2 using limbs x3 with gait x4

Five places
klama	x1 goes/comes to x2 from x3 via x4 by means x5
cukta	x1 is a book about subject/theme/story x2 by author x3 for audience x4 preserved in medium x5
fanva	x1 translates x2 to language x3 from language x4 with translation-result x5

So for example you can say (trying desperately to match the grammar to what you've been taught so far):

la .mari,as. cu ninmu

Maria is a woman.

la .tuitis. cu cipni la .serinus.serinus.kanarias.

Tweety is a bird of species 'Serinus serinus canaria'.

la .iulias. cu pritu la .mari,as. la .klaudias.

Julia is to the right of Maria, facing Claudia.

la .pybysys. cu tivni la .niksyn.in.tcainas. la .kycy,etys. la .telis.

PBS (the American Public Broadcasting Service) televises 'Nixon in China' (an opera) through KCET (the Los Angeles PBS affiliate) to Telly (a pet name for a particular television) (!).

la .iulias. cu klama la .uacintyn. la .losandjeles. la .cikagos. la .amtrak.

Julia travels to Washington from Los Angeles via Chicago on Amtrak (the American inter-city train network).

Determining place structure

If all these places sound a bit daunting, don't worry — you don't have to memorise all of them (in fact nobody does). There are a few cases where it's worth learning the place structure to avoid misunderstanding, but usually you can guess place structures using context and a few rules of thumb.

1. The first place is often the person or thing who does something or is something (in Lojban there is no grammatical difference between ‘doing’ and ‘being’).
2. If someone or something has something done to them, he/she/it is usually in the second place.
3. to places (destinations) nearly always come before from places (origins).
4. Less-used places come towards the end. These tend to be things like ‘by standard’, ‘by means’ or ‘made of’.

The general idea is that the places which are most likely to be filled come first. You don't have to use all the available places, and any unfilled places at the end are simply missed out.

Exercise 5

Try to guess the place structure of the following gismu. You probably won't get them all, but you should be able to guess the most important ones. Think of what needs to be in the sentence for it to make sense, then add anything you think would be useful. For example, with klama, you need to know who's coming and going, and although you could in theory say “Julie goes,” it would be pretty meaningless if you didn't add where she goes to. Where she starts her journey, the route she takes and what transport she uses are progressively less important, so they occupy the third, fourth and fifth places.

1. karce – car
2. nelci – like, is fond of
3. cmene – name
4. sutra – fast, quick
5. crino – green
6. sisti – stop, cease
7. prenu – person
8. cmima – member, belongs to
9. barda – big
10. cusku – say, express
11. tavla – talk, chat

tanru

Note that lo ninmu klama does not mean “A woman goes”. Two gismu next to each other form a compound brivla (or tanru), which means that ninmu and klama do get run together. The result is that that lo ninmu klama means “The woman-type-of goer” (maybe a female traveller). What we say instead, to avoid this, is

lo ninmu cu klama

A woman goes.

Exercise 6

Add cu to the following Lojban sentences where necessary, then work out what they mean. For example, for lo klama ninmu to make sence as a sentence, you need to add cu: lo klama cu ninmu.

1. la .klaudias. dunda lo cukta la .bil.
2. lo karce sutra
3. la .kamIL. cukta
4. mi fanva la .kaMIL. la .lojban.
5. lo prenu sisti
6. lo ninmu cliva
7. la .istanbul. barda
8. mi tavla la .mari,as.
9. la .meiris. pritu la .meilis. mi
10. lo cipni vofli
11. crino
12. ninmu

Changing Places

We've seen that if we don't need all the places (and we rarely do), then we can miss out the unnecessary ones at the end of the bridi. We can also miss out the first place if it is obvious (just as in Spanish). However, it sometimes happens that we want places at the end, but not all the ones in the middle. There are a number of ways to get round this problem.

One way is to fill the unnecessary places with zo'e, which means ‘something not important’. So la .suzyn. cu klama la .paris. la .berlin. zo'e lo karce tells us that Susan goes to Paris from Berlin by car, but we're not interested in the route she takes. In fact zo'e is always implied, even if we don't say it. If someone says klama, what they actually mean is

zo'e klama zo'e zo'e zo'e zo'e

but it would be pretty silly to say all that.

Most people don't want more than one zo'e in a sentence (though there's nothing to stop you using as many as you like). A more popular way to play around with places is to use the place tags fa, fe, fi, fo and fu. These mark a sumti as being associated with a certain place of the selbri, no matter where it comes in the sentence: fa introduces what would normally be the first place, fe the second place, and so on. For example, in

la .suzyn. cu klama fu lo karce

Susan goes in the car / Susan goes by car.

fu marks lo karce as the fifth place of klama (the means of transport). Without fu, the sentence would mean “Susan goes to the car.”

After a place introduced with a place tag, any trailing places follow it in numbering. So in

la .suzyn. cu klama fo la .uacintyn. lo karce

Susan goes via Washington by car.

la .uacintyn. is the fourth place of klama, and lo karce is understood as the place following the fourth place — i.e. the fifth place.

With place tags you can also swap places around. For example,

fe lo cukta cu dunda fi la .klaudias.

The book was given to Claudia.

(The book — lo cukta' — is the second place of dunda, what is given; Claudia — la .klaudias. — is the third place of dunda, the recipient).

Again, you probably don't want to overdo place tags, or you'll end up counting on your fingers (although they're very popular in Lojban poetry — place tags, that is, not fingers).

A final way to change places is conversion, which actually swaps the places round in the selbri — but we'll leave that for another lesson. There are no rules for which method you use, and you can use them in any way you want, so long as the person you're talking to understands.

Vocabulary

glico	x1 is English/pertains to English-speaking culture in aspect x2
rokci	x1 is a quantity of/is made of/contains rock/stone of type/composition x2 from location x3
rupnu	x1 is measured in major-money-units (dollar/yuan/ruble) as x2 (quantity), monetary system x3

Exercise 7

Reorder the sumti with place tags in these Lojban sentences so that no place tags are necessary, and the sumti appear in their expected places. Insert zo'e where necessary. For example: fi la .iulias. cu pritu fa lo karce - lo karce cu pritu zo'e la .iulias.

1. fo lo cukta cu cusku fe lo glico fi lo prenu
2. fi mi vecnu fa do lo karce
3. fu la .Odisis. cu fanva fi lo glico fa la .fits.djerald.
4. mi vecnu fo lo rupnu
5. fi lo rokci cu kabri
6. fi la .lojban. fo la .lojban. cu tavla fa do

Summary

In this lesson we've covered the following points:

• The basic bridi structure.
• lo to convert verbs to nouns, la to convert verbs to names, cu to separate selbri from sumti.
• The difference between different brivla: gismu, cmevla and others.
• The place structure of gismu.
• zo'e to fill missing sumti places.
• Changing places with place-tags.

Although there is a lot more to Lojban sentences than this, you now have the basics of Lojban grammar; the rest is just a matter of adding things on to it — different articles, tags, times, numbers and so on.

Answers to exercises

Exercise 1

1.	lojban	cmene
2.	dunda	gismu (give)
3.	.praxas.	cmene (Prague — Praha in Czech — the capital of the Czech Republic)
4.	mi	Neither: it's a type of cmavo (structure word) called a ‘pronoun’
5.	cukta	gismu (book)
6.	prenu	gismu (person)
7.	blanu	gismu (blue)
8.	ka'e	Neither, it's a cmavo or structure word, meaning ‘can’
9.	.dublin.	cmene (the capital of Ireland)
10.	selbri	Neither, it's a lujvo or compound word

Exercise 2

1. .ua
2. .oi
3. .u'inai
4. .u'i
5. .ienai
6. .oi, .i'enai, or even .oi.i'enai
7. .iunai
8. Probably .a'unai.oi, unless you like cold greasy food, of course.
9. .uu
10. Depends on your feelings about beetles. .ii if you have a phobia, .a'unai if you are merely repelled by it, .a'u if you're an entomologist, and so on.

Exercise 3

1. New York: USA
2. Rome: Italy
3. Havana: Cuba
4. Cardiff: Wales (The Welsh for Cardiff is Caerdydd, which would Lojbanise to something like kairdyd.).
5. Beijing: China
6. Ankara: Turkey
7. Albequerque: New Mexico, USA
8. Vancouver: Canada
9. Cape Town: South Africa
10. Taipei: Taiwan (note b, not p. Although actually, the b in Pinyin is pronounced as a p... But this isn't meant to be a course on Mandarin!)
11. Bonn: Germany
12. Delhi: India (The Hindi for Delhi is Dillî, which would give diliys. or dili'is.).
13. Nice: France
14. Athens: Greece (Athina in Greek)
15. Leeds: England
16. Helsinki: Finland

Exercise 4

There are usually alternative spellings for names, either because people pronounce the originals differently, or because the exact sound doesn't exist in Lojban, so you need to choose between two Lojban letters. This doesn't matter, so long as everyone knows who or where you're talking about.

1. .djon. (or .djan. with some accents)
2. .melisys.
3. .amandys. (again, depending on your accent, the final y may be a, the initial a may be y, and the middle a may be e).
4. .matius.
5. .maikyl. or .maik,l., depending on how you say it.
6. deivyd.bau,is. or bo,is.
7. .djein.ostin.
8. .uiliam.cekspir.
9. .sigornis.uivyr. or .sygornis.uivyr.
10. .ritcyrd.niksyn.
11. .istanBUL. with English stress, .IStanbul. with American, .istanbul. with Turkish. Lojbanists generally prefer to base cmene on local pronunciation, but this is not an absolute rule.
12. .maDRID.
13. .tokios.
14. .san.salvaDOR. (with Spanish stress)

Exercise 5

1.	karce	x1 is a car/automobile/truck/van [a wheeled motor vehicle] for carrying x2, propelled by x3 (A car propelled by natural gas is a different kind of thing to a diesel truck).
2.	nelci	x1 is fond of/likes/has a taste for x2 (object/state)
3.	cmene	x1 (quoted word(s)) is a/the name/title/tag of x2 to/used-by namer/name-user x3 (person) (Different people have different names for things).
4.	sutra	x1 is fast/swift/quick/hastes/rapid at doing/being/bringing about x2 (event/state)
5.	crino	x1 is green
6.	sisti	x1 ceases/stops/halts activity/process/state x2 [not necessarily completing it]
7.	prenu	x1 is a person/people (noun) [not necessarily human]
8.	cmima	x1 is a member/element of set x2; x1 belongs to group x2; x1 is amid/among/amongst group x2
9.	barda	x1 is big/large in property/dimension(s) x2 as compared with standard/norm x3 (Is the Taj Mahal big? Yes, compared to me; no, compared to Jupiter).
10.	cusku	x1 expresses/says x2 for audience x3 via expressive medium x4
11.	tavla	x1 talks/speaks to x2 about subject x3 in language x4

Note the different place structures of cusku and tavla. With cusku the emphasis is on communication; what is communicated is more important than who it is communicated to. Quotes in e-mails frequently start with do cusku di'e (di'e means ‘the following’) as the Lojban equivalent of “You wrote”. (ciska - ‘write’ places more emphasis on the physical act of writing.) With tavla the emphasis is rather more on the social act of talking: you can tavla about nothing in particular.

Exercise 6

1. la klaudias. cu dunda lo cukta la .bil.
   1. Claudia gives the book(s) to Bill.
2. lo karce cu sutra
3. The car(s) is/are fast.
4. la kamIL. cu cukta
5. Camille is a book.
6. mi fanva la .kaMIL. la .lojban.
7. I translate Camille into Lojban.
8. lo prenu cu sisti
9. The person(s) stop(s) (whatever it was they were doing).
10. lo ninmu cu cliva
11. The woman/women leave(s).
12. la .istanbul. cu barda
13. Istanbul is big. (An understatement — it has a population of over ten million)
14. mi tavla la .mari,as.
15. I talk to Maria.
16. la meiris. cu pritu la .meilis. mi
17. Mary is on the right of Mei Li, if you're facing me.
18. lo cipni cu vofli
19. The bird(s) flies/fly.
20. crino
21. It's / they're green.
22. ninmu
23. She's a woman / They're women / There's a woman / There are some women.

In sentences 4 and 8, cu is possible but not necessary. In the last two sentences, cu is impossible, since it has to separate the selbri from the sumti that comes before it, and there are no sumti here to separate. Those last two sentences are observatives, as discussed in Changing Places.

Note that I have translated these sentences in the present tense (since in English you have to choose a tense) but they could be in any tense; so lo cipni cu vofli could also mean “The bird flew”, for example. We'll look at how Lojban expresses tense in later lessons; just remember that you don't actually need it — normally it's obvious whether an action takes place in the past, present or future.

Exercise 7

1. zo'e cusku lo glico lo prenu lo cukta
   1. Someone expresses the English thing for the person(s) through a book.
   2. The book is a medium for English to people.
2. do vecnu lo karce mi zo'e'
   1. You sell me the car for some amount.
   2. I am sold the car by you (Notice how lo karce is assigned x2, since it follows an x1 place immediately).
3. la .fits.djerald. fanva zo'e lo glico zo'e la .Odisis.
   1. Fitzgerald translates something into English from some language as 'The Odyssey'.
   2. 'The Odyssey' is a translation into English by Fitzgerald.
4. 'mi vecnu zo'e zo'e lo rupnu
   1. I sell something to someone for dollars.
   2. I sell (it) for dollars.
5. zo'e kabri zo'e lo rokci
   1. Something is a cup, containing something, made of stone.
   2. Stone is something cups are made of.
6. 'do tavla zo'e la .lojban. la .lojban.
   1. You talk to someone about Lojban in Lojban.
   2. You talk about Lojban in Lojban.

Chapter 3. Commands, Questions, and Possessives

Commands

So far we've looked at simple propositions, sentences that say that something is true. You can, in theory, say anything you want with propositions, but it's pretty inconvenient. For example, if I want you to run, I could say just that:

I want you to run.

but I'd probably just say:

Run!

How do we do this in Lojban? We can't copy English grammar and just say bajra, since, as we've seen, this means “Look! Someone/something runs”. Instead we say

ko bajra

ko means you, the person I’m talking to, but only in commands. (In normal sentences it's do). Normally it comes in the first place of the bridi, since normally you're asking people to do something or be something, not to have something done to them. However, you can put it elsewhere, e.g.

nelci ko

This means something like “Act so that [someone unspecified] likes you”, and sounds pretty odd in English, but you could use it in the sense of “Try to make a good impression.” Another example is:

mi dunda lo cifnu ko

or “Act so that I give the baby to you,” with the possible meaning “Get up and put your cigarette out — I'm going to pass you the baby.”

You can even have ko in two places in a bridi, for example,

ko kurji ko

[Act so that] you take care of you

or in other words, “Take care of yourself.” In fact, as alluded to in the last exercise of the previous lesson, we can put the selbri anywhere other than the beginning of the sentence. (We can't just put the selbri at the very beginning of the sentence, without fa before the x1 sumti, because this would imply ‘someone/something' for the first place: the selbri would become an observative.) Because of this freedom with sumti position, we can (and do) say

ko ko kurji

Vocabulary

catra	x1 (agent) kills/slaughters/murders x2 by action/method x3
ciska	x1 inscribes/writes x2 on display/storage medium x3 with writing implement x4; x1 is a scribe
finti	x1 invents/creates/composes/authors x2 for function/purpose x3 from existing elements/ideas x4
nelci	x1 is fond of/likes/has a taste for x2 (object/state)
nenri	x1 is in/inside/within x2; x1 is on the inside/interior of x2 [totally within the bounds of x2]
prami	x1 loves/feels strong affectionate devotion towards x2 (object/state)
sutra	x1 is fast/swift/quick/hastes/rapid at doing/being/bringing about x2 (event/state)

Exercise 1

Imagine that someone says these things to you. What is it that they want you to do?

1. ko klama mi
2. ko dunda lo cukta mi
3. la .izaBEL. cu nelci ko
4. ko sutra
5. ko ko nelci

Softening the blow...

So far we've looked at simple commands. However, outside the army, we don't normally use these very much — normally we ask people politely. Foreigners in England often make the mistake of thinking that putting please in front of a command makes it into a polite request, which it doesn't (in English we usually have to make it into a question e.g. Could you open the window?) Fortunately, in Lojban, ‘please’ really is the magic word. Putting the word .e'o before a sentence turns it into a request; e.g.

.e'o do dunda lo cukta mi

is literally “Please give me the book,” but is actually more like “Could you give me the book, please?” (Of course, norms of politeness in English do not necessarily translate into other languages, so it is better in such cases to be safe than sorry).

Questions

In English, we make a yes/no question by changing the order of the words (e.g. You are ... - Are you ...) or putting some form of do at the beginning (e.g. Does she smoke?). This seems perfectly natural to someone whose native language is English (or German), but is actually unnecessarily complicated (as any speaker of Chinese or Turkish will tell you). In Lojban we can turn any proposition into a yes/no question by simply putting xu somewhere in the sentence (usually at the beginning.) Some examples:

xu do nelci la .bil.

Do you like Bill?

xu mi klama

Am I coming?

xu crino

Is it green?

There are two ways to answer these questions. Lojban, like some other languages, does not have words that mean yes or no. One way to answer “yes” is to repeat the selbri e.g.

xu do nelci la .bil.

nelci

We can also use go'i, which repeats the last bridi (without the question)

What about negative answers? Any bridi can be made negative by using na. This negates the whole of the bridi, so you can put it anywhere you want, with a little extra grammar. But the simplest place to put it grammatically is right before the selbri. So mi na nelci la .bil. means “It is not true that I like Bill,” or in other words, “I don't like Bill.”

As an answer to a question, we do the same thing, so we just say na nelci or na go'i.

English also has a number of wh- questions — who, what etc. In Lojban we use one word for all of these: ma. This is like an instruction to fill in the missing place. For example:

do klama ma

la .london.

“Where are you going?”

“London.”

ma klama la .london.

la .klaudias.

“Who's going to London?”

“Claudia.”

mi dunda ma do

lo cukta

“I give what to you?” (probably meaning “What was it I was supposed to be giving you?”)

“The book.”

Finally we have mo. This is like ma, but questions a selbri, not a sumti — it's like English “What does x do?” or “What is x?” (remember, being and doing are the same in Lojban!) More logically, we can see mo as asking someone to describe the relationship between the sumti in the question. For example:

do mo la .klaudias.

You ??? Claudia

What are you to Claudia?

The answer depends on the context. Possible answers to this question are:

• nelci: “I like her.”
• pendo: “I am her friend”
• prami: “I adore/am in love with her.”
• xebni: “I hate her.”
• fengu: “I'm angry with her.”
• cinba: “I kissed her”

Note that the time is not important here: just as cinba can mean ‘kiss’, ‘kissed’, ‘will kiss’ and so on, mo does not ask a question about any particular time. There are ways to specify time in Lojban, but it's not necessary to use them. (Just to satisfy your curiosity though, “I kissed Claudia” is mi pu cinba la .klaudias.)

We've said that mo can also be a “What is ...” type of question. The simplest example is ti mo — “What is this?” You could also ask la .meilis. cu mo, which could mean “Who is Mei Li?”, “What is Mei Li?”, “What is Mei Li doing?” and so on. Again, the answer depends on the context. For example:

• ninmu: “She's a woman.”
• jungo: “She's Chinese.”
• pulji: “She's a policewoman.”
• sanga: “She's a singer” or “She's singing.”
• melbi: “She's beautiful.” (possibly a pun, since this is what meili means in Chinese!)

There are ways to be more specific, but these normally involve a ma question; for example la .meilis. cu gasnu ma (“Mei Li does what?”).

There are more question words in Lojban, but xu, ma and mo are enough for most of what you might want to ask. Three other important questions, xo (“How many?”) ca ma (“When?”) and pei (“How do you feel about it?”) will come in the lessons on numbers, time and attitudes.

Exercise 2: Lojban general knowledge quiz

Answer the following questions (in Lojban, of course). Most of the answers are very easy; the trick is to understand the question! For example, cynyny. mo “What is CNN?” — tivni “Broadcaster”

1. la .brutus. cu mo la .iulius.
2. ma prami la .djuliet.
3. xu la .paris. cu nenri la .iunaited.steits.
4. ma finti la .anas.kaREninas.
5. xu la .porc. cu sutra
6. la lis.xarvis.azuald. cu catra ma
7. xu la .djorj.eliot. cu ninmu
8. la sakiamunis. cu mo
9. la cekspir. cu mo la .xamlet.
10. la das.kapiTAL. cu cukta fi ma
11. xu la .xardis. cu fengu la .lorel.

Possessives

The sumti we have seen so far — names, and lo + gismu combinations — do an OK job in describing things. They don't do as good a job in narrowing things down. For example, you may be fortunate enough to know two people who own Porsches. Your friends will (normally) have different names, which you can use to tell them apart. But if you're discussing their cars, how do you tell them apart?

Or take the following sentence:

mi nelci lo tamne

I like the cousin

Not as informative a sentence as it might be: the question that you should be hollering at this instant is, “Whose cousin?” Is it my cousin? Your cousin? Frederick II's cousin? When we talk about things and people, we are expected to give enough information, so that the listener knows who or what on Earth we are talking about. In these examples, saying “the Porsche” or “the cousin” is clearly not enough information.

One of the simplest way to narrow things down is by answering the question ‘whose?' It doesn't work in all cases, but it will here: “Mary's Porsche”, “Fred's Porsche”, “Tim's cousin”, “my cousin”. So, how do we say that in Lojban? Well, there's two ways. Or four. Or seven. Or thirteen. Or more — because this is Lojban, and in Lojban you can be as precise, or as imprecise, as you want to. We'll give you the simple answer first, and then work our way up.

The simplest way of all is to add, after the sumti you're talking about, pe followed by the person (or thing) you associate it with. So:

la .porc. pe la .meiris. cu barda

Mary's Porsche is big.

lo tamne pe la .tim.

Tim's cousin

lo nenri pe lo karce

The inside of the car

lo cmima pe la .lojbangirz.

The member of the Logical Language Group

Easy as pie, so far.

You'll notice that the order is in some instances the other way around from English: la .porc. pe la .meiris.' looks more like “the Porsche of Mary”. Now, English uses both s and of for this kind of association. The choice between the two is complicated, but basically depends on whether the ‘possessor’ is a person or not — which is why the Porsche of Mary sounds odd, as does English's verbs.

Lojban doesn't have those restrictions: if you can do something with one sumti, you can do it with any sumti. And you can put Mary in front of her Porsche. One way to do it is to tuck the pe-phrase in between the article and the rest of your sumti: for instance, lo pe mi karce. This is literally “The of me car”/“my car”.

You can also wedge the ‘possessor’ sumti between the article and the name or gismu, without the pe. This gives you lo mi karce, which should be instantly recognisable as “my car” When the ‘possessor’ is a single-word sumti, this is the most popular way of expressing things: lo mi karce is how you would normally say “my cousin”. However, note that the following sentence

la la .meiris. .porc.

or

la la .meiris. karce

will have no sense because you can't tell when one name ends and another word starts. la .meiris. .porc. sounds like Mary Porche where Porche might be her second name. For the same reason, you can't really say la pe la .meiris. .porc., either.

So it's much safer to always use pe. Examples with single-word sumti like lo mi karce are of course safe as well. But not more than that.

Exercise 3

For each of the following, switch the two sumti around, so that you convert a pe possessive into a nested possessive, and vice versa. Only do this where grammatically allowed. For example, lo la .iulias. kabri  lo kabri pe la .iulias..

1. lo do cukta
2. lo cifnu pe la .meiris.
3. lo cukta pe mi
4. lo cukta pe lo ninmu
5. ma pe mi
6. lo zo'e karce
7. lo do rokci
8. la meiris. pe la .tim.
9. lo cukta pe ma

More Possessives

Warning

This is somewhat advanced, and you might want to skip it on a first reading.

What pe is actually doing is saying that there is a relationship between the two sumti. What that relationship is is left as open as possible: we've used the term ‘possessor’, but the relationship need not involve ownership in Lojban any more than in English. (That also holds when you leave the pe out.) For instance, if I say “Danny's desk” (lo gunjubme pe la .danis.) at an office, I probably don't mean that Danny owns the desk (in all likelihood the company does), but simply that he sits there all the time and keeps his stuff there.

You can get more specific if you want — though Lojbanists tend not to. If you want to say there is actual ownership involved, or any other association in which someone is uniquely associated with what you're talking about, you can use po instead of pe. lo gunjubme po la .danis., for instance, means that this is the desk Danny is uniquely associated with. This can be because he actually paid money for at a store. In that case, like anything he owns, he can sell it, or give it away, in which case it stops being his. Or it may be the desk assigned to him, and him alone, at work; but if the desk (or Danny) is reassigned, the desk stops being his. Moreover, if there is a crisis in office space, and Danny is sharing the desk with Wilfred, then you can't speak of the desk as being either lo gunjubme po la .danis. or lo gunjubme po la .uilfred., because it's unique to the pair of them, not to any one of them. You can still, however, speak of it as lo gunjubme pe la .danis., which does not insist on uniqueness.

Some other examples:

lo cukta po mi

My book

lo cipni po la .meilis.

Mei Li's bird

la .kokakolys. po do

Your Coca-Cola

There are some things which you have which are unique to you, but which also never stop being yours, by definition. Your hand, for example, remains your hand, even if you saw it off (apologies for gruesomeness): you'd have to enter the high-stakes world of international organ transplants before you could say that your hand becomes someone else's hand. Your parents also are not something you can give away or transfer (much though you might be tempted to on occasion!) Whatever happens, they remain, by definition, your parents. Many languages distinguish between this kind of having, and the here-today-gone-tomorrow kind of having. Lojban is one such language, and for your parents or your arm, you would say po'e instead of po:

lo rirni po'e la .iulias.

Julia's parents

lo birka po'e la .klaudias.

Claudia's arm

Oh, and one more thing. We've been answering the question “whose?” through this section, but we haven't said how you ask “whose?” You've probably already guessed, though. The word whose? just means who's?, or of whom? And who? is ma. So if “Tim's cousin” is lo tamne pe la .tim., then we just follow the same fill-in-the-slot approach as we did earlier on, with ma substituting for la .tim.: “whose cousin?” is lo tamne pe ma. (You would have already found this out in the preceding exercise — if you were good, of course!)

Exercise 4 (Advanced)

For each of the following, specify whether they involve po, po'e, or just pe.

1. My car
2. My language
3. My genes
4. My jeans
5. My fault
6. My self
7. My present (that I got)
8. My present (that I gave)

Summary

In this chapter, we have seen how to

• give commands in Lojban;
• give soft commands/requests with attitudinals;
• ask questions and give answers about sumti;
• ask questions and give answers about selbri;
• express association between two sumti, using pe and nesting;
• express association between two sumti more precisely, as alienable or inalienable possession.

Answers to Exercises

Exercise 1

1. Come to me.
2. Give me the book.
3. Act so that Isabel likes you. (or “Butter up Isabel” perhaps).
4. Be fast (“Hurry up!”)
5. Like yourself. (Note that changing the word order doesn't change the meaning here).

Exercise 2

1. catra (assuming it's Julius Caesar we're talking about).
2. la romios. (assuming it's that Juliet).
3. na nenri or na go'i, unless we're talking about Paris, Texas.
4. la tolstois.
5. Tricky question. la can name a specific Porsche, not Porsches in general, and a specific Porsche might go fast or not (e.g. it could have just broken down and not go at all.) In general, la .porc. means just what I say it means, but as a name it is not used in general to refer to all Porsches, or to the typical Porsche. (Lojban has other ways of doing that).
6. la .KEnedis.
7. ninmu or go'i (Despite the pen-name, George Eliot was a woman).
8. Not much we can say with the vocabulary we have at the moment other than prenu (maybe emphasising that Sakyamuni — the Buddha — was a person, not a God or somesuch). Other possible answers would be xindo ‘Indian’, or pavbudjo ‘first Buddhist’.
9. finti — not ciska! Lojban separates the business of putting pen to paper from the act of creating a work of art. If Shakespeare had dictated Hamlet to Francis Bacon, Bacon would have been the ciska (‘writer’), but Shakespeare would have remained the finti (‘creator’).
10. la .karl.marks.
11. fengu or go'i — we're talking about Laurel and Hardy here.

Exercise 3

1. lo cukta pe do (your book)
2. You can't do this: lo la .meiris. cifnu makes no sense.
3. lo mi cukta (My book)
4. You can't do this: lo lo ninmu cukta is ambiguous. (The woman's book)
5. You can't do this: there is no article in ma for mi to follow. The Lojban literally means ‘my what?', but it can be used more flexibly. do nelci ma pe mi, for example, means “What do you like about me?”
6. lo karce pe zo'e ([Someone's] car)
7. lo rokci pe do (your rock)
8. You can't do this: la .la tim. meiris. would make no sense. (Who is Tim Mary?)
9. lo ma cukta (Whose book?)

Exercise 4

1. po: You own it, so it's uniquely associated with you (by default).
2. pe: You don't own it, and you can change it, so neither kinds of ‘possession’ apply.
3. po'e: Your genetic fingerprint makes your genes inseparably yours.
4. Though you might consider yourself inseparable from your jeans, too, they are of course po.
5. po: There's no real sense of ‘possession’ involved here; but this is still a unique association.
6. po'e: If there's one thing that's inseparable from you — it's you.
7. po: I may not have paid any money for it, but a gift is my property nonetheless, so it's uniquely associated with me.
8. po: Since I've given the gift away, I do not own it in any real sense. But the gift is still uniquely associated with me, since it was me that gave it away.

Chapter 4. Numbers, and a few more articles

One of the first things you learn in a new language is how to count, and this course is no exception. However, in Lojban, numbers include much more than just counting; for example, in Lojban, some, most and too many are numbers.

Basic numbers

The numbers from one to nine are as follows:

1. pa
2. re
3. ci
4. vo
5. mu
6. xa
7. ze
8. bi
9. so

This leaves zero, which is no (think “yes, we have no bananas”). You may have noticed that the numbers repeat the vowels AEIOU. Since you can't get by without memorising numbers, try to think of mnemonics for the unfamiliar ones. For example, although the sound is different, xa has the x of six, and I remembered so by thinking of the proverb “A stitch in time saves nine,” which is about sewing (.oi).

Numbers from 10 onwards are made by putting the digits together, just like you'd say a telephone number. For example:

pano	10
zebi	78
xanoci	603
vomusore	4,592

4,592 has a comma in it (or a full stop in some languages, just to make things confusing). We can't use a comma in Lojban, because that means “separate these two syllables” (as we saw in Lesson 1 with Lojbanised names like zo,is. for Zoe). What we say instead is ki'o. We don't have to use ki'o, but it can make things clearer. So 4,592 can also be read as vo ki'o musore. ki'o also has the advantage that if the following digits are all zeroes, we don't need to say them, so 3,000 is ci ki'o. You can remember ki'o easily if you think of kilo — a thousand. (The similarity is not coincidental).

Just as we have a word for a comma, we also have one for a decimal point: pi. So 5.3 is mupici. In fact, pi is not always decimal; it's the point for whatever number base you're using. But that's a more advanced topic.

When you want to talk about numbers as sumti — that is to say, as things in and of themselves — you need to put an article in front of them. But that article cannot be la, and for reasons which hopefully will become clear soon, it cannot be lo either. In front of numbers, Lojban uses the article li. So li pareci means ‘the number one hundred and twenty three’. ‘One, two, three’, on the other hand, would be li pa li re li ci: each li introduces a brand new number.

Exercise 1

What are the following numbers in Lojban? (don't forget li!)

1. 35
2. 4,802
3. 6,000
4. 7.54
5. 6,891,573.905

Numbers and articles

So far, we've looked at three articles: la, for cmene, lo, for sumti, and li for numbers. So li bi is ‘the number eight.’ Actually, outside mathematics, li is not used very much. What we usually want to say is things like ‘three people,’ or ‘the two women.’

We can use numbers either before or after lo. For example,

ci lo gerku

means ‘three of the dogs’, while

lo ci gerku

means ‘the three dogs.’

Now consider the English sentence Three men carried a piano. This sentence has two potential meanings, as does any sentence involving a plural in English. You could be saying that the sentence holds true for each individual of the group. If the men involved are Andy, Barry, and Chris, you might be saying that Andy carried the piano, and Barry carried the piano, and Chris carried the piano. Alternatively, you could be saying that the sentence holds for the group as a unit: no one carried the piano individually, but all three men carried it together.

Natural languages typically leave it up to context and plausibility to determine which of the two interpretations holds. But Lojban is a logical language, and so does not tolerate this confusion! lo and lo force the individual interpretation. That is, if I say

ci lo nanmu cu bevri lo pipno

I mean that each of the three men (nanmu) carried (bevri) the piano (pipno). And if I say

ci lo gerku cu batci mi

I just mean that three dogs bite me. Maybe one dog bit me in the morning, one in the afternoon, and one at night, or maybe I mean that I have been bitten by a dog three times in my life. There is nothing to say that the three dogs have anything to do with each other.

But if you want those dogs, or those men, to be considered as a unit, you'd say

lu'o ci lo nanmu cu bevri lo pipno

lu'o ci lo gerku cu batci mi

lu'o means ‘the mass composed of’, and in effect converts a bunch of individuals into a coherent unit. In the case of the dogs, for example, it makes them a pack. If you're a fan of computer strategy games, think of lu'o as like the ‘group’ command for units (there's also an ‘ungroup’ command, lu'a). Moreover, since the dogs act as a pack, it is not necessarily true that each of them individually bit you: it is actually enough that one of them bit you, for the pack to have bitten you.

With lo things are simpler. While lo pano ninmu means ‘the ten women’, lu'o lo pano ninmu means ‘the ten women treated as a group or mass’. Let's imagine that ten women I have in mind kiss me on ten separate occasions. (Hey, I do get to write these lessons for my own amusement, after all...) I could then say

lo pano ninmu cu cinba mi

in which case I'd consider myself quite fortunate. However, if I say lu'o lo pano ninmu cu cinba mi, I mean that the ten women kiss me en masse, in which case I would consider myself either blessed or harrassed (maybe I'm a rock star or something.) It does not necessarily mean that each and every woman kisses me; simply that I was mobbed by a group of ten women and kissed by one or (probably) more in the process.

lu'o lo is very useful, even without explicit numbers, and there are shorter ways of saying each when no number comes between them: loi. So the three women kissing me could be expressed as loi ci ninmu cu cinba mi.

Exercise 2

In the following English sentences, are the emphasised nouns individuals (prefixed in Lojban with lo) or masses (prefixed in Lojban with loi)?

1. Students listened to the radio.
2. Students built a radio.
3. I bought sugar.
4. I bought radios.
5. Elephants live to an old age.
6. Elephants have flat ears.
7. Students liked talking about elephants.

Proportions

Warning

This section gets into even more tricky logical stuff. Skip it if you're not interested.

If lo ci prenu means “the three people,” and re lo prenu means “two of the people,” how do you say “two of the three people”?

You probably got this one pretty easily: re lo ci prenu. If, however, we use lo, the meaning changes. We can't say re lo ci prenu to mean two out of any three people (i.e. two thirds of the population). This is because while lo ci prenu means the three people that I have in mind, lo ci prenu, by the same logic, means the three people that actually exist — i.e. that there are only three people in the universe. (That's also why, as the astute reader may have noted, you can't say loi ci nanmu cu bevri lo pipno.) You would therefore only use the number+lo+number formula if you knew the actual numbers rather than just the proportions, e.g.

re lo ci mensi pe mi cu nelci la .rikis.martin.

Two of my three sisters like Ricky Martin.

This states two facts. First, that I have three sisters (though it is not actually true in my case!) Second, that two of them like Ricky Martin (it doesn't actually state that my third sister hates him — she may be indifferent to him, or never have heard of him). If I use lo in the same sentence, it isn't actually wrong, but it allows the possibility that I have, say, five sisters, but I'm only talking about three of them! This is one of the few areas where lo is not like the or a/some.

But with people in general, rather than a specific group of people I know, I would have to say something in the order of

vo ki'o nocize ki'o pasovo ki'o rexare lo xa ki'o cipare ki'o pamubi ki'o nosoci remna cu nelci la .rikis.martin.

4,037,194,262 out of the 6,312,158,093 (existing) humans like Ricky Martin

meaning, I would have to give the real counts for all humans, and for all humans who suffer from that particular affliction. Which obviously is not terribly practical. (The real counts, I mean, not the affliction. Though on second thought..).

One way out of this problem is to use fi'u, which is like the Lojban slash sign. So “two out of every three people” is really “2/3 of people”, or refi'uci loi prenu. Of course, this is actually a fraction, and fractions have decimal equivalents; you could also say pixaxaxa loi prenu, and not be that far off — even if your use of decimals might have some people laughing in the aisles...

Yes, that's our new friend loi in that sentence. If I had said refi'uci lo prenu, that would have to be understood in the same way as re lo prenu or ci lo prenu (i.e. as a count of individuals), and I would have ended up talking about two thirds of a person. In most cultures, chopping up persons into thirds is not considered acceptable behaviour even for pollsters or advertisers. On the other hand, chopping up populations into thirds is perfectly acceptable; and that's what loi prenu is. (A population, I mean, not an acceptable. Though on second thought..).

Here are some more proportions:

mi tcica pimu loi prenu

I fooled half of the people (treating the people as a mass, or population)

mi tcica pafi'ure lei prenu

I fooled one out of two people (which means exactly the same thing)

mi tcica pa lo re mlatu

I fooled one out of the two cats (treating the cats as individuals)

mi se slabu vopano lo pacivore gismu

I am familiar with 410 out of the 1342 (existing) gismu

Quantities

I've said that words like most and many are numbers in Lojban, which is pretty logical if you think about it. The following ‘numbers’ are particularly useful:

no	none (we've already seen this as ‘zero’)
ro	each / all

du'e	too many
so'a	almost all
so'e	most
so'i	many / a lot of
so'o	several
so'u	few

su'e	at most
su'o	at least
za'u	can denote plural number . Literally it means more than... (by default more than one).

Some examples:

no lo ninmu cu nelci la .bil.

None of the women like Bill.

no lo ninmu cu nelci la .bil.

No women like Bill.

pa lo ninmu cu nelci la .bil.

One woman likes Bill.

One of women likes Bill.

za'u lo ninmu cu nelci la .bil.

Women likes Bill.

More than one woman likes Bill.

coi ro do

Hi, everyone

mi nelci ro lo mlatu

I like all cats.

mi na nelci ro lo gerku

It's not true that I like all dogs.

(This is not the same as “I don't like any dogs”, which would be mi nelci no lo gerku. There are other ways of saying this, but we haven't got enough grammar under our belt yet).

so'i lo merko cu nelci la .nirvanas.

Many Americans like Nirvana

(The group, not the mystical state. Although on second thought..).

so'u lo jungo cu nelci la .nirvanas.

Few Chinese people like Nirvana.

su'e mu lo muno prenu cu cmila

No more than five out of the fifty people laugh(ed)

(Let's say a comedian told a bad joke).

su'o pa lo prenu cu prami do

At least one person loves you.

This last sentence is logically the same as lo prenu cu prami do, which means “there exists at least one person such that that person loves you,” but it makes the meaning clearer and more emphatic. In fact, all articles in Lojban have such default numbers associated with them; lo by default means su'o pa lo ro “at least one out of all...”.

Vocabulary

batci	x1 bites/pinches x2 on/at specific locus x3 with x4
cifnu	x1 is an infant/baby [helpless through youth/incomplete development] of species x2
cinba	x1 (agent) kisses/busses x2 at locus x3
citka	x1 eats/ingests/consumes (transitive verb) x2
gerku	x1 is a dog/canine/[bitch] of species/breed x2
melbi	x1 is beautiful/pleasant to x2 in aspect x3 (ka) by aesthetic standard x4
mlatu	x1 is a cat/[puss/pussy/kitten] [feline animal] of species/breed x2; (adjective:) x1 is feline
nanmu	x1 is a man/men; x1 is a male humanoid person [not necessarily adult]
rectu	x1 is a quantity of/contains meat/flesh from source/animal x2

Exercise 3

Translate the following sentences.

1. All babies are beautiful.
2. The pack of three cats bite the dog.
3. What a surprise! Mei Li loves two men. (use an attitudinal indicator)
4. Most men love at least one woman.
5. It is not true that all men love at least one woman.
6. The group of four women kiss Ricky Martin.
7. It's a shame that no-one likes Bill. (use an attitudinal indicator)
8. Rosemary's baby bites two people (separately).
9. One in three women like David Bowie.
10. No more than 15% of Buddhists eat meat. (Buddhist is budjo, as you may remember from Lesson 3).
11. Nine out of ten cats like ‘Whiskas.’ (use a cmevla)
12. Cats like ‘Whiskas.’ (use a cmene)

Number Questions

All question words in Lojban are requests to fill in an unknown value: ma asks for an unknown sumti, and mo for an unknown selbri. In Lojban xo is the question word for numbers. So, remembering the sentence re lo mi ci mensi cu nelci la .rikis.martin., how would I answer the following question?

xo lo mensi cu nelci la .rikis.martin.

The answer, of course, is re. (But not all questions that can be answered with a number have to take xo, as we'll see in the next lesson).

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A final exercise

Lojban has no difference between singular and plural. How would you exactly say "one dog". Also think of another way of saying "dogs" in plural finding other suitable cmavo explained in this section.

Summary

In addition to numbers (and their associated questions), this lesson has entered the dangerous waters of Lojban articles. Lojban articles may seem difficult at first, but they are perfectly logical. In fact it's probably because they are logical that people have problems with them to start off with — you have to learn to think in a slightly different way. For the curious, here are the main articles and article-like words:

la	that named
le	that one previously mentioned or known from context or this speech
lo	that which is/does
li	the number

(lu is not an article, it's a quotation mark!)

la'e	the referent of (not really an article, as it takes a full sumti or pro-sumti, as in la'edi'u, what the last sentence refers to, as opposed to di'u, the actual words of the last sentence).
le'e	the typical previously mentioned or known from context
lo'e	the typical

lai	the mass named
lei	the mass previously mentioned or known from context
loi	the mass which is/does

la'i	the set named
le'i	the set previously mentioned or known from context
lo'i	the set which is/does

(Sets turn out to be pretty useful in Lojban, as we'll see towards the end of this course).

We also looked briefly at lu'o, which turns a set into a mass, and lu'a, which turns a mass into a set of individuals (‘group’ and ‘ungroup’). Strictly speaking, these aren't articles, though.

If all this looks terribly complicated, don't be discouraged! As you can see, these articles are all really variants on la, lo and le, which are normally all you will need. My personal advice (not official Lojban policy!) is when in doubt, use lo. If you use lo where another article would be more appropriate, you may not express yourself as clearly as you wanted, but at least you will not be talking ungrammatical nonsense, like you would if you said der Frau in German, or the two womans in English.

Answers to Exercises

Exercise 1

1. 35: li cimu
2. 4,802: li vobinore or li vo ki'o binore (the spaces are optional)
3. 6,000: li xa ki'o or li xanonono
4. 7.54: li ze pimuvo (again, the space is optional)
5. 6,891,573.905: li xa ki'o bisopa ki'o muzeci pisonomu (if that looks long, try writing it as a word in English!)

Exercise 2

1. Individual. The students might have been in a group while listening to the radio, but listening to the radio is something a person is capable of doing on their own.
2. Mass. The students worked together to make the radio, so you cannot say of any one student that they made the radio on their own.
3. Mass. In fact, sugar is a mass noun even in English, because it is very hard to think of it as individual entities. (Even when we do say “three sugars” in English, we're thinking of teaspoons, or kinds of sugar, not individual grains; so in fact, we're talking about two or more distinct masses of sugar.) That's why sugar does not normally take an article in English.
4. Individual. Radios are easy to think of as individual units. But Lojban does allow you to treat the radios you've purchased as a mass, if that's useful to you (particularly if you're buying in bulk).
5. Mass. The statement is not necessarily true of individual elephants, but it is true of elephants as a whole. (To stress that elephants normally live to an old age, you would have to attribute long life, not to the mass of elephants, but to the typical elephant: lo'e xanto, rather than loi xanto).
6. Individual. All elephants by definition (as it were) have flat ears; so the claim is true of each individual elephant. Once again, however, it makes perfect sense in Lojban to make that claim of the mass of elephants, as well.
7. Individual. Talking may be a group activity, but liking is something you do individually, and the students are being described as likers first, and as talkers second.

Exercise 3

1. ro lo cifnu cu melbi
2. loi ci mlatu cu batci lo gerku (or: lu'o ci lo mlatu cu batci lo gerku. If you have lu'o lo ci mlatu cu batci lo gerku, you're implying that the three cats are the only three cats you have in mind, whereas lu'o ci lo mlatu leaves it open that there are other cats around).
3. .ue la .meilis. prami re lo nanmu
4. so'e lo nanmu cu prami su'o pa lo ninmu
5. ro lo nanmu na prami su'o pa lo ninmu
6. lu'o vo lo ninmu cu cinba la .rikis.martin. (Give yourself a pat on the back if you got that one right! If you said loi vo lo ninmu, give yourself a whole backrub! Though you may need help with that..).
7. .uinai [or .uu] no lo prenu cu prami la .bil. or su'o pa lo prenu na prami la .bil. (Lojban na is somewhat odd to English-speakers, since it behaves exactly like logical “it is not the case”; the sentence literally means “It is not the case that at least one person likes Bill” (i.e. “It is not the case that even one person likes Bill.”) But the interaction of negation and quantifiers is beyond the scope of these lessons; for more, see The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 16.9).
8. lo cifnu pe la .ROZmeris. cu batci re lo prenu
9. pafi'uci loi ninmu cu nelci la .deivyd.bo,is. (or: pafi'uci lu'o lo ninmu cu nelci la .deivyd.bo,is).
10. su'e pipamu loi budjo cu citka lo rectu (or: su'e pipamu lu'o lo budjo cu citka lo rectu)
11. sofi'upano loi mlatu cu nelci la .uiskas. (a Commonwealth slogan for a brand of cat food) (or: sofi'upano lu'o lo mlatu cu nelci la .uiskas).
12. za'u lo mlatu cu nelci la .uiskas. (we used za'u for denote plurality)

A final exercise

‘The dog’ would be lo pa gerku. Normally, we wouldn't bother with the pa though, unless we wanted to make it quite clear that we only have one dog in mind. ‘The dogs’ would be lo za'u gerku (more than one dog, dogs) or lo su'o re gerku or loi su'o re gerku, if we're thinking of them as a group — ‘the at least two dogs’. However, it is hard to think of many situations where you would need to say this. Like some other languages (e.g. Chinese), Lojban normally leaves number up to context. You guessed it — you've just spent all this time learning to say how many people, dogs etc. there are, and piso'e of the time, you don't need to! But, like many features of Lojban, it can be very useful when you want it, so please don't feel tricked.

Oh, what does piso'e mean? That, I will leave as an exercise to you ...

Chapter 5. Times, days, dates (and abstractions)

What is the time?

One way to ask the question “What is the time?” is ma tcika ti. We know that ma is the sumti question word (‘what’), so tcika must be a selbri meaning ‘is the time’. The place structure of tcika is

x1 (hours, minutes, seconds) is the time of state/event x2 on day/date x3, at location x4, by calendar x5

So in Lojban, times do not exist in the abstract: times are always the times of something. So we ask what the time is of ti, meaning ‘this event/thing', or, in other words ‘now’.

A full answer would obviously be very long-winded, but remembering the Lojban convention that you miss out all the places after the last one you really need, a typical exchange would be:

• ma tcika ti
• li papa
• What's the time?
• Eleven

Note the li, since we are talking about a number here. li papa is short for li papa cu tcika ti — “the number eleven is the time of this (event)”.

If we want to be a bit more precise, we need to use pi'e. This introduces fractional parts of numbers like pi, but unlike pi it doesn't need to indicate decimal fractions in a number. In fact, the kind of fractional part it does indicate can vary within the same number. In normal counting, pi is a decimal point, in hexadecimal it's a hexadecimal point and so on, but the kind of fraction it indicates never changes its value. But pi'e doesn't have that restriction; so we can use it to separate hours from minutes (which are sixtieths of hours), or, as we will see below, days from hours (which are twenty-fourths of days). pi'e, in other words, means ‘part’, not ‘decimal point’. So an alternative answer to the question could be

li papa pi'e mu

11:05 (Five past eleven)

(The number eleven, and five parts)

or if you want to be particularly precise,

li papa pi'e mu pi'e pabi

Five minutes and eighteen seconds past eleven

(The number eleven, and five parts, and eighteen parts of parts)

Let's imagine, though, that the time is not five past eleven, but five to eleven. We can say li pano pi'e mumu (10:55), but we can also say li papa pi'e ni'u mu, where ni'u is the Lojban minus sign (for negative numbers, not for subtraction) — what we are saying is ‘11:−5'.

For ‘half past eleven’ you can also use pi and say li papa pimu ‘11.5'. I don't particularly like this method, but it is perfectly good Lojban. If we are using numbers for times, it is normal to use the 24-hour system, so 6 PM is li pabi (18:00).

If you want to use twelve-hour time instead, you need some way of distinguishing between AM and PM. The conventional way in Lojban is to use cmene for hours (so we can add supplementary information like that later on, as part of the cmene.) So ‘four o’clock' is la .vocac., ‘five o’clock' is la .mucac. and so on (from cacra ‘hour’). For 11 and 12 we need extra numbers. Fortunately Lojban has these and more; the number system actually goes up to 16 (hexadecimal), so we have the extra numbers

dau	10
fei	11
gai	12
jau	13
rei	14
vai	15

Obviously for anything other than talking about computer programming, the numbers 13–15 are useless, but we can use 10–12 for hours. ‘Ten o’clock' under this scheme is la .daucac., ‘eleven o’clock' is la .feicac., and ‘twelve o’clock' is la .gaicac. . For ‘morning’ and ‘evening’ we can then add lir. and lec., meaning ‘early’ and ‘late’ (from clira and lerci). So la .mucac. lir. is five in the morning.

As you can see, things start to get a little messy with the 12-hour system (how do you say 9:22 AM?), so the 24-hour system is preferred by popular acclamation.

Exercise 1

What are the following times in Lojban?

1. Nine o'clock
2. Eleven o'clock in the morning
3. Two in the afternoon
4. A quarter to twelve
5. Midnight
6. 9:25
7. 12:15
8. 14:30
9. 17:03
10. 20:00:03
11. 21:54:16.71

Times and Events

If we want to give the time of an event, rather than just tell the time, we need to fill in some more places. The second place of tcika is ‘state/event': people don't have times — events have times. So we need some way to show that the sumti in this position is a state or an event, and not a thing. But

la .daucac. cu tcika lo mi klama

won't work; it does not mean “Ten o'clock is the time that I go” (or come!), but “Ten o'clock is the time of my goer,” which is meaningless.

We get round this problem with the word nu, which means — you guessed it — ‘state/event'. This is called an abstraction descriptor (or abstractor for short), other common descriptors being ka (property or infinitive), ni (amount) and so on. What nu does here is allow us to put a whole bridi into a selbri place, and by extension (if we put an article in front of it) a sumti place. The sequence goes a little like this:

la robin. cu salci

Robin celebrates.

la jbonunsla cu nu la .robin. cu salci

Logfest is an event such that Robin celebrates — Logfest is Robin's celebration/celebrating.

mi nelci lo nu la .robin. cu salci.

I like the event such that Robin celebrates — I like Robin's celebration/Robin celebrating.

When used to introduce a sumti, nu is usually written together with the article (lo or le), but is actually a separate word. So what we want is

la 'daucac. cu tcika lo nu mi klama

Exercise 2

What do these Lojban sentences mean?

1. li pamu pi'e reno tcika lonu mi dunda lo cukta do
2. li ze tcika lonu tivni la .SEsamis.strit.
3. li pa tcika lonu mi ciska
4. la klaudias. cu nelci lonu zo'e vecnu loi kabri la .iulias.
5. la tim. cu nelci lonu li paso tcika lonu la .meiris. cu cliva

Times and Events, Improved: Conversion

If “Ten o'clock is the time that I go” sounds backwards, there are two ways you can switch it round. One is using se, which swaps the first and second places of any bridi.

lo nu mi klama cu se tcika la .daucac.

means exactly the same thing as la .daucac. cu tcika lonu mi klama. se coincidentally is pretty much the same as Spanish se, but is actually part of a series along with te, ve and xe, which switch around the first and third, first and fourth, and first and fifth places of a selbri. (This kind of swapping is known as conversion).

This conversion business, of course, doesn't apply just to sentences with abstractions in them, but to any bridi. You may want to change things around for different emphasis (people tend to mention the more important things in a sentence first), or as above, to work around the complexity of Lojban grammar (cu is a very powerful tool.) So the following pairs mean the same thing:

mi viska do

I see you.

do se viska mi

You are seen by me.

lo nanmu cu klama lo barja

The man goes to a bar.

lo barja cu se klama lo nanmu

A bar is gone to by the man.

la .spot. cu mlatu la .abisinian.

Spot is a feline of the breed Abyssinian.

'la .abisinian. se mlatu la .spot.

'Abyssinian is the breed of cat Spot is.

lonu mi cilre fi la .lojban. cu xamgu mi

My learning Lojban is good for me.

mi se xamgu lonu mi cilre fi la .lojban.

I am benefitted by my learning Lojban.

Exercise 3

Rearrange these Lojban sentences so that the main selbri in each sentence is converted to having se. Don't forget to use cu if you need to! For example, mi viska do → do se viska mi

1. mi prami la .meilis.
2. lo mlatu cu catra lo jipci
3. la .mari,as. cu vecnu lo mlatu
4. la .mari,as. cu dunda la .iulias. la .klaudias.
5. la .mari,as. cu vecnu zo'e la .tim.
6. la .fits.djerald. cu fanva fi lo glico
7. klama la .bast,n. fu lo karce
8. li ze tcika lonu tivni la .SEsamis.strit. (Leave the bridi with tivni alone).
9. la .klaudias. cu nelci lonu zo'e vecnu loi kabri la .iulias. (Convert the bridi with vecnu as well as the bridi with nelci).
10. la .tim. cu nelci lonu li paso tcika lonu la .meiris. cu cliva (Convert all three selbri).

Times and Events, Improved #2: sumti tcita

With conversion and se, you have a new and powerful tool to use in your Lojban. But you might still find lonu mi klama cu se tcika la .daucac. too long and clumsy. In that case, get ready for more Lojban tricks.

It would be really nice if klama had a place for the time of going/coming, but it doesn't. (After all, you wouldn't really want to have to learn a six-place selbri!) To get round this problem of missing places in selbri, Lojban has a series of cmavo (structure words) which add extra places to the selbri. The one we want here is ti'u, meaning ‘occurring at the time of day...’. So we can now say

mi klama ti'u la .daucac.

I am going at 10:00

klama now expresses a relationship between six things: a goer, a destination, a source, a route, a vehicle, and a time at which this all takes place.

So why, you may ask, didn't I just say that in the first place? I could have done, but then you wouldn't have found out about nu and se! There is more to this lesson than meets the eye.

Days and Months

The days of the week are also cmene built from numbers, this time adding djed., from djedi, meaning ‘day’. There is at present some disagreement about which day should be day one, though. The original convention was to follow the Judaeo-Christian convention of taking Sunday as the first day, giving

Sunday	la .padjed.
Monday	la .redjed.
Tuesday	la .cidjed.

... and so on. (Conveniently for one of your authors, this matches Greek for Monday through to Thursday.) However, in a Logical Language Group meeting in 1992 it was agreed that Monday be day 1, and Sunday be either 7 (la zedjed.) or zero (la nodjed.) according to taste (much to at least one of your author's inconvenience.) Eventually, though, people will use whichever system they prefer until one becomes universally accepted.

This may sound chaotic, but I have gone into this point as a good example of how in Lojban a large part of the language is “left to usage” — meaning that ultimately the language depends on the way people choose to use it in practice. People are also free to work out alternative conventions for cultures which do not use a seven-day week, possibly adding to the name to make it clear; e.g. la .padjedjung. could be the first day of the Chinese ten-day week. (Remember, jungo means ‘Chinese’).

Tip: You will also see days in full lujvo form (meaning in practice one extra consonant after the number), looking like this:

no(n)djed. or nondei	0-day
pa(v)djed. or pavdei	1-day
re(l)djed. or reldei	2-day
ci(b)djed. or cibdei	3-day
vo(n)djed. or vondei	4-day
mu(m)djed. or mumdei	5-day
xa(v)djed. or xavdei	6-day
ze(l)djed. or zeldei	7-day (= 0-day)

Months also use numbered cmene, adding mast. (from masti ‘month’), so January is la .pamast. and so on. Again, since there are twelve months, we use the extra numbers, so October is la .daumast. .

Note: You will also see months in full lujvo form — the catch being that hexadecimal digits have not been assigned rafsi (combining forms.) So:

pa(v)mast. or pavma'i	1-month
re(l)mast. or relma'i	2-month
ci(b)mast. or cibma'i	3-month
vo(n)mast. or vonma'i	4-month
mu(my)mast. or mumyma'i	5-month
xa(v)mast. or xavma'i	6-month
ze(l)mast. or zelma'i	7-month
bi(v)mast. or bivma'i	8-month
so(z)mast. or sozma'i	9-month
daumast. or pavnonmast. or pavnonma'i	10-month
feimast. or pavypavmast. or pavypavma'i	11-month
gaimast. or pavrelmast. or pavrelma'i	12-month

Just in case you're interested, the words for seasons are:

vensa	Spring
crisa	Summer
critu	Autumn
dunra	Winter

(For full definitions of these words, see the gismu list.) If the seasons where you live don't match this pattern, then you can easily create new words. For example, the rainy season or monsoon could be carvycitsi (from carvi, rain, and citsi, season) or simply la .carv. . Here are some I made up for fun to give a better idea of the weather in the UK:

la .lekcarv.	‘the cold rain’ — Spring
la .mliglacarv.	‘the warm (mildly-hot) rain' — Summer
la .bifcarv.	‘the windy rain’ — Autumn
la .dujycarv.	‘the freezing rain’ — Winter

Joking aside, this shows two features of word-building in Lojban: making cmene by losing the final vowel (which we saw in Lesson 1) and creating lujvo, or compound words. (For the same reason, you'll also see pavdjed., relmast., ...) You actually need a pretty good knowledge of Lojban to make up lujvo on the spot, but we'll learn how to make some simple lujvo later on in this course.

Exercise 4

What are these days and months in Lojban?

1. Saturday
2. Thursday
3. March
4. August
5. November
6. December

Dates

The gismu for dates is detri:

x1 is the date (day, week, month, year) of state/event x2, at location x3, by calendar x4

Phew! Like tcika, though, most places of detri can be left out. The location is only important if we're talking about radically different timezones, or different planets, and the calendar is normally assumed to be the standard Western one — if you want to use, for example, the Arabic or Chinese calendars, you can put lo xrabo or lo jungo in the fourth place. (As always, context is important — in a discussion of Islamic history we would probably assume that the Arabic calendar was being used).

The tricky bit is the number in x1. Normally we don't want to specify the day, week, month and year! To prevent confusion, the following conventions are used:

• If there is only one number, it is the day e.g. li pano is ‘the 10th'.
• If there are two numbers, they are the day and month e.g. li pano pi'e pare is 10/12, or ‘the 10th of December'.
• If there are three numbers, they are day, month, year (not month, day, year, as in the American convention) e.g. li repa pi'e ze pi'e pasoxaso is 21/7/69 — the date of the first moon landing.

We can therefore say

li repa pi'e ze pi'e pasoxaso cu detri lonu lo remna cu klama lo lunra

21/7/1969 is-the-date-of the-event a human goes (to) the moon

Now, just as with tcika, we often want to put the event first — after all, in most languages we would normally say “My birthday is on the fifteenth of August” rather than “The fifteenth of August is the date of my birthday.” We can manage this change by using place tags, e.g.

fe lonu mi jbena [kei] cu detri fa li pamu pi'e bi

the-event I am-born is-dated 15/8

but it is easier to use se, like this:

lonu mi jbena cu se detri li pamu pi'e bi

the-event I am-born is-dated 15/8

In both cases, putting the lonu phrase before the cu is convenient — and a well-established Lojban trick of the trade: cu is powerful enough to close off any structure in front of it, including lonu mi jbena.

As you have probably guessed, there is also a sumti tcita for ‘dated’: de'i, which works like ti'u (notice how sumti tcita tend to be similar to the selbri they suggest). So the other way I can tell you my birthday is:

mi jbena de'i li pamu pi'e bi

Question. If only one number is used with detri, it is the day. So how do we say what year an event happened without giving the day and month as well?

The gismu for ‘year’, nanca cannot be used instead of detri, since it has the place-structure

x1 is x2 years in duration, by standard x3

i.e. it gives the length of an event in years, not the year when an event happened. One way out is to use a cmene for the year, so the year I (Robin) am writing this would be la .pasososonanc. (And the year I (Nick) am writing this would be la .renonopananc.).

Vocabulary

cnino	x1 is new/unfamiliar/novel to observer x2 in feature x3 (ka) by standard x4; x1 is a novelty
dable'a	conquer, sieze (‘war-take’)
facki	x1 discovers/finds out x2 (du'u) about subject/object x3; x1 finds (fi) x3 (object)
gugde	x1 is the country of peoples x2 with land/territory x3; (people/territory relationship)
fraso	x1 reflects French/Gallic culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
guntrusi'o	Communist (‘work-govern-idea’)
jecyga'ibai	revolution (‘government-change-force’)
joi	Joins two sumti together as a mass. We'll have more to say about this later.
selpeicku	manifesto (‘thought-book’)

Exercise 5 — history quiz

Give the dates to answer these questions, using cmene for the years. If you don't happen to know them, that's OK — they're given at the bottom of the exercise.

1. lonu la .kolombus. cu facki lo cnino gugde cu se detri ma
2. la mexmet. cu dable'a la .konstantinupolis. de'i ma
3. lonu fraso jecyga'ibai cu se detri ma
4. la marks. joi la .engels. cu finti lo guntrusi'o selpeicku ku de'i ma
5. la muxamed. cu klama la .medinas. de'i ma

(1492; 1453; 1789; 1848; 622)

Summary

Apart from times and dates, this lesson has covered some important points of Lojban grammar.

• Some simple lujvo.
• The abstractor for states and events, nu, and its terminator, kei.
• Conversion — swapping round places — with se.
• The sumti tcita: ti'u (‘with time’) and de'i (‘with date’).

Vocabulary

barja	x1 is a tavern/bar/pub serving x2 to audience/patrons x3
birje	x1 is made of/contains/is a amount of beer/ale/brew brewed from x2
botpi	x1 is a bottle/jar/urn/flask/closable container for x2, made of material x3 with lid x4
briju	x1 is an office/bureau/work-place of worker x2 at location x3
cpedu	x1 requests/asks/petitions/solicits for x2 of/from x3 in manner/form x4
denpa	x1 awaits/waits/pauses for/until x2 at state x3 before starting/continuing x4 (activity/process)
djica	x1 desires/wants/wishes x2 (event/state) for purpose x3
dotco	x1 reflects German/Germanic culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
jimpe	x1 understands/comprehends fact/truth x2 (du'u) about subject x3; x1 understands (fi) x3
lerci	x1 (event) is late by standard x2
nandu	x1 is difficult/hard/challenging for x2 under conditions x3; x1 challenges (non-agentive) x2
penmi	x1 meets/encounters x2 at/in location x3
pinxe	x1 (agent) drinks/imbibes beverage/drink/liquid refreshment x2 from/out-of container/source x3
sruma	x1 assumes/supposes that x2 (du'u) is true about subject x3
tcita	x1 is a label/tag of x2 showing information x3 (as in sumti tcita)
viska	x1 sees/views/perceives visually x2 under conditions x3
xebni	x1 hates/despises x2 (object/abstraction); x1 is full of hate for x2; x2 is odious to x1
zvati	x1 (object/event) is at/attending/present at x2 (event/location)

Exercise 6

Translate the following from Lojban: Template:Talkquote Template:Talkquote

1. .i la .djang. cu zvati lo barja
2. .i la .djang. cu denpa lonu la .suzyn. zvati lo barja
3. .i la .djang. cu cpedu fi lo dunda fe re birje
4. .i lonu pinxe loi dotco birje cu se nelci la .djang.
5. .i .uu la .suzyn. loi dotco birje cu xebni
6. .i la .djang. cu djica loka li reno pi mu tcika lonu la .suzyn. cu klama
7. .i li repa tcika lonu la .djang. cu djuno lonu la .suzyn. na klama
8. .i pinxe pici lo pa birje
9. .i la .djang. cu cliva lo barja

Exercise 7 (Advanced)

Translate into Lojban (but only if you're feeling intrepid!):

1. Susan goes to the bar at 22:00 from the office.
2. Susan assumes that Zhang knows that Susan is late. (Hint: actually even harder than it looks. Look carefully at the definition of the gismu for ‘late’).
3. Susan sees one of the two bottles.
4. It is not difficult for Susan to understand that Zhang left. (Hint: try it as “To understand that Zhang left is not difficult for Susan.”)
5. At 22:15, Susan wants to meet Jyoti at 22:45.

Answers to Exercises

Exercise 1

1. la .socac. or li so
2. la .feicac. lir.
3. la .recac. lec.
4. li papa pi'e ni'u pamu or li pare pi'e vomu. (You can also use the hexadecimal digits, if you like, though this will probably be less common: li gai pi'e ni'u pamu, li fei pi'e vomu).
5. la .nocac. or la .gaicac. lir. (if you follow the convention that midnight is 12 AM)
6. li so pi'e remu
7. li pare pi'e pamu
8. li pavo pi'e cino or li pavopimu
9. li paze pi'e ci
10. li reno pi'e no pi'e ci
11. li repa pi'e muvo pi'e paxa pi zepa (The last component is just an ordindary decimal point).

Exercise 2

1. 15:20 is the time that I gave the book to you.
2. 7:00 is the time that [someone] broadcasts </nowiki>Sesame Street; 7:00 is the time that Sesame Street is broadcast.
3. 1:00 is the time that I write [something]</nowiki>
4. Claudia likes that [someone] sells cups to Julia; Claudia likes Julia buying cups.</nowiki>
5. Tim likes that 19:00 is the time that Mary leaves; Tim likes it that Mary leaves at 19:00.

Exercise 3

1. la meilis. cu se prami mi (“Mei Li is loved by me.”)
2. lo jipci cu se catra lo mlatu (“The bird is killed by the cat.”)
3. lo mlatu cu se vecnu la .mari,as. (“The cat is sold by Maria.” You now need cu, to prevent mlatu and se vecnu running together into the one tanru).
4. la .iulias. cu se dunda la .mari,as. la .klaudias. (“Julia is given by Maria to Claudia.” As the third place, la .klaudias. is unaffected by the conversion, and stays where it is).
5. zo'e se vecnu la .mari,as. la .tim. (“Something is sold by Maria to Tim.” The same holds for the third place here as in the previous sentence).
6. [zo'e] se fanva la .fits.djerald. lo glico (“[Something] is translated by Fitzgerald into English.” The original sentence has an empty x2 place; so there is nothing there to swap with x1. But of course, when a sumti is left out, you can assume its value to be zo'e — which you can still leave out even after conversion. And now that there is an explicit x2 place there, you don't need fi any more to introduce the x3 place).
7. la bast,n. cu se klama fu lo karce (“Boston is gone to by car.”)
8. lonu tivni la .SEsamis.strit. cu se tcika li ze (“The broadcasting of Sesame Street is at the time 7:00.” The cu is actually necessary, here, even though it follows a cmene; can you work out why?)
9. lonu loi kabri cu se vecnu zo'e la .iulias. cu se nelci la .klaudias. (“That cups are sold by someone to Julia is liked by Claudia; cups being sold to Julia is something Claudia likes.”).
10. lonu lenu se cliva la .meiris. [cu] se tcika li paso cu se nelci la .tim. (“The fact that [something] being left by Mary is at the time 19:00 is liked by Tim; [the place] being left by Mary at 19:00 is something Tim likes.” Yes, I know it's horrible.)

Exercise 4

1. la .xadjed. or la .xavdjed. or la xavdei
2. la .vodjed. or la .vondjed. or la vondei
3. la .cimast. or la .cibmast. or la cibma'i
4. la .bimast. or la .bivmast. or la bivma'i
5. la .feimast. or la .pavypavmast. or la pavypavma'i
6. la .gaimast. or la .pavrelmast. or la pavrelma'i

Exercise 5

1. la .pavosorenanc.
2. la .pavomucinanc.
3. la .pazebisonanc.
4. la .pabivobinanc.
5. la .xarerenanc. (or la .pananc., if you're using the Muslim calendar)

Exercise 6

1. Zhang is at the bar.
2. Zhang waits for Susan to be at the bar.
3. Zhang asks the giver for two beers (and no, that's not necessarily what you'd call a waiter, but that is nonetheless a legitimate if laconic description of what waiters do. Lojban grammar tends to be pedantic, but Lojban descriptions can be rather sparse).
4. Drinking German beer is liked by Zhang
5. Alas, Susan hates German beer.
6. Zhang wants 20:30 to be the time Susan will come. (Zhang is using the fraction pimu, unlike me).
7. 21:00 is the time Zhang knows that Susan is not coming
8. Look! He's drinking 0.3 of one beer. (Any bridi with its x1 missing is considered an observative).
9. Zhang leaves the bar.

Exercise 7

1. .i la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja ti'u li rere lo briju (Because the time of day has its own sumti tcita already, it doesn't really matter where in the sentence you place it. So .i la .suzyn. ti'u li rere klama lo barja lo briju means exactly the same thing).
2. .i la .suzyn. cu sruma {lenu la .djang. djuno {lenu lerci fa {lenu la .suzyn. klama}}} (Lojban insists on distinguishing between events and entities; you can't say that someone is late in Lojban, but only that someone's action is late. There are ways in Lojban for working around this, but they are considered ‘advanced Lojban’ (see Lesson 15).

And yes, that's a rather deeply nested sentence. Lojban tends, for better or worse, to make things more explicit, and thus more complex, than is usual for natural languages. The normal word order version is even worse: .i la .suzyn. sruma {lenu la .djang. djuno {lenu {lenu la .suzyn. klama} cu lerci}}).

1. .i la .suzyn. cu viska pa lo re botpi
2. .i {lonu jimpe {lonu la .djang. cu cliva}} na nandu la .suzyn.
3. ti'u li rere pi'e pamu la .suzyn. cu djica {loka penmi la .djiotis. ti'u li rere pi'e vomu} (Extra credit if you worked through that one!)

Note: As noted in the Introduction, those brackets are there for clarification only; you won't normally see them in Lojban text. The whole point of having a syntactically unambiguous language, after all, is that you shouldn't have to use brackets in the first place!

Chapter 6. Time and Space — basic Lojban ‘tenses’

Terminators

Before we go on any further, we've left a little unfinished business from the previous lesson. This opens up a whole new set of issues, which is why we've held it over for this lesson.

Remember that when we speak of dates in Lojban, we also need to specify the place on the globe where the date was calculated. The instant Neil Armstrong made that small step for (a) man, for instance, it wasn't the 21st of July everywhere on Earth. In Tokyo, it was closer to the 22nd. So if we want to point out that it was the 21st, Houston time, we need to specify the x3 place of detri. That means we can simply say:

li repa pi'e ze pi'e pasoxaso cu detri lonu lo remna cu klama lo lunra la .xustyn.

right?

Actually, no. Look at that sentence again. How would we say that the 21st was the day Armstrong went to the moon [going] from Houston? You guessed it —

li repa pi'e ze pi'e pasoxaso cu detri lonu lo remna cu klama lo lunra la .xustyn.

So now (Houston), we have a problem. Which selbri does la .xustyn. belong to in this sentence? klama, or detri?

This kind of ambiguity is nothing new to natural languages, which tend to resolve problems like these with tricks like well-positioned pauses in speech, and punctuation in writing. (Consider for instance the English sentence 21/7/69 was the date a man went to the moon, from Houston. With that comma, you can only read that as “according to Houston.”)

The trick Lojban uses instead, however, turns out to be one of its major ‘selling points’. Lojban uses words called terminators. No, they aren't killer androids with difficult-to-spell surnames, but little words used to indicate when groups of words, such as phrases, end. You can think of them like the brackets used in mathematics, and they serve pretty much the same purpose. So in Lojban, whenever a structure begins whose length is not known in advance, a terminator goes at the end of the structure. This is what makes Lojban syntactically unambiguous:

• Every time an article like lo or loi starts a sumti, ku ends it.
• Every time a string of numbers starts, boi ends it.
• Every time a series of sumti follows a selbri, vau ends it.
• And every time nu starts an abstraction — a bridi nested inside another bridi — kei ends it.

This means that our sentence about the moon landing is fully elaborated like this (putting in some braces to make things clearer, and sneaking in the terminator lo'o corresponding to li):

[{li [repa pi'e ze pi'e pasoxaso boi] lo'o} cu detri [lo{nu [{lo remna ku} cu klama {lo lunra ku} vau] kei} ku] la .xustyn. vau]

The kei goes before la .xustyn. . This means that as a sumti, la .xustyn. cannot belong to klama: kei has cordoned off the places of klama from the rest of the sentence (and the places of detri.) So la .xustyn. can only be a sumti of the main selbri, detri.

The reader may well be wondering at this point how come they've never seen one of these terminators before. The reason is that Lojban is still meant to be spoken by humans, and keeping track of every single structure used in a sentence is more work than is reasonable to expect of any human. So when the sequence of words has an unambiguous structure, the terminators can be dropped out.

For example, if we see cu in a sentence, we know that what is coming up is a selbri; so the sumti before it must now be over. So we can drop the ku. (In fact, that's why cu exists in the first place: the beginning of a verb is a much more important structural break in natural languages than the end of a noun.) If a new sentence is beginning — as signalled by perhaps the most distinctively Lojbanic word, the ‘audible punctuation’ .i — then there can be no more sumti from the old sentence; so we drop the vau. In fact, it is only in situations of potential ambiguity, like the sentence we've been looking at, that you'll get terminators appearing in normal Lojban usage at all. So our two possible interpretations of the sentence with Neil Armstrong would normally appear as:

li repa pi'e ze pi'e pasoxaso cu detri {lenu lo remna cu klama lo lunra la xustyn.} (date for going to the moon from Houston)

li repa pi'e ze pi'e pasoxaso cu detri {lenu lo remna cu klama lo lunra kei} la xustyn. (date for going to the moon according to Houston)

Vocabulary

cadzu	x1 walks/strides/paces on surface x2 using limbs x3
skicu	x1 tells about/describes x2 (object/event/state) to audience x3 with description x4 (property)
xabju	x1 dwells/lives/resides/abides at/inhabits/is a resident of location/habitat/nest/home/abode x2
zutse	x1 sits [assumes sitting position] on surface x2

Exercise 1

What do the following Lojban sentences mean when the highlighted terminators are present, and what do they mean when they are absent?

1. mi skicu li re boi re lo pendo
2. li pa pi'e cino tcika lonu mi prami kei la .mumdjed.
3. lo nanmu cu zgana lo mlatu vau
4. lo mamta pe lo cifnu ku litru
5. mi cpedu lonu la .mari,as. cu tavla kei la .klaudias.

Tenses

By this time, you may be wondering what has happened to all the tenses. After all, a large part of learning a language is learning tenses, and figuring out which one you ought to be using. English, for example, has about a dozen tenses (depending on what you count as a tense) and some languages have more. Use the wrong one and you're, well, wrong. In addition, there are a load of words and phrases like before, in a while, some time ago and so on.

Lojban deals with time quite differently. Like some other languages (e.g. Chinese), tense is not compulsory. All the bridi we've looked at so far have had no particular time attached to them, and this is perfectly acceptable; in fact it is normal. Saying mi klama ti de'i la .padjed. is good Lojban, even if out of context we don't know if it means I'm coming here next Monday, or I came here last Monday. In most cases, sentences don't happen out of context, and the context is usually enough to tell us if we're talking about the past, present or future. Putting a past tense in just because the same sentence in English would be in the past tense can be rather malglico.

Time with sumti

There are times, though, when you want to say things about time, and Lojban has more than enough cmavo for this. Let's say that Zhang left the bar at 10 o'clock and Susan arrived at 11 (thus missing her date). The most precise way is to use times, as in the last lesson:

la djang. cu cliva lo barja ti'u la .jaucac. .i la .la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja ti'u la .feicac.

However, if the actual times are not important, we can say:

ba lonu la .djang. cu cliva kei la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja

After Zhang left, Susan came into the bar.

or:

pu lonu la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja kei la .djang. cu cliva

Before Susan came into the bar, Zhang left.

which translates more naturally as:

When Susan came into the bar, Zhang had already left.

(This, by the way, is another case of context meaning you don't have to put everything in — we haven't said that the place Zhang leaves is the bar, we just understand it from the context).

What are these ba's, pu's and kei's? Well, the kei's you hopefully remember from the section above: they close off the phrase opened by the nu. As you probably guessed, ba is ‘after’ (from the gismu for ‘future’ or ‘later’, balvi) and pu is ‘before’ (from the gismu for ‘past’ or ‘earlier’, purci).

Whenever we use ba and pu like this, we are situating the time of one event relative to the time of another. The time we will most frequently want to use as a reference point is the speaker's here-and-now. If we want to situate the event in the main bridi relative to the here-and-now, we can leave out the sumti, and just use the tense cmavo on its own. So if we want to say that Susan came to the bar some time after right now, and not after Zhang's leaving, we can say:

baku la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja

baku here is not a city in Azerbaijan; it means ‘afterwards’ or ‘later’. The ku is necessary to separate ba from la .suzyn. (you can also say it as two separate words, ba ku — it makes no difference). Similarly, “Zhang left earlier (than now)” would be:

puku la .djang. cu cliva

Let's imagine that Susan is not so unlucky, and arrives just as Zhang is leaving. We can then say:

ca lonu la .djang. cu cliva lo barja kei la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja

At the moment when Zhang was leaving the bar, Susan came to the bar.

ca also comes from a gismu, in this case cabna, which means ‘simultaneous with’, so another way to say the same thing would be

lonu la .djang. cu cliva lo barja cu cabna lonu la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja

The event of Zhang leaving the bar is simultaneous with the event of Susan coming to the bar.

If you leave out the sumti following ca, the resulting phrase caku is interpreted as ‘simultaneous with the speaker's here-and-now’. If something is simultaneous with the here-and-now, then of course that means it is happening now; so caku itself just means ‘now’:

caku la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja

Now, Susan goes to the bar.

We now have three ‘time words’: pu (before), ca (at, while) and ba (after). We can modify these with another three, zi, za and zu (series of cmavo often take an -i, -a, -u pattern, if they don't follow the AEIOU sequence). These mean a short, medium and long time distance. So puzi is ‘a short time ago,’ puza is ‘a while ago’ and puzu is ‘a long time ago’. How long ‘long’ is depends on what we're talking about — if the subject is archaeology, puzu could be thousands of years; if you've missed your train it could be a matter of minutes.

Let's say this time the unlucky Susan missed Zhang by only a few minutes. We could then say:

bazi lonu la .djang. cu cliva kei la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja

And if you're in the unfortunate position of having to tell Susan that she's just missed Zhang, you would say:

puziku la .djang. cu cliva lo barja

Vocabulary

badri	x1 is sad/depressed/dejected/[unhappy/feels sorrow/grief] about x2 (abstraction)
gleki	x1 is happy/gay/merry/glad/gleeful about x2 (event/state)
ku'i	but, however (This is an attitudinal, just like .uu and .ei)
kumfa	x1 is a room of/in structure x2 surrounded by partitions/walls/ceiling/floor x3 (mass/jo'u)
tcidu	x1 [agent] reads x2 [text] from surface/document/reading material x3; x1 is a reader

Exercise 2

Translate the following. Don't forget your nu's and kei's!

1. Juliette went to Paris a while ago.
2. A long time ago, I read Camille.
3. Ivan just left the room.
4. Yoshiko kissed Jorge just after Pierre came into the room.
5. Tracy was sad just a minute ago. But Mike is happy now.

Time and selbri

What we've looked at so far is similar to (but not quite the same as) English words like before, after and so on. However, we can use exactly the same cmavo with selbri to give effects which are similar (but not identical) to English tenses. Actually this is easier, but I left it till later to avoid the danger of malglico!

Basically, any time cmavo (or sequence of cmavo) can go before a selbri and put the whole bridi into that time. This is precisely the same thing the time cmavo would be doing if followed immediately by ku, with an empty sumti in between. So

la .djang. pu cliva lo barja

and

puku la .djang. cu cliva lo barja

both mean “Zhang before the here-and-now leaves the bar,” or “Zhang left the bar.” We can do the same thing with zi/za/zu, so la .djang. puza cliva lo barja, just like puzaku la .djang. cu cliva lo barja, means “Zhang left the bar a while ago.”

Another group of cmavo which can be used here is ze'i/ze'a/ze'u. Just as zi/ze/zu indicate a short, medium or long time from the present (or whatever other time we happen to be talking about), these cmavo indicate short, medium or long durations for the action or state we are talking about. So mi ze'u bajra means “I run for a long time.” (Not “I am a bar for a long time” — that's barja! Lojban does tend to keep you on your toes like that.) Again, we can put these together, so mi puzaze'u bajra means “A while ago, I ran for a long time.” A few more examples ...

.oi .uinai lo mi zdani puzi se lindi

Oh no! My house has just been struck by lightning! (Every language course has to have a few of these ridiculously artificial examples!)

Note: If you have a tense before the selbri you don't need cu — lo zdani cannot run into puzi to form a single sumti.

la .bil. ze'u pinxe loi birje

Bill drinks beer for a long time.

Tip: Remember: you don't drink something which is a beer, but rather something which is some beer. As discussed way back in Lesson 4, that means a mass rather than an individual — though as it happens lo birje also makes sense, as ‘a (fixed) quantity of beer'.

mi bazize'a xabju la .djakartas.

Pretty soon I'm going to live in Jakarta for a while.

lo jenmi pe la .romas. baze'u gunta la .kart.xadact.

The army of Romans will be attacking Carthage for a long time.

Note: This does not mean that NATO is not attacking Belgrade now (it is at the time I [Robin] am writing this). In Lojban, if we say that something is true at a particular time, it doesn't mean that it is not true at any other time. There are ways to say that NATO will continue to attack, but that comes later. (Sorry, I know I keep saying that things will come later, but you wouldn't really want to have to learn everything at once — it would be like an English course teaching will go and will have been going in the same lesson).

A complete explanation of time cmavo can be found in Chapter 10 of The Complete Lojban Language.

Exercise 3

Translate the following, placing the tense words before the selbri.

1. I will work for a short while.
2. I will work very soon.
3. I was working for a medium amount of time, a long time ago.
4. I work some time around right now.
5. Right now, I've been working for some time.

Space

This is where things start getting strange. In Lojban, space can be a ‘tense’ just as much as time. This is because there is no difference in Lojban between what traditional grammar calls ‘prepositions’ and tenses. As we've seen, English, like many languages, treats a word like earlier and the past tense ending -ed as two totally separate things, while in Lojban they're the same: they both locate an event in time. Space words like in or near are prepositions in English, and can never be tenses; but in Lojban we treat them just like time words: they locate events in space. If you prefer, you can also say that Lojban treats time as a dimension, as is (conventionally) done in Einstein's physics.

Remember the word ti? This is part of a series ti, ta, tu, meaning roughly ‘this’, ‘that’ and ‘that over there.’ If we're talking about places rather than things, we say vi, va, vu, meaning roughly ‘here’, ‘there’ and ‘yonder’ or ‘way over there’. Again, this is determined by the thing you're talking about. If you're telling a doctor where you feel pain, ti might be the end of your toe, while if you're talking about astronomy, ti could be the solar system. We can therefore say

viku mi gunka

Here, I work.

or, more naturally, “I work here.”

We've seen that puku means ‘before the here-and-now’. Similarly, viku means ‘in the immediate vicinity of the here-and-now’, i.e. ‘here’. If we don't want to make the location relative to the speaker, but relative to something else, we can fill in the empty sumti value, in the same way, to say what the event is in the immediate vicinity of. This, of course, makes vi, va, vu acts as sumti tcita, just like de'i and ti'u: they add new sumti to the bridi. For example

vi la .paris. mi gunka

In Paris, I work.

vu lo mi zdani mi gunka

A long way from my home, I work

va lonu la .KEnedis. se catra kei mi gunka

A medium distance from where Kennedy was killed, I work

If we want to emphasise that something is at exactly the same location as something else (something which holds true not as often as you might think), you would use bu'u - ‘coinciding with’:

mi sanli bu'u lonu la .KEnedis. se catra

I'm standing in the very spot where Kennedy was killed (i.e. I've made a visit to the Texas Book Depository — or if you prefer, the Grassy Knoll..).

Just like the time cmavo, place cmavo can be attatched to selbri. For example, instead of saying viku mi gunka, you can say mi vi gunka — “I here-work.” Again, this sounds odd in English, but one of the purposes of Lojban is to encourage you to say things in different ways, which may lead to being able to say different things. Lojban expands the mind (warning: unproven Lojban propaganda!).

If we combine place vi etc. with words like ri'u, they become more productive. ri'u is a place cmavo meaning ‘to the right of’, so ri'u vi ku is ‘in the immediate vicinity of ’'the right of the here-and-now'. What you're doing is, you're still saying where something is happening relative to you, but now you are saying in what direction to look for it. For example:

la .bil. cu sanli ri'u vi ku

la .bil. ri'u vi sanli

Bill stands just to the right.

And just like vi and bu'u, you can use these cmavo with an explicit sumti, to say where things are happening relative to something else:

la bil. cu sanli ri'u vi la .meiris.

Bill stands just to the right of Mary.

There is a whole class of cmavo that work like ri'u, and they are called FAhA-type cmavo, so named after a (somewhat non-representative) member of their class, fa'a (in the direction of). These include to'o (away from), zo'i (to the same side as), zu'a (to the left of), ne'a (next to), ne'i (within) and so on. (Again, all the space cmavo are explained in Chapter 10 of The Complete Lojban Language).

We can also combine time and space. For example, mi vipuzu gunka means “I here-past-long-time-distance work”, or “I used to work here a long time ago.” A common expression with ku is puzuvuku, meaning ‘long ago and far away’ — a standard way to begin a fairy tale or legend!

Getting back to daily speech, these time and space cmavo are very useful for questions. ca ma is ‘simultaneous with what?', or in other words, ‘when?' (a simpler alternative to ti'u or di'e). Similarly, vi ma means ‘at the location of what?', or ‘where?'

Exercise 4

Translate the following.

1. zdani do vi ma
2. la bil. puzavi zutse
3. lo cipni puzine'ava vofli
4. la tcarlz.daruin. puva xabju
5. mi ba tavla ne'i lo barja

More negativity

We have already seen na used to turn bridi into negative statements, of the type “it is not true that.” And we saw that this sometimes leads to slightly unexpected effects compared to English not. For instance, in Lesson 4 we saw that mi na nelci ro gerku means “it is not true that I like all dogs” (or “I don't like all dogs”). It does not mean “I don't like any dogs.”

na says not only that the sumti aren't connected by that particular selbri, but that they aren't necessarily connected by any selbri at all. So

mi na tavla la .suzyn.

It is not true that I talk to Susan.

is just as valid a thing to say if Susan is a rock formation in the Pamir Mountains, as it is if she is a human being I know. Often, however, we need our negation to be a little less powerful. In particular, it is useful to be able to say, not that the whole bridi is false, but only the selbri. This means that there is some relationship between the sumti — but this selbri isn't it.

The word used to negate just the selbri, and not the entire bridi, is na'e. So if we say mi na nelci ro gerku, that could be true even if I have no feelings at all about the canine species. But with

mi na'e nelci ro gerku

I other-than-like all dogs

on the other hand, there is something that can be said about me and all dogs; but it's not that I like them. It isn't necessarily that I hate them: I might write poems about them, or prescribe medicine for them, or imitate them in polite company. But like them, I don't.

If you do want to say you feel the opposite of ‘like’ for all dogs, you can say

mi to'e nelci ro gerku

I un-like (= dislike) all dogs.

to'e turns a selbri into its opposite: to'e nelci is pretty much the same thing as xebni - ‘hate’. And if you're indifferent, you can say

mi no'e nelci ro gerku

I am neutral-as-to-liking all dogs.

no'e indicates that you're neutral on the scale the selbri indicates.

Like time and space, Lojban places negation on a kind of scale, from lesser to greater extent. This ‘shades of grey’ approach pervades the language; you will see it time and again in the grammar. It makes for an interesting contrast with the theoretical basis for the language, classical logic — which is very much a ‘black and white’ domain.

Exercise 5

Now that you have three new negative words, let's see if you can use them. Give Lojban equivalents for the following English words, given their Lojban ‘opposites’ and the cmavo we've just learned.

1. disinterested (cinri: interested)
2. uninterested (cinri: interested)
3. bored (cinri: interested)
4. unborn (jbena: born)
5. uncover (gairgau: cover)
6. undead (morsi: dead)
7. non-Lojban (lojbo: Lojban(ic))
8. un-Lojbanic (lojbo: Lojban(ic))
9. plain (melbi: beautiful)
10. imaginary (fatci: factual, real)

Summary

In this lesson we have covered the following:

1. The uses and usefulness of terminators.
2. Time cmavo: pu, ca, and ba.
3. Time intervals: zi, za and zu.
4. Duration: ze'i, ze'a and ze'u.
5. Location: vi, va, vu and bu'u.
6. Direction: fa'a, to'o, zo'i, zu'a (and so on).
7. Negation: na'e, no'e and to'e.

There are many more cmavo to describe time and space (and a couple more for negation, for that matter), but they are only there if you need them. In fact, unless you want to be specific about time or space, you don't even need the ones in this lesson. Remember the golden rule of Lojban grammar: If you don't need it, don't use it! Lojban grammar is your servant, not your master.

Vocabulary

bevri	x1 carries/hauls/bears/transports cargo x2 to x3 from x4 over path x5; x1 is a carrier/[porter]
culno	x1 is full/completely filled with x2
kunti	x1 [container] is empty/vacant of x2 [material]; x1 is hollow
lebna	x1 takes/gets/gains/obtains/seizes/[removes] x2 (object/property) from x3 (possessor)
pendo	x1 is/acts as a friend of/to x2 (experiencer); x2 befriends x1
vanju	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of wine from fruit/grapes x2
zgana	x1 observes/[notices]/watches/beholds x2 using senses/means x3 under conditions x4

Exercise 6

Translation exercises are not your master, either, but they are your business! Translate from Lojban; assume the story is happening in the here-and-now:

1. .i baza lonu la .djang. cu cliva kei la .suzyn. sanli ne'i vi lo barja
2. .i caziku la .suzyn. denpa lonu baziku la .djang. cu viska la .suzyn.
3. .i la .suzyn. cu viska re lo kabri
4. .i go'i pa lo pu culno .i go'i pa lo ca culno
5. .i lo puzi culno ca kunti ba lonu la .djang. cu pinxe loi birje kei .i'enai vau .ua
6. .i lonu pinxe loi dotco birje kei ku na se nelci ro lo prenu
7. .i la .suzyn. ze'i tavla lo bevri
8. “.i ko lebna ta .i ko dunda lo cnino vanju botpi mi”
9. “.i .ei na dotco”

Exercise 7

Translate into Lojban these (hopefully much less brain-squelching than the previous lesson's) sentences:

1. A long time ago, Susan briefly lived at Zhang's.
2. Now Susan lives some way away from Zhang.
3. When Susan goes to the house, she goes a little to the left of the bar.
4. Every Thursday Susan goes to the bar, not far from the office.
5. At the bar Susan meets Susan's long-time friends.
6. Susan notices that the beer is German by seeing the bottle label. (Hint: look carefully at the place structure of zgana).
7. Susan sits away from the German beer.

Answers to exercises

Exercise 1

1. With terminator: I described the number two to two friends. Without terminator: I described the number twenty-two to a friend.
2. With terminator: 1:30 was the time when I loved, on Friday. (la mumdjed. is the x3 of tcika) Without terminator: 1:30 was the time when I loved Friday. (la mumdjed. is the x2 of prami)
3. With terminator: The man observes the cat. Without terminator: The man observes the cat. (Yep, trick question. For an isolated sentence, the presence or absence of vau seldom makes any difference).
4. With terminator: The mother of the infant travels. (Since ku indicates the sumti is over, the selbri can now begin.) Without terminator: The mother of the infant traveller.
5. With terminator: I request of Claudia that Maria speaks. (Claudia is the x3 of cpedu, the person to whom a request is made.) Without terminator: I request that Maria speaks to Claudia.

Exercise 2

1. puzaku la .juLIET. cu klama la .paris.
2. puzuku mi tcidu la .kaMIL.
3. puziku la .iVAN. cu cliva lo kumfa
4. bazi lonu la .pi,ER. cu klama lo kumfa kei la .iocikos. cinba la .xorxes.
5. puziku la .treisis. cu badri .i ku'i caku la .maik. cu gleki

Exercise 3

1. mi baze'i gunka
2. mi bazi gunka
3. mi puzuze'a gunka
4. mi caza gunka (That was a tricky one..).
5. mi cazize'a gunka (You could also argue for mi puzize'a gunka. What's actually being conveyed by I've been working is something we'll be looking at more closely in Lesson 12).

Exercise 4

1. Where is your house? (Literally “[something] is the house of you at what?”)
2. Bill was sitting here a while ago.
3. The bird was just flying some distance by me. (Literally “the bird flew a short time ago located next to here at a medium distance.” This is not saying anything about the direction in which the bird was flying: FAhA on its own identifies location, not motion).
4. Charles Darwin lived near here. (Note that we don't need zu to specify that he lived near here a long time ago: we assume that the person we're talking to knows who Darwin was, and therfore knows that he lived over a century ago. In fact, you could even miss out the pu, but I left it in to avoid confusion — maybe my friend thinks I'm talking about a different person with the same name, or that I'm somehow speaking metaphorically about the spirit of Darwin).
5. I will speak in the bar. (As you will have surmised, you don't need to follow FAhA words with cmavo like vi).

Exercise 5

1. disinterested: no'e cinri
2. uninterested: na'e cinri (The distinction between disinterested and uninterested in English in slowly dying out — which makes the word a pedant's delight!)
3. bored: to'e cinri
4. unborn: na'e jbena (no'e jbena would be someone in a twilight-zone between being born and not being born — perhaps the baby at the moment it emerges from the womb. to'e jbena is the opposite of being born; what that may mean, up to and including crawling back into the womb, or dying, is pretty much up to you. The English expression is actually more like ‘not yet born’, and we will find out how to say this in a few lessons' time).
5. uncover: to'e gairgau (na'e gairgau means simply ‘not to cover’, and no'e gairgau ‘to leave ajar’).
6. undead: no'e morsi (na'e morsi is someone alive, not a zombie. But don't worry too much about the phenomenology of the occult; just be comfortable in the knowledge that Lojban allows you to make these distinctions, if you want to).
7. non-Lojban: na'e lojbo (na'e is frequently glossed as ‘other than’; this example may show you why).
8. un-Lojbanic: to'e lojbo (There is often something subjective about how things are opposites to each other; using an expression like this, you may well be asked to explain exactly how something can be the opposite of Lojban).
9. plain: no'e melbi (to'e melbi would be ‘ugly’, of course).
10. imaginary: na'e facti (You can quibble about whether it's not more like to'e facti or no'e facti. That's why it's just as well ‘imaginary’ has its own gismu: xanri).

Exercise 6

1. A while after Zhang left, Susan is standing in the bar.
2. Right now, Susan expects that Zhang will soon afterwards see Susan.
3. Susan sees two cups.
4. [She sees] one previously full one. [She sees] one currently full one.</nowiki>
   1. Comment: (It's amazing what can be tucked away in exercises. Yes, sumti can have tenses in Lojban. There's no reason they can't: though there's an article in front of the gismu in lo kabri, that gismu is still a selbri, and so it still expresses a relationship. This means that sumti have all the characteristics of selbri: they have sumti of their own (as we'll see later on); durations; locations; and tenses. This is an important way Lojban is different from many (though not all) natural languages: it has no essential grammatical difference between its ‘nouns’ and ‘verbs’).
5. The one full just a little time ago is now empty (aha!) after Zhang drank the beer (pah!).
   1. Comment: (There's some mischief with terminators and attitudinals here. Attitudinals apply to the structure that precedes them. If they follow a sumti, they apply to that sumti. If they follow a selbri, they apply to that selbri. If they are at the start of a bridi, on the other hand, they apply to the whole bridi.
   2. Now, .i'enai ‘disapproval; Pah!' follows kei, so it applies to the phrase closed off by that kei: that is, lonu la .djang. pinxe loi birje kei. But .ua follows vau, so it applies to the whole phrase closed off by vau: namely, the entire bridi, lo puzi culno ca kunti ba lonu la .djang. pinxe loi birje).
6. Drinking German beer is not liked by all people. (The terminators are the normal implied terminators for that particular structure. Of course, it's much easier to say .i lonu pinxe loi dotco birje na se nelci ro lo prenu, without the kei ku; the na acts like cu, to block off the selbri from its preceding sumti).
7. Susan briefly talks to the carrier. (See? A better word for waiter already. Notice, too, that you can specify a duration without specifying a tense).
8. “Take that away. Give me a new wine bottle.”
9. “It should not be German.”

Exercise 7

1. .i puzuku la .suzyn. ze'i xabju lo la .djang. zdani (You can't just say xabju la .djang. — you have to fill in the blank of “Zhang's ___.”)
2. .i la .suzyn. ca xabju va la .djang.
3. ca lonu la .suzyn. klama lo zdani kei la .suzyn. klama zu'a vizi lo barja (We don't really have a way for saying she — as you're probably painfully aware of by now. Take heart — relief is coming in the next lesson!
   1. Comment: Note that Susan's route is away from the bar, but not explicitly moving to or from it; so we don't have to indicate motion along with direction. Not that we can right now, anyway).
4. .i ca ro la .vodjed. la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja va lo briju
5. vi lo barja la .suzyn. penmi lo la .suzyn. ze'u pendo (Remember, sumti take tenses and durations, too).
6. .i la .suzyn. cu zgana lonu lo birje cu dotco kei lonu viska lo botpi tcita (or: lo tcita pe lo botpi, or lo lo botpi ku tcita — you can feel really smug if you came up with that!)
7. .i la .suzyn. zutse to'o lo dotco birje

Chapter 7. Getting Personal: Pro-sumti and more abstractions

Referring back

So far we've been referring to everybody by name, which can get very repetitive if you want to tell a story, or even string two sentences together (as you will have seen in the last few exercises.) Consider the following:

la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja .i la .suzyn ze'a pinxe loi vanju .i la .suzyn. cu zgana lo nanmu .i lo nanmu cu melbi .i lo nanmu cu zgana la .suzyn.

Susan goes to the bar. Susan drinks some wine for a while. Susan notices [sees, observes] a man. The man is beautiful. The man notices Susan.

It is pretty tedious to have to keep repeating Susan and man. English gets round this problem by using pronouns, like she or he. This works OK in this case, because we have one female and one male in the story so far, but it can get confusing when more characters enter the scene. (It's even more confusing with languages that only have one word for he, she and it, like Turkish or spoken Chinese.) Lojban, for its part, has pro-sumti, which are like pronouns — sort of.

In fact, we've already met some pro-sumti: mi and do, and the ti/ta/tu group; but we still don't have he/she/it, which are a bit more complicated. One way of dealing with this is a group of cmavo which refer back to something we've just said. In fact we have met one of these in a different context: go'i. Just as go'i on its own repeats the previous bridi, lo go'i repeats the first sumti of the previous bridi. (In this, it is behaving no differently to any other selbri with an article in front of it: lo + selbri refers to the x1 of that selbri.) So we can rewrite the first three sentences as

la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja .i lo go'i ze'a pinxe loi vanju .i lo go'i cu zgana lo nanmu

The system breaks down here, though, since nanmu is not in the first, but the second place of the previous bridi. English doesn't bother with precision here — he just means ‘some male person mentioned earlier.’ This works in the example here, because there is only one man in the story, but what about

Bill saw Rick. He hit him.

Did Bill hit Rick, or did Rick hit Bill? We don't know. Lojban does have other tricks up its sleeve, and as you might just have already guessed, lo se go'i will do the trick. But counting sumti from the preceding bridi isn't really a general solution.

Coming back to the man Susan saw, we can refer to him as ri, which means ‘the most recent sumti.’ So we can say

.i lo go'i cu zgana lo nanmu .i ri melbi

ri is one of a series, ri/ra/ru, meaning ‘the most recent/fairly recent/distant sumti'; but as far as I've noticed, ra and ru aren't very popular in Lojbanistan at the moment. (Put it down to ideological reasons: they are deliberately vague, like their natural language counterparts, so they are regarded as somehow ‘un-Lojbanic’.) ri, on the other hand, is used a lot, since it's very common for the last thing in one sentence to be the subject of the next sentence.

lonu lo nanmu cu dotco kei cu se djuno ri

ri refers to lo nanmu and not lonu lo nanmu cu dotco: the start of lo nanmu is closer to ri than the start of lonu lo nanmu cu dotco.

la .suzyn. cu pinxe lo ri vanju

ri obviously refers to la .suzyn., and not to lo vanju.

Another pro-sumti is da, which means ‘someone/something.' You may remember zo'e, which means also means ‘someone/something,' but with zo'e the something is unimportant — it's just a way of filling a sumti place. da, on the other hand, is important: it introduces something or someone we are directly talking about.

Coming back to our story, we could start by saying 'da klama lo barja — “Someone came to the bar.” Unlike the other pro-sumti we've been looking at, da does not point back to a sumti we've necessarily already seen. It does, however, point back to the same thing as any other da in any sentences conjoined with logical connectives, or more informally anywhere in the same paragraph. (No, we haven't done Lojban logical connectives or paragraphs yet... Just keep this in mind for future reference.) So if I say da nanmu .i da klama lo barja, you can typically assume I'm referring to the same man in both sentences.

Because they are all tied up with predicate logic, da and its companions de and di are used a lot for talking about language — you see them frequently on the Lojban e-mail list, for example. By the way, there are no do and du in this series, because these already have other meanings: ‘you’ and ‘is the same thing as.’

Exercise 1

The two highlighted sumti in each of the following Lojban sentences refer to the same thing or person. For each, check whether the pro-sumti you have learned — lego'i, ri, ra — can replace the second sumti.

1. .i la .suzyn. cu nelci loi vanju .i la .suzyn. na nelci loi birje
2. .i la .suzyn. cu viska lo nanmu .i lo nanmu cu dotco
3. .i la .suzyn. cu nelci lonu la .suzyn. cu klama lo barja
4. .i la .suzyn. cu nelci lo la .suzyn. cu pendo
5. .i lonu la .suzyn. cu badri cu nandu .i la .suzyn. cu gleki
6. .i lenu la .suzyn. cu badri cu nandu .i lenu la .suzyn. cu badri na se zgana

Assigning pro-sumti

If we're telling a story in English, the meaning of, say, she keeps changing. At the moment, it means ‘Susan’, but if Susan's friend Jyoti walks into the bar, she could very well mean start meaning ‘Jyoti’. In Lojban, we can keep on using lo go'i, ri and their relatives, but there is an easier way of dealing with a larger cast of characters.

What we do is assign pro-sumti as and when we need them, using the cmavo goi (which is like the Latin word sive, or the English also known as (aka)). The sumti assigned by goi are a series called KOhA, consisting of ko'a, ko'e, ko'i ... you get the idea?

OK, let's go back to Susan's story. We start by saying

la .suzyn. goi ko'a klama lo barja

This means that from now on, every time we use ko'a, we mean ‘Susan’. The man she sees can then be ko'e, so we say

.i ko'a zgana lo nanmu goi ko'e

Now every time we use ko'e, it means that particular man, so the full story so far reads:

la .suzyn. goi ko'a klama lo barja .i ko'a ze'a pinxe loi vanju .i ko'a zgana lo nanmu goi ko'e .i ko'e melbi .i caku ko'e zgana ko'a

(Note how the cus have disappeared: ko'a, like mi, doesn't need them, since it can't join with a selbri to form a new selbri).

Assigning ko'e to lo nanmu is actually better than starting the next sentence with lo nanmu. This is because lo nanmu simply means “the thing I have in mind which I call ‘man’,” which is not exactly the same as “the man” (it could, in theory, be something totally different). Some Lojbanists might even say that using lo like this is a bit malglico. (Or at least malrarbau ‘damned natural languages’: lots of languages have definite articles, and Lojban lo is no definite article).

Let's continue by introducing Susan's friend Jyoti (if people are wondering where I get all these unusual names from, Jyoti is an old Gujarati friend of mine). We continue ....

la .djiotis. goi ko'i mo'ine'i klama .i ko'i rinsa ko'e

Jyoti (henceforth #3), goes into. #3 greets #2.

Jyoti comes in and says hello to the guy.

mo'ine'i is another space ‘tense’. mo'i indicates movement; ne'i means ‘inside’ (from the gismu, nenri). So mo'ine'i corresponds to the English preposition into (while ne'i on its own corresponds to inside or in.) The way Lojban grammar works, mo'ine'i on its own is treated as mo'ine'i ku: a sumti tcita with an omitted sumti. (Remember caku, which is exactly the same. Just as baku means ‘afterwards’ (relative to the here-and-now), mo'ine'i [ku] means something like ‘in(to)wards' — but is nowhere near as weird in Lojban as it is in English).

mo'i is extremely useful, as it allows you to distinguish between location and motion. For example, I ran behind the bar in English is properly speaking ambiguous: are you running while behind the bar, or are you running with your final destination behind the bar? Lojban does not allow that ambiguity: mi bajra ti'a lo barja means the former, while mi bajra mo'i ti'a lo barja means the latter. In the example given above, ne'i klama would mean not that Jyoti comes in (from outside), but that she is going from somewhere to somewhere else, while inside. This kind of ambiguity may pass unnoticed by native English speakers, but speakers of languages which are more precise about direction find it extremely vague (Turkish, for example, has at least three words to translate ‘here’).

Vocabulary

catlu	x1 looks at/examines/views/inspects/regards/watches/gazes at x2 [compare with zgani]
je	and (individuals, as opposed to joi.) Stay tuned for a proper explanation of these words in a couple of lessons.
rinsa	x1 (agent) greets/hails/[welcomes/says hello to]/responds to arrival of x2 in manner x3 (action)
xanka	x1 is nervous/anxious about x2 (abstraction) under conditions x3

Exercise 2

Translate the following. Assume the same values for ko'a/ko'e/ko'i that we have been using so far (i.e. ko'a is Susan, and so on).

1. .i ko'a ca rinsa ko'i
2. .i ko'a je ko'i xanka cmila
3. .i caku lo go'i cu catlu ko'e
4. .i ko'e cadzu mo'i zu'a ko'i
5. .i ko'e djica lonu djuno fi lo ko'a cmene

Acronyms

Now there are plenty of KOhA sumti to go around. In fact, if you've run out of words by getting to ko'u, you can start over again with fo'a, fo'e ... fo'u. There is a problem, though: you have to remember (a) which sumti was assigned to which KOhA word, and (b) to assign the sumti in the first place. There's nothing to say that this will not become commonplace in future Lojban usage. Right now, however, there is a feeling that this is a little too calculated to work spontaneously. And Lojban cannot readily use the little hints natural languages pepper their grammar with (like gender and number), to keep track of who is who.

As a result, yet another strategy has been introduced to refer back to sumti. This strategy dates back from ‘Institute’ Loglan, before Lojban arose in its modern form. (Yes, Lojban has a history and a prehistory. No, we don't really have the time to go into them here.) The strategy involves acronyms. Simply put, if you see a Lojban letter being used as a sumti, you take it as referring to the last sumti whose selbri starts with that letter. So in

la .suzyn. cu cusku lu coi li'u lo nanmu .i ny. cisma

Susan says “Hello” to a man. The man smiles

ny. stands for nanmu. There is no need to explicitly assign ny. with goi; but you can, and indeed if you assign it to a sumti which doesn't start with that letter, then that assignment will be the one that counts (“A certain Lojbanist, let's call him N, dislikes KOhA cmavo...”). Some Lojbanists dislike this usage because it, too, seems a little calculated (and initials and acronyms have decidedly non-literary associations in most natural languages!) Only time will tell which of the two usages will become more commonplace.

Direct quotations

You may have noticed two other new words in the previous Lojban sentence. lu and li'u are like ‘quote’ and ‘unquote’ — they put something someone says into a sumti. li'u is one of the few terminators that can almost never be missed out, since that would make everything else that follows part of the quotation. You can also nest quotations, e.g.

la ranjit. pu cusku lu la .djiotis. pu cusku lu coi li'u mi li'u

Ranjeet said “Jyoti said ‘Hello’ to me.”

which is similar to

la ranjit. pu cusku lu la .djiotis. pu rinsa mi li'u

Ranjeet said “Jyoti greeted me.”

Being a logical language, Lojban is very careful to distinguish between words for things, and the things themselves. So you can't speak about the phrase lo munje ‘the universe’ in the same way you speak about the universe itself. To give a silly example, the phrase lo munje is small, but the universe itself is not. To distinguish between the two in Lojban, you need to use quotation:

lu lo munje li'u cu cmalu

‘The universe’ is small

lo munje na cmalu

The universe is not small

Vocabulary

fengu	x1 is angry/mad at x2 for x3 (action/state/property)
zmadu	x1 exceeds/is more than x2 in property/quantity x3 (ka/ni) by amount/excess x4
clani	long	x1 is long in dimension/direction x2 (default longest dimension) by measurement standard x3

Exercise 3

Translate the following. Continue to assume the same values for ko'a/e/i that we have been using so far.

1. .i ko'e cusku lu doi djiotis. ma cmene lo do pendo li'u
2. .i ko'i cusku lu lu suzyn. li'u li'u
3. .i ko'e cusku lu .ui ro lo do pendo cu pendo mi li'u
4. .i ko'i fengu cusku lu djica ma li'u ko'i

Indirect quotations (reported speech)

A phrase like “Ranjeet said ‘Jyoti said “Hello” to me.'” can also be expressed in a rather more subtle way:

la ranjit. pu cusku lo se du'u la .djiotis. pu rinsa ry.

Ranjeet past-express the-predicate Jyoti past-greet R

Ranjeet said that Jyoti greeted him.

What is this sedu'u? Well, to explain that, we have to go via du'u.

du'u is a tricky but very useful cmavo meaning, in logical terms, ‘the proposition.’ What this means in ordinary language is something like “the notion that x is true.” Sorry, that wasn't really ordinary language. The closest equivalent in English is that, as in “Ranjeet knows that ...”, or “Ranjeet thinks that ...”. Here's an example of du'u used on its own:

la .suzyn. na djuno lo du'u la .djang. cu cinynei ra

Susan doesn't know that Zhang fancies (‘sexually-likes’) her.

du'u belongs to selma'o (= se cmavo) NU, just like nu itself. This means you can use it grammatically wherever you use nu. In fact, du'u and nu are the two major kinds of abstractions in Lojban. Lojban can distinguish between abstractions pretty finely, but the main distinction is between things that can happen (events), which take nu, and things you can know (facts), which take du'u. The gismu definition usually tells you which abstraction type is normal for the word.

OK, but why is what Ranjeet said introduced with sedu'u rather than du'u? Basically, because Lojban is a stickler for details. What you know or remember or believe is a fact: something you hold inside your brain. What you say, however, is not something you hold inside your brain; instead, it is sounds which mean what you hold inside your brain. The distinction is subtle, but it is the kind of distinction Lojban insists on. (That's why it's a logical language, after all.) When you want to refer to something you say rather than something you think, Lojban uses sedu'u rather than du'u.

So Lojban has different words for that..., depending on what sort of thing is meant.

• If that introduces something that happened, use nu. (Events can be subdivided more finely yet, but for now let's not complicate matters even more than necessary).
• If that introduces something that you think, use du'u.
• If that introduces something that you say, use sedu'u
• — unless it is a literal quote, in which case you use lu ... li'u.

• mi nelci losu'u mi dotco
• mi djuno losu'u mi dotco
• mi cusku losu'u mi dotco

Infinitives, properties and quantities

The word ka also belongs to selma'o NU. It's main purpose is to create infinitives.

mi djica lo ka pinxe

I want to drink.

This is equivalent to

mi djica lo nu mi pinxe

which literally means

I want that I drink.

or something like

I want myself drinking.

Yes, it sounds weird. That's why we have ka. What this abstractor does is actually copying the sumti from the main bridi (in most cases it's intuitively clear from context which sumti will be copied).

Another NU abstractor is ni. It's the same as ka but talks about quantities.

mi zmadu do lo ni clani

I exceed you in the quantity of being long

I'm longer/higher than you

Just like ka ni copies one of the sumti of the main bridi into the inner bridi. Thus in this example it says that

mi clani .i do clani .i mi zmadu do lo nu clani

I'm long. You are long. I'm longer than you.

Exercise 4

Which of nu, du'u, sedu'u, ka or ni would you use to translate that in the folowing sentences?

1. I claimed that Lojban is easy.
2. I am frustrated that Lojban is easy.
3. I agree that Lojban is easy.
4. It is confusing that Lojban is easy.
5. It was decided that Lojban should be easy.
6. You want to ask me.
7. Ranjeet is bigger than me.

Some more personal pro-sumti

We've already seen two personal pro-sumti, mi and do, meaning ‘I’ (or ‘me’) and ‘you’. However, you in English can mean four different things:

1. The one person I'm talking to.
2. A number of people I'm talking to.
3. The person or people I'm talking to and some other person or people.
4. Anyone (as in “Money can't buy you love.”)

Lojban gets round the confusion between (1) and (2) by using numbers. The most common way to express (2) is rodo, ‘all of you’ (or Southern U.S. Y'all) and, as we've seen, coi rodo is “Hello all” — a common way to start an e-mail to a list. You can also use specific numbers: redo would mean ‘two of you’ or ‘you two’ (for example, I start e-mails to my parents with coi redo).

You can also use numbers with ko, e.g. ro ko klama ti “All of you, get over here.”

Case (3) is expressed by do'o ‘you and someone else’. Case (4) is completely different: it's normally expressed by roda ‘all ’'x or, more specifically ro lo prenu ‘all persons’, but often you can just miss it out altogether.

English we is almost as confusing, as it can mean the speaker and the listener(s), the speaker and some other people, or the speaker and the listener and some other people. Not surprisingly, Lojban has five distinct pro-sumti for we:

mi'ai	I and at least one other person (corresponds to English "we")
mi'o	you and I (but no-one else)
mi'a	I and another/others (but not you)
ma'a	you and I and another/others

(Once again, Lojban follows the lead of languages other than English in differentiating between these different kinds of we).

The fifth pro-sumti? Oddly enough, it's mi! Lojban makes no distinction between singular and plural by default; so if several people are speaking all together, mi (which refers to the one or more speakers) is perfectly correct for we. In practice, you'll usually get mi used like that when one person is presuming to speak (or more often, to write) on behalf of others.

Some examples:

mi prami do

I love you.

mi'a penmi do ti'u la .cicac.

We'll meet you at three o'clock.

ma'a remna

We are all human.

mi djica lonu do cliva

We want you to go away.

mi'ai prami la .bil.

We love Bill :[the sentence just states there are several people loving Bill including the speaker. It's not known if "we" includes the listener]

Exercise 5

Is we/us in the following mi'o, mi'a, ma'a, or mi?

(Of course mi'ai is more vague than mi'o, mi'a, ma'a and therefore can replace any of them so we excluded it from this task to make it more hard and interesting ;) )

1. We need to start seeing other people.
2. We the people hold these truths to be self-evident.
3. We decided to expel you from the association.
4. You can't talk to us that way!
5. We're in a fine mess, all of us, aren't we?
6. They told us we should get married, and you said “OK.”
7. They told us we should get married, and he said “OK.”

Summary

In this chapter, we have covered the following topics:

• How to refer back to previous sumti, using the previous bridi (lo go'i), counting sumti (ri, ra, ru), assigning pro-sumti (ko'a–ko'u, fo'a–fo'u), and using acronyms (Lojban letters).
• How to refer to existential x (‘something, someone’) (da, de, di).
• Referring to motion in Lojban (mo'i).
• How to give direct quotations (lu ... li'u).
• How to give indirect quotations (se du'u).
• How to refer to facts (du'u) as distinct from events (nu).
• Lojban's complement of first and second person pro-sumti (do'o, mi'o, mi'a, ma'a).

Vocabulary

bebna	x1 is foolish/silly in event/action/property [folly] (ka) x2; x1 is a boob
burna	x1 is embarrassed/disconcerted/flustered/ill-at-ease about/under conditions x2 (abstraction)
cinri	x1 (abstraction) interests/is interesting to x2; x2 is interested in x1
dansydi'u	disco [dansu (dance) + dinju (building)]
.e'u	‘I suggest’ (attitudinal)
mutce	x1 is much/extreme in property x2 (ka), towards x3 extreme/direction; x1 is, in x2, very x3
ni'a	down, below (space ‘tense’)
ninpe'i	meet for the first time [cnino (new) + penmi (meet)]
pe'i	‘I think’ (opinion attitudinal)
penmi	x1 meets/encounters x2 at/in location x3
simlu	x1 seems/appears to have property(ies) x2 to observer x3 under conditions x4
simxu	x1 (set) has members who mutually/reciprocally do x2
.y.	‘er’ (hesitation)

Exercise 6

The story is now on in earnest! For each of the highlighted pro-sumti, say who or what they mean. (Oh, and translate the sentences, too).

1. .i ko'a burna
2. .i ko'a catlu lo kabri pe la .cardoNES.
3. .i lonu zgana ra cu simlu loka cinri ko'a
4. .i ko'e simxu cinba ko'i
5. .i ko'i cusku lu pe'i redo puzi simxu ninpe'i li'u
6. .i lo vanju pe ni'a cu simlu loka mutce cinri
7. .i ko'a sutra pinxe lo go'i
8. .i ko'e cusku lu .y. na go'i
9. .i mi puze'a na simxu penmi ti
10. .i baziku ko'a cmila
11. .i ko'a cusku lu .u'i redo bebna
12. .i .e'u mi'o klama lo dansydi'u

Vocabulary

bilga	x1 is bound/obliged to/has the duty to do/be x2 in/by standard/agreement x3; x1 must do x2
cismyfra	x1 reacts/responds/answers by smiling to stimulus x2 under conditions x3 [cisma (smile) + frati (react)]
dunku	x1 is anguished/distressed/emotionally wrought/stressed by x2
gusta	x1 is a restaurant/cafe/diner serving type-of-food x2 to audience x3
jinvi	x1 thinks/opines x2 [opinion] (du'u) is true about subject/issue x3 on grounds x4
kansa	x1 is with/accompanies/is a companion of x2, in state/condition/enterprise x3 (event/state)
morji	x1 remembers/recalls/recollects fact(s)/memory x2 (du'u) about subject x3
reisku	x1 asks question x2 (reported speech with sedu'u/text with zo or lu ... li'u/or a concept with lu'e) to x3 via expressive medium x4, about subject x5.
spusku	x1 gives reply/answer/responds with x2 (reported speech with sedu'u/text with zo or lu ... li'u/or a concept with lu'e) to x3 via expressive medium x4, about subject x5.
xumske	chemistry [xukmi (chemical) + saske (science)]

Exercise 7

Translate into Lojban. Use Lojban letters (acronyms) for the characters to refer to each other. Do not use li'u to close quotations opened with lu at the end of each sentence, but only when the speaker actually stops speaking.

1. Jyoti asked Susan, “Where's Zhang?” (Hint: just use reisku).
2. Susan answered “He said that he would wait for me to come.” (Hint: just use spusku).
3. Jyoti said, “I'm not that worried about him leaving. I think that he'll meet us at the disco.” (Use a gismu instead of an attitudinal for ‘I think.’)
4. “He has to read for a while.”
5. “He's forgotten a lot of chemistry in the summer.” (Hint: he's actually forgotten many things about chemistry).
6. “We're going to a restaurant before going to the disco.”
7. “Do you want to accompany us?”
8. “Sure,” said Susan, as she smiled at Ranjeet. (Hint: as = at the same time as).

Answers to Exercises

Exercise 1

1. lo go'i: Yes. ri: No. (ri would be loi vanju.) ra: Yes.
2. lo go'i: No. ri: Yes. ra: No. (Strictly speaking, if ri is not used in a sentence, ra can refer to the immediately preceding sumti; but that would be needlessly misleading.)
3. lo go'i: No. (go'i refers back to the previous sentence — which is why it can answer a yes/no-question — and not to a bridi in the same sentence.) ri: Yes. ra: No.
4. lo go'i: No. (Once again, there's no previous sentence for it to refer to.) ri: Yes. (ri counts only completed sumti, and lo ri pendo is not yet complete when you count back from ri to the lo immediately in front of it.) ra: No.
5. lo go'i: No. (The x1 of the preceding sentence is not la .suzyn. but lonu la .suzyn. badri.) ri: Yes. (See discussion.) ra: No.
6. lo go'i: Yes. ri: No. ra: Yes. (lenu la .suzyn. badri is the second sumti counting backwards from the start of the sentence).

Exercise 2

1. Susan greets Jyoti.
2. They laugh nervously.
3. Now, they look at the man. (lo go'i means that the people doing the laughing are the same as the people doing the looking — both of them).
4. He walks towards the left of Jyoti. (Without the mo'i, this would mean “He walks at the left of Jyoti”).
5. He wants to know (about) her name. (That's Susan's name, not Jyoti's — though in English you'd assume Jyoti, since she is the most recently named female. Pro-sumti like ko'a aren't affected by what candidate referent has been mentioned most recently: they have a unique referent that stays constant).

In order to get this into understandable English, we've had to change some of the pro-sumti back into names. We could also make the translation sound more natural by changing the word order a bit more, and maybe putting the whole thing into the past tense.

Exercise 3

1. He says “Jyoti, what is the name of your friend?” (This is actually the simplest way of saying “Who's your friend?”; lo do pendo cu mo is closer to “What's your friend?”, as in “What does your friend do?” or “What is your friend like?”)
2. She says “‘Susan.’” (Note the characteristic, Lewis-Carrollesque Lojban pedantry here. Susan, the young woman with an irrational fear of German alcoholic beverages, is not Susan's name. The word ‘Susan’ is Susan's name. So Jyoti cannot answer la .suzyn., meaning la .suzyn. cu cmene lo mi pendo, but lu suzyn. li'u, meaning lu suzyn. li'u cu cmene lo mi pendo. Since we're putting everything Jyoti says inside our own quotes, this makes her answer be lu lu suzyn. li'u li'u).
3. He says “Delighted — any friend of yours is a friend of mine.” (Remember, Lojban selbri can be used in both bridi and sumti: pendo means both ‘a friend’, with an article in front of it, and ‘is a friend’, as an independent selbri).
4. Jyoti says to herself angrily “What does he want?” (Because it is in direct quotation, the question is Jyoti's, not the narrator's, obviously: this does not mean “What was it that Jyoti said to herself he wanted?”)

Exercise 4

1. sedu'u, in the usual usage of claim as ‘make a statement’. Lojban gives du'u for xusra ‘assert, claim’, but that points to the more logic-specific sense of ‘claim that something is true’.
2. nu. It is events in the world, rather than concepts, which usually provoke emotional responses. If du'u represents something you hold in your brain, then nu, not du'u, is necessary after ‘frustrated’: your emotional response is too much of a reflex action for your perception to have the time to become something you hold in your brain!
3. du'u: agreement is a response you have to a concept; this concept has not necessarily been put in words, nor are you necessarily putting it in words yourself.
4. nu. Confusion is an emotional response, just like frustration, and primarily involves events in the world, rather than rational facts. (If they're confusing, of course, they're probably not all that rational in the first place).
5. du'u: decisions are things you hold in your brain, before you either put them into words, or into action.
6. ka: you want the following event: you ask. So instead of saying "you" two times you can use ka to say it shorter like in English.
7. ni: you are talking about quantities. Adn you compare quantities in this example.

Exercise 5

1. mi'o
2. mi (Classic case of someone speaking on behalf of the many, by the way).
3. mi'a, although this could be mi if the expeller is speaking institutionally, on behalf of the association.
4. mi'a
5. ma'a
6. mi'o
7. mi'a

Exercise 6

pro-sumti
ra	lo kabri pe la .cardoNES. (It can't be lonu zgana ri kei, because the lonu-sumti isn't finished yet — and that interpretation would be as weirdly self-referential as any Escher drawing. Not that Lojban isn't perfectly capable of such mischief! But we couldn't refer back to lo pe kabri la .cardoNES. with ri, either: the way sumti are counted by their beginnings, the immediately previous sumti is not lo kabri la .cardoNES.— it's the la .cardoNES. inside the phrase lo la .cardoNES. kabri! This kind of annoyance may give you a hint about why ri is not as popular as you might think..).
redo	la .suzyn. je la .ranjit.: “You two.”
lo go'i	lo vanju
go'i	la .suzyn. ce la .ranjit. puzi simxu ninpe'i. Don't worry about how you said “Susan and Ranjeet” — it's not like we've covered ce anyway! (For the record, it makes a set out of Susan and Ranjeet, since a set is what simxu looks for. See Lesson 14). go'i here refers back not to the previous sentence in the story, but to the previous sentence in the conversation. Obviously Ranjeet wouldn't be referring back to sentences written by the narrator. He's not meant to realise he's fictional, after all.
mi	la .ranjit. (Just checking if you're awake..).
ti	la .suzyn. (By elimination; but strictly speaking ti could be anyone or anything Ranjeet happens to be pointing to).
ma'a	la .suzyn. je la .ranjit. je la .djiotis.

Translation

1. Susan felt embarrassed.
2. She looked at the chardonnay glass. (As specified in Lesson 3, lo la .cardoNES. kabri does not mean that the Chardonnay owns the glass — merely that it is associated with it: it corresponds to lo kabri pe la .cardoNES).
3. She seems to find observing it very interesting. (In Lojban, things and people aren't interesting by themselves; only their properties or activities can be interesting. There is a workaround, which is something like “some property about the glass I won't bother specifying is interesting.” We'll cover this towards the end of the course).
4. Ranjeet and Jyoti kissed each other.
5. “I think you two have just [mutually] met,” she said. (In Lojban, you can't say “two people meet”. But you can use simxu ‘mutually’ to get the two sumti involved into the one sumti place.) Note: Seasoned Lojbanists will have noticed that this sentence is not strictly correct, and that it would have been rather better as lu'i redo puzi ninpe'i simxu, or lu'i redo puzi simxu loka ce'u ninpe'i ce'u. Seasoned Lojbanists will also cut me some slack for not trying to introduce everything at once...
6. The wine below seemed to be incredibly interesting. (Literally, “The wine associated with below...”. Strictly speaking, this does not mean the wine below Susan, but the wine below the speaker; but we won't insist on that point for now).
7. She drank it quickly.
8. “Errr, no,” said Ranjeet.
9. “We've never met [each other].”</nowiki>
10. A little later, Susan laughed.
11. “Come on, you're both being silly,” she said.
12. “Let's go (you and I) to the disco.”

Exercise 7

You now know enough Lojban that your translations can vary to some extent. Don't be too concerned about matching these translations to the letter.

1. .i lu jy. zvati ma li'u se reisku la .djiotis. la .suzyn. or .i lu jy. zvati ma li'u se reisku fi la .suzyn. fe la .djiotis.
2. .i la .suzyn. cu spusku lu jy. cusku lo se du'u jy. denpa lonu mi klama li'u (And no, it's unlikely that Susan would refer to herself as sy.!)
3. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu mi no'e dunku lonu jy. cliva .i mi jinvi lodu'u jy. penmi ma'a vi lo dansydi'u (We translate us as ma'a rather than mi'o, because presumably it refers to Ranjeet as well as Jyoti and Susan).
4. .i jy. bilga loka ze'a tcidu
5. .i jy. to'e morji so'e da lo xumske ca lo crisa (You could also say so'e lo fatci instead of so'e da).
6. .i mi'a klama lo gusta pu loka klama lo dansydi'u
7. .i xu do djica lonu do kansa mi'a li'u (We put li'u here, because this is where Jyoti's quotation ends).
8. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu go'i li'u ca lonu sy. cismyfra la .ranjit. (or: ra cismyfra or ko'a cismyfra. Not ri cismyfra, though: ri here is lu go'i li'u! Infuriating but true..).

Chapter 8. Swapping things round: conversion and simple lujvo

selbri conversions

Conversion is swapping the places of a bridi around. We have already encountered one case of conversion: the cmavo, se, which changes round the first and second places of a bridi. For example

la .djiotis. cu cinba la .ranjit.

Jyoti kisses Ranjeet.

is the same as

la ranjit. cu se cinba la .djiotis.

Ranjeet is kissed by Jyoti.

se is part of a series of cmavo which go, in alphabetical order, se, te, ve, xe. Like a lot of these series, the first one is used a lot more than the others, but sometimes the others are useful.

Just as se changes round the first and second places, te changes round the first and third places, ve, the first and fourth, and xe, the first and fifth.

ti bakfu loi tirse grana loi skori

This is-a-bundle-of iron rods held together with string.

loi skori cu te bakfu loi tirse grana ti

String holds the bundle of iron rods together (literally, “with string are bundled iron rods.”)

The ti has now moved to a less conspicuous place in the sentence, and so can now be dropped out without being missed. In fact place conversion is often used when we want to get rid of places like this.

mi'a tugni do zo'e lo dinske

mi'a tugni do fo lo dinske

We agree with you [that something is true] about economics.

lo dinske cu ve tugni

As regards economics [we] agree [with you].

lo prenu cu klama zo'e zo'e zo'e lo trene

lo prenu cu klama fu lo trene

The person goes somewhere, from somewhere, via somewhere, by train.

lo trene cu xe klama

[Someone] goes by train. (literally “By a train is gone”)

A train is a vehicle.

As I've said, the more extreme conversions like ve and xe are rarely used, partly because most gismu only have two or three places, and partly because even with four- or five-place gismu, the less-used places are what come towards the end.

Vocabulary

gugde	x1 is the country of peoples x2 with land/territory x3; (people/territory relationship)
jamna	x1 (person/mass) wars against x2 over territory/matter x3; x1 is at war with x2
jdini	x1 is money/currency issued by x2; (adjective:) x1 is financial/monetary/pecuniary/fiscal
xatra	x1 is a letter/missive/[note] to intended audience x2 from author/originator x3 with content x4
xlura	x1 (agent) influences/lures/tempts x2 into action/state x3 by influence/threat/lure x4

Exercise 1

Convert the following sentences so that the highlighted sumti comes first. Miss out any unimportant places.

1. zo'e fengu lonu jamna
2. ti xatra mi la .djang.
3. zo'e xlura mi lonu cliva lo gugde kei loi jdini
4. lo prenu cu tavla zo'e zo'e la .lojban.
5. lo prenu cu dunda lo cukta mi

sumti conversions

Another thing we can do is to use conversion cmavo to make sumti. We saw how Lojban articles turn selbri into sumti, so that, for example, lo mlatu means “something(s) which could fit in the first place of mlatu” — in other words, lo changes ‘is-a-cat’ to ‘a cat’. The same is true for lo mlatu except that, as we've seen, it is something which the speaker has in mind as occupying x1 of mlatu — in other words, ‘the cat.’

This works fine if the only place we want to access and turn into a sumti is x1; but with other gismu we may want to make sumti out of other places. Let's look at the last example from the previous exercise:

lo prenu cu dunda lo cukta mi

lo prenu can also be lo dunda ‘the giver’; but what about the sumti describing mi and lo cukta? Well, you probably guessed. The answer you gave to the exercise was (I hope)

mi te dunda lo cukta

This means that mi can be lo te dunda ‘the recipient’. In the same way, lo cukta can be lo se dunda ‘the gift’ or ‘the thing given’. So if we want to make a really obvious sentence, we can say

lo dunda cu dunda lo se dunda lo te dunda

The giver gives the given-thing to the person-to-whom-it-is-given

The donor gives the gift to the recipient.

These conversions apply not only to gismu, but to any word acting as a selbri. Remember go'i, for example, which stands in for the preceding sentence's bridi. Just as we did with dunda, we can construct a bridi like

lo go'i cu go'i lo se go'i lo te go'i lo ve go'i lo xe go'i

On its own, this sentence doesn't mean terribly much; it just repeats the previous sentence. But the trick is, this version of the sentence repeats the previous sentence, with its sumti appearing explicitly. This is how we can refer back to sumti in the previous sentence in general. For example,

.i la .suzyn. cu zgana lo nanmu goi ko'a .i ko'a melbi

can also be expressed as

.i la .suzyn. cu zgana lo nanmu .i lo se go'i cu melbi

That's because lo se go'i refers to the second place (x2) of the preceding bridi, which is lo nanmu. (There are even ways to refer back to sumti introduced by sumti tcita; but that's an advanced topic.)

Even some abstraction cmavo can be modified by se. For example, du'u, which can be used to form a selbri, has two sumti: x1, the thought described, and x2, the words used to express it:

lo la .djang. cu se pensi cu {du'u ri nelci la .suzyn. kei} lu do dirba mi li'u

Zhang's thing-thought (= what Zhang thought) is {the thought that he likes Susan}, put into the words “You are dear to me.”

That's why lo se du'u refers to words rather than thoughts.

Exercise 2

Come up with sumti for the following concepts, using the following gismu:

ciska

cmene

cpedu

fanva

klama

penmi

skicu

spusku

1. the destination
2. the route
3. the namer
4. the translation
5. the translator
6. the request
7. the meeting place
8. the writing implement
9. the description
10. the response

lujvo

We've already seen quite a few lujvo, or compound words, in the exercises; but we haven't actually made any of our own yet. Lojban has strict rules for making lujvo; you can't just crunch words together like English brunch or edutainment, because this might result in a word which sounds like something else, falls apart or makes intelligent computers repeat “Does not compute” in a tinny voice and blow up in a cloud of blue smoke. However, one safe way of making acceptable lujvo is by using the conversion cmavo we've just looked at.

se dunda, as we've seen, means ‘is given (by someone, to someone)'. We can turn this into a lujvo simply adding l to the se, to give seldunda. The new word comes complete with its own place-structure — which is, of course, the same as that of se dunda:

x1 is a gift from x2 to x3

If we want to say ‘the gift’, lo seldunda is not really an improvement on lo se dunda. However, most gismu have short combining forms (rafsi). These are never used on their own, only in lujvo. As it happens, dunda has two short forms: dud and du'a. We can't use dud, because that would give us a word ending in a consonant, and, as we know, only cmene can end in a consonant. (Some cmene do in fact use them for that reason.) The only candidate, then, is du'a, so ‘the gift’ is lo seldu'a. (seldu'a has exactly the same place structure as seldunda).

The same is true for the other conversion cmavo, though their corresponding rafsi don't all follow the same pattern:

se	sel-
te	ter-
ve	vel-
xe	xel-

So ‘the recipient’ is lo terdu'a.

In this way you can expand on the gismu list dramatically, to give equivalents of common English words which are not included and, more interestingly, words which don't have equivalents in English. A lot of these are words you would probably never want to say, like terna'e ‘x1 is the rule/logic by which proposition x2 contradicts/denies/refutes/negates proposition x3.' However, you sometimes find interesting and/or useful words which don't exist as single words in English. Here are a few of my own creations:

lo tertcu	a purpose/activity for which something is needed (from nitcu ‘need’)
lo ternu'e	a person to whom a promise is made (from nupre ‘promise’)
lo selvu'e	a moral standard (from vrude ‘be virtuous’)
lo selte'a	a scary thing (from terpa ‘fear’)
lo selcta	something/someone that is looked at (from catlu ‘look, examine’)
lo selta'i	something which wears you out (from tatpi ‘be tired/fatigued')
lo veltu'i	an area of agreement (from tugni ‘agree with’)
lo selzi'e	something you are free to do (from zifre ‘be free’)
lo selxei	an object of hate (from xebni ‘hate’)
lo selpa'i	an object of devotion (from prami ‘love, be devoted to’)

Warning

This method will always give you an acceptable lujvo — except in one case. Lojban does not allow double consonants, because they are difficult to pronounce, and can be heard incorrectly as one consonant. This means that we can't have lujvo like vellu'i (‘cleansing agent’, from the x4 of lumci ‘wash’). The way out of this problem is to put y between the two ls, giving us velylu'i.

In fact, if you see y in a Lojban word, it cannot be a gismu or a cmavo (with two exceptions we've already seen: .y. ‘er...’ and letters of the alphabet like .y'y. and dy.) Such a word can only be either a lujvo or a name (cmene). y was purposefully avoided in ‘normal’ Lojban words.

Negative lujvo

Just as se has the combining form sel, the negative na'e has the combining form nal, and we can use this to make lujvo in exactly the same way.

For example, jdice means ‘decide’ and has the short combining form jdi. naljdi therefore means ‘not decide’ or ‘be indecisive’. Some other examples:

lo naljmi	one who does not understand (from jimpe ‘understand’)
lo naljvi	a non-competitor (from jivna ‘compete’)
lo nalkri	a non-believer/skeptic (from krici ‘believe’)
lo nalyla'e	an unlikely event (from lakne ‘be likely’)
lo nalre'a	a non-human (from remna ‘be human’)

We can see that nal is like the English non-, but we need to remember that non- sometimes has other meanings or associations that nal does not have. lo naljvi is simply someone who is not taking part in a competition, not a ‘non-contender’ in the sense of someone who competes but doesn't stand a chance of winning. Similarly lo nalre'a is someone who is not a member of the species homo sapiens (e.g. a chimpanzee or Klingon), and cannot be applied to someone who is inhumane or perceived as subhuman in some way.

We can also use nal with sel and its relatives; for example,

lo naltertcu	not a purpose/activity for which something is needed; something which has no requirements (from nitcu ‘x1 needs/requires/is dependent on/[wants] necessity x2 for purpose/action/stage of process x3')
lo nalveltu'i	an area of disagreement; a controversial issue (from tugni ‘x1 [person] agrees with person(s)/position/side x2 that x3 (du'u) is true about matter x4')
lo nalselzi'e	something you are not free to do (from zifre ‘x1 is free/at liberty to do/be x2 (event/state) under conditions x3')
lo nalselsanji	something you are unaware of (from sanji ‘x1 is conscious/aware of x2 (object/abstract); x1 discerns/recognizes x2 (object/abstract)'; this gismu has no suitable short combining form)
lo nalselse'i	someone who lacks a self/ego; an enlightened person according to Hindu/Buddhist philosophy (from sevzi ‘x1 is a self/ego/id/identity-image of x2')

As you'll have guessed, the companions of na'e, namely to'e and no'e, have rafsi of their own: tol- and nor-, respectively. So ‘disinterested’, ‘uninterested’ and ‘bored’ in Lojban are norselci'i, nalselci'i and tolselci'i.

lujvo can be much more interesting than this; interesting enough, in fact, that we won't be covering them any further here. You can make lujvo out of pretty much any tanru you can devise; this is the main way to introduce ‘new words’ into Lojban. But to make the lujvo you come up with work, you need some background knowledge:

• how to make sure rafsi in a word stick together unambiguously in Lojban grammar (The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 4.5–4.6, 4.10–4.12).
• how to make sure the gismu inside your tanru group together properly (The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 5).
• how to derive the place structure of the lujvo from the place structures of the gismu that make it up (The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 12).

It's worth your while to look into these issues if you'll be using the language seriously, and especially if you'll be writing in it. (lujvo are easier to deal with while writing than while speaking, because you have the time to reflect on how you'll be creating your new word.) At this stage, though, you don't need to go into all that just yet.

Exercise 3

If you have access to a gismu list, use it to look up gismu and make lujvo meaning the following, using short combining forms where possible and nal- where necessary.

1. a television
2. a subject of conversation
3. someone who is deceived or cheated
4. an immoral or amoral (not virtuous) person
5. a railroad
6. an insignificant event
7. something unseen
8. something about which you have no feelings/emotions

Reflexives

Let's now look at a slightly embellished version of the plot-advancing example sentence from Lesson 7, involving Zhang and Susan:

la .suzyn. na djuno fi lo nei fe lo du'u la .djang. cu cinynei sy.

Susan doesn't know about herself that Zhang fancies (‘sexually-likes’) her.

We have snuck into the sentence a new construct: lo nei.

nei alone links to the current bridi. Just like go'i links to the previous bridi. They both belong to selma'o GOhA.

Now lo nei means ‘the first sumti of this bridi’, lo se nei - ‘the second sumti of this bridi’, lo te nei - ‘the third sumti of this bridi’ and so on. In practice, lo nei is used quite a lot, while the others are rarer; but that could be because people still tend to think in terms of natural languages, where only the equivalent of lo nei is usual. Those equivalents are reflexives — words like herself, itself, and so on; and lo nei is very handy for expressing them. As people start thinking more in Lojban, the others could get used more.

Here are some more straightforward examples of its use:

la meilis. cu pensi lo nei

Mei Li thinks about herself.

lo gerku cu batci lo nei

The dog bites itself.

You can also say

mi nelci lo nei

I like myself.

but this is the same as mi nelci mi, which is simpler.

Okay, this is all well and good when your sentence only contains one bridi. But when it doesn't — and it often doesn't — we have a problem. In

la .kris. cu djuno lodu'u la .pat. cu prami lo nei

Chris knows that Pat loves herself

lo nei refers to la .pat.

In order to refer always to the first sumti of the sentence we can use the word vo'a.

la .kris. cu djuno lodu'u la .pat. cu prami vo'a

Chris knows that Pat loves her.

Here is the difference. lo nei refers to the first sumti of the current bridi. And vo'a refers to the first sumti of the current sentence.

When there are no embedded bridi those two words mean the same. But as you can see not in this case.

Template:Talkquote Some Lojbanists in order to get long-distance reflexives use ra, which is deliberately as vague as natural language pronouns.

vo'a belongs to selma'o KOhA4. Here are other words of this selma'o.

• vo'e refers to the second sumti of the current sentence.
• vo'i refers to the third sumti of the current sentence.
• vo'o refers to the 4th sumti of the current sentence.
• vo'u refers to the 5th sumti of the current sentence.

Summary

This lesson has introduced the following:

• Converting sentences (swapping round sumti) using se and its relatives;
• Making sumti from places other than x1 by the same method;
• Making lujvo using sel-, vel- etc. and short combining forms (rafsi);
• Making negative lujvo using nal-.
• Expressing reflexives using lo nei and vo'a.

Vocabulary

berti	x1 is to the north/northern side [right-hand-rule pole] of x2 according to frame of reference x3
cinta	x1 [material] is a paint of pigment/active substance x2, in a base of x3
cpina	x1 is pungent/piquant/peppery/spicy/irritating to sense x2
ctebi	x1 is a/the lip [body-part]/rim of orifice x2 of body x3; (adjective:) x1 is labial
fanza	x1 (event) annoys/irritates/bothers/distracts x2
jarbu	x1 is a suburban area of city/metropolis x2
jmina	x1 adds/combines x2 to/with x3, with result x4; x1 augments x2 by amount x3
jukpa	x1 cooks/prepares food-for-eating x2 by recipe/method x3 (process)
kisto	x1 reflects Pakistani/Pashto culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
klaji	x1 is a street/avenue/lane/drive/cul-de-sac/way/alley/[road] at x2 accessing x3
minra	x1 reflects/mirrors/echoes x2 [object/radiation] to observer/point x3 as x4; x2 bounces on x1
nitcu	x1 needs/requires/is dependent on/[wants] necessity x2 for purpose/action/stage of process x3
snanu	x1 is to the south/southern side of x2 according to frame of reference x3

Exercise 4

Translate from Lojban; some of the places used here are contorted into quite non-English forms, but try and be as idiomatic as possible.

1. .i lo karce pe la .djiotis. cu xe klama lo gusta fu la .djiotis je la .ranjit je la .suzyn.
2. .i la .suzyn. cu catlu lo ve minra pe lo nei
3. .i lo go'i cu jmina fi lo ctebi cinta pe lo nei
4. .i ca lonu go'i kei la .suzyn. cu simxu te minra la .ranjit.
5. .i la .suzyn. cu reisku fi la .djiotis. fe lu .i ma te klaji fi ti li'u
6. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i lo kisto jarbu
7. .i lo vu se jukpa cu mutce cpina li'u
8. .i la .djiotis. cu se fanza cusku lu .i ma'a doi ranjit. do'u klama lo berti lo snanu
9. .i pe'i lo ve klama pe lo gusta na te djuno fi do li'u

Answers to Exercises

Exercise 1

1. lenu jamna cu se fengu
2. la .djang. cu te xatra [mi ti] (Whether or not you include the mi and ti depends on whether they are important in this context — probably they are obvious and can be missed out).
3. loi jdini cu ve xlura mi lonu cliva lo gugde (“Money is an inducement for me to emigrate.”)
4. la lojban. cu ve tavla fo lo prenu (“There is a conversation in Lojban.” We don't need lo prenu, though, since we can assume that it is people chatting in Lojban and not, say, chimpanzees).
5. mi te dunda lo cukta lo prenu

Exercise 2

1. lo se klama
2. lo ve klama
3. lo te cmene
4. lo xe fanva
5. lo fanva (Hope you weren't fooled!)
6. lo ve cpedu (lo se cpedu is what you ask for, not your request)
7. lo te penmi
8. lo ve ciska
9. lo ve skicu
10. lo se spusku

Exercise 3

1. lo veltivni
2. lo terta'a
3. lo seltcica
4. lo nalvu'e
5. lo teryre'e
6. lo nalvai
7. lo nalselvi'a
8. lo naltercni

Exercise 4

1. Jyoti's car is the means by which Jyoti, Ranjeet and Susan get to the restaurant.
2. Susan looks at her reflection. (This is the more Lojbanic version of “looks at herself in the mirror.” There are other ways to say this, but we haven't covered the requisite grammar yet).
3. She puts on more lipstick. (Literally, “She adds to her lip paint.)”
4. When this is happening, Susan and Ranjeet see each other's reflection.
5. Susan asks Jyoti, “Where does this street go to?”
6. Ranjeet says, “The Pakistani suburb.”
7. “The cuisine there is very spicy.”
8. Jyoti irritatedly says, “We, Ranjeet, have been going from south to north” (i.e. from south to north).
9. “I think the way of (= to) the restaurant is unknown to you.”

Chapter 9. Let me qualify that: internal sumti and relative clauses

Internal sumti

The business of a selbri (as you hopefully remember from Lesson 2) is to point out a relationship between one or more things (its sumti.) So when you say dunda, you mean that there's a giver, a receiver, and a gift involved. When you say klama, you mean that there's a traveller, a destination, an origin, a route, and a means of transportation involved. When you say mensi, you mean that there's someone who is a sister, and someone that she's a sister of. And so on.

Now, when we put an article in front of a selbri, we turn it into a sumti. But the selbri within a sumti remains a selbri: it still indicates that there's a relationship between some sumti of its own. If you say lo dunda, you still mean that there is something the ‘donor’ is giving, and someone they are giving it to. If you say lo xe klama, you still mean that there is someone going in the ‘vehicle’, somewhere they are going to, somewhere they are coming from, and some route they are taking. And as we've already hinted, it is meaningless just to say lo mensi, just as we don't say the sister in English: a sister is always a sister of someone.

Previously, we have used pe to attach sumti to other sumti, in order to narrow things down. But that doesn't necessarily mean that what follows pe is a sumti of what comes before it. So if I describe my sister as lo mensi pe mi ‘my sister’, for example, that might be the same as saying zo'e (= my sister) mensi mi. But if I say lo jdini pe mi ‘my money’, I certainly do not mean zo'e jdini mi — that I am the mint which issued the money! Obviously pe won't do as a general solution to filling in the selbri you might need.

If you have a selbri contained inside a sumti, the way to give it a sumti of its own (an internal sumti) is to add it in with be. You'll remember (we hope!) that, when a selbri gets an article, its meaning is the x1 place of that selbri. By default, be fills in the x2 place of the sumti. So:

la renas. cu mensi mi

Rena is my sister

lo mensi be mi

My sister

la renas. cu te dunda lo cukta

Rena is given the book

lo te dunda be lo cukta

The recipient of the book

la renas. cu klama la .sidnis.

Rena is going to Sydney

lo klama be la .sidnis.

The one going to Sydney

As you can see, be can translate — often but not always — to English of. In fact, it covers surprisingly many of the functions of of. And because it is tied to a specific place of the sumti, its relation to the main sumti is unambiguous (another one of Lojban's ‘selling points’!)

Exercise 1

What do these sumti mean in English?

1. lo vecnu be lo cukta
2. lo cliva be la .sanfransiskos.
3. lo xe klama be la .sanfransiskos.
4. lo se xabju be la .renas.
5. lo detri be lonu mi cliva
6. lo pendo be lo penmi be la .ranjit.

More internal sumti

If you want to add a sumti to a place other than x2, you can use a FA tag. So:

la renas. cu klama fi la .melbn.

Rena is going from Melbourne

lo klama be fi la .melbn.

The one going from Melbourne

ti xatra fo lei dinske

This is a letter about economics

lo xatra be fo lei dinske

The letter about economics

If you want to be really thorough, you can add more than one sumti to the selbri in your sumti. The extra sumti are added in with bei, not be. This (like many things in Lojban) is to avoid ambiguity: if we just used be again, the new sumti would be considered a sumti of the sumti you just added, rather than the original sumti!

OK, that wasn't terribly clear. Let me illustrate:

la renas. cu klama {lo jarbu be la .melbn.}

Rena is going to a suburb of Melbourne

lo klama {be lo jarbu be la .melbn.}

The one going to a suburb of Melbourne

la renas. cu klama {lo jarbu} {la melbn.}

Rena is going to a suburb, from Melbourne

lo klama {be lo jarbu} {bei la .melbn.}

The one going to a suburb, from Melbourne

This means, by the way, that you can nest sumti inside sumti inside sumti, up to and including the point where you fry your brain. To hold off on frying your brain just a little, you need to be able to say “this is where the list of nested sumti stops” — at least at the current level of nesting. That means a terminator, of course, and the terminator corresponding to be is be'o. Armed with this little word, you can come up with phrases like these:

lo xatra be la .djang. bei la .suzyn.

The letter to Zhang from Susan

la .djiotis. cu mrilu ti la .ranjit.

Jyoti mails this to Ranjeet

la .djiotis. cu mrilu lo xatra be la .djang. bei la .suzyn. la .ranjit.

Jyoti mails {Susan's letter to Zhang} to Ranjeet

lo mrilu be lo xatra be la .djang. bei la .suzyn. be'o bei la .ranjit.

The one who mails {Susan's letter to Zhang} to Ranjeet

lo mrilu be lo xatra be la .djang. bei la .suzyn. ____ bei la .ranjit.

The one who mails {Susan's letter to Zhang about Ranjeet}

For example:

mi penmi {lo pendo be la .ranjit. [be'o]} lo barja

I met Ranjeet's friend in the bar

In such a phrase, the be'o can (and will) be left out.

Vocabulary

cidjrkari	curry. Yes, this is a very odd-looking word; we'll explain why in a little while.
ctuca	x1 teaches audience x2 ideas/methods/lore x3 (du'u) about subject(s) x4 by method x5 (event)

Exercise 2

Convert the following selbri to sumti, by substituting ti with lo. Use be, bei and be'o as needed to link the existing sumti in to the new sumti. If you feel up to it, translate the sumti into as colloquial English as you can manage.

1. ti fanza la .suzyn.
2. ti te jukpa loi cidjrkari
3. ti klaji lo barja lo gusta
4. ti se nitcu fi lonu jukpa loi cidjrkari
5. ti se nitcu la .ranjit. lonu jukpa loi cidjrkari
6. ti se reisku fu lei xumske fe la .djang. fi lo ctuca
7. ti kansa lo ctuca be la .ranjit.
8. ti kansa lo ctuca be la .ranjit. lonu pinxe loi birje (Hint: be careful about this one!)

Internal sumti tcita

Using be, you can attach the default places of a selbri to it when it acts as a sumti. But default places aren't the only places a selbri can have. We have seen in Lesson 5 that sumti tcita and tense cmavo can be used to add new sumti to a selbri. You can add these kinds of places as internal sumti, as well. This can often be useful. For example, if I wanted to say

This letter, dated the 4th, was mailed on the 7th

I could try

lo vi xatra de'i li vo cu se mrilu de'i li ze

But this would not work at all. A date tagged with de'i applies to the whole bridi, and can appear anywhere in that bridi. So there's no actual way of telling that either date applies to the letter specifically. (Mere position is not enough to do it in Lojban.) What we want to say is that the former date applies just to the letter, and the latter date applies to the mailing of the letter. This means that the 4th, as a date, applies only to the sumti, lo xatra, and not to the entire bridi. So it is an internal sumti:

lo vi xatra be de'i li vo cu se mrilu de'i li ze

Much better. Still not usable everywhere, though. In particular, you won't be able to attach a sumti to something like a cmene, because it won't contain a selbri. In that case, you would use pe rather than be in front of the sumti tcita.

Huh? Well, let's try it slower. Take fi'e: a sumti tcita meaning ‘authored by’ (from finti.) Now, fi'e, like by in English, tends to apply only to specific things, and not to events: you say “a book by Dickens” or “a sonata by Mozart”, not “Jim went to the zoo, by Norman Mailer.” (OK, you can say “Jim Went To The Zoo, by Norman Mailer” if Jim Went To The Zoo is the name of a book. But then by Norman Mailer is still attached to a thing, and not to an event.) So fi'e is almost always used as an internal sumti. This means you can say

lo cukta be fi'e la .dikens.

So how do I say “Oliver Twist by Dickens is very good”? I could say

la .Oliver.tuist. be fi'e la .dikens. cu mutce xamgu

But that looks kind of odd: .Oliver.tuist is not really a selbri, so it is strange to say that it actually has sumti places of its own. (As it turns out, in fact, this is considered ungrammatical in Lojban.) But if you say

la .Oliver.tuist. pe fi'e la .dikens. cu mutce xamgu

you aren't really committing to .Oliver.tuist being a selbri; you're merely saying that the phrase “authored by Dickens” is closely associated with the thing you're calling la .Oliver.tuist.

Vocabulary

kakne	x1 is able to do/be/capable of doing/being x2 (event/state) under conditions x3 (event/state)
lidne	x1 precedes/leads x2 in sequence x3; x1 is former/preceding/previous; x2 is latter/following
pluja	x1 is complex/complicated/involved in aspect/property x2 (ka) by standard x3

Exercise 3

Translate the following sentences into Lojban. The highlighted terms are to be attached into the sentence with sumti tcita; we give you the sumti tcita you need for each sentence. You'll have to work out whether the highlighted term is an internal sumti (in which case use be or pe to link it in), or a normal sumti.

1. I mail you in Lojban (bau: in language..., from bangu ‘language’)
2. I give you a book in Lojban (bau: in language..., from bangu ‘language’)
3. According to Jyoti, Ranjeet is foolish (cu'u: as said by..., from cusku ‘express’)
4. So named by Susan, ‘Chemistry Irritant’ drinks German beer (te me'e: as a name used by..., from te cmene ‘name’)
5. Names in Lojban are preceded by ‘la’ (se pa'u: as a part of..., from se pagbu ‘have as a part’. There's a trick to the quotation here (and you do need to use a quotation); check Lesson 7 again..).
6. City roads are very complicated; for example, Ranjeet cannot go to the Pakistani restaurant (mu'u: exemplified by..., from mupli ‘example’)

Relative clauses

Nesting sumti within sumti goes a long way towards pinning down what exactly we mean; but it's not always going to work. If for example, I have two sisters, I can point out that they are mensi be mi until I'm blue in the face; but that won't go any further towards distinguishing one from the other. What I'd want to do instead is introduce a new bridi into the mix: the sister I'm talking about is the one who doesn't like Ricky Martin, say, or the one you saw at the restaurant last night. Similarly, if I'm talking about two different Pakistani restaurants, pointing out that the type of food they serve is Pakistani (gusta be loi kisto) doesn't go very far in differentiating them; pointing out the one which is north of town, or the one I eat curry at, does.

What I want, in other words, are relative clauses. In fact, they are what I've just used in English: phrases like who doesn't like Ricky Martin; [which] I eat curry at; and so on. These clauses contain a verb and nouns in English: they correspond to Lojban bridi, though they might be missing a word or two. What we need in Lojban is some way of connecting a bridi like this to a sumti — without necessarily the peculiarities of words like who and that.

Lojban allows this: you connect a relative clause — a bridi narrowing down what a sumti means — by using poi. And just as with nu and its relatives (those other words which nest bridi inside bridi in Lojban), you want a terminator to say “the relative clause is over, the rest of these words belong to the main bridi now.” That terminator is ku'o.

So let's try this out. How would we say “You talked to my sister — the one who doesn't like Ricky Martin — about economics”? Let's take it by steps:

do pu tavla lo mi mensi loi dinske

You talked to my sister about economics.

lo mi mensi na nelci la .rikis.martin.

My sister does not like Ricky Martin.

do pu tavla lo mi mensi {poi lo mi mensi na nelci la .rikis.martin. ku'o} loi dinske

You talked to my sister who doesn't like Ricky Martin about economics.

Notice that you needed the ku'o there, to keep the relative clause out of the hair of the main bridi. Otherwise, loi dinske would be a sumti of nelci and not tavla — which is not really what you want. Just as with nu and kei, though, Lojbanists will normally make sure they don't have to use ku'o, by little tricks like making sure the relative clause comes just before cu — which shuts every open clause down.

Here's another example:

mi klama lo gusta be loi kisto

I go to the Pakistani restaurant.

lo gusta be loi kisto cu berti lo tcadu

The Pakistani restaurant is north of town.

mi klama lo gusta be loi kisto be'o {poi ra berti lo tcadu}

I go to the Pakistani restaurant which is north of town.

ke'a

We're almost there; but you'll notice we've repeated lo mi mensi twice. We might have tried using ri to refer back to lo mi mensi. But you'll remember from the exercises to Lesson 7 the acute pain associated with using ri: we should be avoiding it where possible. (In this instance, in fact, we can't use it properly anyway, because a sumti includes its relative clause; so ri would not be referring back to a completed sumti, like it's supposed to: the risk of insane recursion is just too great.) A similar problem arises with ra referring back to lo gusta be loi kisto: ra isn't particularly precise, so if at all possible we'd like to use a less ambiguous sumti in its place.

Fortunately, we can avoid ri and ra after all: relative clauses in Lojban have a special pro-sumti, ke'a, which like who and which in English points back to the sumti you've been talking about. So now, we can make a stab at all four relative clauses in our example:

lo mi mensi poi ke'a na nelci la .rikis.martin.

My sister, such that she doesn't like Ricky Martin.

My sister who doesn't like Ricky Martin.

lo mi mensi poi do viska ke'a ca lo purlamcte

My sister, such that you saw her at the restaurant during the immediately-preceding-night.

My sister whom you saw at the restaurant last night.

{lo gusta be loi kisto be'o} poi ke'a berti lo tcadu

The restaurant of Pakistani things such that it is north of the city.

The Pakistani restaurant which is north of town.

(The be'o is needed, because what you're describing as being north is the restaurant, not the Pakistani cuisine it serves).

lo gusta be loi kisto be'o poi mi citka loi cidjrkari ne'i ke'a

The restaurant of Pakistani things, such that I eat curry in it.

The Pakistani restaurant [that] I eat curry in.

The Pakistani restaurant where I eat curry.

To make things somewhat more succinct, there exists a convention that, when a relative clause is missing its ke'a, you fill it in at the first available empty place. Which means, if the bridi after poi has nothing in its x1 place, that's where the ke'a goes. If it has an x1 place but no x2 place, then that's where ke'a goes. (This way, poi-clauses look a little more like most languages' relative clauses, as they don't use a distinct word for ke'a and poi.) So our example phrases become:

lo mi mensi poi na nelci la .rikis.martin.

lo mi mensi poi do viska ca lo purlamcte

lo gusta be loi kisto be'o poi berti lo tcadu

lo gusta be loi kisto be'o poi mi citka loi cidjrkari ne'i ke'a

The last sentence hasn't changed: the convention does not apply to non-default places (like sumti tcita and spatial ‘tense’ places), since they don't follow a predictable order.

lo mi mensi poi na nelci la .rikis.martin. zi'e poi do viska ca lo purlamcte

My sister who doesn't like Ricky Martin and whom you saw last night.

Exercise 4

Combine the following pairs of sentences into single sentences. In each case, make the second sentence a relative clause modifying the highlighted sumti in the first sentence. The highlighted sumti in the second sentence is the same as that in the first, and will turn into ke'a; leave ke'a out, where the convention allows it. Also leave out ku'o where this would not result in ambiguity. For example:

.i mi viska lo botpi .i lo botpi cu culno 

.i mi viska lo botpi poi culno

Watch out for any terminators you may have to insert!

1. .i lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu lo nanmu .i lo nanmu cu citka loi cidjrkari
2. .i lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu lo nanmu .i lo cifnu cu kakne loka citka
3. .i lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu lo nanmu .i mi pu viska lo ninmu vi lo barja
4. .i lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu lo nanmu .i lonu mi viska lo ninmu cu nandu
5. .i mi viska va lo barja lo ninmu .i mi klama lo barja lo briju
6. .i ca lonu mi klama lo barja lo briju kei mi penmi lo nanmu .i lo barja cu snanu lo briju
7. .i mi viska lo kansa be lo ninmu .i lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu lo kansa be lo ninmu

8. .i mi kakne loka citka loi cidjrkari .i lenu citka loi cidjrkari cu nandu

Restrictive and non-restrictive

We've learnt how to use relative clauses to narrow things down. But not all relative clauses are used for that purpose. Sometimes they are used just to supply extra information about someone or something whose identity we've already worked out. For example, if I say

Lojban, which is descended from (Institute) Loglan, has a public domain grammar

I'm hardly saying that Lojban is descended from Institute Loglan, in order to distinguish it from the scores of Lojbans not descended from Loglan! Instead, I'm providing extra, incidental information, to fill in the listener or reader.

This means that there are two kinds of relative clause: restrictive, like we've been discussing until now, and non-restrictive, like what we've just seen. The grammar of these kinds of relative clause is different in many languages. In American English, for example, style guides recommend that you keep who and which for non-restrictives, and use that for restrictives. (“The Lojban that I learned in 1993 is somewhat different from contemporary Lojban.”) Furthermore, non-restrictive relative clauses in English usually have a comma in front of them, in writing, and a little pause in front of them, in speaking: this kind of clause is pretty much a parenthetical remark, and is marked out like one.

Lojban distinguishes between the two kinds of relative clause by the word that introduces them: non-restrictive relative clauses start with noi, rather than poi. Otherwise, their grammar is identical:

la lojban. noi [ke'a] se dzena la .loglan. pe lo ckule cu se gerna lo gubni

Lojban, which (non-restrictive) [it] has-the-ancestor Loglan-of-the-institute, has-as-its-grammar something-public

(Yes, that's the old “cu closing off everything in its wake” trick in action).

Exercise 5

Are the relative clauses in the following English sentences restrictive or non-restrictive? We've left off any punctuation hints like commas or choice of correct relativisers, so some sentences will sound a little odd.

1. This is the way that the world ends.
2. I saw the same waiter that I saw last night.
3. This is my friend Zhang that I already told you about.
4. Then came a full train that I wasn't going to bother boarding.
5. I'm doing the best that I can.
6. Radiophones that are generally known as radios are prevalent at the majority of work places.
7. I don't like what has happened.
8. I live in the city centre where the rent is more expensive.

Summary

In this lesson, we have covered the following:

• Internal sumti (be, bei, be'o);
• Internal sumti attached with sumti tcita (pe, fi'e);
• Restrictive relative clauses (poi, ku'o, ke'a)
• Non-restrictive relative clauses (noi, ne)

Vocabulary

bartu	x1 is on the outside of x2; x1 is exterior to x2
cacra	x1 is x2 hours in duration (default is 1 hour) by standard x3
fonxa	x1 is a telephone transceiver/modem attached to system/network x2
janco	x1 is a/the shoulder/hip/joint [body-part] attaching limb/extremity x2 to body x3
jgari	x1 grasps/holds/clutches/seizes/grips/[hugs] x2 with x3 (part of x1) at locus x4 (part of x2)
jgita	x1 is a guitar/violin/fiddle/harp [stringed musical instrument] with actuator/plectrum/bow x2
jgitrviolino	x1 is a violin
jundi	x1 is attentive towards/attends/tends/pays attention to object/affair x2
kanla	x1 is a/the eye [body-part] of x2; [metaphor: sensory apparatus]; (adjective:) x1 is ocular
kerfa	x1 is a/the hair/fur [body-part] of x2 at body location x3
mintu	x1 is the same/identical thing as x2 by standard x3; (x1 and x2 interchangeable)
moi	convert number to ordinal selbri; x1 is (n)th member of set x2 ordered by rule x3
nenri	x1 is in/inside/within x2; x1 is on the inside/interior of x2 [totally within the bounds of x2]
simsa	x1 is similar/parallel to x2 in property/quantity x3 (ka/ni); x1 looks/appears like x2
sazri	x1 operates/drives/runs x2 [apparatus/machine] with goal/objective/use/end/function x3
secau	sumti tcita: without... (from se claxu ‘lacked’)
zgike	x1 is music performed/produced by x2 (event)

Exercise 6

Translate from Lojban:

1. .i bazi lo cacra be li pimu lo karce cu zvati lo kisto gusta
2. .i la .djiotis. noi sazri lo karce cu fengu la .ranjit. lonu na jundi lo ve klama
3. .i la .ranjit. cu simxu jundi la .suzyn.
4. .i la .ranjit. ca tavla la .suzyn. loi zgike pe fi'e la .ioxan.sebastian.bax.
5. .i la .suzyn. na se cinri loka jundi loi zgike pe la .bax. noi ke'a dotco
6. .i ku'i la .suzyn. cu mutce se cinri lonu jundi lo kanla be la .ranjit.
7. .i la .suzyn. nelci loka zgana lo kerfa be la .ranjit. bei lo ctebi be'o noi zo'e pe la .lex.va,uensas. cu simsa
8. .i la .djiotis. noi denpa vi lo bartu be lo gusta cu sazri lo se bevri fonxa ne la .nokias.
9. .i cusku lu .i coi jan. mi'e djiotis.
10. .i ko penmi mi'a vi lo dansydi'u pe vi la re moi klaji ba lo cacra be li re li'u

Exercise 7

Translate into Lojban:

1. When Jyoti goes to the interior of the restaurant, Susan asks her “Where were you?”
2. Jyoti says “I was talking to a friend I forgot to talk to earlier.”
3. Susan says “Ranjeet was telling me that Bach's music is like Pakistani music in its complexity.”
4. Jyoti says “Susan, you think anything without a guitar is complex.”
5. Ranjeet says “The violin is identical to the guitar one carries on the shoulder.”
6. Jyoti says “Ranjeet is identical to one unable to go to a restaurant north of town.”
7. “What will you be eating?”
8. Susan and Ranjeet stare at each other.
9. Jyoti, who is bored by the staring, asks for the carrier (= waiter) to her left to come.

Answers to Exercises

Exercise 1

1. The seller of the book.
2. The one leaving from San Francisco.
3. The vehicle going to San Francisco. (mi klama la .sanfransiskos. fu lo karce  lo karce cu xe klama la .sanfransiskos. fu mi)
4. The dwelling of Rena. (la renas. xabju lo zdani  lo zdani cu se xabju la .renas).
5. The date of my leaving; the date of my departure.
6. The friend of the one meeting Ranjeet; the friend of the ‘meet-er’ of Ranjeet. (Yes indeed, internal sumti can nest. Somehow, I don't think you're really all that surprised..).

Exercise 2

1. lo fanza be la .suzyn.: Susan's annoyance, what annoyed Susan
2. lo te jukpa be loi cidjrkari: the recipe for curry
3. lo klaji be lo barja bei lo gusta: the road at (or from) the bar to the restaurant
4. lo se nitcu be fi lonu jukpa loi cidjrkari: the requirements for cooking curry. (loi cidjrkari is safely tucked away inside the lonu jukpa abstraction, so there's no reason that be need be worried about it).
5. lo se nitcu be la .ranjit. bei lonu jukpa loi cidjrkari: Ranjeet's requirements for cooking curry
6. lo se reisku be la .djang. bei lo ctuca bei fu lei xumske: Zhang's question about chemistry to the teacher
7. lo kansa be lo ctuca be la .ranjit.: the one with Ranjeet's teacher, Ranjeet's teacher's partner
8. lo kansa be lo ctuca be la .ranjit. be'o bei lonu pinxe loi birje: Ranjeet's teacher's partner in drinking beer.

Note: You absolutely must have that be'o there; otherwise, lonu pinxe loi birje would be the x3 sumti not of kansa (the collaborative effort), but of ctuca (the subject taught). The meaning would then be “The partner of Ranjeet's teacher about drinking beer.” Remember, Lojban words attach to the words closest to them, unless a terminator intervenes).

Of course, you would never say lo ctuca be la .ranjit. bei lo nu pinxe loi birje, because you've noticed that the x3 of ctuca is a fact (du'u) and not an event (nu) — and you would never get the two confused. Right?

Exercise 3

1. mi mrilu fi do bau la .lojban.
2. mi dunda lo cukta be bau la .lojban. do (The book is in Lojban; the giving is not).
3. cu'u la .djiotis. la .ranjit. cu bebna (Since Jyoti said the whole bridi, the sumti applies to the whole bridi — so it cannot be ‘internal’).
4. la xumske fanza ku pe te me'e la .suzyn. cu pinxe loi dotco birje (Yes, trick question. Despite where so named by Susan sits in the sentence, it applies only to the studious person of Zhang, and not to his preferences in alcohol).

Tip: The need for ku in the sentence above is very deep voodoo, so there's no need for you to be particularly concerned about it (yet). As The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 8.6 points out, without the ku any qualifying phrase becomes part of the name.

To illustrate this, consider the old parlor trick of calling someone Nobody. This is a device as old as Homer, and is used to work in jokes like “Nobody hurt me!” Lojban disallows this kind of ambiguity (consider why), so this kind of joke is impossible in the language. (The notorious Who's on First? sketch by Abbott & Costello is un-Lojbanisable for the same reason.) But you'll still want to talk about people called Nobody.

So suppose you're talking about the Greek Nobody (Homer's Oútis), and comparing him to the Latin Nobody (Jules Verne's Captain Nemo). And in a pique of Lojban purism, you decide to refer to both with Lojbanised names — la nomei. If now you want to say “The Greek Nobody”, you can't say la nomei poi xelso. That would mean that Odysseus identified himself to the Cyclops not as Nobody, but as Nobody Who Is Greek (something like Oútis Hòs Akhaiós in Greek.) You want to make sure that the cmene is over before the relative clause begins. Since this cmene contains a selbri, it is terminated with ku: la nomei ku poi xelso. If you'd stuck with la .utis., the pause would have been signal enough that the cmene is over, so the issue would not arise.

No, of course you weren't meant to know all that. But aren't you happy you know it now?

1. loi cmene be se pa'u la .lojban. [cu] se lidne lo'u la le'u (Hope you remembered to put la .inside the Lojban ‘error’ quotes lo'u ... le'u! You can't use lu ... li'u, because la .by itself doesn't make sense as a fragment of Lojban).
2. loi tcadu klaji cu mutce pluja mu'u lonu la .ranjit. na kakne loka klama lo kisto gusta (Ranjeet's navigational difficulties are an illustration of the complexity of city streets — not of the streets themselves).

Exercise 4

1. .i lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu lo nanmu poi citka loi cidjrkari “The woman gives the baby to the man who eats curry”
2. .i lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu poi kakne loka citka ku'o lo nanmu “The woman gives the baby who can eat to the man” (If you did not insert ku'o, you would be claiming that the infant can eat the man!)
3. .i lo ninmu poi mi pu viska vi lo barja cu dunda lo cifnu lo nanmu “The woman I saw at the bar gives the baby to the man” (Despite the presence of vi lo barja, ke'a can be dropped off, since it occupies the first available default place in its bridi).
4. .i lo ninmu poi lonu mi viska ke'a cu nandu cu dunda lo cifnu lo nanmu “The woman that it is difficult for me to see gives the baby to the man” (ke'a cannot be dropped off, since it doesn't occupy a default place of the relative clause bridi, but rather a nested place inside an abstraction within the bridi).
5. .i mi viska va lo barja poi mi klama fi lo briju ku'o lo ninmu “I saw, some way away from the bar that I go to from work, the woman” (The x2 place of klama is left empty as the place where ke'a belongs; so now you have to insert fi to make sure lo briju is the origin, not the destination. You also need to insert ku'o; otherwise lo ninmu becomes a sumti of klama instead of viska: the woman becomes not who you see, but the route you take to the bar (!) ).
6. .i ca lonu mi klama lo barja poi snanu lo briju ku'o lo briju kei mi penmi lo nanmu “While going to the bar [which is] south of the office from the office, I meet the man” (Again, ku'o needs to be inserted, to prevent lo briju being incorporated into snanu: “going to the bar south of the office from the office's perspective,” rather than “going from the office to the bar south of the office.”
7. .i mi viska lo kansa be lo ninmu be'o poi lo ninmu cu dunda lo cifnu “I see the woman's companion, who the woman gave the baby to” (You must insert be'o, so that the relative clause applies to the entire sumti, lo kansa be lo ninmu. Otherwise, it will apply only to the sumti it is right next to, lo ninmu: “I see the companion of the woman the woman gave the baby to.”)
8. .i mi kakne loka citka loi cidjrkari kei poi nandu “I can eat curry, which is difficult” (Again, you must insert kei, so that the relative clause applies to the entire abstraction. Otherwise, what is difficult is not eating the curry, but the curry itself).

Exercise 5

1. Restrictive: the way is pretty meaningless unless you say what it is the way of.
2. Restrictive: again, the same waiter is being uniquely identified by the relative clause, and is otherwise pretty opaque.
3. Non-restrictive: normally, the description my friend Zhang should be doing a good job of identifying who is being talked about.
4. Non-restrictive: although this is an indefinite noun phrase in English, the relative clause given doesn't make it any more definite: I'd be saying the same about any full train.
5. Restrictive: the best is meaningless without the following relative clause.
6. Non-restrictive: obviously, this is merely providing an alternative name for the same thing.
7. Restrictive: in fact, this is what is called in English a headless relativiser — not because the relative clause is about decapitated horsemen in Washington Irving short stories, but because there is no noun (‘head’) there for the relative clause to narrow down at all! So the relative clause ends up supplying all the information on what is being talked about. That's as restrictive as it gets. Lojban would use a fairly empty ‘head’ to translate this — something like da.
8. Non-restrictive — unless you live in a city with multiple city centres. In which case I'd move away, if I were you: the traffic must be murder...

Exercise 6

1. A little after half an hour, the car is at the Pakistani restaurant.

Note: That odd expression lo cacra be li pimu is in fact how you'd normally say ‘half an hour.’ In general, when Lojban measures things, it doesn't divide them up into n individual units, but rather says that x measures n units. So “Reading this lesson took me two hours” would be in Lojban lonu mi tcidu lo vi ve cilre cu cacra li re.

We've also specified a distance after the half an hour, through zi. Logically, ba lo cacra be li pimu will be true if I show up after half an hour, or after three hours: in both cases, you've shown up ‘after’ half an hour. By adding zi, you're making sure that you're not allowing that kind of latitude: the event happens in the immediate vicinity of half an hour later. This is being pedantic, of course; but of such pedantry is Lojban made.

1. Jyoti, who was driving the car, is angry at Ranjeet for not paying attention to the route. (Literally, “Jyoti, who was operating the car.” Lojban tends to keep its gismu fairly vague: there is no essential difference, as far as it's concerned, between what you do with a car, a computer, or an espresso machine).
2. Ranjeet and Susan have been paying attention to each other.
3. Ranjeet is now talking to Susan about music by Johann Sebastian Bach.
4. Susan is not interested in paying attention to music by Bach — who is German. (Bach, not the music! Although, on second thought..).
5. But Susan is very interested in paying attention to Ranjeet's eyes.
6. Susan likes observing Ranjeet's lip hair (= moustache), which Lech Wałesa's looks like (You need the be'o, otherwise it will be Ranjeet's lip that Wałesa's moustache resembles).
7. Jyoti, who is waiting at the outside of the restaurant (= outside the restaurant), is operating a Nokia mobile phone. (Since this is presumably Jyoti's only mobile phone, we do not need to use pe: the brand is only incidental information, and we don't need it to narrow down which phone is being ‘operated’. So ne is the word to use).
8. She says “Hello Zhang. This is Jyoti.” (Hope you remembered coi from Lesson 7!)

10. “Meet us at the disco at Second Street after (= in) two hours.” (Sorry about springing that ordinal on you. All Lojban ordinals — pamoi ‘first’, bimoi ‘eighth’, nomoi ‘zeroth’, romoi ‘allth = last' — are formed in the same way).

Exercise 7

1. .i ca lonu la .djiotis. cu klama lo nenri be lo gusta kei la .suzyn. cu reisku fi dy. fe lu .i do zvati ma li'u (or: reisku lu .i do zvati ma li'u la .djiotis.)
2. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i mi pu tavla lo pendo poi mi to'e morji lonu mi tavla ke'a puku li'u (You have to insert the ke'a).
3. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i la .ranjit pu tavla mi lo se du'u lo zgike be fi'e la .bax. cu simsa lo kisto zgike lo ka pluja li'u (<!- remove? -->We tucked away ka in an earlier lesson; nu or su'u would be just as fine. You could also have said the less specific lo zgike pe la .bax.; this could mean the music Bach played or owned, rather than wrote, but in context it's clear enough.)
4. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i doi suzyn. do jinvi lodu'u ro da pe secau lo jgita cu pluja li'u (Lojban does not distinguish between ‘anything’, ‘everything’ and ‘all things’).
5. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i lo jgitrviolino cu mintu lo jgita poi zo'e bevri vi lo janco li'u

Note: Two things. First, Lojban doesn't encourage you to say that one sumti ‘is’ another sumti; there is a word, du, that sort of does that, but you should think of it as being more like an equals sign (see Lesson 12.) If you want to say that a violin is a guitar, it is better to say either that they are identical (lo jgitrviolino cu mintu lo jgita), or to turn one of the two sumti into a selbri (lo jgitrviolino cu jgita). Since we need a relative clause here, we have gone with the former.

The other thing is that Ranjeet (much to Jyoti's annoyance) is correct in his Lojban usage. In order to have as broad a coverage as possible, gismu tend to be inclusive rather than narrow in their definitions; we already saw that with Jyoti ‘operating’ her car. So while the Lojban wordlists list jgita under guitar, the gismu is actually used to refer to any stringed instrument. Jyoti should have specified Susan's instrument of choice as jgitrgitara (a ‘guitar guitar’), or even dikca jgitrgitara ‘electric guitar’.

Those funny-looking words are loan words into Lojban (fu'ivla), and we will also be covering them in Lesson 12.

1. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i la .ranjit. cu mintu da poi na kakne loka klama lo gusta poi berti lo tcadu (or: la .ranjit mintu lo na kakne be loka klama lo gusta poi berti lo tcadu)
2. .i do ba citka ma li'u (You could specify that Jyoti means both of them by using re do or ro do, but you wouldn't normally bother unless it was somehow vital).
3. .i la .suzyn. cu simxu catlu la .ranjit.
4. .i la .djiotis. noi to'e se cinri lonu catlu cu cpedu fi lo bevri pe zu'a lo nei fe lonu klama (or: cpedu lo nu klama kei lo bevri pe zu'a lo nei) (As you can see, lo nei is more useful than you might have thought!)

Chapter 10. Cause and Effect

Most children go through a phase where every second sentence seems to start with why? For example:

• Why is it raining?
• Why did Sally hit me?
• Why does Sally always get a star from the teacher?
• Why did Fluffy have to die?

To these, the frustrated parent may give a series of answers with because:

• Because the clouds are crying.
• Because you pulled her hair.
• Because she works hard.
• Because Fluffy is a rabbit, and rabbits don't live very long.

What neither the child nor his long-suffering parent are aware of is that in these examples, the whys ask different questions and the becauses give different kinds of answers. In some languages, in fact, we would use different words for them: Turkish has three words for why, and until recently even English had two (the other being wherefore, as in “wherefore art thou Romeo?”) We would expect, then, that Lojban would have at least four words for why, but in fact it doesn't, since all such questions are handled with ma. What Lojban does have is four words for because.

Physical causation

Going back to the first question, “Why does it rain?”, the child is asking for a physical explanation, and this is what he gets. If we express the rather unlikely explanation in Lojban, we get

lonu lei dilnu cu klaku cu rinka lonu carvi

the-event the-mass-of cloud weep physically-cause the-event rain

The clouds' crying is making it rain.

rinka means ‘cause’ in a physical or mechanical sense:

x1 (event/state) effects/physically causes effect x2 (event/state) under conditions x3

To change this ‘cause’ to a ‘because’, we can use ri'a. This is a sumti tcita derived from rinka, in the same way that we saw de'i derived from detri in Lesson 5. So it adds a new place to the bridi it sits in: just as de'i means ‘with date’, ri'a means ‘with physical cause’. This means we can now say

carvi ri'a lonu lei dilnu cu klaku

which is much more elegant. (Note that Lojban does not need the empty it in It's raining).

The reason I have emphasised that rinka and ri'a only deal with physical causes is that it cannot apply in many cases where an English-speaker would use because. Consider the second example. If we say

la salis. darxi do ri'a lonu do lacpu lei kerfa

Sally hits you with-physical-cause you pull the-mass-of hair

this is nonsense, since it means that little Joey pulling Sally's hair physically caused her to hit him, which would only be true if Joey had pulled her hair so hard that she had fallen on top of him, perhaps.

Motivation

In the hair-pulling case, what we have is not two events which are physically connected, like clouds and rain, but three events:

1. Joey pulls Sally's hair.
2. Sally decides, as a result of this, to hit Joey.
3. Sally hits Joey.

For the sake of convenience, English misses out the second event and says “Sally hit Joey because he pulled her hair.” However, this is not only vague but, some would say, psychologically dangerous. People do not generally react to stimuli automatically, but as a result of motivation, and confusing complex responses with simple physical causation may lead us to believe that we have no control over our emotions or even our actions. Whether or not we believe in free will at a metaphysical level, it is useful to distinguish between physical reactions and responses which have a cognitive/emotional element. Not surprisingly, then, Lojban has a separate gismu for motivation: mukti. The full definition of mukti is

x1 (action/event/state) motivates/is a motive/incentive for action/event x2, per volition of x3

We can therefore say

lenu do lacpu lei kerfa [pe la .salis.] cu mukti lonu la .salis. darxi do [kei la .salis]

the-event you pull the-mass hair [related-to Sally] motivates the-event Sally hit you [through the volition of Sally]

Your pulling Sally's hair motivated her to hit you.

As we can see, the third place is nearly always unnecessary, since we can assume that the agent of the second event is also the person who decides to do it. Even so, this structure is a bit clumsy, so again we would normally use a sumti tcita — in this case, mu'i. This gives us

la salis. cu darxi do mu'i lonu do lacpu lei kerfa

Sally hits you with-motive you pull the-mass hair

Exercise 1

Don't bother to translate these sentences, just decide whether they should use ri'a or mu'i.

1. The can exploded because it was hot.
2. I felt afraid because I heard a noise.
3. The people revolted because of the high taxes.
4. The bread is moldy because you left it in the plastic wrapper.
5. Prices have risen because of excessive wage claims.

Justification and Implication

The difference between motivation and justification is not always clear, but we can say that the latter involves some rule or standard while the former does not require this. Going back to the example of Sally and the teacher, it is possible to say

la salis. cu te dunda lo tartcita lo ctuca mu'i lonu sy. tcetoi gunka

Sally is-given a star-label [by] the teacher with-motivation she much-try work

However, this says only that Sally's hard work motivated the teacher to give her a star. It does not imply that it is the custom for teachers to give stars (or ‘star-labels’, as I have rather pedantically translated it) as a reward for good work. What we need here is ki'u, the sumti tcita from krinu:

x1 (event/state) is a reason/justification/explanation for/causing/permitting x2 (event/state)

We can therefore more accurately say

lonu la .salis. cu tcetoi gunka cu krinu lonu lo ctuca cu dunda lo tartcita sy.

or, as in the earlier example,

la .salis. cu te dunda lo tartcita lo ctuca ki'u lonu sy. tcetoi gunka

ki'u appeals to more general considerations than mu'i, but it still deals with human standards, not logical laws. Only a very naive student would believe that if a student is given a star, it must logically imply that that student has worked hard. In the tragic case of Fluffy, however, the fact that Fluffy is a rabbit logically implies that he will not live long, given what we know about rabbits. Here we can confidently use nibli

x1 logically necessitates/entails/implies action/event/state x2 under rules/logic system x3

The sentence

lonu la .flufis. cu ractu cu nibli lonu fy. mrobi'o

the-event Fluffy is-a-rabbit implies the-event he dies

actually misses out a step (the information that rabbits are short-lived) but it will do for practical purposes. If you want a textbook logic example, you can say

la .flufis. cu ractu .ije ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive .i la .flufis. ni'i na ze'u jmive

This expresses the following:

1. Fluffy is a rabbit and all rabbits are not long-lived.
2. Fluffy is therefore not long-lived.

Converting causes

The reason I have included this blindingly obvious piece of logic is that it demonstrates how sentences can be joined, and how ‘because’ can be turned into ‘therefore’. We'll deal with the second part first, because there's a few issues about connecting sentences we want to leave till the next section. So for now, don't worry about .ije. Do worry, however, about ni'i.

What we have here is a proposition (Fluffy is a rabbit, and rabbits don't live long), and a conclusion (Fluffy doesn't live long.) So what is ni'i doing in front of the final selbri? Lojban treats sumti tcita the same as tenses; so ni'i can go in front of the selbri, as if it was a tense. This corresponds to an adverb like therefore in English; in terms of Lojban, however, it means the same as if you'd said ni'i zo'e ‘because of something obvious’ (in this case, the preceding two sentences). So in this construction, ni'i, used as a tense (or ni'i zo'e, using an ellipsed sumti) correspond to therefore.

But in the following sentence, where ni'i is a sumti tcita introducing a distinct sumti and not a ‘tense’, ni'i does not mean ‘therefore’. As we'd expect, ni'i relates a sumti to its bridi through the gismu underlying ni'i, namely nibli ‘logically necessitates.’. So ni'i means ‘logically because’:

la .flufis. cu mrobi'o ni'i lonu ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive

Fluffy past die with-logical-necessity the-event all rabbits other-than long-time-period live

Fluffy died because rabbits don't live long.

But what is the sumti tcita for ‘therefore’? How do we say the reverse — “Rabbits don't live long; therefore Fluffy died” — in a single sentence? As it turns out, we say it like this:

ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive seni'i lonu la .flufis. cu mrobi'o

Rabbits don't live long, with the logical consequence that Fluffy died.

We have here a sumti tcita, seni'i, which means ‘with the logical consequence that’, i.e. ‘therefore’. And this seni'i looks a lot like ni'i, the sumti tcita meaning ‘logically because’.

Actually, you should have seen enough to work out the relation between the two from Lesson 9. As you saw there, sumti tcita can be modified with se, te, ve, xe, just like their underlying gismu. You know by now that the sumti introduced by ni'i is lo nibli ‘that which logically necessitates, the logical cause.’ This means that se ni'i is a sumti tcita introducing lo se nibli — ‘that which is logically necessitated; the logical result.' So we have a pair: ni'i ‘the logically necessitator, logically because’, and seni'i ‘the logically necessitated, logically therefore’.

We can apply this principle to the other sumti tcita we've looked at. Here are some examples:

lo lante cu spoja ri'a lonu ri pu glare

the can explode with-physical-cause the-event it past is-hot

The can exploded because it was hot.

lo lante pu glare seri'a lonu ri spoja

the can past is-hot with-physical-result the-event it explode

The can was hot, so it exploded.

so'i lo prenu cu nelci la .djiotis. mu'i lonu ri xajmi

many people like Jyoti with-motivation the-event she is-funny

Many people like Jyoti because she's funny.

la .djiotis. xajmi semu'i lonu so'i prenu cu nelci dy.

Jyoti is-funny with-motivated-result the-event many people like her

Jyoti is funny, so many people like her.

Exercise 2

This is just like Exercise 1, except that now we have eight choices: ri'a, mu'i, ki'u, ni'i and their se forms. For each sentence, choose the most suitable sumti tcita.

1. Alien Bloodbath won an Oscar because of its brilliant special effects.
2. I like Quine's Rabbit because it's got an exciting story-line.
3. He spilt my beer, so I hit him.
4. He walks like that because he has an artificial leg.
5. She's Australian, so she must like Vegemite.
6. That computer can't get a virus because it's running Linux.
7. You have committed adultery, and thus shall burn in Hell.

Connecting sentences

Let's revisit that piece of logic we were ruminating on earlier:

la .flufis. cu ractu .ije ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive .i la .flufis. ni'i na ze'u jmive

We've seen how .i shows that a new sentence is starting; but we can also tag things onto the .i. We've seen (in passing) that two sumti can be joined with .e. In the same way, .ije joins two sentences with a logical AND, i.e. it asserts that both sentences are true. Normally we don't need to do this, since we usually assume that what we say is true; but it is useful here, because it binds the first two sentences together, so that when the ‘conclusion’ sentence comes, it ‘therefores’ both of them, not just the second. (This is called ‘left-grouping’ and there are ways to override it, which we'll come back to).

Now, lonu-abstractions can be treated as sentences: they contain complete bridi, after all. So we can also phrase these sentences as separate sentences, still using sumti tcita to connect them:

la .flufis. cu mrobi'o ni'i lonu ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive

Fluffy died because rabbits don't live long.

la .flufis. cu mrobi'o .i ni'ibo ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive

Fluffy died. That's because rabbits don't live long.

ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive seni'i lonu la .flufis. mrobi'o

Rabbits don't live long, with the logical consequence that Fluffy died.

ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive .iseni'ibo la .flufis. mrobi'o

Rabbits don't live long. Therefore, Fluffy died.

There's a new cmavo in the last example, bo. Why? Well, a sumti tcita can indeed be used to connect sentences to other sentences, just as it is used to connect sumti into bridi (though there are only so many sumti tcita this makes sense for — and this lesson contains most of them.) However, left on its own, a sumti tcita always applies to the sumti after it. So had I just said

.iseni'i la .flufis. cu mrobi'o

that would have meant something like “With the logical result of Fluffy, [something] dies.” I'm not quite sure what this means; maybe the ‘something’ is some mythical creature that spontaneously generates bunny rabbits as it expires. But of course, this doesn't mean what we want. To make the sumti tcita apply to the entire sentence, we follow it with the word bo.

Vocabulary

catke	x1 [agent] shoves/pushes x2 at locus x3
cnita	x1 is directly/vertically beneath/below/under/underneath/down from x2 in frame of reference x3
crane	x1 is anterior/ahead/forward/(in/on) the front of x2 which faces/in-frame-of-reference x3
ganlo	x1 (portal/passage/entrance-way) is closed/shut/not open, preventing passage/access to x2 by x3
telgau	x1 (agent) makes x2 be a lock/seal of/on/for sealing x3 with/by locking mechanism x4 (stela ‘lock’ + gasnu ‘do’)

Exercise 3

Where necessary, insert any of je, seni'ibo, babo, seri'abo after all but the first .i in each of the following text fragments. For example: .i mi telgau fi lo vorme .i seni'ibo lo vorme cu te telgau fi mi

1. .i mi telgau fi lo vorme .i ___ do na klama lo nenri
2. .i mi telgau fi lo vorme .i ___ lo vorme cu ganlo
3. .i mi telgau fi lo vorme .i ___ mi cliva
4. .i mi viska do .i ___ do viska mi .i ___ mi simxu rinsa do
5. .i do rinsa mi .i ___ do crane mi .i ___ do seni'i viska mi
6. .i la .pantc. cu catke la .djudis. .i ___ ri farlu .i ___ ri cnita

Why?

With four types of because, we can now make four types of why, simply by using ma. Our child's questions from the beginning of the lesson translate as follows:

• .i carvi ri'a ma
• .i la .salis. cu darxi mi mu'i ma
• .i la .salis. cu te dunda lo tartcita lo ctuca ki'u ma
• .i la .flufis. pu mrobi'o ni'i ma

Of course, the questions do not have to take these forms; if young Joey is a religious type, he might say la .flufis. pu mrobi'o ki'u ma, asking with what justification God took his rabbit from him, whereas if he is scientifically minded, he might ask la .flufis. pu mrobi'o ri'a ma, inquiring as to the physical cause of Fluffy's death.

To an English-speaker, this looks back-to-front (“It rains. Why?”) but there is really no reason why question-words have to come at the beginning of a sentence. However, if you prefer to start with ma, you can always use the full gismu, e.g.

ma rinka lonu carvi

what? physically-causes the-event rain

And since the position of sumti tcita in the bridi is fairly free, nothing is preventing you from saying

ri'a ma carvi

Answers to why-questions are usually not a whole sentence but an event abstraction-sumti, following Lojban's fill-in-the-slot approach to questions and answers; e.g.

• la .salis. cu darxi mi mu'i ma
• lonu do lacpu lei kerfa

This is short for the long-winded la salis. cu darxi do mu'i lonu do lacpu lei kerfa.

Vocabulary

cevni	x1 is a/the god/deity of people(s)/religion x2 with dominion over x3 [sphere]; x1 is divine
cmoni	x1 utters moan/groan/howl/scream [non-linguistic utterance] x2 expressing x3 (property)
danfu	x1 is the answer/response/solution/[reply] to question/problem x2
manku	x1 is dark/lacking in illumination
palci	x1 is evil/depraved/wicked [morally bad] by standard x2
spebi'o	x1 marries x2; x1 becomes a spouse of x2 under law/custom/tradition/system/convention x3 (speni ‘spouse’ + binxo ‘become’)

Exercise 4

Translate the following questions.

1. Why did Jim marry Samantha?
2. Why's the dog barking?
3. Why is it dark in here?
4. Why is the answer 4.6?
5. Why does God allow evil?

Summary

In this lesson we have looked at four gismu for cause and effect and their corresponding sumti tcita:

ri'a	physical cause (rinka)
mu'i	motive (mukti)
ki'u	justification (krinu)
ni'i	implication (nibli)

We have also seen how sumti tcita can be converted with se and looked briefly at connecting sentences (.ije, .iseni'ibo.) The next lesson will look at connectives in more detail.

Vocabulary

ba'e	forethought emphasis indicator; indicates next word is especially emphasized
carna	x1 turns/rotates/revolves around axis x2 in direction x3
ckasu	x1 ridicules/mocks/scoffs at x2 about x3 (property/event) by doing activity x4 (event)
clite	x1 is polite/courteous/civil in matter x2 according to standard/custom x3
jubme	x1 is a table/flat solid upper surface of material x2, supported by legs/base/pedestal x3
lanli	x1 analyzes/examines-in-detail x2 by method/technique/system x3 [process/activity]
manci	x1 feels wonder/awe/marvels about x2
pi'o	used by... (sumti tcita from pilno ‘use’)
sanmi	x1 (mass) is a meal composed of dishes including x2
se ba'i	instead of... (sumti tcita from se basti ‘is replaced’)
smaji	x1 (source) is quiet/silent/[still] at observation point x2 by standard x3
tarti	x1 behaves/conducts oneself as/in-manner x2 (event/property) under conditions x3
tirna	x1 hears x2 against background/noise x3; x2 is audible; (adjective:) x1 is aural
voksa	x1 is a voice/speech sound of individual x2
vi'irku'a	toilet (vikmi ‘excrete’ + kumfa ‘room’)
xajmi	x1 is funny/comical to x2 in property/aspect x3 (nu/ka); x3 is what is funny about x1 to x2

Exercise 5

Translate from Lojban.

1. .i la .ranjit. cu smaji ca lonu la .suzyn. cu cpedu lo sanmi lo bevri kei ki'u lo nu ry. clite kei je lo nu ry. nelci lo voksa be la .suzyn. kei
2. .i seri'a bo la .djiotis. cu kakne loka tirna lonu lo'i zutse pe lo ri'u jubme cu tavla simxu
3. .i la .djiotis. mu'i lonu go'i cu carna fi lo ri'u jubme
4. .i ni'i ku la .djiotis. na zgana lonu la .ranjit. cu tarti lonu simsa dy. kei mu'i lo nu ckasu
5. .i la .suzyn. cu cmila semu'i lonu la .djiotis. cu carna fi sy.
6. .i cusku lu .i mo li'u
7. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i la .ranjit. pu cusku lo xajmi pe la'o gy. Schönberg gy. .e. la'o gy. Stravinsky gy. li'u
8. .i la .djiotis. mu'i cmoni cusku zoi gy. chootio! gy.

Exercise 6

Translate into Lojban.

1. After requesting the meal, Ranjeet leaves to go to the bathroom, so he cannot hear Jyoti.
2. Jyoti talks so that she is like Ranjeet in complexity.
3. She says “I shall now analyse the 47th creation (= composition) of Jimmy Bob Bach with this mirror — because I can.” (Hint: use la'o. You can come up with a word for ‘with’; look at the vocabulary list carefully..).
4. Susan laughs, since Jyoti is as funny as Ranjeet. (Hint: use mintu)
5. Jyoti says “Susan, why are you talking with Ranjeet about crap?” (Hint: do not use the Lojban word for ‘excrement’; the metaphor won't necessarily translate, and would be malglico. Instead, use ‘foolishness’).
6. Susan says “Because he has awesome eyes.” (Hint: don't use the Lojban for ‘have’; the place structure of ‘eye’ will do this for you).

Answers to Exercises

Exercise 1

1. ri'a, obviously.
2. mu'i. Even if it is a classic ‘startle response’, my fear is not a direct result of the noise, but the result of some kind of cognitive interpretation, however low-level.
3. Even the most dogmatic dialectical materialist would probably give mu'i here.
4. ri'a, since the mold cannot really be said to be motivated by the plastic wrapper, or indeed by anything.
5. I would say mu'i, since economics is determined by human motives, not physical laws. Note that here the x3 of mukti is not ‘prices’ (jdima) but those who increase the prices: manufacturers, retailers or the government.

Note: This is actually a classic example of the ‘invisible hand’ phenomena so beloved of economists: the result is not an intended result of human activities, but comes about as a side-effect of them. The best sumti tcita for this is actually one we happen not to have covered here: seja'e ‘as a result of’ (from jalge ‘result’).

Exercise 2

1. ki'u, because at least somebody thought that it deserved an Oscar.
2. mu'i: the exciting story motivated me to like the book.
3. semu'i (an obscure example of British pub culture).
4. ri'a: the artificial leg physically causes him to walk in a particular way.
5. seni'i, even though it's a logical fallacy — just because a lot of Australians like Vegemite doesn't mean that she has to.

Cultural note: Vegemite is the Australian equivalent of the British Marmite; both are a salty paste that you spread on bread. Outside these two countries, nobody seems to like the stuff. Your Australian co-author did not spend his formative years in ‘God’s Own Country', so he never really did get a taste for it).

1. A tricky one. You could say ri'a, meaning that the fact that the computer is running Linux physically prevents it from getting a virus, or you could possibly say ni'i, implying that it is an essential feature of Linux computers that they are immune to viruses.

Computer flamebait: One can argue that Macintoshes are immune to viruses only ki'u their being Macs, and not ni'i: they aren't inherently more secure than PCs, they just haven't been paid as much attention by crackers. This would of course be getting into geek wars; but we have a sneaking suspicion many of you will indeed be geeks...

1. seki'u, whether or not you actually believe in Hell or the criteria for entering it. Note also that in English and sometimes has the sense of so, which is not the case in Lojban:

do pu zergle .ije vi lo daptutra do ba jelca

It is true that you committed adultery and it is also true that you will burn in Hell

(literally: you past crime-copulate AND at-this-place the hell you future burn)

More about the logical (and non-logical) connectives follows in the next lesson.

Exercise 3

1. seri'abo: The door is not only logically preventing you from going inside; it is physically preventing you.
2. seni'ibo: It logically follows from the definition of ‘lock’ that, if you lock a door, the door is then closed.
3. babo: there is no real causal connection between closing a door and leaving. You may be closing the door because you've finished your business there; but who's to say why you closed it, after all...
4. Either je; babo, or babo; babo. The actions don't follow from each other logically or physically. (If they follow at all, they follow by social convention; so you might have used seki'ubo.) With the first pair, you're at least allowing that you saw me at the same time I saw you. With the second pair, you definitely saw me only after I saw you.
5. je; nothing. This is a syllogism like the Fluffy syllogism above; it follows from the two facts — you greeting me and you being in front of me — that you have seen me. (Well, it doesn't really follow, but this is a lesson on Lojban, not logic.) So you need to join the two facts together with AND.

On the other hand, the ‘therefore’ is already there, as the ‘adverbial’ seni'i; so you don't need to insert it again for the third sentence. In fact, as we discussed later on, it would join the wrong sentences together anyway...

1. seri'abo; seni'ibo. People fall as a physical result of being pushed. The definition of ‘fall’ logically requires that someone who has fallen is lower down than someone who hasn't fallen. (You don't fall upwards. Zero-gravity counterexamples — and you'll make a good Lojbanist if you came up with one — are already anticipated in the x4 place of farlu!)

Exercise 4

1. la djim. cu spebi'o la .samantas. mu'i ma
2. lo gerku ca cmoni mu'i ma (mu'i seems the best choice, since we can assume that dogs bark as a response to something, and are thus motivated rather than physically caused to bark. Note that cu is possible here instead of ca; I have used ca since it seems important that the dog is barking now).
3. vi manku ri'a ma (It isn't really necessary to translate the in, since the speaker is probably inside anyway).
4. li vopixa cu danfu ni'i ma (Give yourself a pat on the back if you got that one right! Numbers and mathematical problems belong to the realm of logic, not the physical world).
5. lo cevni cu curmi lonu palci kei ki'u ma (ki'u is best here, since a religious believer would probably look for some justification for the existence of evil, rather than a physical cause or personal motivation. Some theologians might prefer ni'i, I suppose! The kei is necessary because you're asking a question about the allowing, not about the evil itself).

Exercise 5

1. Ranjeet is silent while Susan requests a meal from the carrier (= waiter), because (justification) he is polite and because he likes Susan's voice. (Note the kei: only the first kei is absolutely necessary, and by now you should be able to work out why).
2. As a (physical) result, Jyoti can hear the ones sitting at the table to the right talking to each other. (simxu takes a set as its x1; more on this in Lesson 14. lo ri'u jubme means ‘the table to the right’: selbri can take sumti tcita and locations as ‘tenses’, just like they do time tenses).
3. Jyoti, because (motivation) of this, turns towards the table to the right.
4. Necessarily (= with something logically causing this), Jyoti does not observe that Ranjeet behaves as resembling her in order to mock (i.e. Ranjeet is imitating her) (The logical cause in ni'i ku has been left out, but is presumably the previous sentence. Without the kei, the mocking would be associated with simsa rather than tarti — although there's ultimately isn't that much difference in meaning between the two. Unambiguity doesn't always buy you that much).
5. Susan laughs, causing (motivating) Jyoti to turn to her.
6. (She) says “What?”
7. Susan says “Ranjeet said something funny to do with Schönberg and Stravinsky.”
8. Jyoti thus (motivation) groans “Chootio!” (Gujarati for ‘jerk’) (Like any other sumti tcita, mu'i can also be used as a ‘tense’).

Exercise 6

1. .i ba lonu cpedu lo sanmi kei la .ranjit. cu cliva mu'i lonu klama lo vi'irku'a kei se ri'a lonu ry. na kakne loka tirna la .djiotis. (or: ra na kakne)
2. .i la .djiotis. cu tavla semu'i lonu ri simsa la .ranjit. lo ka pluja
3. .i dy./lo go'i/la .djiotis./ra cusku lu .i mi lanli lo vozemoi se finti be la'o gy. Jimmy Bob Bach gy. se pi'o lo vi minra mu'i lonu mi kakne li'u (or la .djimis.bab.bax.. You could say lo vozemoi se finti pe fi'e ..., but that would mean exactly the same thing. If the composition rather than the analysis happened with a mirror, you would say lo vozemoi se finti be la'o gy. Jimmy Bob Bach gy. be'o ne se pi'o lo vi minra.

You could also say lo vozemoi be lo'i se finti be ... , in which case you're either brilliant, or you've been reading ahead..).

1. .i la .suzyn. cu cisma ki'u lonu la .djiotis. cu mintu la .ranjit. lo ka xajmi
2. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i doi suzyn. mu'i ma do [simxu] tavla la .ranjit. loi se bebna li'u (loi se bebna, ‘the thing one is foolish in’, is better here than loi nu bebna or loi ka bebna).
3. .i lu .i lonu ry./lo se go'i/la ranjit./ra cu se kanla lo ba'e se manci li'u (This is an extra-idiomatic way of saying things; kudos if you got it, don't be too worried if you didn't).

Chapter 11. Putting it together: Lojban connectives

All languages need ways to connect words, phrases and sentences. In English there are a host of words for this purpose: and, or, because, additionally, however, on the other hand ... the list seems endless, as foreign students of English know all too well. Lojban also has a wide variety of words like this, known as connectives, but it is more systematic about it. (Lojban also handles some of the functions of English conjunctions in other ways — as we saw, because and so are translated with sumti tcita, not connectives).

There are two types of connective: logical and non-logical. Logical connectives say something about whether and in what circumstances the two things connected are true; an example is .ije. Non-logical connectives do not deal with separate truth values, but group things together to form different kinds of units; an example is joi, which we've already seen in passing, and we'll be discussing again below.

Moreover, Lojban distinguishes between the logical component of connectives, and their attitudinal content. For example, most languages have different words for and and but. Logically, they both mean the same thing. In terms of attitude, however, they are different: but contains a connotation of contrast or unexpectedness, which and does not. So Lojban translates but in two parts: je ku'i ‘and — however'. This follows the Lojban principle of keeping content and attitude separate as far as possible (e.g. .ui la .djiotis. cu klama ti has a content element — the information that Jyoti is coming here, and an attitude element — happiness).

In this lesson we will only look at logical connectives; non-logical connectives (with one exception) will be dealt with later, along with some other attitudinals.

Types of logical connectives

In order to understand Lojban connectives, we first need to look at logical connectives in general. The types of logical connective in Lojban are based on truth tables and are explained in detail in Chapter 14 of The Complete Lojban Language. However, if you're not a logician, this can be rather confusing, so here I'll look at them in terms of Boolean operators. If you haven't a clue what a Boolean operator is, don't panic; they are very simple, and you may even have used them in an internet search without realising it. On the other hand, if you've used Boolean operators in maths or computer programming, the rest is a piece of cake. The operators we will look at here are AND, OR, EOR, IF and IFF.

We have already looked at one operator: AND. A statement with AND is true if and only if both elements are true. For example, if you do an internet search for “games AND strategy”, the search engine will only come up with pages that contain both games and strategy: you will get pages on strategy games, for example, but not (ideally) on simulation games or military strategy. Similarly in Lojban

la .flufis. cu ractu .ije ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive

is false if Fluffy is not a rabbit, or if some rabbits are long-lived. It is only true if both sentences are true.

The next type we need to look at is OR. This is not always, or even usually, the same as the English word or. English is vague about or, which sometimes means ‘one or the other or both’, but sometimes means ‘one or the other but not both’. Compare these two sentences:

1. If it's cold or rainy we'll stay inside.
2. The winner of the competition will receive a holiday in Hawaii or the cash equivalent.

In the first sentence common sense tells us that if it is both cold and rainy we will also stay inside. However, in the second case, the winner would have a hard time convincing the competition organisers that he/she is entitled to both the holiday and the cash. The first case is a genuine logical OR; the second is called an EOR, for ‘exclusive or’ (or sometimes XOR — I use EOR because it reminds me of the donkey in Winnie the Pooh). You can think of OR as ‘and/or' and EOR as ‘either/or'.

English has similar problems with the word if. Sentence (1) is unclear as to what will happen if it is neither cold nor rainy. We assume that in this case we will go out, but this is not necessarily the case. Strictly speaking, we might stay inside even if the weather is beautiful. In fact there are two potential meanings here:

1. IF it's cold or rainy we'll stay inside.
2. IFF it's cold or rainy we'll stay inside.

The first means “If it's cold or rainy we'll stay inside (but we may stay inside anyway)”, while the second means “If and only if it's cold or rainy, we'll stay inside (otherwise we'll definitely go out)”.

Just to make the difference clear, here are some examples:

Romeo loves Juliet AND Juliet loves Romeo

means that both statements are true, i.e. Romeo and Juliet love each other.

Romeo loves Juliet OR Juliet loves Romeo

means that one of them loves the other, and perhaps both of them do.

Romeo loves Juliet EOR Juliet loves Romeo

means that either Romeo loves Juliet (but Juliet doesn't love him) or Juliet loves Romeo (but he doesn't love her).

Romeo loves Juliet IF Juliet loves Romeo

means that if Juliet loves Romeo, he definitely loves her, but he may love her anyway (the only outcome which is impossible is that Juliet loves Romeo but he doesn't love her).

Romeo loves Juliet IFF Juliet loves Romeo

means that if Juliet loves Romeo, he loves her, and if she doesn't love him, he doesn't love her.

The basic operators OR, AND and IFF are represented in Lojban by the words ja, je and jo.

• ju is a special case, taking the logical meaning ‘whether or not’ — in other words, it emphasises that the second value does not affect the truth of the sentence.
• The other operators, EOR and IF, are based on these vowels combined with negatives. As we shall see below, EOR is jonai and IF is janai.

Exercise 1

In the following, work out whether the logical relationship represented by the emphasised word is closer to OR, EOR, IF, or IFF.

1. If you're naughty, I won't get you any ice cream.
2. If Jack Kennedy is the president of the United States, this must be the twentieth century.
3. If I drink too many strawberry daquiris, I get a hangover.
4. Call now for a free consultation or quote!
5. I can come up with six or seven reasons why that won't work.
6. Liechtenstein's next to Switzerland or Austria or something.

Connecting sumti

The most common connective for sumti is AND. In fact we've already seen this as early as Lesson 7: .i ko'a je ko'i xanka cmila (“Jyoti and Susan laugh nervously”). Here's another example:

mi ralte pa gerku je re mlatu

I keep one dog AND two cat

I've got a dog and two cats.

This is actually a contracted way of saying “It is true that I have a dog; it is true that I have two cats,” or in Lojban,

mi ralte pa lo gerku .ije mi ralte re lo mlatu

Not all English sentences containing and are like this, though. Firstly, sentences like “I had a bath and washed my hair” are structurally different and will be dealt with later on. Secondly, “I visited Ranjeet and Jyoti” is slightly different from “I visited Ranjeet AND I visited Jyoti.” In this case, you probably want to say that you visited Ranjeet-and-Jyoti as a unit on one occasion — not that you visited Ranjeet and Jyoti on (potentially) different occasions (“It is true that I visited Ranjit, and it is true that I visited Jyoti.”) In this case you don't want je (which is true but potentially misleading), but joi, which means ‘in a mass with’. So what you have is

mi pu vitke la .ranjit. joi la .djiotis.

I past visit Ranjeet in-a-mass-with Jyoti

I visited Ranjeet and Jyoti (together).

You've seen joi before, too: in Lesson 5, where Marx and Engels wrote The Communist Manifesto as a joint project, rather than individually (la marks. joi la .engels. finti lo guntrusi'o selpeicku.) This is just like the difference between lo ci gerku and loi ci gerku which we looked at in Lesson 4 — considering the three dogs as individuals, or as a mass. Incidentally, it is not just Lojban which makes this distinction; Turkish, for example, would use ile (‘with’) rather than ve (‘and’) for joi here.

We can also use OR here. For example,

mi ba vitke lo mi mamta ja lo mi tamne

I future visit the me mother OR the me cousin

I'll visit my mother or my cousin.

This leaves open the possibility that I will get round to visiting both of them at some point. If I want to say that that I will visit either my mother or my cousin but not both, I need EOR. For this we use .onai. This is actually a negative IFF, which sounds confusing, but is quite simple and logical. “If and only if I do not visit my cousin, I will visit my mother” logically implies that, if I visit my cousin, I will not visit my mother, and vice versa; so I will visit either my mother or my cousin but not both. So we have

mi ba vitke lo mi mamta jonai lo mi tamne

I future visit the me mother EOR the me cousin

I'll visit either my mother or my cousin.

It is probably obvious that jo means IFF, so “I will visit my mother if (and only if) I visit my cousin” would be mi ba vitke lo mi mamta jo lo mi tamne. If, for some strange reason, I want to use IF and say that I will definitely visit my mother if I visit my cousin, but I may visit her anyway, I need another negative: janai. But since this is rare in sumti connection, I'll leave that till later.

Finally, there is ju, meaning ‘whether or not’. This is not a standard Boolean operator, but I've called it WON for convenience. In this way I can say

mi ba vitke lo mi mamta ju lo mi tamne

I future visit the me mother WON the me cousin

I'll visit my mother whether or not I visit my cousin.

To sum up:

OR	ja
AND	je
IFF	jo
WON	ju
IF	janai
EOR	jonai

Vocabulary

cinynei	x1 fancies x2 (cinse ‘sex’ + nelci ‘like’)
finpe	x1 is a fish of species x2
jisra	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of juice/nectar from-source/of-type x2
narju	x1 is orange [color adjective]
nimre	x1 is a quantity of citrus [fruit/tree, etc.] of species/strain x2
patlu	x1 is a potato [an edible tuber] of variety/cultivar x2
pelxu	x1 is yellow/golden [color adjective]
ralte	x1 retains/keeps/holds x2 in its possession
rasyjukpa	fry (grasu ‘grease’ + jukpa ‘cook’)

Exercise 2

Express the following in Lojban. Don't try to translate the English word for word; work out what the Boolean operator is first, then work from that.

1. Susan fancies Zhang or Ranjeet, or maybe both of them.
2. I like fish and chips.
3. Request (= order) the lemon juice or the orange juice. (Hint: Build expressions for ‘lemon’ and ‘orange’ (the fruit) as tanru).
4. I want the beer, whether or not I want the curry. (Hint: This is a single bridi, ‘want’!)
5. If I go from Boston to Washington, I'll go all the way to Atlanta. (Hint: This too involves a single bridi).

Connectives in tanru

tanru have been lurking in these lessons since Lesson 2 without a proper explanation; so before discussing connectives in tanru, it's worth looking at how tanru normally work.

As we've seen before, we can put two or more words into a selbri or sumti place. An example is the aforementioned ‘Communist manifesto’, lo guntrusi'o selpeicku.

Let's start with a simpler example, though.

xunre cukta

[there is a] red [type-of] book

The first element of the tanru modifies or restricts the second element, in some unspecified way. What happens if there are three or more elements, though? Like many other features of Lojban grammar, tanru follow a left-grouping rule, which means that the element on the far left modifies the next one, then those two together modify the next, and so on. For example, in a careless moment I once described The Complete Lojban Language as lo barda xunre cukta since it is, indeed, big and red. However, lo barda xunre cukta does not mean this; it means “the {(big type-of red) type-of book}” and it is hard to imagine what “big type of red” would mean.

There are various ways to get out of the left-grouping rule when you need to; we'll see some in Lesson 14, but the simplest one here is to use a logical connective and say

lo barda je xunre cukta

the {(big AND red) book}

The big red book.

la .suzyn. cu cinynei ro xajmi ja melbi nanmu

Susan fancy all {(funny OR beautiful) man}

Susan fancies men who are funny or handsome (or both).

Warning

This sentence is still true even if Susan also likes men who are not funny or handsome. In natural language, social conventions means you wouldn't normally say such a sentence in that case, because it would be misleading. Lojban is stricter about these things, so you might want to add po'o ‘only’ (see Lesson 13), or use a relative clause: ro nanmu poi se cinynei la .suzyn. cu xajmi ja melbi. We'll stick with the vaguer sentences here, though.

Let's say that Susan finds the qualities of humour and good looks attractive but incompatible — she fancies Woody Allen and Steven Seagal, but thinks a mixture of the two would be just too much. We would then say

la .suzyn. cu cinynei ro xajmi jonai melbi nanmu

Susan fancy all {(funny EOR beautiful) man}

Susan fancies men who are either funny or handsome (but not both).

On the other hand, Jyoti is turned on by funny men, and doesn't care about their looks at all. Woody Allen would do fine, but Steven Seagal wouldn't stand a chance unless he could tell a few jokes (funnier than Schwarzenegger's, preferably.) What we need here is

la .djiotis. cu cinynei ro xajmi ju melbi nanmu

Jyoti fancy all {(funny WON beautiful) man}

Jyoti fancies funny men, whether they are handsome or not.

As you'll remember from last lesson, this kind of connective is also used to connect sentences, placed next to .i. So if I wanted to say “Either Susan fancies funny men, or Susan fancies handsome men”, I need only say

.i la .suzyn. cu cinynei ro xajmi nanmu .ijonai la .suzyn. cu cinynei ro melbi nanmu

Warning

Be careful not to confuse this kind of connection with sumti connectives. mi ba vitke lo mi mamta je lo mi speni is not the same as mi ba vitke lo mi mamta je speni. The first means that I will visit my mother and my spouse (probably on separate occasions). The second means that I will visit a person who is both my mother and my spouse, which implies that I have a really serious Oedipus complex.

je and joi act as both sumti connectives and tanru connectives. However, don't forget to put lo where needed as in the example above.

This means you can say loi jisra joi jdacu ‘the juice-and-water-mixture’; but you have to say loi jisra joi loi djacu ‘the juice and the water, considered together’.

Vocabulary

kukte	x1 is delicious/tasty/delightful to observer/sense x2 [person, or sensory activity]
nabmi	x1 (event/state) is a problem to/encountered by x2 in situation/task/inquiry x3

Exercise 3

Translate the following from Lojban.

1. la .ranjit. cu pinxe loi vanju jonai birje
2. la .ranjit. cu pinxe loi vanju joi birje
3. la .natraj. cu barja je gusta
4. da se spusku ju danfu lo nabmi
5. la .djang. cu klama je penmi je tavla la .suzyn.
6. ro prenu cu fengu naja xanka loka se xebni
7. la .ranjit. cu nelci loi kukte ja cpina
8. mi bilga jenai kakne loka klama lo barja

Connecting bridi tails

Many human languages — English among them — divide sentences into two parts: the subject, and the rest. In mainstream linguistic parlance, these get called the noun phrase and the verb phrase. (We've mostly managed to avoid so far the kind of grammar talk that might have sent shivers down your spine at school. Don't worry, this won't hurt a bit..).

Now the thing about subjects is, we tend to talk about them a lot. In fact, it's not unusual to string together a series of sentences, each with the same subject. From sentence to sentence, you keep saying what the same person did, or was. This means you're keeping the subject constant, and changing the rest of the sentence.

This makes for an obvious shortcut: rather than repeat the same subject in two sentences, keep everything in one sentence, with a single subject, and join together the two ‘rest-of-the-sentences’. For example, why say Nick went to California. And Nick stayed there for three years, when you can join them together as Nick went to California, and stayed there for three years?

Lojban, being spoken by human beings (ostensibly), is not immune to this kind of pressure. Strictly speaking, Lojban doesn't have noun phrases and verb phrases. However, it does have zero or more sumti in front of the selbri, and then a selbri followed by zero or more other sumti. The selbri with its trailing sumti can be considered the tail of the bridi (corresponding to the verb phrase), where the initial sumti (if any!) are its head (corresponding to the noun phrase).

Lojban allows you to join bridi-tails using a different series of logical connectives. You just add the word gi in front of our logical connectives. So the bridi-tail connective version of AND is gi je.

So what is this good for? Quite simply, you can take sentences like

.i la .nik. cu klama la .kalifornias. .ije la .nik. cu stali la .kalifornias. ze'a lo nanca be li ci

and change them into the much more stylish

.i la .nik. cu klama la .kalifornias. gije stali la .kalifornias. ze'a lo nanca be li ci

— or, indeed, the even more stylish (and much less like English)

.i la .nik. la .kalifornias. cu klama gije stali ze'a lo nanca be li ci

You'll be seeing a lot of gije in Lojban for that reason.

Vocabulary

bruna	x1 is brother of/fraternal to x2 by bond/tie/standard/parent(s) x3; [not necess. biological]
dunli	x1 is equal/congruent to/as much as x2 in property/dimension/quantity x3
gunta	x1 (person/mass) attacks/invades/commits aggression upon victim x2 with goal/objective x3
jatna	x1 is captain/commander/leader/in-charge/boss of vehicle/domain x2
jikca	x1 interacts/behaves socially with x2; x1 socializes with/is sociable towards x2
kratr­senatore	x1 is a senator representing x2 in senate x3
mansa	x1 satisfies evaluator x2 in property (ka)/state x3
misno	x1 (person/object/event) is famous/renowned/is a celebrity among community of persons x2 (mass)
nupre	x1 (agent) promises/commits/assures/threatens x2 (event/state) to x3 [beneficiary/victim]
slabu	x1 is old/familiar/well-known to observer x2 in feature x3 (ka) by standard x4
speni	x1 is married to x2; x1 is a spouse of x2 under law/custom/tradition/system/convention x3
tinbe	x1 obeys/follows the command/rule x2 made by x3; (adjective:) x1 is obedient
vlipa	x1 has the power to bring about x2 under conditions x3; x1 is powerful in aspect x2 under x3

Exercise 4

Combine the following pairs of Lojban sentences into a single sentence. Get as many common sumti as possible into the bridi-head. Use conversion liberally.

1. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu jatna lo merko .i la .djak.kenedis. bruna la .rabyrt.kenedis.
2. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu speni la .djaklin.buvier. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu se catra la .lis.xarvis.azuald.
3. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu nupre lonu lo merko cu cadzu lo lunra .i la .nasas. cu tinbe fi la .djak.kenedis.
4. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu tavla fi la .kubas. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu gunta la .kubas.
5. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu mansa lei merko loka vlipa .i la .djak.kenedis. cu ckasu la .nikitas.xrucTCOF. loka vlipa
6. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu sutra tavla .i la .djak.kenedis. na denpa
7. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu jikca la .MErilin.monROS. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu djuno lodu'u la .MErilin.monROS. cu misno
8. .i mi la .djak.kenedis. cu se slabu .i la .djak.kenedis. pu pendo mi .i do doi kratrsenatore na dunli la .djak.kenedis.

Asking about connectives

• How can you tell someone is a computer programmer?
• You ask them “Do you want milk or sugar?”, and they answer “Yes.”

In natural languages, that kind of answer is liable to get you a clip around the ears. That is because natural languages are run not only by logic, but also by social conventions. And one of the most important social conventions about language (Gricean informativeness, for those taking third year linguistics courses) is that, whatever you say, you should say enough to fully inform your listener about what's going on. If I ask “Do you want milk or sugar?”, I need that information in order to prepare you a cup of coffee to your liking. Answering me “yes” doesn't give me much to go on.

As far as strict logic is concerned, though, “Yes” is the only proper answer, as computer programmers (and logicians, and Lojbanists) discover much to their amusement — and to the irritation of the rest of the world. That is because the question is phrased as a yes/no question; and OR, in the question, does not behave any differently as a logical connective than AND. (“Yes” is an appropriate answer to “Do you want milk and sugar?” Of course, now it's “No” which is not helpful as an answer).

The same holds for Lojban, of course: .i xu do djica lonu jmina loi ladru ja loi sakta is a yes/no-question, and the only proper answers are .i go'i and .i na go'i. What you should actually be asking, if you want to be logically correct, is “Identify which of the following you want: milk, sugar.”

You could say that, but it's not much like Lojban's fill-in-the-slot approach. Instead, Lojban sneakily asks you to fill in a slot you might not have expected: not the ‘milk’ slot, or the ‘sugar’ slot, but the connective slot:

.i do djica lonu jmina loi ladru ji loi sakta

You want to add milk ___ sugar.

By filling in the slot, you get to pick what you want. If you say je, you are saying the sentence .i do djica lonu jmina loi ladru je loi sakta — in other words, you want both. If you say .enai, you are using the AND NOT connective, which negates what follows it: so you are saying “I want milk, and not sugar.” If you want to negate what went before the connective instead, you use na je. (You can negate what goes before any connective by putting na in front of it.) So if you answer na je, you are saying “I want not milk, and sugar” (or, as is more usual in English, “not milk, but sugar”) — which means that you are picking only sugar. If you want neither, you can negate both sides: na je nai. You can still be unhelpful with your response: ja would leave us right where we started, for instance. But at least this way you have a logically consistent way of picking alternatives presented to you.

You can ask questions in the same way about the other kinds of connectives we have looked at. The connective interrogative for bridi-tails is gi ji.

Vocabulary

spita	x1 is a hospital treating patient(s) x2 for condition/injuries/disease/illness x3
stali	x1 remains/stays at/abides/lasts with x2
tadni	x1 studies/is a student of x2; x1 is a scholar; (adjective:) x1 is scholarly

Exercise 5

Answer these questions in Lojban.

1. .i la .ranjit. cu penmi la .suzyn. vi lo barja ji lo spita
2. .i la .djiotis. cu stali lo barja giji klama lo gusta
3. .i la .djang cu. tadni loi xumske giji nelci loi dotco birje
4. .i la .djiotis. cu pendo la .lis.xarvis.azuald. ji la .ranjit.
5. .i la .suzyn. cu nelci loi dotco ji fraso birje (Hint: Just as you thought: you have no idea whether Susan likes French beer or not. You should still be able to come up with a connective that reflects that).

Summary

In this lesson, we have covered:

• Lojban logical connectives (AND, OR, EOR, WON, IF, IFF)
• Non-logical connectives (joi)
• sumti and tanru connectives (ja, je, jo, ju, jonai, janai)
• bridi-tail connectives (gija, gije, gijo, giju, gijonai, gijanai)
• Asking questions about logical connectives (ji, giji)

Vocabulary

bakni	x1 is a cow/cattle/kine/ox/[bull/steer/calf] [beef-producer/bovine] of species/breed x2
cidjrkebabi	x1 is a kebab (Yet another one of those funny-shaped words..).
djacu	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity/expanse of water; (adjective:) x1 is aqueous/[aquatic]
fange	x1 is alien/foreign/[exotic]/unfamiliar to x2 in property x3 (ka)
jipci	x1 is a chicken/[hen/cock/rooster]/small fowl [a type of bird] of species/breed x2
ju'i	Pay Attention! Followed by the name of the person; same grammar as doi and coi (selma'o COI)
kensa	x1 is outer space near/associated with celestial body/region x2
lanme	x1 is a sheep/[lamb/ewe/ram] of species/breed x2 of flock x3
nanba	x1 is a quantity of/contains bread [leavened or unleavened] made from grains x2
pencu	x1 (agent) touches x2 with x3 [a locus on x1 or an instrument] at x4 [a locus on x2]
sabji	x1 (source) provides/supplies/furnishes x2 [supply/commodity] to x3 [recipient]
sluni	x1 is a quantity of/contains onions/scallions of type/cultivar x2
spaji	x1 (event/action abstract) surprises/startles/is unexpected [and generally sudden] to x2
zdile	x1 (abstract) is amusing/entertaining to x2 in property/aspect x3; x3 is what amuses x2 about x1

Exercise 6

Translate from Lojban.

1. .i lo bevri cu klama lo jubme pe lo ci pendo gije cusku lu .i do djica lonu do citka ma li'u
2. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i do ca sabji lo mo cidjrkari ja cidjrkebabi li'u
3. .i lo bevri cu cusku lu .i lanme ja bakni ja jipci li'u
4. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i mi djica lo bakni cidjrkari je lo sluni nanba li'u
5. .i lo bevri fi la .djiotis. cu dunda fe loi djacu gije cusku fe lu .i do djica ma li'u
6. .i la .djiotis cu cusku lu .i lo cidjrkari li'u
7. .iseki'ubo lo bevri cu cusku lu .i lanme ji bakni li'u
8. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i naje li'u

Exercise 7

Translate into Lojban.

1. The waiter turns to Susan, smiles, and says “Lamb or beef?”
2. Susan either didn't hear the waiter, or didn't pay attention to him.
3. Jyoti touches Susan on the shoulder and says “Hey, Susan?”
4. Susan is surprised, and says “Um... Chicken.”
5. Jyoti says “Hope you enjoyed travelling through outer space — whether or not you met any aliens.” (Use an attitudinal for ‘Hope.’)

Answers to exercises

Exercise 1

1. IFF. In English, we expect that IFF is what is meant, anyway; but a very legalistic (and horridly mean) parent can still say “I said I wouldn't get you ice cream if you were naughty; I never said I'd get you ice cream if you were nice.” That's because if in English logically means IF, and only conventionally means the stronger IFF. This conventional kind of meaning goes by the name of implicature; and implicature has always been something of an issue in Lojban, since humans expect it, but it's not really anything to do with logic.
2. Definitely IF: If Calvin Coolidge is president, it's still the twentieth century.
3. IF. If this was IFF, the relation would be symmetrical, so you should be able to say If I get a hangover, I've drunk too many strawberry daquiris. But daquiris aren't the only way to get a hangover, so this doesn't follow.
4. The reputable members of the business community who say this kind of thing will hardly begrudge you a quote if you've already called for a consultation; so this is OR.
5. EOR: You may be being imprecise, but you're not being nonsensical — the number of reasons you can come up with can't be both six and seven.
6. OR: As it turns out, it's next to both. (Nick met some people from Liechtenstein once, actually. They found the name of their capital hilarious..).

Exercise 2

1. la .suzyn. cu cinynei la .djang. ja la .ranjit.
2. mi nelci loi finpe joi loi se rasyjukpa patlu (or any reasonable facsimile thereof: loi patlu poi se rasyjukpa, loi rasyjukpa patlu, or anything of the sort).

je is possible, but joi is better, since we are probably talking about fish and chips together.

1. ko cpedu lo pelxu nimre jisra jonai lo narju nimre jisra (When you order your beverage, you are not normally expected to order more than one.)
2. mi djica lo birje ju lo cidjrkari
3. mi klama la .uacintyn jo la .atlantas. la .bastn. (Yes, this was meant to be tricky. In particular, it involves IFF rather than IF, since to get from Boston to Atlanta, you would likely go via Washington. So you cannot go to Atlanta without going to Washington, and you've just said you won't go to Washington without going to Atlanta).

Exercise 3

1. Ranjeet drinks something which is either wine or beer.
2. Ranjeet drinks wine mixed with beer (.aunai)
3. Natraj is a bar and restaurant (i.e. a bistro, or a licensed restaurant).
4. x is a response, whether or not it is an answer to the question.
5. Zhang goes up to, meets, and talks to Susan.

This might lead you to ask what the place structure of a tanru is. The answer is, it is the place structure of its final gismu — however it is connected with the rest of the tanru.

1. All people are, if angry, then anxious about being hated.
2. Ranjeet likes tasty or spicy things. (The normal implication in English, made explicit in Lojban, is to add “or both”. This is an implicature, as described in Exercise 1).
3. I should but cannot go to the bar. (Not a typo: jenai builds a new connective, AND NOT, since what follows it gets negated).

Exercise 4

1. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu jatna lo merko gije bruna la .rabyrt.kenedis. “Jack Kennedy was leader of America and brother of Robert Kennedy.”
2. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu speni la .djaklin.buvier. gije se catra la .lis.xarvis.azuald. “Jack Kennedy was married to Jacquelin Bouvier and killed by Lee Harvey Oswald.”
3. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu nupre lonu lo merko cu cadzu lo lunra kei gije te tinbe fi la .nasas. “Jack Kennedy promised that an American would walk on the moon, and was obeyed by NASA.” (The conversion works out in putting Kennedy as the x1 of both bridi).
4. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu tavla fi la .kubas. gije gunta la .kubas. “Jack Kennedy talked about Cuba and attacked Cuba.” (You can't get Cuba into the bridi-head, because it's in different places in the two bridi: x4 in the first bridi, x2 in the second).
5. .i la .djak.kenedis fi loka vlipa cu mansa fe loi merko gije ckasu fe la .nikitas.xrucTCOF. “Jack Kennedy, as regards power, satisfied the Americans, and mocked Nikita Khrushchev.” (Tricky, tricky, I know. The x1 and x3 are the same; so with some clever usage of fi — and fe, so that the next sumti doesn't get taken for x4 — this can be made to work).
6. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu sutra tavla gije na denpa — or equivalently, .i la .djak.kenedis. cu sutra tavla gijenai denpa “Jack Kennedy talked fast and didn't pause.”
7. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu jikca la .MErilin.monROS. gije djuno lodu'u la .MErilin.monROS. cu misno “Jack Kennedy socialised with Marilyn Monroe and knew that Marilyn Monroe was famous.” (Marilyn isn't in the same place in the two bridi: she's in x2 in the first bridi, but in a sumti within an abstraction in x2 in the second bridi).
8. .i la .djak.kenedis. cu slabu mi gije pu pendo mi gijenai se dunli do doi kratrsenatore “Jack Kennedy was familiar to me and was my friend, and is not equalled by you, senator.” (If it wasn't for the third sentence, you could have fit the mi into the bridi-head. The original text, famously spoken by Lloyd Bentsen to Dan Quayle in the 1988 American Vice-Presidential debate, is: “I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy.”)

Exercise 5

1. jenai (“Does Ranjeet meet Susan at the bar or the hospital?”)
2. nagije (“Does Jyoti stay at the bar or go to the restaurant?”)
3. gije, because he does both. (“Does Zhang study chemistry or like German beer?”)
4. naje — in all likelihood. (“Is Jyoti is a friend of Lee Harvey Oswald's or of Ranjeet's?”)
5. naju. Think about it... (“Does Susan like German or French beer?”)

Exercise 6

1. The waiter goes to the three friends' table and says “What would you like to eat?”
2. Ranjeet says “What curries or kebabs are you serving now?” (There's no reason you can't use mo in a tanru. As usual, this asks for the listener to fill in the blank. The way Lojban works, mo cidjrkari ja cidjrkebabi is interpreted as mo {cidjrkari ja cidjrkebabi} — in other words, mo} applies to both cidjrkari and cidjrkebabi. There is more on the structure of tanru in Lesson 14).
3. The waiter says “Lamb, beef or chicken.” (That is to say, the sentence “We serve x curries and kebabs” is true for x being lamb OR beef, OR chicken. This means that the waiter has come up with a new kind of animal, a ‘Lamb-OR-Cow-OR-Chicken’; but of course, that description fits any one of a lamb, a cow or a chicken, so what the waiter has said does make sense).
4. Ranjeet says “I want a beef curry and an onion bread.”
5. The waiter gives Jyoti water and says to her “What would you like?” (Whatever is in front of the first selbri gets repeated in front of the second; so this is the same as saying lo bevri fi la .djiotis. cu dunda fe loi djacu .i je lo bevri fi la .djiotis. cu cusku fe lu .i do djica ma li'u).
6. Jyoti says “A curry.”
7. For that reason, the waiter says “Lamb or beef?”
8. Jyoti says “Not A but B” (or, in English, “Beef.”)

Exercise 7

1. .i lo bevri cu carna fi la .suzyn. gije cisma gije cusku lu .i lanme ji bakni li'u
2. .i la .suzyn. cu tirna lo bevri gijonai jundi lo bevri (or: .i la .suzyn. cu tirna lo bevri gijonai jundi ri)
3. .i la .djiotis. cu pencu la .suzyn. lo janco gije cusku lu .i ju'i .suzyn. li'u
4. .i la .suzyn. cu se spaji gije cusku lu .i .y. jipci li'u (Not one of the alternatives the waiter presented, so she couldn't very well answer with a connective).
5. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i .a'o do se zdile lonu do litru lo kensa kei giju penmi lo fange (If you left out the kei, the giju will attach to litru rather than se zdile, which gives a slightly different meaning. As it turns out, though, both would be acceptable renderings of the English).

Chapter 12. Aspect, Vocatives, Loan Words, and Equalities

This lesson is something of a mixed bag. In it, we cover four topics which are fairly important in Lojban, each of which kind of fits somewhere else — but would take us far afield in each of the other lessons. Aspects are a special kind of tense; vocatives are a special kind of attitudinal; loan words are a way of introducing new words into Lojban, comparable to lujvo; and equalities involve a special kind of selbri.

Aspect

We've seen that we can locate our bridi in space and time, by using tenses. But this is something of a simplification. We can't just say that events are before, simultaneous with, or after other events, because events have beginnings, middles and ends. They are not simply points that can be lined up on a timeline.

And we tend to be very interested in the beginnings and ends of events. There is quite a difference between these three sentences:

• Is he about to do his homework?
• Is he still doing his homework?
• Has he done his homework yet?

Doing homework is an activity that has a beginning, a middle, and an end. So when we pinpoint the time at which doing homework happens, we are also pinpointing its beginning, its middle, and its end. Which means that the first of those questions asks whether the time is before the beginning of doing the homework, or after it. The second question asks whether or not the time is in the middle of doing the homework. And the third question asks whether the time is after the end of doing the homework, or not.

The term in linguistics for situating the beginnings and ends of events is aspect. The term Lojban uses is event contours: events are perceived as shapes, which have beginnings and ends. (This is why Lojban can use its aspects in space as well as time, although we won't be going into that here.) In many languages, aspect is as important as tense, or even more important. In Russian, to use the best-known example, you cannot use a verb at all without choosing between a stem indicating that something is (or was, or will be) still going on (imperfective), and a stem indicating that something is (or was, or will be) completed (perfective).

English isn't like that: you can quite often leave off any indication of aspect in your verbs. Yet English has ways of expressing aspect anyway. When we say “I have spoken to the doctor”, we are also indicating that we have now finished doing so — we are after the end of the event. When we say “I am speaking to the doctor”, on the other hand, we are also indicating that we are in middle of the event: the event is continuing, and is not yet over.

Lojban uses cmavo belonging to selma'o ZAhO to express event contours. You use them just like tense words; if you use both, the tense word goes first. The three-way distinction we made — before the beginning, in the middle, after the end — is made with three distinct words: pu'o, ca'o, ba'o. This is, of course, no coincidence: before (pu) an event begins, you use pu'o; after (ba) an event ends, you use ba'o. So you can come up with sentences like these:

mi ba'o tavla lo mikce

I have spoken to the doctor (or had spoken, or will have spoken)

mi ca'o tavla lo mikce

I am speaking to the doctor (or was speaking, or will be speaking)

mi pu'o tavla lo mikce

I am about to speak to the doctor (or was about to speak, or will be about to speak)

mi pu pu'o tavla lo mikce

I was about to speak to the doctor

mi ba ba'o tavla lo mikce

I will have spoken to the doctor

mi pu ba'o tavla lo mikce

I had spoken to the doctor

mi pu ca'o tavla lo mikce

I was speaking to the doctor

Vocabulary

fekpre	insane, crazy person (fenki ‘crazy’ + prenu ‘person’)
troci	x1 tries/attempts/makes an effort to do/attain x2 (event/state/property) by actions/method x3

Exercise 1

Translate into Lojban.

1. I will be on the verge of going insane.
2. I'm done reading the book.
3. Jyoti's still on her way to the restaurant.
4. Ranjeet was eating his curry.
5. Susan was to have been with us, but she had to stay at the bar.
6. I'd gone to the hospital before you tried to talk to me.

More Aspects

The aspects pu'o and ba'o describe situations in which the event is still not going on, or is no longer going on: if you draw a time-line, they are outside of the line corresponding to the event. But beginnings and endings are pretty conspicuous, as moments go. So we often want to point out that we are not before the beginning of the event, but right at the point when it begins; and not after the end of the event, but right at the point when it ends.

To pinpoint your time at the instant when the event begins, the aspect word you use is co'a. So you can say mi co'a tcidu lo cukta at the moment when you start reading a book. When you stop reading the book, the aspect is co'u. When you finish reading, on the other hand, the word to use is mo'u. So Lojban makes a distinction between finishing and stopping (before the event would have finished normally).

For this kind of aspect, English normally just uses verbs: start, finish, stop. Lojban likewise allows you to use distinct selbri to express these notions: cfari, mulno, and sisti. Using aspects just lets you express things more succinctly; and with Lojban the way it is, anything that makes things more succinct comes in handy.

There are more aspects in Lojban, though you won't necessarily see them as often in Lojban text; you can find out about them in Chapter 10.10 of The Complete Lojban Language.

Exercise 2

Some of you may be familiar with the puzzles Where's Waldo? and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?. Well now we're going to play a little game of la .djang. cu zvati ma. For each of these sentences, say where Zhang is, given the aspect expressed. You're allowed to say “Between A and B” in your answer. For example:

.i la .djang. ca'o klama la .paRIS. la .li,ON.  Zhang is between Paris and Lyon.

Watch out for strange Lojbanisations of names!

1. .i la .djang. co'a klama la .sankt.PEterspurg. la .myskFAS.
2. .i la .djang. ba'o klama la .minxen. la .keln.
3. .i la .djang. mo'u klama la .firentses. la .veNEtsi,as.
4. .i la .djang. co'u klama la .cai,en. la .nolinz.
5. .i la .djang. pu'o klama la .canXAIS. la .guanJOUS.
6. .i la .djang. ca'o stali lo barja.

Vocatives

When you address people by name, you usually do so to make it clear who out of a group you are talking to. We've already seen how to do that in Lojban: doi, followed by the name (without the name article, la.) So “Houston, we have a problem” ends up as

doi xustyn. mi'a se nabmi

(sidestepping the slight illogicality of speaking to a single person in Houston but addressing a whole city).

Often, however, we address people in order to manage our conversations: to make someone pay attention to our turn; to butt in before it is our turn; to signal that a conversation is beginning or ending; and so on. We can also do this without using names, but instead by various context cues and all-purpose words. When you think about it, for example, OK does a lot of work for such a small word.

As we know, Lojban tends to be precise rather than vague. So when it comes to signalling what you want done with a conversation, Lojban doesn't play along with the usual natural language tricks of leaving it up to the principles of politeness and social convention to work out what's going on. Instead, it has explicit words for managing turns in a conversation, which can optionally be followed by the name of whoever you're bringing it to the attention of. Since all these words address someone, they are called vocatives (selma'o COI).

Natural languages don't distinguish as carefully between these various contexts, except in fairly artificial contexts: for example, conversations over two-way radio, where it is impossible to talk over each other, or to negotiate whose turn it is to speak through subtle visual cues. (A less elaborate vocabulary is in place for IRC, its Internet equivalent.) This means that Lojban vocatives look a little like a CB enthusiast's nightmare, because the glosses you see for them come from this more explicit subset of English. But normal English has these kinds of words as well — they're just not as clearly distinguished, because context is usually relied on instead.

We are already familiar with some of them. Remember mi'e used for self-introduction? And they work exactly as attitudinals but take one sumti after them.

• mi'e is the word you use to introduce yourself: it's the only vocative followed by the speaker's name, rather than the addressee's. So mi'e la .robin. means “I'm Robin” or “This is Robin speaking.”
• o'ai is the greeting/parting word much like Italian ciao: it corresponds to “Hello” / “Bye” and whatever else happens to be in vogue.
• coi is the word for greetings only: it corresponds to “Hello”, “Good morning”, “Hi”, “Wazzup?”, and whatever else happens to be in vogue.
• Conversely, co'o is the farewell word, corresponding to “Goodbye”, “Farewell”, “Yo Later Dude”, and so on. Lojbanists signing off on e-mail often end with something like co'omi'e .robin. — this is equivalent to putting your name at the end of your email in English as a signature, and translates as “Goodbye; I'm Robin.”

The other vocatives are not as common.

• Two words similar to coi are ju'i ‘Hey!', with which you draw someone's attention, and fi'i ‘Welcome! At your service!', with which you offer hospitality or a service. (It's what you say to a visitor; you wouldn't say it over the phone, for instance, unless your addressee is calling from the airport and is on their way over).
• je'e corresponds to ‘Roger!' in radio-speak, and ‘right’ or ‘uh-uh’ in normal English: it confirms that you've received a message. If you haven't, you say je'enai instead (of course); in normal English, that would be ‘Beg your pardon?' or ‘Huh?'.
• In case you haven't received the message clearly, you can explicitly ask for the speaker to repeat whatever they said with ke'o.
• Similarly, be'e signals a request to send a message (“Hello? Are you there?”), and re'i indicates that you are ready (Lojban bredi) to receive a message. (It's what you say when you pick up the phone — which in English also happens to be “Hello?”, but in Italian is Pronto ‘Ready!').
• mu'o is what you say when you explicitly make it another speaker's turn to speak: it's the “Over!” of radio.
• When it isn't your turn to speak, but you want to barge in anyway, you can say ta'a — though it probably won't make anyone any happier that you're interrupting.
• nu'e introduces a promise; pe'u introduces a request, and so is fairly similar to the attitudinal .e'o.
• vi'o acknowledges a request, and promises to carry it out: in radio talk this is “Wilco!”, and in normal English “OK” or “All right, I will” (or for that matter, “Consider it done!”)
• You say “Thank you” with ki'e — to which the appropriate response is not fi'i (“You're welcome” doesn't mean you're being visited by some guests), but the simple acknowledgement je'e.
• Finally, to close communication (radio's “Over and out!”), you can use fe'o. (This is what people actually should be putting at the end of their e-mails; but it's not as well-known a word as co'o)

Vocatives take names, sumti or selbri. The names come after an obligatory pause, to make sure any eavesdropping computers don't misconstrue the vocative as one long name. The sumti or selbri describes the addressee (e.g. co'o lo mensi or co'o mensi - “Goodbye, sister!”.) If any of these are used, they normally don't need terminators after them. If you use the vocative on its own, however, you will need a terminator, because the things likeliest to follow the vocative in a sentence could easily be misconstrued as describing your addressee. The terminator for vocatives is do'u. For example,

coi do'u la .suzyn. la .ranjit. puzi cliva

Hello! Susan's just left Ranjeet.

coi la .suzyn. la .ranjit. puzi cliva

Hello, Susan! Ranjeet's just left.

Exercise 3

Give the Lojban vocatives corresponding to the emphasised words in each of the following sentences. You may need to add nai to your vocatives. Beware of trick questions!

1. “Jyoti, are you there?” “Just a second!”
2. “Come on in, Zhang, make yourself at home!” “Much obliged!”
3. “You're coming along, right?” “Come again?”
4. “Excuse me, is this seat taken?” “Be my guest!”

Loan words

You got a brief taste of lujvo in Lesson 8. As we said there, lujvo are the main way of introducing new words — more precisely, new brivla — into Lojban. The most important thing about lujvo is that, as selbri, they are meant to have very well-defined place structures; and there are guidelines in place for deriving them (see The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 12.) So, particularly when the concept you want to express is ‘verb-like’ (that is, when it's likely to have sumti of its own), lujvo are preferred.

There are some cases, though, when you do have to borrow a word from another language, creating a loan word (called in Lojban a fu'ivla). This can be because the thing you're talking about is very concrete or particular, and/or because the reference is quite culture-specific. In either case, it would be really cumbersome to describe it with a combination of gismu. (For example, how would you come up with a description for brie? Or rock 'n' roll? — which, we should point out, you would have to keep distinct from the later musical genre of rock!)

The problem with borrowing words into Lojban is, Lojban has a quite thorough set-up for working out what the words are in a stream of letters. This means that most words you import into Lojban (once you spell them in Lojban letters) are likely to mean something else already. For example, if I want to bring the ancient name of the river Danube - Istros into Lojban, the last thing I want to do is start saying .istero. That will get analysed as .i stero, which is something like ‘and steradian function’.

The sanctioned way to deal with loan-words (described in more detail in The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 4.7) is to stick a gismu (minus its final letter) in front of the word, showing what sort of thing the word is; and to put an r (or, if an r is already there, an n) between the gismu and the word. The gismu helps the reader or listener, who has likely never seen this word before, guess what the word might be. This is particularly handy if the source word might be ambiguous between two different meanings. And the combination of gismu minus final vowel, source word (which should start with a consonant, and end with a vowel), and r or n will hopefully produce a cluster of consonants crunchy enough that it cannot be mistaken for another Lojban word or phrase.

So what does all this look like in practice? Well, we've already seen curry:

• take ‘food’, cidj[a];
• take the word in Lojban garb (starting with a consonant and ending with a vowel), kari;
• and wedge them together with an r: cidjrkari.

(The consonant cluster is also crunchy enough to be difficult to pronounce; the r is a syllable on its own, and the word should sound something like shidgerrrrrkari).

Loan words (in Lojban, fu'ivla) are still only sporadically used — particularly because, as of this writing at least, there is no Lojban dictionary where a standard list of them can be looked up. The problem of which language to borrow words from is also hard to settle, and the choices made can cause problems of their own. The most international solution for plant and animal names, for example, is Latin, and in particular the Latin of the Linnaean system of classification. But this means that, to come up with a word for ‘catnip’, say, you have to know Latin and your Linnaean taxonomy. (Or, like I did, look it up on the Internet — but you can't normally do that while you're having a conversation.) So fu'ivla are still largely unexplored terrain in Lojban.

Exercise 4

Turn these words into fu'ivla, using the gismu supplied as the prefix. For example:

Mummy/Mommie: mamta  mamtrmami.

1. Cockney: bangu
2. Pizza: cidja
3. Derivative: cmaci
4. Adagio: zgike
5. Psychopathy: bilmi
6. Deuterium: cidro
7. Amethyst: jemna
8. Rallentando: zgike

Equalities

You may at some stage have asked yourself the question, what the Lojban for is is. The short answer is, most of the time there isn't one. Lojban represents the world in terms of relations (bridi), and is is a fairly empty kind of relation. Moreover, if the thing to the right of is (the ‘predicate’, in grammar terminology) means a class of things, instead of a single entity, then it corresponds to a selbri, and we don't need to put a word for is in. So “Robin is English” comes out in Lojban as la .robin. glico: glico is already a selbri that takes la .robin. as a sumti — so we don't need a separate selbri for is.

Very, very, very occasionally, you'll need a Lojban word for is anyway. Lojban offers three words which sort of do the job of is; each has its own provisos.

The first word is me. me takes a sumti following it, and converts it into a selbri. So me la .nik. is a selbri, which takes as a sumti anything that ‘is a Nick’. Similarly, since lo mi ci mensi is ‘my three sisters’, la .renas. cu me lo mi ci mensi means “Rena is one of my three sisters” (as she is described by the selbri version of ‘my three sisters’.) So me is best thought of as meaning ‘is one of’.

The second word is du. du is a selbri on its own, and it means that all its sumti are the same thing and have the same identity. So mi du la .nik. (or mi du la .robin.) is a way of saying “I am Robin (or Nick.)” The claim made is one of identity; so you can flip the sumti around without making any difference: la .robin. cu du mi. It does not make a sumti behave like a selbri, so du cannot mean ‘is one of’, like me does: la .renas. cu du lo mi ci mensi makes the nonsensical claim that Rena is my three sisters. (Or should that be are?)

We can also see the difference between me and du in the following example:

mi me lo ctuca

I'm a teacher

mi du lo ctuca

mi du lo ctuca

I'm the teacher [may be the one you were talking about]

These two means are grammatical Lojban, but they are viewed with some distaste, and are usually giveaways that some poor translating from English (or another natural language) has been going on. The third mechanism is better regarded, because it tucks the equality away in an inconspicuous corner. po'u has the same grammar as the sumti modifiers like pe and po we saw in Lesson 3. But instead of claiming that one sumti is associated with the other, or owned by the other, po'u claims that the two sumti are the same thing. So:

la ranjit. po'u lo pendo be la .djiotis. vi zvati

Ranjeet, who is Jyoti's friend, is here.

Like those other members of selma'o GOI (pe, po and po'e), po'u has a non-restrictive version: no'u. So if I was saying that Ranjeet was Jyoti's friend, not to distinguish him from the other Ranjeets you might know, but just for your information, I should use no'u instead of po'u. You can think of no'u as tantamount to noi du, and po'u as tantamount to poi du.

Vocabulary

xadba

x1 is exactly/approximately half/semi-/demi-/hemi- of x2 by standard x3

Exercise 5

Where appropriate (and only where appropriate), translate is in each of the following sentences with each one of me, du, po'u, and no'u. To get po'u and no'u to work, you may have to rearrange the sentences. For instance:

x, which is [equal to] y, is a number.

• da noi me de cu namcu
• da noi du de namcu
• da no'u de namcu

1. Jyoti is a woman.
2. Jyoti and Susan are the two women who went in Jyoti's car.
3. Jyoti and Susan are among the women whom Zhang considers his friends. (Use jinvi).
4. Ranjeet, who is a friend of Jyoti, is half-German.
5. This blue car which is the one to the right of mine is a Ford car. (Use lo pritu for the one to the right).

Summary

In this lesson, we have covered:

• Simple aspects (pu'o, ca'o, ba'o; co'a, co'o, mo'u)
• Vocatives (DOI, COI)
• Loan words
• Words expressing equality (me, du, po'u, no'u)

Vocabulary

banli	x1 is great/grand in property x2 (ka) by standard x3
banxa	x1 is a bank owned by/in banking system x2 for banking function(s) x3 (event)
casnu	x1(s) (mass normally, but 1 individual/jo'u possible) discuss(es)/talk(s) about topic/subject x2
cladu	x1 is loud/noisy at observation point x2 by standard x3
cradi	x1 broadcasts/transmits [using radio waves] x2 via station/frequency x3 to [radio] receiver x4
dukse	x1 is an excess of/too much of x2 by standard x3
ji'a	additionally, also
la'edi'u	‘the content of the previous sentence’ (that, as in “I knew that!”)
mau	sumti tcita: exceeded by... (from zmadu ‘more’)
sanga	x1 sings/chants x2 [song/hymn/melody/melodic sounds] to audience x3
smagau	x1 acts so that x2 is quiet/silent/[still] at observation point x3 by standard x4 (smaji ‘quiet’ + gasnu ‘do’)
ticygau	x1 (person) acts so that x2 (event/experience) misleads/deceives/dupes/fools/cheats/tricks x3 into x4 (event/state) (tcica ‘deceive’ + gasnu ‘do’)
voksa	x1 is a voice/speech sound of individual x2
zmadu	x1 exceeds/is more than x2 in property/quantity x3 (ka/ni) by amount/excess x4
zgikrfanki	This is a fu'ivla, and you'll have to work out what it is. Hint: say the word out loud, minus the prefix.

Exercise 6

Translate from Lojban:

1. .i ba'o lonu citka kei lei ci pendo ca casnu
2. .i ca'o bo ri klama lo dansydi'u po'u la zgikrfanki jipci
3. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i pe'u .djiotis. ko smagau lo ve cradi
4. .i mi co'u tirna la .ranjit. li'u
5. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i ke'o .suzyn. mi na'e tirna ri'a lonu lo ve cradi cu cladu li'u gije mo'u smagau
6. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i .u'i ki'e do'u mi co'a tirna mi li'u
7. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i .uu mi ji'a go'i li'u
8. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i ke'onai .djiotis. mi nelci lei me la'o gy. Eurythmics gy. selsanga ne mau lemi voksa li'u
9. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i mi pu'o cusku la'edi'u li'u
10. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i ke'onai .suzyn. li'u

Exercise 7

Translate into Lojban:

1. Jyoti, Ranjeet and Susan arrive at the disco at 0:50. (Hint: you don't have a distinct word for ‘arrive’; use klama and an appropriate aspect).
2. Ranjeet says to Jyoti and Susan “Look, you two, I've got to go to the bank.”
3. “I was going to bring money, but I was paying too much attention to my radio transmissions.” (Hint: use dukse in a tanru)
4. While Ranjeet isn't there, Jyoti says “Susan? Günter — The Great Deceiver — dumped you” (Again, you don't have a word for ‘dump’; use prami and an appropriate aspect).
5. “So I thought you still hated everything German.”
6. Susan says “Uh-uh, but Ranjeet's eyes are much more beautiful than Günter's.”
7. A long way away from the women, Zhang loudly says “How are you doing, friend!” to Ranjeet.

Answers to exercises

Exercise 1

1. .i mi ba pu'o fekpre
2. .i mi ca ba'o tcidu lo cukta
3. .i la .djiotis. ca ca'o klama lo gusta
4. .i la .ranjit. pu ca'o citka loi ri cidjrkari/.i la .ranjit. pu ca'o citka loi cidjrkari pe lo nei
5. .i la .suzyn. pu pu'o kansa mi'a gije ku'i bilga lonu stali lo barja
6. .i mi pu ba'o klama lo spita pu lonu do troci lonu do tavla mi

Exercise 2

To explain the peculiar Lojbanisations of place names below, we have helpfully supplied IPA transcriptions in brackets afterwards.

1. Moscow (St. Petersburg [</nowiki>sanktˈpɛtɛrspurg], Moscow [məsˈkfa])
2. Munich (Munich [</nowiki>ˈmynçɛn], Cologne [ˈkœln])
3. Florence (Florence [</nowiki>fiˈrentse], Venice [veˈnetsia])
4. Between New Orleans and Cheyenne (Cheyenne [</nowiki>ʃæˈjɛn], New Orleans [ˈnɑlɪnz]. OK, we aren't necessarily serious about the last one).
5. Canton/Guangzhou (Shanghai [</nowiki>ʂaŋxai], Canton/Guangzhou [kuaŋtʂow])
6. The bar ([</nowiki>lo ˈbarʒa]). Of course.

Exercise 3

1. • be'e (“Will Jyoti receive my message?”, although ju'i could also be used, as someone is trying to draw Jyoti's attention).
   • re'inai (Jyoti is not ready to receive any messages).
2. .
   • fi'i (the English is a classic formula for offering hospitality; it may not always be literally meant!)
   • je'e (the simplest response is simply to acknowledge what has been said to you; “Much obliged!” is doing pretty much the same job as “You're welcome!” You could respond with vi'o “That's exactly what I'll do!”; but vi'o is a response to an explicit request, and fi'i isn't really a request. It would also make sense to respond with ki'e).
3. • mu'o (“Please respond”, which is pretty much the same thing as “It's now your turn to speak.”)
   • ke'o (unless you're sneakily trying to say “No”, which would be more like vi'onai “I refuse to comply with your request.”)
4. • pe'u (because the primary thing you're doing is making a request; but “Excuse me” is also initiating an exchange the other person wasn't expecting, so you could also use ju'i, ta'a, be'e, or even coi).
5. • fi'i, because you're offering a service, although vi'o is just as good, because you're carrying out a request.

Exercise 4

1. bangrkokni
2. cidjrpitsa (Remember, fu'ivla are done by pronunciation, not by spelling).
3. cmacrderivativi (Or, if you know about Interlingue and ablatives, cmacrderivativo. But that's a long story..).
4. zgikrnadadjio or zgikrxadadjio, depending on what your favourite consonant is.
5. bilmrsaikopati, if you're borrowing the word from English; bilmrpsikopati or bilmrpsikopatia, if you want something closer to Greek (and thus presumably more recognisable to at least some non-English speakers).
6. cidrndeuteriumu (or cidrndeuterio, if you know about those ablatives I'm not going to explain here...) Of course, you can't use r as the joining consonant, since cidr- already ends in r.
7. jemnrnametisti or jemnrxametisti. (As it turns out, jemnrametisti would have also been acceptable as a fu'ivla).
8. zgiknralentando (Remember, the word already starts with r, so you have to use n to join the two parts of the fu'ivla together instead).

Exercise 5

1. • la .djiotis. me lo ninmu.
   • la .djiotis. du lo ninmu is possible, but frowned on, as discussed.
   • As for the other two alternatives, even if we tucked away the is-clause after po'u or no'u, we would be left with no selbri at all. So we can't get away with them.
2. • la .djiotis. je la .suzyn. cu me lo re ninmu poi klama fu lo karce po la .djiotis.
   • la .djiotis. joi la .suzyn. du lei re ninmu poi klama fu lo karce po la .djiotis. (note the masses! If you'd used .e, you would be saying that Jyoti was the two women, and Susan was also the two women!)
   • There are two selbri here, but you can't really tuck one away with po'u and be left with a selbri for the rest of the sentence.
3. • la .djiotis. je la .suzyn. me lo ninmu poi la .djang. jinvi lo du'u ke'a pendo ri.
   • la .djiotis. je la .suzyn. du lo ninmu poi la .djang. jinvi lo du'u ke'a pendo ri is possible but frowned on.
   • A version with no'u is not really possible, because there would be no selbri left for the main bridi.
4. • la .ranjit. noi me lo pendo be la .djiotis. cu me lo xadba dotco.
   • Frowned on but possible: la .ranjit. noi du lo pendo be la .djiotis. cu me lo xadba dotco.
   • Frowned on but possible: la .ranjit. no'u lo pendo be la .djiotis. cu me lo xadba dotco.
5. • lo vi blanu karce poi me lo pritu be lo mi karce cu me la .ford. karce
   • lo vi blanu karce poi du lo pritu be lo mi karce cu me la .ford. karce (The first is does indeed act as an equality sign: you're describing a car two different ways, to narrow it down. But the brand of a car is a class, so the second is is not an equality sign).
   • lo vi blanu karce po'u lo pritu be lo mi karce cu me la .ford. karce (Since you're narrowing down what the car is, you need a restrictive rather than a non-restrictive clause).

Note: This use of me is pretty standard to get a cmene into a tanru. There are often times when you will want to use a name to describe a class of things, rather than a unique thing. This in turn means you have to treat a cmene like a selbri, entering into domains like tanru. In fact, as an extension of this, Type 1 and 2 fu'ivla are merely cmene converted with me to selbri: Type 1 involves the undigested cmene, with la'o (e.g. me la'o gy. curry gy.), while Type 2 Lojbanises it, using la .(e.g. me la .karis.).

Exercise 6

1. After they have finished eating, the three friends are now discussing. (Aspects can be used as sumti tcita, just like tenses can. ba'o means pretty much the same as ba here, but emphasises that they had finished eating when they started talking again).
2. While they were doing so, they went to the disco [which is] </nowiki>The Funky Chicken (Aspects can also be used to connect sentences, just like tenses can. .i ca'o bo means that the second sentence took place while the first sentence was still going on. The fu'ivla considers Funky to be a kind of music: ‘The Funk Chicken’ is probably more accurate).
3. Susan says “Jyoti, please turn the radio down.”
4. “I've stopped hearing Ranjeet.”
5. Jyoti says “Come again, Susan? I didn't hear you because the radio is loud”, and completes turning it down. (i.e. she turns it down to completion — all the way down).
6. Ranjeet says “Heheh, thanks! I now start hearing myself!” (This is a more pedantic rendering of what in English would be more like “I can hear myself think again”. The do'u is necessary, because otherwise Ranjeet would be addressing himself: “Thanks, Me!”)
7. Jyoti says “Unfortunately, so can I.”
8. Ranjeet says “Don't repeat, Jyoti. I like Eurythmics songs, but my own voice more. (or: I like my own voice more than Eurythmics songs.)” (Ranjeet, too clever a Lojbanist for his own good, is playing around with his vocatives).
9. Susan says “I was about to say that.” (The full tense would have been pu pu'o, but you don't have to state the tense as well as the aspect when you think it is obvious from context).
10. Jyoti says “Don't repeat, Susan.” (Two can play at that game!)

Exercise 7

1. .i la .djiotis. je la .ranjit. je la .suzyn. mo'u klama lo dansydi'u ti'u li no pi'e muno (Not co'u klama, which would have had them stop on the way; nor ba'o klama, which would mean that they had already arrived at 0:50).
2. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku fi la .djiotis. joi la .suzyn. fe lu ju'i redo mi bilga lonu mi klama lo banxa (or: mi .ei klama lo banxa. Since Ranjeet speaks to Jyoti and Susan as a unit (together), joi is more appropriate, though je is strictly speaking correct).
3. .i mi pu pu'o bevri loi jdini gije dukse jundi lemi se cradi li'u (A more pedantic version — in keeping with Ranjeet's style — would be: .i ku'i lonu mi jundi lo se cradi pe mi cu se dukse)
4. .i ca'o lonu la .ranjit. na zvati kei la .djiotis. cu cusku lu be'e .suzyn. la .ginter. no'u la banli ticygau co'u prami do (co'u is the only really good aspect to use; it's somewhat more controversial to think of love as something with a natural ending point (mo'u), and Günter — though he has turned Susan off some perfectly acceptable beverages — had not necessarily reached that point, anyway. If you wanted to keep the umlaut, you could also use la'o dy. Günter dy., or something like that. We presume this is the only Günter they know, so his nickname isn't being used to distinguish him from other Günters; hence, no'u instead of po'u).
5. .i semu'ibo mi pu jinvi lodu'u do ca'o xebni ro lo dotco li'u (or: ro dotco, since lo is assumed after numbers. ro da poi dotco is also correct).
6. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i je'e do'u ku'i lo kanla be la .ranjit. cu mutce zmadu lo kanla be la .ginter. lo ka melbi li'u (Kind of a baptism by fire for you with that new gismu. Sorry about that. You can't avoid do'u here, otherwise Susan would be speaking to Ranjeet's eyes: “That's right, O eyes of Ranjeet's.”

By the way, the cu is necessary; otherwise, kanla be la .ranjit. mutce zmadu would be taken as a single tanru — individual gismu within a tanru can still have their own sumti attached with be).

1. .i vu lo ninmu la .djang. cu cladu cusku lu .i coi pendo li'u la .ranjit. (A pure greeting, of course; Zhang is not actually asking Ranjeet ‘how he is doing’ anything. He might want to know what he is doing there; but that's the next chapter of the saga..).

Chapter 13. Keeping it flowing: Textual cmavo

Most of what we've been concentrating on until now has had to do with the logical side of Lojban — getting sentences to be true. To that end, we've been looking at how to describe relationships between things (bridi, internal sumti); how to situate events and things in time and space; how to describe things as masses or individuals; how to speak about events and facts; and so on.

This kind of thing is the ‘hard-core’ of Lojban, so to speak; the logical machinery on which Lojban is based, and which works with concrete realities. But there's another, less concrete side to language. No, not its ineffable soul, or its intrinsic poetry, or anything like that: we're not about to go into such rarified abstractions. (Although those rarified abstractions do have some rather tangible — and linguistically concrete — bases.) The less concrete side of language has to do, not with what you say about things, but how you manage the business of saying it. This means things like:

• how you express your attitudes to things;
• how you put the things you talk about in the foreground or the background;
• how you deal with misunderstandings and errors;
• how you structure your texts.

A language isn't really a language if it can't cope with things like these — although typically these kinds of things are not dealt with in traditional grammars, but are picked up in usage. If there's one thing you'll have noticed about Lojban, of course, it's that it is as explicitly specified as possible. Accordingly, Lojban has a special subsection of its grammar dealing with these issues, rather than leaving it up to usage. But, precisely because this isn't what logic was designed for, the grammar Lojban uses here has little to do with bridi: it is a much simpler grammar, mostly using isolated words. We'll go through the ones you're likeliest to meet.

Lojban with lots more attitude

You'll remember from way back in Lesson 1 that Lojban has little words called attitudinal indicators (or attitudinals), which show how you feel about something. That ‘something’ is whatever precedes the attitudinal. As we have seen, if the attitudinal is after a terminator, it's a reaction to whatever phrase ends in the terminator. If it follows an article, then it applies to the entire sumti; if it follows a connective, it applies to the connective and whatever following term it is connecting; and so on.

Attitudinals belong to selma'o UI. This means that their grammar is as simple as can be: they can turn up after just about any word of Lojban, without disrupting anything going on grammatically. For that reason, they don't need terminators: there's no danger of them swallowing up any errant sumti (unlike their close relatives, the vocatives).

There are some cmavo whose job is to modify other UI cmavo, though. You've seen one already: nai has the function of converting the attitudinal expressed to its opposite. So if .a'u expresses interest, its opposite, .a'unai, expresses repulsion. We saw in our discussion of negations that, when you set up a scale between something and its opposite (to'e), you can also speak of something that's neutral, in-between (no'e). The same goes for attitudinals, and the word to use in that case is cu'i. So .a'ucu'i expresses neither interest nor repulsion, but disinterest.

You can divide up the continuum even more finely. If you want to say that you feel an emotion only weakly, you can add to it ru'e. If you want to say you feel it strongly, you can add sai. And if you want to say you feel it really strongly, you add cai. This gives you a seven-part scale:

cai > sai > (nothing) > ru'e > cu'i > nairu'e > nai > naisai > naicai

So for instance, if you want to say “Eh. That's cool”, you'd say .a'ucu'i. If you want to say “That is really gross!”, you'd say .a'unaisai. And if you want to say “Oh my God, that is the most interesting thing in the world since the very invention of Lojban!!!”, .a'ucai is a pretty safe bet.

There are 39 attitudinals fitting the pattern VV (two vowels, possibly with an apostrophe between them; these are a subclass of selma'o UI, called UI1.) Each of these corresponds to a different emotional state. With the addition of the seven-way scale we've just described, that makes 273 attitudinals you can use, plunking them pretty much wherever you want in your sentence. That's not even counting selma'o UI4 and UI5, which can further modify your attitudes. As with everything else, Lojban allows you to be as specific as you want to be in expressing yourself.

Vocabulary

Note: Attitudinals have three-way glosses: what they mean on their own, what they mean with cu'i after them, and what they mean with nai after them.

.o'o	attitudinal: patience – mere tolerance – anger
.o'u	attitudinal: relaxation – composure – stress
.e'u	attitudinal: suggestion – abandon suggest – warning
.i'e	attitudinal: approval – non-approval
.uu	attitudinal: pity – cruelty
.u'u	attitudinal: repentance – lack of regret – innocence

Exercise 1

Match one of the following attitudinals to each of the following situations.

.a'unairu'e

.e'uru'e

.e'ucai

.i'enai

.i'eru'e

.i'esai

.o'onai

.o'u

.u'u

.uu

1. You see someone stub their toe.
2. You bought the last ice cream in the shop, and the toddler queuing behind you has started crying.
3. You'd like to ask someone to take you along to the shops, if it's not too much trouble.
4. You will absolutely die if your sister doesn't take you to the Ricky Martin concert.
5. Your local football team, the Loglandia Contrapositives, has just won a match. You watch football maybe twice a year.
6. You have just been slapped in the face, and you are neither the Buddha nor Christ — or into S&M, for that matter.

My attitudinals! All mine! (And you?)

A common pitfall to avoid is trying to specify whose attitude the attitudinals express. The reason UI cmavo are so simple is that they express direct emotional responses — gut reactions, without making any fine distinctions like whose attitude is involved. The reaction is always taken to be the speaker's. So .ui do cliva means you're happy that someone else is leaving, just like “You're leaving — Yay!” does. If you wanted to say that the ‘someone else’ is happy, not you, then you wouldn't say “Yay!” at all. Instead, you'd say something like “You must be happy you're leaving.” The same goes in Lojban: if you're relaying someone else's responses, not your own, then that's what bridi are there for.

You wouldn't likely make this mistake for .ui; but there are other cmavo it's almost impossible not to do this with. The worst offender is probably .ei, which expresses obligation. .ei mi cliva means “I ought to leave.” But .ei do cliva doesn't necessarily mean “You ought to leave.” It's more like “I feel the obligation for you to leave”: I can say this if I want you gone while you're making yourself comfortable — but not if you've remembered you've got to be somewhere else, while I'd want nothing more than for you to stick around.

One final thing: if you want to know how someone feels about something, once again Lojban provides a fill-in-the-slot question word. The word asking the listener to fill in the attitudinal that best applies is pei. You can fill pei in with anything from selma'o UI, NAI or CAI. So if I ask you

.i pei lo lunra cu blanu

The moon is blue — how do you feel about that?

at least one response is .ienai “Disagree!” (“Uh-uh”, “No way!”, “No!”, etc.) pei can also explicitly ask for NAI or CAI alone, by following a UI cmavo. So a response to

.i .u'ipei do farlu lo pesxu

You fell into the mud! Funny, eh?

could well be ru'e: “Kinda...” Then again, it could also be naicai: “Absolutely not, and I shall thank you never to mention it in my presence again.” (Allowing for some latitude in translation..).

Discursives

Attitude isn't the only meaning UI cmavo convey. Another subclass of UI cmavo (UI3: discursives) carry information about how a particular word or phrase fits in with everything else you're saying.

We've seen one such cmavo already: ku'i, which means ‘but, however’. This means that whatever it is attached to contrasts with what you've been saying. It usually applies to a whole sentence (so normally you'll see it next to .i), but it can apply to a single word: .abu na.e ku'i by. is the proper Lojban for “Not A, but B.”

The flipside to ku'i is ji'a ‘additionally, also’ (which we saw in passing last lesson.) This means that whatever it is attached to adds on to what you've been saying. Again, this can apply to individual words, as well as sentences:

.i mi venfu do doi melbi je ji'a lo do cmalu gerku

I'll get you, my pretty — and your little dog, too!

In some cases, there is nothing to either contrast or add to what you've said, because what you've said is the unique relevant case. In that context, you would use only in English. Because only is somewhat clumsy to express in terms of pure logic, Lojban allows another discursive as its equivalent: po'o. So “Only cats like catnip” is in Lojban

loi mlatu po'o cu nelci loi spati be la'o ly. Nepeta cataria ly. (Nepeta cataria being the Linnaean name for catnip I had to go look up online).

If you wanted to say that something is not the only applicable case, then of course you'd say po'onai.

There are several more discursives, but you won't seem them all that often. Some to watch out for, though, include:

ba'u	exaggeration – accuracy – understatement
sa'e	precisely speaking – loosely speaking
ju'o	certainly – uncertain – certainly not
la'a	probably – improbably
ta'o	by the way – returning to the subject
zu'u	on the one hand – on the other hand

There are two more UI cmavo that will come in handy. da'i means ‘hypothetically’; it points out that what you are saying is a hypothesis, an imaginary event rather than fact. This is how you distinguish between hypothetical and non-hypothetical kinds of if:

.i da'i do zvati lo nu la .rikis.martin. tigni .inaja do tirna la'o sy. la .Vida Loca sy.

If you had gone to the Ricky Martin concert, then you would have heard La Vida Loca.

.i da'inai do zvati lo nu la .rikis.martin. tigni .inaja do tirna la'o sy. la .Vida Loca sy.

If you did go to the Ricky Martin concert, then you must have heard La Vida Loca.

ki'a, finally, is a cmavo you want to make your friend. ki'a is Lojban for ‘Huh?' When you don't understand what someone has just said — whether because you don't get what they were referring to, or you don't know the word, or the grammar confused you — you can repeat the word or phrase you didn't get, and add ki'a as a plaintive request for clarification (so it's even better than Huh?, because you can point out exactly what made you say Huh?):

.i mi puzi te vencu lo matcrflokati

.i matcrflokati ki'a

“I just bought a flokati [rug].”

“Flokati? Huh?”

Exercise 2

Give the Lojban discursives corresponding to the emphasised words in each of the following sentences.

1. The Eiffel Tower is, like, 20 miles tall or something.
2. Say this guy goes up to you and goes, “Dude, your fly's undone.” That'd be, like, so embarrassing!
3. So, anyway, I see this dude, and he's like, all “I'm just hanging with my friends, you know what I'm saying?”. And I'm, like, “Hellooo? There's, like, nobody else here!”
4. So, like, here you've got this dude who's, like, totally grody, scoping me out. And then there's Tiffany walking by in the other direction. Plus she's got Tracy and Shannon with her. And she totally walks two feet away from me acting like, “Do I know you?” Like, bogus to the max!

(You may attain Lojban divinity status if, on some future date, you come back to this scintillating little anecdote and translate in to Lojban. Like, totally).

Erasure

When you make a mistake while speaking, whether in your wording or your grammar, you don't normally bother to correct it — if you even realise you made a mistake in the first place. That's because natural languages are fairly redundant (for this very reason!); and we normally rely a lot more on context than on what we actually hear, anyway. If we do catch ourselves making an error, we stumble out a correction that will do the trick, without going into details like how many words should be cancelled: again, context is almost always more than adequate. So if I say

I downloaded and learned some Esperanto vocabulary. Er, Lojban vocabulary.

context and common sense dictate that Lojban vocabulary is meant to replace Esperanto vocabulary. But what if it was meant to replace some Esperanto vocabulary? Or downloaded and learned some Esperanto vocabulary? We wouldn't normally care, in natural languages.

But Lojban is Lojban precisely because it is not a natural language. And this kind of imprecision does not sit well with how the language was designed. So Lojban allows you to be more precise about what words you are correcting. Whether it is actually too be precise to be useful — well, that's something for usage to determine. But the tools are available, if you want them.

si erases the immediately preceding word. If you want to erase two words in a row, you say si si after them. So the correction above would be in Lojban

.i mi te benji je cilre loi spero valsi si si lojbo valsi.

The problem with si is, you have to count words. This can get tedious, and you shouldn't have to keep a transcript of your words when you want to correct yourself. The other correction word Lojban offers is somewhat more helpful: sa erases a phrase. It works by taking the word following it, which starts the phrase to serve as the correction. It then goes back in the sentence, looking for the last time you used a phrase starting with the same word. (Same selma'o, actually.) Once it finds the last such phrase, it replaces all text from that phrase up to sa with the phrase following sa. For example:

.i mi te benji je cilre loi sa .i mi cilre loi lojbo.

The correction following sa is a sentence; you know that, because the first word after sa is the sentence marker, .i. So the sentence following sa replaces the current sentence up to and including sa. Or consider:

.i mi mrilu fi do ca lo prulamdei sa ca la .reldjed.

The correction is ca la .reldjed. ‘on Monday’. So what it replaces is everything from the last phrase beginning with ca: ca lo purlamdei ‘yesterday’. The English version would be “Yesterday I mailed you... actually, it was Monday.”

Exercise 3

Apply the required erasures to the following Lojban sentences.

1. .i mi viska lo si la .djan.
2. .i mi viska la .djan. si si si catlu la .djan.
3. .i mi viska la .djan. sa catlu
4. .i lonu lebna loi lojbo valsi cu nandu sa nu vimcu loi lojbo valsi lo jufra cu nandu
5. .i mi je lo mi pendo cu zvati lo barja sa je la .ranjit. cu zvati lo barja ca lonu do zvati lo gusta

Bits and pieces

Inevitably with textual cmavo, there's a lot of words that can only be called odds and ends; they each have a specific little job, and don't have much in common. The Complete Lojban Language, Chapter 19, bemoans the same problem in paedagogy for the same topic; so at least we're in good company.

To survive in Lojbanistan, though, you'll certainly need the following:

• ni'o begins a new paragraph. Paragraphs are usually associated with new topics, and ni'o is meant to remind you of cnino ‘new’. There's some complicated stuff about what happens with tenses and assigned pro-sumti across different types of paragraph, but you can do without that for now.
• To emphasise a word, where you would use stress in a spoken natural language, and italics or capitals in a written language, Lojban insists (as should be no surprise to you by now) that you use a separate word: ba'e. Like UI, this word can go pretty much anywhere in a Lojban sentence, but it emphasises the word that follows it, rather than what precedes it. Or, to put it in Lojban,

zo ba'e basna lo valsi poi se lidne jenai lidne zo ba'e

• zo ki'a, I hear you ask? Good, that means you've been paying attention! zo is a quotation marker, just like lu. However, zo quotes only the word immediately after it. This means it does not need a terminator: we already know where the quotation ends. The saving of two syllables is highly valued in a language which can get as prolix as Lojban does.

Note: Since zo quotes any word following it — any word — it turns out that zo ki'a doesn't mean “zo? Huh?” at all, but “The word ki'a.” To ask “zo? Huh?”, you'll have to resort to (wait for it) zo zo ki'a.

• Parenthetical remarks can go anywhere UI can — meaning pretty much anywhere in a Lojban sentence. With parentheses, just like with quotes, you need to know where the parenthesis starts, and where it ends. And just like quotes, the end-parenthesis terminator is going to be pretty hard to drop out. The normal Lojban parentheses are to and toi. So “This (no, I don't want another one!) apple is rotten” comes out in Lojban as:

ti poi to vi'onai do'u mi na djica lo drata toi plise cu fusra

Vocabulary

cizra

x1 is strange/weird/deviant/bizarre/odd to x2 in property x3 (ka)

Exercise 4

Translate the following disfunctional dialogue.

1. .i zo to to mi ca tavla fo la .lojban toi xamgu lonu tavla fo la .lojban
2. .i xamgu ki'a
3. ni'o xu do nelci lai loglandias.kontrapositivos.
4. .i lai ki'a
5. .i mi to je do xu toi gleki lonu te vecnu loi matcrflokati
6. .i do tavla lo ba'e cizra

Summary

In this lesson, we have covered lots and lots of little words:

• Attitudinal scales (NAI, CAI)
• Non–self-directed and empathic attitudinals
• Attitudinal questions (pei)
• Discursives (UI3)
• Erasing words and phrases (si, sa)
• Paragraphs (ni'o)
• Emphasis (ba'e)
• Single-word quotations (zo)
• Parentheses (to, toi)

Vocabulary

crida	x1 is a fairy/elf/gnome/brownie/pixie/goblin/kobold [mythical humanoid] of mythos/religion x2
dansu	x1 (individual, mass) dances to accompaniment/music/rhythm x2
dasni	x1 wears/is robed/garbed in x2 as a garment of type x3
drata	x1 isn't the-same-thing-as/is different-from/other-than x2 by standard x3; x1 is something else
.e'e	attitudinal: competence – incompetence/inability
.ia	attitudinal: belief – skepticism – disbelief
krixa	x1 cries out/yells/howls sound x2; x1 is a crier
lanli	x1 analyzes/examines-in-detail x2 by method/technique/system x3 [process/activity]
milxe	x1 is mild/non-extreme/gentle/middling/somewhat in property x2 (ka); x1 is not very x2
sesi'u	sumti tcita: assisting... (sidju “help”)
pensi	x1 thinks/considers/cogitates/reasons/is pensive about/reflects upon subject/concept x2
sisku	x1 seeks/searches/looks for property x2 among set x3 (complete specification of set)
terdi	x1 is the Earth/the home planet of race x2; (adjective:) x1 is terrestrial/earthbound
xalfekfri	inebriated, drunk (xalka ‘alcohol’ + fenki ‘crazy’ + lifri ‘experience’)
zirpu	x1 is purple/violet [color adjective]

Exercise 5

Translate from Lojban. Remember, ka is the abstractor that specifies a quality (and is obligatory for the second place of sisku).

1. ni'o ta'o la .djang. cu milxe xalfekfri ki'u lonu klama lo drata barja
2. .i ta'onai la .djang. cu cusku lu .i doi lo pedro si pendo .e'uru'e mu'i ma do vi zvati li'u
3. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i lonu mi kansa la .djiotis. je lo pendo be ri to mutce melbi .uasai toi li'u
4. .i la .djang. lu .i mi lonu do je re lo melbi cu kansa cu ba'e gleki doi pendo sa lonu do kansa re sa'e melbi cu gleki li'u
5. .i la .ranjit. lu .i .e'epei zo'o do ca klama la .jipci li'u
6. .i la .djang. lu .i .audai do denpa lonu viska lonu mi dansu lonu si si la .jipci vi .y. la .jipci li'u
7. .i ranjit. lu .i ro da pe lo dansydi'u co'a krixa zo pe'u vau ba'uru'e li'u
8. .i la .djang. lu .i xu .iacu'i do ba'o cradi fo lo crida li'u
9. to la .ranjit. cu lanli loi se cradi sesi'u lo nu sisku loka terdi bartu pensi toi
10. .i la .ranjit. lu .i .i'e ju'o lonu do tavla cu zdile li'u
11. .i la .djang. lu .i je'e do'u .i'ese'i go'i li'u

Exercise 6

Translate into Lojban.

1. Only Susan doesn't know that Zhang knows Ranjeet. (Hint: trick question! The two instances of know do not translate to the same gismu!)
2. Susan: “Woah! You're here, and you're wearing purple, too!”
3. Zhang: “If I'd known you'd be here, I'd have worn nothing :-)” (Nothing in Lojban is ‘zero somethings’).
4. Jyoti: “Not only geeky, but insane.” (Make up a fu'ivla for ‘geeky’, based on kulnu ‘x1 [mass of ideas, customs, skills, arts] is culture of nation/ethos x2 (mass); x1 is ethnic'. Assume (for now!) the place structure “x1 is geeky”).
5. Ranjeet is very amused, and says “Probably!”
6. (Far away, an extraterrestrial intelligence sets off for Earth.) (You'll need a three-part tanru for this. And you've already seen it, if you've been good...).

Answers to exercises

Exercise 1

1. .uu is the most usual reaction. This is one meaning of English Sorry!
2. .u'u (again, unless you flout the dominant social norms.) This is the other meaning of English Sorry!
3. .e'uru'e, the “Eh, whatever” type of request.
4. .e'ucai, the “Begging on hands and knees” type of request.
5. .i'eru'e: yet another ‘slacker’ attitudinal.
6. .o'onai. In Lojban, anger is considered the opposite of patience: “losing your temper”. The Buddha would presumably react with .a'ucu'i (indifference), and Christ with .io (love). Someone getting a thrill out of this would react with something more like .oinai (un-complaint, i.e. pleasure).

Exercise 2

1. ba'u is the only discursive Lojban would tolerate here, as the Eiffel Tower, is, like, totally not 20 miles tall!
2. da'i
3. ju'o “that would certainly be embarrassing” (or sa'e — “that would, in precise terms, be embarrassing.”)
4. ta'onai (“getting back to what I was saying...”)
5. po'o (“this is the only relevant thing I'm doing.”)
6. ki'a (there's a wealth of attitudinals in this word, but ki'a is really the only relevant discursive).
7. zu'u (“on the one hand...”; it might not be as elegant as the Classical Greek contrast clauses with men and de, but that's what it means).
8. zu'unai
9. ji'a
10. sa'e (or ba'ucu'i: presumably our hapless narrator isn't exaggerating here).

Exercise 3

1. .i mi viska la .djan.
2. .i mi catlu la .djan.
3. .i mi catlu (What follows sa is a selbri; so it replaces the last selbri we've seen, as well as everything else up to sa, including the sumti, la .djan).
4. .i lonu vimcu loi lojbo valsi lo jufra cu nandu (You're telling me!)
5. .i mi je la .ranjit. cu zvati lo barja ca lonu do zvati lo gusta (The phrase following sa is the name la .ranjit.; everything from that name on, i.e. cu zvati lo barja, is deleted).

Exercise 4

1. The word to (I am now speaking Lojban) is good for speaking Lojban.
2. Good?!
3. To change the topic: Do you like the (mass of) Loglandia Contrapositives?
4. lai?! (Not a commonly used article, after all).
5. I (and you?) are happy to buy flokati rugs. (Note that xu, as a UI cmavo, specifically queries the word it follows; this is shorthand for asking “Do you too?”)
6. You say strange things.

Exercise 5

1. (New Paragraph) Incidentally, Zhang is somewhat drunk, because he went to another bar.
2. Anyway, Zhang says “Pedro, I mean, friend, do you mind telling me what you're doing here?”
3. Ranjeet says “I'm with Jyoti and a friend of hers (really good-looking; what a win!)”
4. Zhang: “I, for you and two beautiful people accompanying, am happy, friend... I mean, for you accompanying two beautiful people (to put it precisely), am happy” (We can get away with “this sentence no verb” in Lojban. And let's not be too hard on Zhang, either, who has the sense to fix his Lojban grammar even in his elated state. He has tried to say “for you and two beautiful people being together”, but kansa in Lojban corresponds to “you are together with two beautiful people”: it is not reciprocal).
5. Ranjeet: “You're now going to the Chicken — sure you can manage it? :‑)”
6. Zhang: “You're just waiting to see me dance that, er, the Chicken at, uh, the Chicken.” (The empathy attitudinal dai expresses desire, but it's a desire Zhang is projecting onto others. That's roughly what just is doing in the English: “You must be wanting it, waiting for me...”. Zhang produces one too many lenus, so he has to delete his last one; note that lonu counts as two words!)
7. Ranjeet: “Everybody in the disco starts shouting ‘Please do’ — more or less.” (Any resemblance to “Everybody in the house say ‘Yeah’” is purely obscured by Ranjeet's pedantry. The attitudinal goes after vau, which you may remember from Lesson 5 is the terminator for a sentence; so the ‘slight exaggeration’ attitudinal applies to the whole sentence).
8. Zhang: “Are you really done sending broadcasts to the pixies?” (Sacrificing Zhang's pretty good wordplay, considering his ‘tired and emotional’ state).
9. (Ranjeet analyses radio transmissions for the Search for Extraterrestial Intelligence.) (Abstractions can be names just like simple sumti).
   1. Note: When you search in Lojban, you search for something that fits some property, and so you name the property as x2. That means that you don't say you're searching for good things, but for goodness — that is, you're searching by checking whether each thing you come across has goodness or not. This is sort of an extension of Lojban's fill-in-the-slot approach to questions: .i mi sisku loka ___ terdi bartu pensi .i lo fange pe la .mars. cu terdi bartu pensi .i lo fange pe la .venus. cu terdi bartu pensi .i lo fange pe la .vulkan. cu terdi bartu pensi .i la .djang. na terdi bartu pensi.
10. Ranjeet: “Good job! Certainly you talking is entertaining.” (Or more colloquially, “It's fun to hear you talk.”)
11. Zhang: “Yup, it is, isn't it!” (Spoken with some comical smugness, no doubt..).

Exercise 6

1. .i la .suzyn. po'o na djuno lodu'u la .ranjit. cu slabu la .djang. (Some languages, like French and German, differentiate between knowing facts and knowing people. Some languages, like English, do not. No prizes for guessing which side of the divide Lojban is on. po'o follows la .suzyn., since that's who it applies to).
2. .i la .suzyn. lu .i .uecai do vi zvati gije ji'a dasni loi zirpu li'u or .i la .suzyn. lu .i .uecai do vi zvati .i je ji'a do dasni loi zirpu li'u (You can tone it down to .uesai, if you want).
3. .i la .djang. lu .i da'i mi djuno lodu'u do vi zvati kei nagi'a dasni noda zo'o li'u or .i la .djang. lu .i da'i mi djuno lodu'u do vi zvati .inaja mi dasni noda zo'o li'u. In fact (for reasons we won't go into here), things turns out to be less problematic for hypothetical if-statements if you use a solution based on nibli or ni'i: .i la .djang. lu .i lonu mi da'i djuno lodu'u do vi zvati cu nibli lonu mi dasni noda zo'o li'u, or .i la .djang. lu .i mi da'i djuno lodu'u do vi zvati .i seni'ibo da'i mi dasni noda zo'o li'u
4. la .djiotis. lu .i kulnrgiki po'onai gije ji'a fekypre li'u (But here doesn't contradict expectation; it corroborates it. So in this case but actually means ‘also’! You could in fact add also or too in the English sentence. Some languages have different words for the two types of but: German, for instance, would here use sondern instead of aber).
5. .i la .ranjit. cu mutce se zdile gije cusku zo la'a (or lu .i la'a go'i li'u)
6. to vuku lo terdi bartu pensi co'a klama la .terdi toi or to lo terdi bartu pensi vu co'a klama la .terdi toi (You could optionally put an .i after to, but you don't have to: there's no danger of the sentence within parentheses being merged in with the sentence before it).

Chapter 14. Why didn't I think of that before? More connectives

We have already seen in Lesson 11 several Lojban connectives described. This lesson rounds off discussion of connectives, with three additional types. First, we consider forethought connectives: these are used to identify the logical relation between two terms by being placed in front of the first term, rather than in between the two. Then, we look at some more non-logical connectives — which may prove more useful than you might have expected, especially in a ‘logical’ language. Finally, we look at connectives used to structure tanru — in particular, how to group gismu together within tanru.

Forethought connectives

As we've already seen, there are some things odd about the Lojban logical connective for IF. One oddity we haven't touched upon is that you realise that there's a conditional going on only halfway through. Recall what a typical instance of IF looks like:

.i mi djuno lodu'u do vi zvati .inaja mi dasni noda

You read the first sentence, and everything goes swimmingly: “I know that you're here.” Then, shazam! you get the connective: “IF that were the case, I would wear nothing.” You didn't know in advance that the first sentence was going to be an IF. This is unlike the case in English (and natural languages in general), where the if comes right at the start of the first sentence, and gives you plenty of warning about what's coming up.

The problem here is, the logical version of IF denies what comes before it. So in effect, you're getting the first statement, quite normally, and then the surprise: “Either that's not true, or this is true.” Things are just as bad for other connectives denying what comes before them. For instance, na.e is a perfectly reasonable connective:

mi djica loi bakni na.e loi jipci

I want not the beef, but the chicken.

But look at what the Lojban is actually saying:

I want the beef — NOT! and the chicken.

There was a vogue in the '90s of putting NOT! at the end of sentences in American English (see Wayne's World.) This was a joke, and the reason it was a joke is that saying a sentence isn't true after you've already said it isn't exactly being helpful.

So if we're going to use logical connectives in Lojban, and are obligated to pull NOT!-tricks like this, the Lojban listener can understandably get frustrated. Once again, though, Lojban has an answer. With forethought connectives, you can indicate the logical relationship between two terms in front of the first term. You still need a word separating the two terms, to show what is being logically connected; but now you know in advance what that logical connection is.

If sumti are involved, the forethought connective is formed by placing gi after the logical connective. The two sumti are then connected with the leftover g-word, gi. So the forethought version of mi je do is

jegi mi gi do

Here, jegi means that the two sumti coming up are connected with AND, while gi indicates that what follows is the second sumti in the relation.

The real usefulness of these forms comes out in the NOT!-connectives we've just seen. If you want to give some warning when choosing the chicken instead of the beef, you can now say

mi djica jeginai loi bakni gi loi jipci

(Forethought connectives can be followed by nai, just like their afterthought counterparts.) If you wanted to say “beef, not chicken”, you would put nai after the gi:

mi djica jegi loi bakni ginai loi jipci

If you're connecting bridi, as it turns out, you still use je gi or their friends. If you don't follow jegi + sumti immediately by gi and another sumti, then Lojban grammar assumes that you're connecting not sumti any more, but bridi. So our forethought version of Zhang's statement of wishful thinking is:

.i jaginai mi djuno lodu'u do vi zvati gi mi dasni noda

You'll notice that there is no second .i here. Two bridi connected by jaginai belong to the same sentence; we already know from the grammar that what's coming up after the gi is a separate bridi, so we don't need to separate it out with .i.

.i la .flufis. cu ractu .ije ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive .i la .flufis. seni'i na ze'u jmive

We should be able from that to say

.i la .flufis. ractu .ije ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive .iseni'ibo la .flufis. na ze'u jmive

Right? Actually, no we can't: bo has the function of connecting sentences through sumti tcita, because it connects sentences on its own. And when it does, it connects them tighter than .ije does. This means that .iseni'ibo connects only to the immediately preceding sentence — not to the preceding sentence pair! So Fluffy's death is presented as a consequence of rabbits not living long — not a consequence of both rabbits not living long and Fluffy being a rabbit.

However, if we put the two bridi in a single sentence, then none of this is an issue: the conclusion will attach to both bridi, but will still attach to a single sentence:

.i jegi la .flufis. cu ractu gi ro ractu na'e ze'u jmive .iseni'ibo la .flufis. na ze'u jmive

There is also a forethought connective for tanru, corresponding to JA: these connectives are formed by placing gu at the back of the connective vowel (connecting the second tanru with gi.) So if we want to say that Susan fancies men that are, if funny, then also handsome, the afterthought version is

la .suzyn. cu cinynei ro melbi naja xajmi nanmu

To make this slightly (but only slightly!) more comprehensible, we can put this in forethought mode:

la .suzyn. cu cinynei ro jagunai melbi gi xajmi nanmu

There are no forethought versions of bridi-tail connectives. In practice, however, two bridi connected by JAgi can be bridi-tails just as easily as full bridi: there is no real meaning distinction between the two.

Exercise 1

Give sentences using forethought connectives instead of the afterthought connectives used below.

1. .i la .djiotis. cu nelci loi cidjrkari .a loi nanba
2. .i la .djiotis. cu nelci loi cidjrkari .iju la .djiotis. cu citka loi cidjrkari
3. .i la .djiotis. cu nelci ju citka loi cidjrkari
4. .i la .djiotis. cu nelci loi cidjrkari gije xebni loi zirpu
5. .i la .djiotis. cu jonai la .suzyn. cu djuno lodu'u la .djang. cu zvati jonai tadni
6. .i la .djiotis. cu nelci loi cidjrkari ja loi nanba je loi jisra (Remember: Lojban nests to the left!)
7. .i la .djiotis. cu jonai la .suzyn. cu djuno lodu'u la .djang. cu zvati .inaja la .djang. cu se denpa

Non-logical connectives

We have already seen one non-logical connective, joi. By non-logical, we mean that the truth of the combined terms does not depend on the truth of the individual components. It may not be true that la .kris. cu bevri lo pipno “Chris carries the piano”, or la .pat. cu bevri lo pipno “Pat carries the piano”, for example (to revisit an example from Lesson 4), even if it is true that la .kris. joi la .pat. cu bevri lo pipno “Chris and Pat carry the piano.”

Lojban has several other non-logical connectives; we'll cover the most frequently used ones:

• ce joins sumti (usually) into a set, rather than a mass like joi.

We haven't said much about sets; and because sets are fairly abstract entities, as entities go, you don't often have occasion to talk about them. While you can say mi viska loi remna “I saw a mass of people”, for example (you saw them as a bunch), you aren't likely to say mi viska lo'i remna “I saw a set of people.”

But as we have seen in the exercises, some gismu need sets in order to work. simxu, for example, takes as its x1 a set. This is because the group of things or people in a mutual relationship needs to be well-defined: you've got to be able to say with certainty whether someone is involved in the relationship or not. The point of sets is that you can categorically say x belongs to the set or doesn't. The membership of masses is left much more nebulous, so saying “a bunch of people talk to each other” doesn't make as definite a statement. The same goes for cuxna ‘choose’: what you choose from in Lojban (x3) is a set, because you normally have to be certain what belongs in the group you're choosing from, and what doesn't.

So when you form a set out of several sumti, you connect them with ce. To say “Jyoti, Susan and Ranjeet talk to each other”, you would say something like

la .djiotis. ce la .suzyn. ce la .ranjit. cu simxu loka tavla

or

la .djiotis. ce la .suzyn. ce la .ranjit. cu tavla simxu

Similarly, if you pick one of Jyoti, Susan or Ranjeet, you would say

mi cuxna pa da la .djiotis. ce la .suzyn. ce la .ranjit.

• If you are referring to an ordered set — a sequence of things, in other words — then you use ce'o to place things in order. This gets invoked when you're compiling a list for whatever reason; for example, the Lojban alphabet is a sequence, and you'd list it as

.abu ce'o by. ce'o cy. ce'o dy. ce'o .ebu ...

and so on. This is what liste ‘list’ and porsi ‘sequence’ expect as their x1 sumti.

• fa'u carries the meaning of respectively: it relates pairs of sumti cross-wise. If I were to say

la .suzyn. je la .djiotis. cu tavla la .djang. je la .ranjit.

that means that both Susan and Jyoti talk to both Zhang and Ranjeet. If I want to say that Susan only talked to Zhang, and Jyoti only to Ranjeet (i.e. “Susan and Jyoti talked to Zhang and Ranjeet, respectively”), a logical connective is not useful. Instead, I would use fa'u to connect both pairs of sumti:

la .suzyn. fa'u la .djiotis. cu tavla la .djang. fa'u la .ranjit.

Susan, cross-wise with Jyoti, talks to Zhang, cross-wise with Ranjeet.

• If you're talking about a range, you use bi'i to describe the range between the first thing and the second thing; so it corresponds to English between. If you want to say “I dropped my pencil somewhere between the office and the bar”, you would describe the location “somewhere between the office and the bar” as lo briju ku bi'i lo barja. The whole sentence would come out as:

mi falcru lemi pinsi vi lo briju bi'i lo barja

• If the order of the things defining the range matters, you use bi'o. This corresponds to from... to... in English (though between covers both ordered and unordered intervals.) For example, “from 1 PM to 2 PM” is an interval lasting an hour; but “from 2 PM to 1 PM” would normally be interpreted as a 23-hour interval (1 pm the following day), since times in English are assumed to be presented in order. Lojban follows suit with li pavo lo'o bi'o li paci as a 23-hour interval. If I said li pavo lo'o bi'i li paci, the order of the two times would not matter at all; so I could still be talking about a one-hour interval instead.

Exercise 2

Which logical or non-logical connective would you use to translate the emphasised phrases in the following sentences?

1. The murderer is one of Colonel Mustard, Professor Plum, or Miss White.
2. The Greek Dialect Dictionary has published five volumes, from alpha to delta.
3. See the Lojban Reference Grammar, pp. 22–24.
4. A dactyl consists of two short syllables, one long syllable; an anapaest consists of one long syllable, two short syllables.
5. Out of Zhang, Susan, Jyoti and Ranjeet, Zhang is the purplest.
6. Jyoti and Susan discuss Zhang's fashion sense.
7. Ranjeet and Zhang are wearing shirts.

tanru grouping

The default grouping in Lojban is leftwards. This means that, if you have three things connected together in Lojban, the first two go together before you join in the third. For example, la .djiotis. je la .suzyn. jonai la .ranjit means not “Jyoti and either Susan or Ranjeet”, but “Either Jyoti and Susan, or Ranjeet.”

Does the distinction matter? Depends on your background; programmers, for example, are often driven to distraction in making sure their logical connectives work out in the right order (usually by copious use of brackets.) But there is often a real difference in meaning; the first interpretation given above describes a couple, for example, but the second doesn't.

The grouping of terms in Lojban grammar is particularly important when it comes to tanru. The way gismu group together in a tanru determines what that tanru means. For example,

bad music magazine

has in English two interpretations: a bad magazine about music, or a magazine about bad music. In Lojban, its equivalent

xlali zgike karni

has only the interpretation ‘magazine about bad music’, because the first two gismu (xlali zgike ‘bad music’) group together first. So it is important to be able to modify the grouping of gismu, so that we can make sure the tanru means what we actually intend it to mean. For that reason, Lojban has a couple of mechanisms in place for making tanru group together properly.

If you are a programmer, or a mathematician, you have long ago made brackets your trusted aide in dealing with this kind of problem. So you won't be surprised to hear that Lojban has cmavo that act as parentheses, grouping gismu together. Those cmavo are not to and toi: those are reserved for your own parenthetical comments, and you never know when you might want to insert a snide remark in the middle of a particularly arduous tanru. Rather, the cmavo you need are ke, to open the grouping bracket, and ke'e, to close it. So if xlali zgike karni means a {bad music} magazine, then a bad {music magazine} is in Lojban:

xlali ke zgike karni ke'e

Now, ke'e is a terminator, like all the other terminators we've seen: ku, kei, ku'o, vau, and so on. And like those terminators, it can be dropped out when no ambiguity will result. So if we know we're at the end of the tanru, having reached the end of the selbri (because we've just bumped into a sumti, say, or a new sentence), then we also know that any open ke brackets must now close; so ke'e can be omitted. This means you won't necessarily see a ke'e ‘close bracket’ after each ke ‘open bracket’:

.i mi pu zi te vecnu lo xlali ke zgike karni .i to'e zanru la'o gy. Eurythmics gy.

I just bought a bad {music magazine [}]. It dissed the Eurythmics.

That's one way of grouping together gismu in tanru. The other way is to use a cmavo we've already seen in a related role: bo. When bo appears between two gismu, it means that those gismu group together more tightly than anything else. So an alternative way of saying bad {music magazine} is

xlali zgike bo karni

This means that zgike bo karni should count as a unit, to which the description xlali ‘bad’ applies.

bo does the same job with sentences (.i bo, .i ba bo, .i seni'i bo all attach to only the preceding sentence), with connectives (je bo, gije bo), and so on. So if I want to say “Jyoti and either Susan or Ranjeet”, I would say

la .djiotis. je la .suzyn. jonaibo la .ranjit.

For that matter, ke can also be used with connectives (though not with sentences; they have their own kind of bracket, tu'e–tu'u.) So I could also say

la .djiotis. je ke la .suzyn. jonai la .ranjit. ke'e

— where in most cases the ke'e may be left out.

jegi la .djiotis. gi joginai la .suzyn. gi la .ranjit.

and “Either Jyoti and Susan, or Ranjeet” is

joginai jegi la .djiotis. gi la .suzyn. gi la .ranjit.

Since there is no ambiguity, you won't need bo or ke with forethought connectives.

Exercise 3

Gloss the following into English, using brackets to indicate their structure. For instance:

xlali zgike karni

( ( bad music ) magazine )

1. xlali bo zgike karni
2. xlali zgike bo karni
3. ke xlali zgike karni
4. ke xlali zgike bo karni
5. xlali ke zgike ke karni ke tcidu
6. xlali zgike bo karni tcidu
7. xlali zgike ke karni tcidu
8. ke xlali zgike ke'e karni tcidu
9. xlali ke zgike karni ke'e tcidu
10. ke xlali zgike bo karni ke'e tcidu

Summary

In this lesson, we have covered:

• Forethought logical connectives (JAgi, JAgu)
• Non-logical connectives (ce, ce'o, fa'u, bi'i, bi'o)
• Uses for sets and sequences
• tanru-grouping cmavo (ke, ke'e, bo)

Vocabulary

cabdei	today (cabna ‘now’ + djedi ‘day’)
certu	x1 is an expert/pro/has prowess in/is skilled at x2 (event/activity) by standard x3
cfipu	x1 (event/state) confuses/baffles x2 [observer] due to [confusing] property x3 (ka)
ckafi	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of coffee from source/bean/grain x2
ckule	x1 is school/institute/academy at x2 teaching subject(s) x3 to audien./commun. x4 operated by x5
frumu	x1 frowns/grimaces (facial expression)
glare	x1 is hot/[warm] by standard x2
gusni	x1 [energy] is light/illumination illuminating x2 from light source x3
jamfu	x1 is a/the foot [body-part] of x2
ladru	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of milk from source x2; (adjective:) x1 is lactic/dairy
moi	convert number to ordinal selbri; x1 is (n)th member of set x2 ordered by rule x3
ni	abstractor: quantity/amount abstractor; ‘the amount that...’
skapi	x1 is a pelt/skin/hide/leather from x2
stedu	x1 is a/the head [body-part] of x2
sodva	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of a carbonated beverage/soda of flavor/brand x2
traji	x1 is superlative in property x2 (ka), the x3 extreme (ka; default ka zmadu) among set/range x4
vimcu	x1 removes/subtracts/deducts/takes away x2 from x3 with/leaving result/remnant/remainder x4
zbasu	x1 makes/assembles/builds/manufactures/creates x2 out of materials/parts/components x3
zmadu	x1 exceeds/is more than x2 in property/quantity x3 (ka/ni) by amount/excess x4

Exercise 4

Translate from Lojban.

1. .i la .djang. cu traji loka zirpu kei fo la .djang. ce la .ranjit. ce la .djiotis. ce la .suzyn.
2. .i ji'a la .djang. cu joginai zmadu la .ranjit. loni certu lonu dansu gi xalfekfri caku
3. .i la .suzyn. cu bevri loi birje gi loi sodva fa'u gi la .djiotis. fa'u la .djang.
4. .i la .djang. cu jugu sutra gi djica pinxe loi sodva
5. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i pe'ipei do baza djica loi glare cnino bo se zbasu ckafi li'u
6. .i la .djang. cu cusku lu .i cnino skapi ki'a .i lo ca skapi be mi cu stedu bi'i jamfu melbi li'u
7. .i la .ranjit. cu krixa lu .i ckafi li'u
8. .i la .djang. cu se cfipu catlu gije ba ke cmila gije cusku lu .i na go'i doi bebna .i mi pinxe loi sodva li'u

Exercise 5

Translate into Lojban. Use only forethought connectives.

1. Jyoti, who is holding and drinking coffee, speaks to Susan.
2. “It's good that Zhang is here, and that you met him today.”
3. Susan says “Tell me about Ranjeet, not Zhang.”
4. “Is he an old schoolfriend of yours?”
5. Just then, Susan hears Superfreak, the first out of the songs which are danced to (= to dance to).
6. Susan shouts “Yay!”, and she and Ranjeet start dancing.
7. Jyoti stares at Zhang, who is smiling and building a chicken out of pretzels, and frowns. (Make a fu'ivla for pretzel based on nanba ‘bread’. Be careful, by the way: is Zhang really constructing a chicken?)
8. An alien space vehicle arrives, shines light, and removes the four friends from the disco. (Use ce'o to join the steps in this somewhat unlikely sequence of events).

Answers to exercises

Exercise 1

1. .i la .djiotis. cu nelci jagi loi cidjrkari gi loi nanba
2. .i jugi la .djiotis. cu nelci loi cidjrkari gi la .djiotis. cu citka loi cidjrkari
3. .i la .djiotis. cu jugu nelci gi citka loi cidjrkari
4. .i la .djiotis. cu jegi nelci loi cidjrkari gi xebni loi zirpu
5. .i joginai la .djiotis. cu gi la .suzyn. cu djuno lodu'u la .djang. cu jonaigu zvati gi tadni (or: .i jogi la .djiotis. cu ginai la .suzyn. cudjuno lodu'u la .djang. cu jonaigu zvati gi tadni)
6. .i la .djiotis. cu nelci jegi jagi loi cidjrkari gi loi nanba gi loi jisra (You're joining loi cidjrkari ja loi nanba to loi jisra)
7. .i jaginai jogi la .djiotis. cu ginai la .suzyn. cu djuno lodu'u la .djang. cu zvati gi la .djang. cu se denpa

Exercise 2

1. ce: You are picking a murderer out of a group, so the group you are picking from needs to be well-defined. That makes it a set.
2. bi'o: The dictionary does not contain the letters alpha and delta, of course, but all the Greek dialect words between those two letters; so we are dealing with a range. And however slow the Academy of Athens has been in getting the volumes out (67 years and counting), it has still done them in alphabetical order; so the order of the interval matters.
3. bi'o: This is still a range, as you are being asked to consult the text contained between those pages (you will also be looking at page 23.) The pages are also assumed to be in numerical order, so bi'o is preferred (although bi'i would not be incorrect: even if you looked through the pages backwards, you would still end up looking at the same pages).
4. ce'o: Even if you don't know what on earth a dactyl and an anapaest is (no, they are not components of dinosaurs), you can tell from the definition that the order of short and long syllables makes a difference. So the two terms involve types of sequences.
5. ce: You are still picking something out of a well-defined group, so Lojban uses a set. In fact, all superlatives in Lojban (‘fastest’, ‘smartest’, ‘most likely to dance the funky chicken’) involve sets in the same way.
6. joi: Discussion is a group effort, and it does not involve ranges of people or sequences of people. We could speak of sets of people involved in discussion, if we assumed that you're definitely either in the discussion or out of it; but joi avoids having to commit to such a clearcut distinction.
7. je: This is a perfectly logical connective: what Ranjeet and Zhang do with their shirts, they do independently.

Exercise 3

1. ( ( bad music ) magazine )
2. ( bad ( music magazine ) )
3. ( ( ( bad music ) magazine ) ) — The ke spans the entire tanru, so it doesn't make much of a difference in the meaning.
4. ( ( bad ( music magazine ) ) )
5. ( bad ( music ( magazine reader ) ) )
6. ( ( bad ( music magazine ) ) reader ) — bo binds zgike and karni together, so this becomes a three-part tanru, which still binds leftwards.
7. ( ( bad music ) ( magazine reader ) )
8. ( ( ( bad music ) magazine ) reader ) — the ke–ke'e pair is merely reproducing the standard structure of a tanru.
9. ( ( bad ( music magazine ) ) reader )

10. ( ( bad ( music magazine ) ) reader )

Exercise 4

1. Zhang is the most purple out of Zhang, Ranjeet, Jyoti and Susan. (Literally, “Zhang is superlative in purpleness among...” You would normally use a lujvo — in this case ziryrai ‘purplest’ — to cut the sentence down to a manageable size: la .djang. cu ziryrai la .djang. ce la .ranjit. ce la .djiotis. ce la .suzyn.).
2. Also, Zhang either dances better than Ranjeet, or drunk (at that time). (Or: when he's not drunk.) (Literally, again, the Lojban gives more detail: “Zhang exceeds Ranjeet in the amount by which he is expert at dancing.” And here, too, you can use a lujvo to make the sentence somewhat simpler: .i la .djang. cu cremau la .ranjit. lonu dansu, from certu zmadu ‘more expert’).
3. Susan brings Jyoti a beer, and Zhang a soda. (Or soft drink, or pop, or coke, or cordial, or lolly water — whatever your local word for carbonated beverages is).
4. Zhang quickly (whether or not willingly) drinks the soda. (Remember that jugu sutra gi djica means the same as sutra ju djica: it is the willingness, rather than the quickness, that is irrelevant).
5. Ranjeet says “Don't you think you'll eventually want some hot, freshly-brewed coffee?” (As the punctuation in the English shows, the Lojban words for freshly-brewed — literally the more prosaic ‘newly constructed’ — go together. If the bo was not there, Ranjeet would be saying something like the coffee being novel in that it is hot ({hot [kind of] new} made coffee); perhaps the establishment doesn't normally have much of a water heating process, so any actual hot coffee would be a sensation).
6. Zhang says “New skin? Huh? My current skin is head-to-foot beautiful!” (Zhang has misheard Ranjeet over the thumping music, not to mention the buzz in his own head. As this shows, you can use non-logical connectives to join together selbri as well as sumti: from head to toe snuck inside a tanru is as good a place as any for it).
7. Ranjeet shouts “Coffee!”
8. Zhang looks confusedly, and afterwards (then) laughs and says “No, silly! I'm drinking soda!” (Ranjeet's exclamation can also be interpreted as an observative — “Look! Coffee!”, especially to a mind as addled as Zhang's).

Note: Just like .i, gije can be followed by a tense to indicate when the second term happened relative to the first term. If gije means ‘and’, then gije ba bo means ‘and later’, or ‘and then’. We saw someting similar with gi ca bo above.

But bo still binds immediately to what went before it. So if we left things as they were, we would be saying something like “Zhang looks confusedly and then laughs. He also says...” In that case, it wouldn't necessarily be clear that he spoke after he stared at Ranjeet, dumbstruck: since logical AND says nothing about the time when things happen, that sentence would still be true even if Zhang had made his perceptive remark three days earlier.

What we want is for the and later to apply to both him laughing and him talking. To force this to happen, we use the bracket ke instead of bo (ke can also take tense): “Zhang {stares}, and then {laughs and says ‘No, silly...’}” You might also want to refer to p. 364 of The Complete Lojban Language.

Exercise 5

1. .i la .djiotis. noi jegu jgari gi pinxe loi ckafi cu tavla la .suzyn.
2. There are several ways you can say this:

• .i lu .i lonu jegi la .djang. vi zvati gi do penmi ri ca lo cabdei cu xamgu li'u
• .i lu .i jegi lonu la .djang. vi zvati gi lonu do penmi ri ca lo cabdei cu xamgu li'u
• .i lu .i xamgu fa lonu jegi la .djang. vi zvati gi do penmi ri ca lo cabdei li'u
• .i lu .i xamgu fa jegi lonu la .djang. vi zvati gi lonu do penmi ri ca lo cabdei li'u

1. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i ko tavla mi jegi la .ranjit. ginai la .djang.
2. .i xu slabu ckule bo pendo do li'u or .i xu slabu ke ckule pendo do li'u (slabu ckule pendo would have meant ‘friend from an old school’ instead).
3. .icazibo la .suzyn. cu tirna la'o gy. Superfreak gy. no'u lo pamoi be lo'i selsanga poi se dansu or .icazibo la .suzyn. cu tirna la .SUperfrik. noi pamoi lo'i selsanga poi se dansu
4. .i jegi la .suzyn. cu krixa zo .ui gi joigi la .suzyn. gi la .ranjit. co'a dansu (if you want to emphasise that they're dancing together) or .i jegi la .suzyn. cu krixa zo .ui gi jegi la .suzyn. gi la .ranjit. co'a dansu (if you don't.)
5. .i la .djiotis. cu jegi catlu la .djang. noi jegi cisma gi zbasu lo jipci loi nanbrpretsele gi frumu
6. .i lo fange kensa bo xe klama ce'ogi mo'u klama gi ce'ogi te gusni gi vimcu lo vo pendo lo dansydi'u (Although fange ke kensa xe klama would also have been fine. fange kensa xe klama would have meant a vehicle intended only for alien space — which can't be right, since the spaceship has just paid planet Earth a surprise visit. Way surprising..).

Chapter 15. Singled out: Isolating specific places

In this lesson, we look at three features of Lojban grammar which normally get relegated to the ‘too-hard’ basket. Each of them involves singling out a particular sumti from a bridi, as being somehow more special than the other sumti. The full logical machinery associated with these ‘singlings out’ can get rather formidable, which is why Lojbanists tend to regard these features with some degree of awe. Hopefully we'll present these concepts to you with a minimum of fuss, in enough detail that you can go about using them comfortably in your Lojban.

Indirect questions

A Lojban question word is a request to “fill in the slot”, wherever it appears in a sentence. So

ma cilre la .lojban.

is the question “Who is learning Lojban?” By the same token,

mi djica lonu ma cilre la .lojban.

is the question “I want who to learn Lojban?” — or, in actual English (since English likes to have its question words at the start of the sentence), “Who do I want to learn Lojban?” And

mi pu cusku lo se du'u ma cilre la .lojban.

is “I said who is learning Lojban?” — i.e. “Who did I say is learning Lojban?”

There's no reason du'u should behave any differently than nu, let alone sedu'u; so

mi djuno lodu'u ma cilre la .lojban.

means “I know that who is learning Lojban?” — i.e. “Who do I know is learning Lojban?”

What it does not mean is “I know who is learning Lojban” — as in “I know the identity of the person learning Lojban.” In a construction like that in English, you are not asking a real question; that's why this is called an indirect question. Instead, you are saying that you already know the answer to the question. You can tell that the word who in that statement is not a request for information, because it is not at the start of the sentence, there's no question mark (or questioning intonation), and the question word is not being emphasised.

Lojban does not use any of these workarounds; a question word is a question word in Lojban, wherever it happens to end up in the sentence. This means that mi djuno lodu'u ma cilre la .lojban. can never be an indirect question: it is asking for an answer. (It is asking for an answer even if you're doing it rhetorically, although that's the kind of behaviour which Lojbanists — a level-headed bunch by most accounts, at least when they're speaking in Lojban — might not necessarily appreciate.) So what to do?

Well, let's look at what you do know. Let's say the person learning Lojban is Fred. If I ask you the question ma cilre la .lojban., you know what value to fill in the ma slot with: la .fred. So you could just say

mi djuno lodu'u la .fred. cu cilre la .lojban.

For whatever reason, however, you're not telling me the actual name — totally within your prerogative. In fact, I could say about you that “You know who is learning Lojban” — but because I don't know it, I have no name to fill in the ‘who’ slot with.

So you know that someone is learning Lojban: do djuno lodu'u zo'e cilre la .lojban. And you can fill in the value of zo'e, even though I can't. What we want is some word that would tell us “the answer that goes here isn't being said, but it is known anyway.” That word is the UI cmavo, kau. So we can say:

mi djuno lodu'u zo'e kau cilre la .lojban.

I know someone is learning Lojban, and I know who it is.

do djuno lodu'u zo'e kau cilre la .lojban.

You know someone is learning Lojban, and you know who it is.

kau says that the value of the word it attaches to is known — whatever that word might be. So in fact, you can put it next to a question word, and it will cancel out the question word's force. mi djuno lodu'u ma kau cilre la .lojban. means exactly the same as mi djuno lodu'u zo'e kau cilre la .lojban. — and it has the advantage of looking just like the indirect questions we're already familiar with.

Since kau belongs to selma'o UI, you can place it pretty much anywhere. In particular, anywhere you can put a question word in Lojban, you can turn it into an indirect question by adding kau. So you can say “I know how many people are learning Lojban”, as

mi djuno lodu'u xo kau lo prenu cu cilre la .lojban.

(Remember, xo is the question word for numbers).

You can even make indirect questions of Lojban's more exotic question words. For example, in Lesson 11, the waiter asks Jyoti and Susan lanme ji bakni “lamb or beef?” Once they answer, he knows whether they want to eat lamb or beef; in Lojban,

ba'o lonu la .djiotis. je la .suzyn. cu spusku kei lo bevri cu djuno lodu'u re ra djica loka citka loi lanme ji kau bakni

Vocabulary

farna	x1 is the direction of x2 (object/event) from origin/in frame of reference x3
gunro	x1 rolls/trundles on/against surface x2 rotating on axis/axle x3; x1 is a roller
rokci	x1 is a quantity of/is made of/contains rock/stone of type/composition x2 from location x3
sepli	x1 is apart/separate from x2, separated by partition/wall/gap/interval/separating medium x3
simsa	x1 is similar/parallel to x2 in property/quantity x3 (ka/ni); x1 looks/appears like x2

Exercise 1

Express the following indirect questions in Lojban. Use Lojban question words to translate the English question words.

1. I want to know when you will talk to me.
2. I don't know why you don't talk to me.
3. I've said who I thought was a fool.
4. Tell me where the beer is.
5. You said who I should give the book to.
6. Tell me how does it feel when you're on your own with no direction known like a rolling stone. (Not only is there a profusion of Dylan here, but this is kind of a trick question. But do translate it as an indirect one, anyway).

Infinitives and properties

We have seen, here and there, instances of Lojban expressions of infinitives and properties. Lojban treats them as abstractions, introduced by ka. There is nothing controversial about that; properties are things you can talk about (sumti), which involve relationships and characteristics (selbri). So if xendo means ‘kind’, for instance, lo ka xendo refers to ‘kindness’.

The thing about properties, though, is that they are properties of something. They are associated, not just with a selbri, but with a particular place of the selbri. For example, kindness is not just lo ka xendo, but the property of someone displaying kindness — as a characteristic of that someone. In other words, not just lo ka xendo, but lo ka ___ xendo, where ___ stands in for that ‘someone’.

As a further example, consider influence and susceptibility. Both involve the relationship expressed in Lojban as xlura:

x1 (agent) influences/lures/tempts x2 into action/state x3 by influence/threat/lure x4

So the Lojban for influence is lo ka xlura. And the Lojban for susceptibility is... what ? lo ka xlura?

Well, strictly speaking, both properties involve the same bridi, xlura. But obviously, we can't have the same expression for both influence and susceptibility; we have to have a way of highlighting the place in the bridi we are interested in. Though the two properties involve the same bridi, they focus on different places of that bridi. Influence is the property associated with the x1 of xlura, the influencer. Susceptibility is the property associated with the x2 of xlura, the influencee. So how do we say that in Lojban?

Lojban's solution to this problem is fairly similar to Lojban's approach to questions, as it turns out. Remember in Lesson 13 that the search for extraterrestrial intelligence was, in terms of Lojban, a search for the value to fit in the slot

loka ___ terdi bartu pensi

By the same token, influence is a property of things that fit into the x1 place of xlura; so you can think of influence as lo ka ___ xlura. If we know that mi fits into the slot, we have ‘my influence’; if we know that la .fred. fits into the slot, we have ‘Fred’s influence'. And susceptibility is a property of things that fit into the x2 place of xlura; so you can think of susceptibility as lo ka xlura ___ (or lo ka ___ se xlura).

Lojban has a word for that slot associated with properties. It isn't ma, because you're not asking someone what fills the slot; you're just pointing out that there's a slot there that can be filled. It isn't ke'a either, because ke'a refers back to something you've already expressed as a sumti (though you might think of a relative clause as a property belonging to that sumti.) Property slots get their own KOhA cmavo, ce'u. So:

• Influence is lo ka ce'u xlura “the property that x influences”: anyone or anything that has that property can stand in for ce'u.
• Susceptibility is lo ka xlura ce'u - “the property that [something] influences x”, or lo ka ce'u se xlura - “the property that x is influenced”: anyone or anything that has that property can stand in for ce'u.
• And extraterrestrial intelligence is lo ka ce'u terdi bartu pensi “the property that x is an earth-exterior thinker.” You can tell whether you've found your Little Green Men by substituting them for ce'u, and seeing if the bridi is true:

lo ka lo fange pe la .vulkan. cu terdi bartu pensi

Abstractors in one system

The difference between nu, du'u, ka and si'o is purely grammatical, and concerns the interpretation of elided sumti.

• In nu and du'u abstractions, all elided sumti are interpreted as zo'e.
• In ka abstractions that contain one or more overt ce'u, all elided sumti are interpreted as zo'e.
• In ka abstractions that contain no overt ce'u, the rule is that the first empty slot of the internal bridi gets ce'u implied unless specified otherwise. One of such exclusions is simxu that has two ce'u places according to it's definition. So if nothing is said in the definition then the leftmost empty sumti is interpreted as ce'u and the rest are interpreted as zo'e.
• In si'o abstractions, all elided sumti are interpreted as ce'u.

So lo ka xendo means lo ka ce'u xendo - ‘the property of people being kind’, and lo ka xendo fi ce'u - ‘the property of an action being something in which kindness is shown’ (that action is frequently what is meant in English by kindness).

If you cast your mind back to Lesson 7, you'll remember that we split up the abstractions Lojban uses into two main types: events, using nu, and facts or propositions, using du'u. A property, as introduced by ka, is still what we called there a reification. That means it's just like du'u: it's something you hold in your mind about what happens in the world, rather than something that objectively happens in the world. The difference is, ka has an empty slot, occupied by ce'u; and you're interested in the ka-clause only inasmuch as you're interested in what fills the slot. On the other hand, du'u-clauses don't necessarily have any such slot — although they can. Template:Talkquote

Most usage of ka in Lojban fits this pattern of ‘filling a slot’ straightforwardly. This is particularly the case when a ka-abstraction is required in the place structure definition of a gismu: a ka-clause is required, because by it's definition the gismu involves that slot. So with sisku ‘seek’, you search for ka-clauses, to find what will fill the slot. With karbi ‘compare’, you compare things to see how well they fit the slot. Or alternatively, the gismu by definition fills that slot, by relating the property to the value satisfying it. For example,

mi fange do loka ce'u se krasi lo bartu be lo tcadu

I am alien to you in the property of “x1 is from out of town” (as applied to me).

mi barda loka lo xadni be ce'u cu clani

I am big in the property of “x1's body is long” — i.e. “x1 is tall” (as applied to me).

mi mansa do loka ce'u pensi

I satisfy you that the property “x1 is intelligent” applies to me.

What happens when you find the value that fills the slot? Then — and here Lojban parts ways with English — you no longer have a slot; so you no longer have a property. You've gone back to du'u. If mi mansa do loka ce'u pensi, that's the same as saying do djuno lodu'u mi pensi. A property applying to a known entity is no longer a property at all in Lojban, but a fact — or (if you no longer have to reify it) an event.

Be careful here: what English (and in fact, most traditional usage) calls properties are often actually considered just states in Lojban — that is, something that happens in the world, but without anybody lifting a finger. Being a runner (also known as ‘running’) is hard work; so we're happy to think of it as an event: nu bajra. But being happy (also known as ‘happiness’) is something that just happens, without any work; so we're inclined to call it ka gleki. But that's misleading. English distinguishes between running and happiness grammatically, because run is a verb and happy is an adjective. But verbs and adjectives don't mean anything to Lojban (or to many other languages), so there's nothing to say you can't say nu gleki instead. Much of the time, in fact, that is precisely what you should be saying. As a rule of thumb: if you wouldn't say ka bajra in a sentence, don't say ka gleki either. Template:Talkquote

Sometimes you'll want to speak of properties of applying to two entities at once. For example, the cop knows who talked about the robbery, and to whom:

lo pulji cu djuno lodu'u makau tavla makau lo nu jemna zercpa.

To get that information he probably looked for both x1s and x2s to fill in his ka-property:

lo pulji cu sisku loka ce'u tavla ce'u lonu jemna zerle'a To put it more formally, he was seeking pairs {.abu, by.} such that the proposition .abu tavla by. is true.

Reciprocals

The main use for multiple instances of ce'u is our old friend simxu.

If we want to speak about reciprocality, we are very much interested in which two places are related through that reciprocality:

mi ce do simxu loka ce'u tavla ce'u lonu jemna zerle'a

or saying shorter

mi ce do simxu loka tavla fi lonu jemna zerle'a

Note that first two empty places in the abstraction are filled in with ce'u as stated in the definition of simxu.

There are some reciprocalities that can be nicely distinguished here: simxu loka draci fi ce'u ce'u is a situation where people take turns writing plays for each other, while simxu loka draci fo ce'u ce'u is a situation where people take turns performing plays for each other.

Vocabulary

ckire	x1 is grateful/thankful to/appreciative of x2 for x3 (event/property)
mamta	x1 is a mother of x2; x1 bears/mothers/acts maternally toward x2; [not necessarily biological]

Exercise 2

Express the following qualities in Lojban, using ce'u explicitly in all cases.

1. Gratitude
2. Similarity to Arnold Schwarzenegger
3. Motherhood
4. Having a mother
5. My similarity to Arnold Schwarzenegger
6. Being a place where people get anxious; creepiness, (one interpretation of) hauntedness (Hint: Use sumti tcita).

From sumti to abstraction: tu'a

When looking up words in a gismu list, you may have already noticed that, where languages like English have people or things as subjects and objects, Lojban often uses abstractions instead as gismu places. For example, in English, you say that someone is interesting, or something is interesting. In Lojban, you aren't really meant to say either. The definition of cinri is:

x1 (abstraction) interests/is interesting to x2; x2 is interested in x1

In other words, as far as Lojban is concerned, it's not things or people that are interesting, but actions or properties involving those things or people. For example, Jyoti cannot be said to be interesting simply by virtue of being Jyoti; the way Lojban puts it, it's the things Jyoti does (or is) that are interesting — the way she talks about British sitcoms, her choice of headgear, her tendency to break into '80s songs after she's had a few drinks. (Oh, I forgot to tell you about all that. Maybe next course).

The same goes for fenki ‘crazy’. In almost every language, it is people that are called crazy. Only occasionally are actions also called crazy. Lojban, however, defines fenki as:

x1 (action/event) is crazy/insane/mad/frantic/in a frenzy (one sense) by standard x2

In other words, as far as Lojban is concerned, craziness lies in actions, not in people; a crazy person is by definition someone who does crazy actions.

For now, you may be prepared to accept this as an endearing quirk of Lojban. (If you're not, we explain why Lojban is all topsy-turvy like this in the next section.) But very often, you have no idea what to say is the selbri of that abstraction, or you don't particularly care to. For example, yes, Jyoti doing this, that and the other is what is interesting about her; but I may not know first-hand what exactly her particular talents are, or I may not feel like going into a five-minute spiel every time I merely want to point out that she is interesting. If I can't say the Lojban for “Jyoti is interesting”, I should at least be able to say something like “Jyoti {doing some stuff I'm not listing here} is interesting”, or “Some things about Jyoti are interesting.” In other words, I have to say

lonu la .djiotis. cu ___ cu cinri

but I shouldn't have to fill in that slot with an explicit selbri each time.

There are slots in Lojban sentences that we have in fact been leaving empty all the time. Remember zo'e? zo'e is the ‘don't care’ value we leave implied in the unspecified places of bridi. For example, when I say mi klama lo barja, I'm not bothering to specify my point of origin, route, or vehicle. They are all implied to be zo'e: mi klama lo barja zo'e zo'e zo'e. This means that there is a point of origin, a route and a vehicle involved, but we don't really care what they are.

zo'e is a sumti; but it has a selbri equivalent, co'e. co'e can appear where any selbri can appear, but it leaves the relationship between its sumti unspecified. So mi co'e lo barja means something like “I thingummy the bar”: the bar and I are in some relationship, but I'm not bothering to say what it is. I might be going to it, coming from it, sleeping in it, refurbishing it, or hearing about my neighbour getting drunk in it once. It just doesn't matter enough for me to say what.

Now normally, you can't get away with this: if you leave out the selbri in your story, you pretty much have no story. But with these abstractions that we wish weren't really abstractions, co'e is just what you need: you can get away with making an abstraction containing only the sumti you want to talk about. You don't have to specify anything else in the abstraction — especially not the selbri. So if I want to say “Jyoti is interesting”, I need only say

lonu la .djiotis. cu co'e cu cinri

I'm still saying an abstraction involving Jyoti is what is interesting, so I'm following the requirements of the gismu list. But that's all I'm saying; what particular abstraction it is that is interesting, I am leaving entirely open. In the same way, if I want to say “Zhang is crazy” (or “berserk”, probably a closer translation of fenki), I don't have to enumerate the various wacky stunts he has pulled over the years. I can simply say that “some stuff about Zhang is crazy”, which in Lojban comes out as

lonu la .djang.cu co'e cu fenki

The value of co'e could be

• dasni [loi zirpu] “wears purple”
• dansu [la zgikrfanki jipci] “dances the Funky Chicken”
• tavla [bau la .lojban.] “speaks Lojban”

or whatever; we're just not bothering to name it here.

Lojban can go one better, though. As you can tell, Lojban is going to have you saying lonu ___ cu co'e kei quite often (and you never know when you might need that kei terminator); so it offers you an abbreviation: tu'a. tu'a da means lesu'u da cu co'e kei (where su'u, you may recall, is the generic abstractor); so you can translate tu'a as “some abstraction associated with...”, or more colloquially, “some stuff about...”. tu'a is easily the most popular way of dealing with abstractions you wish weren't there in Lojban; Lojban sentences using it come out fairly similar to the natural language sentences without abstractions that we're used to seeing. So the usual Lojban for “Jyoti is interesting” is

tu'a la .djiotis. cu cinri

and the usual Lojban for “Zhang is crazy” is

tu'a la .djang. cu fenki

Vocabulary

djica	x1 desires/wants/wishes x2 (event/state) for purpose x3
cfari	x1 [state/event/process] commences/initiates/starts/begins to occur; (intransitive verb)
fanza	x1 (event) annoys/irritates/bothers/distracts x2
nelci	x1 is fond of/likes/has a taste for x2 (object/state)
snuti	x1 (event/state) is an accident/unintentional on the part of x2; x1 is an accident
troci	x1 tries/attempts/makes an effort to do/attain x2 (event/state/property) by actions/method x3

Exercise 3

Some of these sentences need to be translated in Lojban with tu'a, and some don't. Supply the appropriate translation, in either case.

1. I tried the curry.
2. I wanted the curry.
3. I liked the curry.
4. My leaving was accidental.
5. Gratitude annoys me.
6. Curry annoys me.
7. The irritation has begun.

Raising: jai

Warning

This section is long and complicated. On the plus side, it's also the final section in the course.

Things weren't always like this. In the '80s, the ancestor of Lojban still said that things were interesting, and people were crazy, just like most normal languages, and without detouring through abstractions. So what happened?

Well, what happened was that Lojbanists noticed how linguists have been analysing these concepts in natural languages, and how they were coming up with their own versions of selbri. Often, what was a noun in one part of the sentence, and a verb in another part, were brought together and considered to be underlyingly part of the same abstraction sumti.

A good example is the phrase I am difficult to annoy in English. At first sight, you might think that I is a sumti of difficult. And grammatically it is: it's the subject. But logically it isn't: what we're describing as difficult is not me. We can't say:

• “Who is difficult?”
• “Me (to annoy).”

What's actually going on is that, underlyingly, what is difficult is to annoy me: the action of getting me annoyed is what is hard to achieve — not me! This is why English also allows you to say It is difficult to annoy me, and (if you squint a little) To annoy me is difficult. And sure enough, Lojban expresses this concept according to that ‘underlying’ form:

lonu fanza mi cu nandu

The event of annoying me is difficult

So why did English pull that weird switcheroo with I am difficult to annoy? Basically, because when we talk, we aren't concentrating in our minds on intangible abstractions like “the event of annoying me”, let alone “the state of Jyoti having certain unspecified properties.” Instead, we run little stories in our head, with heroes and villains: concrete heroes and villains — people, for the most part. And as it happens, we make the subjects of our sentences be the heroes and villains we're concentrating on. (That's what a subject's ultimate job is: to present what we're concentrating on).

So by pulling a switcheroo like that, we're not talking about abstractions and events any more; the subject of the sentence is now our perennially favourite subject — namely me: it's me that is difficult to annoy. (Yes, it is all about me...) This process is called in linguistics raising, because it raises concrete subjects (and objects) we want to talk about, out of the haziness of an abstraction sumti (or ‘clausal argument’, to use English logical terminology).

Once the requisite number of Lojbanists did an undergraduate course in syntax (you may commence throwing darts at effigies of Nick Nicholas at your leisure), it was realised that there were a lot of gismu whose place structures contained both a raised concrete sumti (usually x1), and an abstraction sumti which itself contained the first sumti. For example, the place structure of fenki used to be

x1 is crazy in behaviour x2 (abstraction) by standard x3

But any abstraction that would go into x2 would contain the x1 sumti: any crazy behaviour would automatically be the behaviour of the crazy person. For example, you'd get

• la .djang. cu fenki lonu la .djang. cu dasni loi zirpu
• la .djang. cu fenki lonu la .djang. cu dansu la jipci
• la .djang. cu fenki lonu la .djang. cu tavla bau la .lojban.

The question then became: does the x1 tell us anything the x2 wasn't already telling us? We know who was involved in the crazy behaviour, because that person would be a sumti inside x2. (More specifically, he or she would be the active party: someone hitting random strangers is crazy; someone being hit by random strangers isn't — although arguably someone allowing themselves to keep being hit by random strangers is.) Was there any reason, then, to grant the person an extra place in the overall bridi? The decision was, no: behaviour is what is crazy, so you can work out that the person acting out the behaviour is the crazy person. There's no need to have an extra place for the person, when you can already work out who they are. The same conclusion was arrived at for cinri: it is abstractions — events and qualities — that attract interest; and an interesting person is simply a person involved in an interesting abstraction.

All well and good; but natural languages do raising for a reason. So when Lojban has its gismu without raising, it gains in eliminating redundancy and logical muddledness; but it loses in ‘naturalness’. We like talking about people rather than abstractions in our languages; and Lojban should not go out of its way to form an exception to this.

There is a solution of sorts to this problem using tu'a; but it doesn't actually do what raising does in natural languages: it doesn't change the x1 place from an abstraction to a concrete sumti. And there are times you will want to do just that.

One example is joining bridi-tails. In English, you can say Jyoti is interesting and beautiful. This is based on two sentences (Jyoti is interesting, Jyoti is beautiful) which have the same subject. So we can easily combine them into a single sentence. In Lojban, the equivalent sentences are

tu'a la .djiotis. cu cinri

and

la .djiotis. cu melbi

There is no way you're going to join those two bridi together with gije: they simply do not have their first sumti in common. But they're both somehow ‘about’ Jyoti; so you really should be able to work around this.

An even more important instance when you want raising is in forming sumti out of this kind of gismu. A sumti means whatever goes into the x1 of its selbri. If la .djiotis. cu ninmu “Jyoti is a woman”, then I can describe Jyoti as lo ninmu ‘a woman’. If lo mi karce cu xe klama lo gusta fu mi “My car is a vehicle to the restaurant for me”, then I can describe lo mi karce as lo xe klama ‘a vehicle’. So how do I say that someone is a cheat, or a deceiver? The gismu for ‘deceive’, tcica, has the place structure

x1 (event/experience) misleads/deceives/dupes/fools/cheats/tricks x2 into x3 (event/state)

This means that, while in English we say that “x1 (person) deceives x2 into doing x3, by doing x4”, in Lojban the person and the action are merged into the one place. That makes lo tcica a trick, not a trickster; a deception, and not a deceiver. To say that someone is a trickster or a deceiver, we need to use tu'a: tu'a da tcica. But you can't put lo in front of tu'a da: the deceiver has to be the x1 of some selbri, in order to get their own sumti.

The solution to this is to force Lojban to have raising after all, changing the place structure of the selbri involved. This works just like se changing the place structure of its selbri, swapping its first and second place. If we put jai in front of a selbri, its x1 place changes from an abstraction, to any sumti contained within the abstraction. Let's try this with a few sentences:

• lonu la .djang. cu dasni loi zirpu cu fenki
• la .djang. cu jai fenki

• lenu la .djiotis. cu co'e cu cinri
• la .djiotis. cu jai cinri

• tu'a la .ranjit. cu tcica la .suzyn.
• la ranjit. u jai tcica la .suzyn.

• lo nu fanza mi cu nandu
• mi jai nandu

You'll notice that, with these new place structures, the Lojban phrases sound pretty much like their English equivalents. For example,

la .djiotis. cu jai cinri

Jyoti is interesting

la ranjit. cu jai tcica la .suzyn.

Ranjeet deceives Susan

We can now do with jai those things we couldn't before. The Lojban for “Jyoti is interesting and beautiful”, for example, is

la .djiotis. cu jai cinri gije melbi

That's because Jyoti goes in the x1 place of jai cinri, just as it goes into the x1 place of melbi. And if I want to make a sumti meaning ‘deceiver’ or ‘trickster’, I can use jai to do it:

tu'a la .ranjit. cu tcica → la ranjit. jai tcica → lo jai tcica

However, mi jai nandu does not correspond to “I am difficult to annoy.” In switching a concrete sumti for the original x1 — the abstraction that was difficult — we have lost the abstraction itself: there is nothing in mi jai nandu that means ‘to annoy’. But not to worry: Lojban allows you to keep the original abstraction in the bridi by preceding it with fai. fai is a place tag like fa and fe; it effectively adds a new place to the bridi. So I am difficult to annoy is matched almost word-for-word by the Lojban sentence

mi jai nandu fai lonu fanza mi

And we can apply this pattern further afield; for example, “the book took three months to write” is in Lojban properly

lonu finti lo cukta cu masti li ci

To write the book had a month-duration of three

Raising allows the slightly more familiar-looking

lo cukta cu jai masti li ci fai lonu finti

jai has not proven as popular as tu'a, presumably because it involves a fairly thorough rearrangement of place structures — and has the whiff about being somehow ‘un-Lojbanic’. But as we've seen, it allows you to talk about things in a way that is in many ways more natural; and though it belongs to ‘advanced’ Lojban, it is a feature you will find it useful to be familiar with.

Exercise 4

That was pretty heavy going. You can relax: this exercise will go easy on you. (You still have the final translation exercises to go through, after all!) Where possible, and by all means necessary, recast the abstractions in the following sentences so that they use jai (and fai, where applicable).

1. .i tu'a mi nabmi
2. .i lodu'u mi xebni loi kensa fange cu nabmi
3. .i mi djuno tu'a la .lojban.
4. .i mi djuno lo du'u la .lojban. cu bangu kei la .lojban.
5. .i lonu mi ckire da cu nibli lonu mi se xamgu tu'a da (Don't try and be too clever here — it won't work..).
6. .i lonu lonu la .djang. cu xalfekfri cu nabmi cu cizra (Only eliminate one level of abstraction).
7. .i da poi lonu fanza ke'a cu nandu cu zvati (Reduce this, then see if you can't reduce it a little more..).

Summary

In this lesson, we have covered:

• Indirect questions (kau)
• Property variables (ce'u)
• Raising (co'e, tu'a, jai, fai)

And with that, we have reached the end of the Lojban for Beginners course! There are several bits of the grammar of Lojban not covered here; but you now have the essentials with which to start using Lojban, and you are in a good position to pick up the rest — preferably from The Complete Lojban Language, which is a fairly easy read for a reference grammar. Moreover, most of the Lojban you will see will stick fairly closely to the grammar covered here. .i .a'o do se zdile tu'a lo ve ctuca gije ba gleki lonu pilno la .lojban.

Vocabulary

Note: Remember the ‘error quote’ lo'u... le'u from Lesson 7.

birti	x1 is certain/sure/positive/convinced that x2 is true
cipra	x1 (process/event) is a test for/proof of property/state x2 in subject x3 (individ./set/mass)
curmi	x1 (agent) lets/permits/allows x2 (event) under conditions x3; x1 grants privilege x2
dicra	x1 (event) interrupts/stops/halts/[disrupts] x2 (object/event/process) due to quality x3
drata	x1 isn't the-same-thing-as/is different-from/other-than x2 by standard x3; x1 is something else
drani	x1 is correct/proper/right/perfect in property/aspect x2 (ka) in situation x3 by standard x4 (Note: when people say correct things, that does not automatically make them ‘correct/proper/right/perfect')
jarco	x1 (agent) shows/exhibits/displays/[reveals]/demonstrates x2 (property) to audience x3
kucli	x1 is curious/wonders about/is interested in/[inquisitive about] x2 (object/abstract)
kumfa	x1 is a room of/in structure x2 surrounded by partitions/walls/ceiling/floor x3 (mass/jo'u)
logji	x1 [rules/methods] is a logic for deducing/concluding/inferring/reasoning to/about x2 (du'u)
mebri	x1 is a/the brow/forehead [projecting flat/smooth head/body-part] of x2
remna	x1 is a human/human being/man (non-specific gender-free sense); (adjective:) x1 is human
rufsu	x1 is rough/coarse/uneven/[grainy/scabrous/rugged] in texture/regularity
sonci	x1 is a soldier/warrior/fighter of army x2
tarci	x1 is a star/sun with stellar properties x2

Exercise 5

Translate from Lojban.

1. .i lo vo pendo na djuno lo du'u ri zvati ma kau mu'i ma kau
2. .i la .djang. cu cusku lu .i mi cazi ckire da'i tu'a loi glare ke cnino se zbasu ckafi li'u
3. .i la .djiotis. cu se cinri loka ce'u cizra pe lo kumfa poi dy. nenri
4. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i .ue lo vi canko noi jarco tu'a loi tarci cu pe'i jai se xanka li'u
5. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i go'i fa ji'a lo re fange noi jarco loka lo mebri po'e ce'u cu rufsu li'u
6. .i pa fange poi simsa lo sonci cu jai cfari fai lonu lanli lo terdi pendo kei gije cusku lo'u .uxrup .ua. doglau. latl. tcak. val. tca. le'u
7. .i la .ranjit. cu kucli lodu'u lo fange cu tavla bau ma kau
8. .i lo ka tu'a ce'u se kucli cu se jundi lo drata fange noi cusku zoi gy. Greetings people of the planet ... um... Saturn? gy.
9. .i la .djang. cu cusku lu .i tu'a lo fange na drani so'a da li'u

Exercise 6

Translate into Lojban. Use ce'u in quality abstractions. Use jai instead of tu'a wherever possible.

1. Susan says “Excuse me, but I think you are uncertain about where you are — which is Earth.”
2. The alien says “You are correct.”
3. “We are, uh, merely testing you for terrestrial intelligence.”
4. Jyoti says “You could have done that and not have interrupted our dancing.”
5. Ranjeet says “And also, if you knew that we are terrestrial people and intelligent, then you also knew that we are terrestrial intelligences.” (Use forethought connectives).
6. The alien says “Are you the radio transmitter?”
7. Ranjeet says “I am one of the radio transmitters.”
8. “But mi po'onai cradi is more logically correct.”
9. The alien frowns, says “You are allowed to leave”, and un-removes the friends from the dance hall.

10. The alien says “xuˈmɑn ˈmɛqːoq. ˈwɛdʒpux”, which is translated as “Human logic. Yuck.”

Answers to exercises

Exercise 1

1. mi djica lo ka djuno lodu'u do ba tavla mi ca ma kau (You can place the ca ma kau anywhere after lodu'u).
2. mi na djuno lodu'u do na tavla mi mu'i ma kau (Same goes for mu'i ma kau).
3. mi ba'o cusku lo se du'u mi pu jinvi lodu'u ma kau bebna (Yes, Lojban can get prolix..).
4. ko cusku lo se du'u lo birje cu zvati ma kau or ko cusku lo se du'u birje vi ma kau (... except, perhaps, where it matters most! The observative in the second version actually works: “Beer! Where?!”)
5. do pu cusku lo se du'u mi bilga lonu mi dunda lo cukta ma kau or (if you want to risk the attitudinal) do pu cusku lo se du'u mi .ei dunda lo cukta ma kau
6. OK, this doesn't have to be that close (let alone rhyme), and in fact the English is closer to a direct than an indirect question, but this is something like ko cusku fi mi fe lo se du'u pei kau do sepli gije na djuno lo farna gije simsa lo gunro rokci.

Told you this was kind of a trick question...

Exercise 2

1. lo ka ce'u ckire
2. lo ka ce'u simsa la .arnold. .cfartseneger. (or la'o gy. Arnold Schwarzenegger gy., if you prefer. The Lojban sound system (phonology) doesn't allow cv in sequence; this is something you can worry about more in your further Lojban studies. See The Complete Lojban Language, p. 36)
3. lo ka ce'u mamta
4. lo ka mamta ce'u or lo ka ce'u se mamta
5. lo ka ce'u simsa la .arnold. cfartseneger. kei poi ckaji mi (or, of course, lo du'u mi simsa la .arnold. cfartseneger., which actually means the same thing).
6. lo ka xanka vi ce'u. A little contrived, we admit.

Exercise 3

1. .i mi troci tu'a lo cidjrkari (What you actually try is to eat it — or, on occasion, to keep it down).
2. .i mi djica tu'a lo cidjrkari (This usually comes as a shock to people learning Lojban, but you can't actually want objects, only events. The event you usually want is to be in possession of the object, in some way or other).
3. .i mi nelci lo cidjrkari (The gismu list explicitly allows nelci to involve both objects and events; so you don't need tu'a here. This makes nelci quite different to djica).
4. .i lonu mi cliva cu snuti (No surprise there; ‘leaving’ corresponds to an abstraction).
5. .i loka ckire cu fanza mi
6. .i tu'a lo cidjrkari cu fanza mi (Unlike gratitude, curry is certainly not an abstraction).
7. .i lo fanza cu cfari (Yes, you read correctly. To fit the x1 of cfari, a sumti doesn't actually have to look like an abstraction; it just has to mean an abstraction. Anything that can be described as lo fanza is going to be an abstraction, because of the place structure of fanza. So since the x1 of fanza is a state or event, and the x1 of cfari is also a state or event, they can both be describing the same thing — without needing to strain abstractions out of one or the other using tu'a).

Exercise 4

1. .i mi jai nabmi “I am a problem.”
2. .i mi jai nabmi fai lodu'u mi xebni loi kensa fange “I am a problem in [the fact] that I hate space aliens.”
3. .i la .lojban. cu jai se djuno mi “Lojban is known to me.” (We did say “all means necessary...”)
4. .i la .lojban. cu jai se djuno mi la .lojban. fai lodu'u la .lojban. cu bangu “Of Lojban, it is known to me about Lojban that Lojban is a language.” (As this indicates, the x3 place of djuno is raised out of its x2 place. Since you have wide liberty in stating what you know about a subject, however, this won't necessarily always be the case:
   1. .i mi djuno lodu'u loi cidro ku joi loi kijno cu cupra loi djacu kei loi xumske
   2. I know about chemistry that hydrogen and oxygen makes water
5. .i mi/da cu jai nibli lonu mi se xamgu tu'a da kei fai lonu mi ckire da, or .i mi/tu'a da jai se nibli lonu mi ckire da kei fai lonu mi se xamgu tu'a da No real English equivalent; the original sentence is “Me being grateful to x necessitates that I have been benefitted by x.”
6. .i lonu la .djang. xalfekfri cu jai cizra fai lonu nabmi “Zhang being drunk is strange in that it is a problem” or .i lonu la .djang. jai nabmi fai lonu xalfekfri cu cizra “Zhang being a problem in that he is drunk is strange.”
   1. Note: Can you eliminate both abstractions? For the record, yes you can, by applying jai twice:
   2. .i la .djang. jai jai cizra fai xi pa lonu xalfekfri kei fai xi re lonu nabmi
   3. Messily, we now have two fai places: the Lojban subscript phrases xi pa ‘subscript 1' and xi re ‘subscript 2' helpfully keep them apart. You're not really encouraged to do this kind of thing, though; after all, jai was intended to make Lojban more natural — not more wacky!
7. da poi ke'a jai nandu fai lonu fanza da cu zvati “x such that x is difficult to annoy is here.” You do need to indicate somehow who is being annoyed in the fai-clause. One way of doing so is to leave the raised sumti in, as we've just done: fai lonu fanza da cu zvati. Another is to make the raised place of the fai-clause its x1, conventionally its most important place: da poi ke'a jai nandu fai lonu se fanza cu zvati.
   1. Since what you're describing is a thing or person (a person, in this case), that means that da poi ke'a jai nandu fai lonu fanza should be a sumti, with nandu as its selbri. This gives
   2. lo jai nandu be fai lonu fanza cu zvati
   3. The one difficult to annoy is here.
   4. If you came up with that, we hereby dub thee King/Queen of Lojban! .i ko jgira! If not, well, that's OK, too; this kind of expression isn't all that popular yet, so you're not at a terrible disadvantage if you don't use it...

Exercise 5

1. The four friends do not know where they are, or why they are there. (You can ask more than one question in a sentence in Lojban, direct or indirect).
2. Zhang says “Right now, I would be grateful for a hot, freshly-brewed coffee.” (You are grateful in Lojban for events rather than objects, so fully expanded, .i la .djang. cu ckire da'i lonu kakne loka pinxe loi glare ke cnino se zbasu ckafi).
3. Jyoti is interested in the weirdness of the room she is in. (pe is another way of associating abstractions with specific objects).
4. Susan says “Wow! This window, which shows the stars, is in my opinion something to be anxious about.” (se xanka describes an event that provokes anxiety, so jai se xanka describes a thing involved in the event that provokes anxiety. Strictly speaking, Susan is probably misusing jarco..).
5. Ranjeet says “So are the two aliens, who show that their foreheads are rough” or “who exhibit roughness in their foreheads.” (... Ranjeet, of course, cannot help but be correct in his usage of jarco).
6. One alien who is like a soldier starts analysing the Earthling friends, and says “ˈʔuxrup wɑʔ ˈɖoɣlɑwʔ lɑtɬ tʃɑq vɑl tʃɑʔ” (A lot of you may have guessed the language the alien is speaking. You are correct, and let's leave it at that, shall we?)
7. Ranjeet is curious about what language the aliens are speaking in. (No, I haven't clued him in..).
8. Being an object of curiosity is something noticed by the other alien, who says (in English) “Greetings people of the planet ... um... Saturn?”
9. Zhang says “Stuff about the aliens is not right in most regards.” (In other words, there are properties involving these aliens that are not correct in most regards; for example, their sense of direction).

Exercise 6

1. .i la .suzyn. cu cusku lu .i ta'a do'u pe'i do na birti lodu'u do zvati ma kau po'u la terdi li'u
2. .i lo fange cu cusku lu .i do jai drani (or do drani as the second place of drani specifies in what asppect you are correct).
3. .i mi'a .y. jai cipra po'o loka ce'u terdi pensi kei do li'u (You could say .i mi'a .y. jai cipra po'o loka do po'u ce'u terdi pensi kei li'u, because it's the person with the quality being tested that is the test subject. But for practical reasons, Lojban hasn't eliminated this particular redundancy, so you might as well exploit it).
4. .i la .djiotis. cu cusku lu .i do pu kakne loka go'i gijenai jai dicra lonu mi'a dansu li'u (In Lojban, only events interrupt; latex-foreheaded aliens are ‘involved in interrupting’).
5. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i ji'a jaginai do pu djuno lodu'u mi'a jegi terdi prenu gi pensi gi do djuno lodu'u mi'a terdi pensi li'u (Ranjeet can never resist a good syllogism).
6. .i lo fange cu cusku lu .i xu do du lo cradi li'u (A legitimate use of du, since to the alien ‘The radio transmitter’ and ‘You’ refer to the same person).
7. .i la .ranjit. cu cusku lu .i mi me lo cradi (If you want to emphasise the plurality of the transmitters, you could say .i mi me lo su'o re cradi “I am one of the two or more radio transmitters”).
8. .i ku'i lu mi po'onai cradi li'u cu zmadu fi loka ce'u logji drani li'u (Although a person saying something correct is not eligible to be the x1 place of drani, the correct thing that they say is eligible: drani is not by definition restricted to abstractions).
9. .i lo fange cu frumu gije cusku lu .i do jai se curmi fai lonu cliva li'u gije to'e vimcu lo pendo lo dansydi'u
10. .i lo fange cu cusku zoi gy. xuˈmɑn ˈmɛqːoq. ˈwɛdʒpux gy. noi se fanva fu lu .i remna logji .a'unai li'u (or, in Lojban phonetic approximation, lo'u xuman. mekok. .uedj. pux. le'u).

Appendix. Vocabulary

.abu	a	letteral for a
.a'o	hope	attitudinal: hope – despair
.a'u	interest	attitudinal: interest – disinterest – repulsion
.au	desire	attitudinal: desire – indifference – reluctance
.ebu	e	letteral for e
.e'e	competence	attitudinal: competence – incompetence/inability
.ei	obligation	attitudinal: obligation – freedom
.e'o	request	attitudinal: request – negative request
.e'u	suggestion	attitudinal: suggestion – abandon suggest – warning
.i ja	sentence or	logical connective: sentence afterthought or
.i je	sentence and	logical connective: sentence afterthought and
.i ji	sentence conn?	logical connective: sentence afterthought connective question
.i jenai	sentence but not	logical connective: sentence afterthought x but not y
.i jo	sentence iff	logical connective: sentence afterthought biconditional/iff/if-and-only-if
.i jonai	sentence xor	logical connective: sentence afterthought exclusive or
.i ju	sentence whether	logical connective: sentence afterthought whether-or-not
.i naja	sentence only if	logical connective: sentence afterthought conditional/only if
.i	sentence link	sentence link/continuation; continuing sentences on same topic
.ia	belief	attitudinal: belief – skepticism – disbelief
.ibu	i	letteral for i
.i'e	approval	attitudinal: approval – non-approval – disapproval
.ie	agreement	attitudinal: agreement – disagreement
.ii	fear	attitudinal: fear – security
.iu	love	attitudinal: love – no love lost – hatred
.o'ai	ciao/greetings/parting	vocative: ciao/greetings/hello/goodbye
.obu	o	letteral for o
.oi	complaint	attitudinal: complaint – pleasure
.o'o	patience	attitudinal: patience – mere tolerance – anger
.o'u	relaxation	attitudinal: relaxation – composure – stress
.ua	discovery	attitudinal: discovery – confusion/searching
.ubu	u	letteral for u
.u'e	wonder	attitudinal: wonder – commonplace
.ue	surprise	attitudinal: surprise – not really surprised – expectation
.u'i	amusement	attitudinal: amusement – weariness
.ui	happiness	attitudinal: happiness – unhappiness
.u'u	repentance	attitudinal: repentance – lack of regret – innocence
.uu	pity	attitudinal: pity – cruelty
.y	hesitation	‘er’ (hesitation)
.ybu	y	letteral for y
.y'y	'	letteral for '
.y'ybu	h	letteral for h
ba	after	time tense relation/direction: will [selbri]; after [sumti]; default future tense
badri	sad	x1 is sad/depressed/dejected/[unhappy/feels sorrow/grief] about x2 (abstraction)
ba'e	emphasize next	forethought emphasis indicator; indicates next word is especially emphasized
bai	compelled by	bapli modal, 1st place (forced by) forcedly; compelled by force ...
bajra	run	x1 runs on surface x2 using limbs x3 with gait x4
bakfu	bundle	x1 is a bundle/package/cluster/clump/pack [shape/form] containing x2, held together by x3
bakni	bovine	x1 is a cow/cattle/kine/ox/[bull/steer/calf] [beef-producer/bovine] of species/breed x2
spero	Esperanto	x1 pertains to Esperanto language/culture in aspect x2
bangu	language	x1 is a/the language/dialect used by x2 to express/communicate x3 (si'o/du'u, not quote)
banli	great	x1 is great/grand in property x2 (ka) by standard x3
banxa	bank	x1 is a bank owned by/in banking system x2 for banking function(s) x3 (event)
ba'o	perfective	interval event contour: in the aftermath of ...; since ...; perfective
bapli	force	x1 [force] (ka) forces/compels event x2 to occur; x1 determines property x2 to manifest
barda	big	x1 is big/large in property/dimension(s) x2 as compared with standard/norm x3
barja	bar	x1 is a tavern/bar/pub serving x2 to audience/patrons x3
bartu	out	x1 is on the outside of x2; x1 is exterior to x2
batci	bite	x1 bites/pinches x2 on/at specific locus x3 with x4
ba'u	exaggeration	exaggeration – accuracy – understatement
bau	in language	bangu modal, 1st place in language ...
be	link sumti	sumti link to attach sumti (default x2) to a selbri; used in descriptions
bebna	foolish	x1 is foolish/silly in event/action/property [folly] (ka) x2; x1 is a boob
be'e	request to send	vocative: request to send/speak
bei	link more sumti	separates multiple linked sumti within a selbri; used in descriptions
benji	transfer	x1 transfers/sends/transmits x2 to receiver x3 from transmitter/origin x4 via means/medium x5
be'o	end linked sumti	elidable terminator: end linked sumti in specified description
berti	north	x1 is to the north/northern side [right-hand-rule pole] of x2 according to frame of reference x3
bevri	carry	x1 carries/hauls/bears/transports cargo x2 to x3 from x4 over path x5; x1 is a carrier/[porter]
bi	8	digit/number: 8
bi'i	unordered interval	non-logical interval connective: unordered between ... and ...
bilga	obliged	x1 is bound/obliged to/has the duty to do/be x2 in/by standard/agreement x3; x1 must do x2
bilma	ill	x1 is ill/sick/diseased with symptoms x2 from disease x3
binxo	become	x1 becomes/changes/converts/transforms into x2 under conditions x3
bi'o	ordered interval	non-logical interval connective: ordered from ... to ...
birje	beer	x1 is made of/contains/is a amount of beer/ale/brew brewed from x2
birka	arm	x1 is a/the arm [body-part] of x2
birti	certain	x1 is certain/sure/positive/convinced that x2 is true
blabi	white	x1 is white / very light-coloured
bo	short scope link	short scope joiner; joins various constructs with shortest scope and right grouping
boi	end number or lerfu	elidable terminator: terminate numeral or letteral string
botpi	bottle	x1 is a bottle/jar/urn/flask/closable container for x2, made of material x3 with lid x4
bredi	ready	x1 is ready/prepared for x2 (event)
bridi	predicate	x1 (text) is a predicate relationship with relation x2 among arguments (sequence/set)
briju	office	x1 is an office/bureau/work-place of worker x2 at location x3
bruna	brother	x1 is brother of/fraternal to x2 by bond/tie/standard/parent(s) x3; [not necess. biological]
budjo	Buddhist	x1 pertains to the Buddhist culture/religion/ethos in aspect x2
burna	embarassed	x1 is embarrassed/disconcerted/flustered/ill-at-ease about/under conditions x2 (abstraction)
bu'u	coincident with	location tense relation/direction; coincident with/at the same place as; space equivalent of ca
by	b	letteral for b
ca	during	time tense relation/direction: is [selbri]; during/simultaneous with [sumti]; present tense
cabdei	today	x1 is today (cabna ‘now’ + djedi ‘day’)
cacra	hour	x1 is x2 hours in duration (default is 1 hour) by standard x3
cadzu	walk	x1 walks/strides/paces on surface x2 using limbs x3
cai	intense emotion	attitudinal: strong intensity attitude modifier
ca'o	continuative	interval event contour: during ...; continuative)
carna	turn	x1 turns/rotates/revolves around axis x2 in direction x3
carvi	rain	x1 rains/showers/[precipitates] to x2 from x3; x1 is precipitation [not limited to ‘rain’]
casnu	discuss	x1(s) (mass normally, but 1 individual/jo'u possible) discuss(es)/talk(s) about topic/subject x2
catke	shove	x1 [agent] shoves/pushes x2 at locus x3
catlu	look	x1 looks at/examines/views/inspects/regards/watches/gazes at x2 [compare with zgani]
catra	kill	x1 (agent) kills/slaughters/murders x2 by action/method x3
ce	in a set with	non-logical connective: set link, unordered; ‘and also’, but forming a set
ce'o	in a sequence with	non-logical connective: ordered sequence link; ‘and then’, forming a sequence
certu	expert	x1 is an expert/pro/has prowess in/is skilled at x2 (event/activity) by standard x3
ce'u	lambda	pseudo-quantifier binding a variable within an abstraction that represents an open place
cevni	god	x1 is a/the god/deity of people(s)/religion x2 with dominion over x3 [sphere]; x1 is divine
cfari	initiate	x1 [state/event/process] commences/initiates/starts/begins to occur; (intransitive verb)
cfipu	confusing	x1 (event/state) confuses/baffles x2 [observer] due to [confusing] property x3 (ka)
ci	3	digit/number: 3
cidja	food	x1 is food/feed/nutriment for x2; x1 is edible/gives nutrition to x2
cidjrkari	curry	x1 is a quantity of curry
cidjrkebabi	kebab	x1 is a kebab
cidro	hydrogen	x1 is a quantity of/contains/is made of hydrogen (H)
cifnu	infant	x1 is an infant/baby [helpless through youth/incomplete development] of species x2
cilre	learn	x1 learns x2 (du'u) about subject x3 from source x4 (obj./event) by method x5 (event/process)
cinba	kiss	x1 (agent) kisses/busses x2 at locus x3
cinmo	emotion	x1 feels emotion x2 (ka) about x3
cinri	interesting	x1 (abstraction) interests/is interesting to x2; x2 is interested in x1
cinse	sexual	x1 in activity/state x2 exhibits sexuality/gender/sexual orientation x3 (ka) by standard x4
cinta	paint	x1 [material] is a paint of pigment/active substance x2, in a base of x3
cinynei	fancy	x1 fancies x2 (cinse ‘sex’ + nelci ‘like’)
cipni	bird	x1 is a bird/avian/fowl of species x2
cipra	test	x1 (process/event) is a test for/proof of property/state x2 in subject x3 (individ./set/mass)
cirla	cheese	x1 is a quantity of/contains cheese/curd from source x2
ciska	write	x1 inscribes/writes x2 on display/storage medium x3 with writing implement x4; x1 is a scribe
cisma	smile	x1 smiles/grins (facial expression)
cismyfra	smile at	x1 reacts/responds/answers by smiling to stimulus x2 under conditions x3 [cisma (smile) + frati (react)]
citka	eat	x1 eats/ingests/consumes (transitive verb) x2
citsi	season	x1 is a season/is seasonal [cyclical interval], defined by interval/property x2, of year(s) x3
cizra	strange	x1 is strange/weird/deviant/bizarre/odd to x2 in property x3 (ka)
ckafi	coffee	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of coffee from source/bean/grain x2
ckasu	ridicule	x1 ridicules/mocks/scoffs at x2 about x3 (property/event) by doing activity x4 (event)
ckire	grateful	x1 is grateful/thankful to/appreciative of x2 for x3 (event/property)
ckule	school	x1 is school/institute/academy at x2 teaching subject(s) x3 to audien./commun. x4 operated by x5
clani	long	x1 is long in dimension/direction x2 (default longest dimension) by measurement standard x3
cladu	loud	x1 is loud/noisy at observation point x2 by standard x3
clira	early	x1 (event) is early by standard x2
clite	polite	x1 is polite/courteous/civil in matter x2 according to standard/custom x3
cliva	leave	x1 leaves x2 via route x3
cmaci	mathematics	x1 is a mathematics of type/describing x2
cmalu	small	x1 is small in property/dimension(s) x2 (ka) as compared with standard/norm x3
cmavo	structure word	x1 is a structure word of grammatical class x2, with meaning/function x3 in usage (language) x4
cmene	name	x1 (quoted word(s)) is a/the name/title/tag of x2 to/used-by namer/name-user x3 (person)
cmila	laugh	x1 laughs
cmima	member	x1 is a member/element of set x2; x1 belongs to group x2; x1 is amid/among/amongst group x2
cmoni	moan	x1 utters moan/groan/howl/scream [non-linguistic utterance] x2 expressing x3 (property)
cnino	new	x1 is new/unfamiliar/novel to observer x2 in feature x3 (ka) by standard x4; x1 is a novelty
cnita	beneath	x1 is directly/vertically beneath/below/under/underneath/down from x2 in frame of reference x3
co'a	initiative	interval event contour: at the starting point of ...; initiative
co'e	unspecified selbri	elliptical/unspecified bridi relationship
coi	greetings	vocative: greetings/hello
co'o	partings	vocative: partings/good-bye
co'u	cessative	interval event contour: at the ending point of ... even if not done; cessative
cpedu	request	x1 requests/asks/petitions/solicits for x2 of/from x3 in manner/form x4
cpina	pungent	x1 is pungent/piquant/peppery/spicy/irritating to sense x2
cradi	radio	x1 broadcasts/transmits [using radio waves] x2 via station/frequency x3 to [radio] receiver x4
crane	front	x1 is anterior/ahead/forward/(in/on) the front of x2 which faces/in-frame-of-reference x3
cremau	more expert	x1 is more expert/pro/has prowess than x2 in/is more skilled at x3 by standard x4, by amount/excess x5 (certu ‘expert’ + zmadu ‘more’)
cribe	bear	x1 is a bear/ursoid of species/breed x2
crida	fairy	x1 is a fairy/elf/gnome/brownie/pixie/goblin/kobold [mythical humanoid] of mythos/religion x2
crino	green	x1 is green
crisa	summer	x1 is summer/summertime [hot season] of year x2 at location x3
critu	autumn	x1 is autumn/fall [harvest/cooling season] of year x2 at location x3
ctebi	lip	x1 is a/the lip [body-part]/rim of orifice x2 of body x3; (adjective:) x1 is labial
ctuca	teach	x1 teaches audience x2 ideas/methods/lore x3 (du'u) about subject(s) x4 by method x5 (event)
cu	selbri separator	elidable marker: separates selbri from preceding sumti, allows preceding terminator elision
cu'i	neutral emotion	attitudinal: neutral scalar attitude modifier
cukta	book	x1 is a book about subject/theme/story x2 by author x3 for audience x4 preserved in medium x5
culno	full	x1 is full/completely filled with x2
cupra	produce	x1 produces x2 [product] by process x3
curmi	let	x1 (agent) lets/permits/allows x2 (event) under conditions x3; x1 grants privilege x2
cusku	express	x1 expresses/says x2 for audience x3 via expressive medium x4
cu'u	as said by	cusku modal, 1st place (attribution/quotation) as said by source ...; used for quotation
cy	c	letteral for c
da	something #1	logically quantified existential pro-sumti: there exists something #1 (usually restricted)
dable'a	conquer	x1 conquers/siezes x2 from x3 (‘war-take’)
da'i	supposing	discursive: supposing – in fact
dai	empathy	attitudinal modifier: marks empathetic use of preceding attitudinal; shows another's feelings
danfu	answer	x1 is the answer/response/solution/[reply] to question/problem x2
dansu	dance	x1 (individual, mass) dances to accompaniment/music/rhythm x2
dansydi'u	disco	x1 is a disco (dansu ‘dance’ + dinju ‘building’)
dapma	curse	x1 curses/damns/condemns x2 to fate (event) x3
daptutra	hell	x1 is the territory of damnation by x2 (dapma ‘curse’ + tutra ‘territory’)
darxi	hit	x1 hits/strikes/[beats] x2 with instrument [or body-part] x3 at locus x4
dasni	wear	x1 wears/is robed/garbed in x2 as a garment of type x3
dau	10	digit/number: hex digit A
de	something #2	logically quantified existential pro-sumti: there exists something #2 (usually restricted)
de'i	dated	detri modal, 1st place (for letters) dated ... ; attaches date stamp
denpa	wait	x1 awaits/waits/pauses for/until x2 at state x3 before starting/continuing x4 (activity/process)
detri	date	x1 is the date [day,{week},{month},year] of event/state x2, at location x3, by calendar x4
di	something #3	logically quantified existential pro-sumti: there exists something #3 (usually restricted)
dicra	interrupt	x1 (event) interrupts/stops/halts/[disrupts] x2 (object/event/process) due to quality x3
dikca	electric	x1 is electricity [electric charge or current] in/on x2 of polarity/quantity x3 (def. negative)
dilnu	cloud	x1 is a cloud/mass of clouds of material x2 in air mass x3 at floor/base elevation x4
dinske	economics	x1 is economics based on methodology x2 (jdini ‘money’ + saske ‘science’)
dirba	dear	x1 is dear/precious/darling to x2; x1 is emotionally valued by x2
djacu	water	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity/expanse of water; (adjective:) x1 is aqueous/[aquatic]
djedi	full day	x1 is x2 full days in duration (default is 1 day) by standard x3; (adjective:) x1 is diurnal
djica	want	x1 desires/wants/wishes x2 (event/state) for purpose x3
djuno	know	x1 knows fact(s) x2 (du'u) about subject x3 by epistemology x4
do	you	pro-sumti: you listener(s); identified by vocative
doi	vocative marker	generic vocative marker; identifies intended listener; elidable after COI
dotco	German	x1 reflects German/Germanic culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
draci	drama	x1 is a drama/play about x2 [plot/theme/subject] by dramatist x3 for audience x4 with actors x5
drani	correct	x1 is correct/proper/right/perfect in property/aspect x2 (ka) in situation x3 by standard x4
drata	other	x1 isn't the-same-thing-as/is different-from/other-than x2 by standard x3; x1 is something else
du	same identity as	identity selbri; = sign; x1 identically equals x2, x3, etc.; attached sumti refer to same thing
du'e	too many	digit/number: too many
dukse	excess	x1 is an excess of/too much of x2 by standard x3
dunda	give	x1 [donor] gives/donates gift/present x2 to recipient/beneficiary x3 [without payment/exchange]
dunku	anguish	x1 is anguished/distressed/emotionally wrought/stressed by x2
dunli	equal	x1 is equal/congruent to/as much as x2 in property/dimension/quantity x3
dunra	winter	x1 is winter/wintertime [cold season] of year x2 at location
du'u	bridi abstract	abstractor: predication/bridi abstractor; x1 is predication [bridi] expressed in sentence x2
dy	d	letteral for d
dzena	elder	x1 is an elder/ancestor of x2 by bond/tie/degree x3; x1's generation precedes x2's parents
fa	1st sumti place	sumti place tag: tag 1st sumti place
fa'a	towards point	location tense relation/direction; arriving at/directly towards ...
facki	discover	x1 discovers/finds out x2 (du'u) about subject/object x3; x1 finds (fi) x3 (object)
fagri	fire	x1 is a fire/flame in fuel x2 burning-in/reacting-with oxidizer x3 (default air/oxygen)
fai	extra sumti place	sumti place tag: tag a sumti moved out of numbered place structure; used in modal conversions
falcru	drop	x1 allows x2 to fall/drop to x3 in gravity well/frame of reference x4
fange	alien	x1 is alien/foreign/[exotic]/unfamiliar to x2 in property x3 (ka)
fanva	translate	x1 translates x2 to language x3 from language x4 with translation-result x5
fanza	annoy	x1 (event) annoys/irritates/bothers/distracts x2
farlu	fall	x1 falls/drops to x2 from x3 in gravity well/frame of reference x4
farna	direction	x1 is the direction of x2 (object/event) from origin/in frame of reference x3
fasnu	event	x1 (event) is an event that happens/occurs/takes place; x1 is an incident/happening/occurrence
fatci	fact	x1 (du'u) is a fact/reality/truth/actuality, in the absolute
fa'u	and respectively	non-logical connective: respectively; unmixed ordered distributed association
fau	in the event of	fasnu modal, 1st place (non-causal) in the event of ...
fe	2nd sumti place	sumti place tag: tag 2nd sumti place
fei	11	digit/number: hex digit B
fekpre	crazy	x1 is an insane, crazy person (fenki ‘crazy’ + prenu ‘person’)
fengu	angry	x1 is angry/mad at x2 for x3 (action/state/property)
fenki	crazy	x1 (action/event) is crazy/insane/mad/frantic/in a frenzy (one sense) by standard x2
fe'o	over and out	vocative: over and out (end discussion)
fi	3rd sumti place	sumti place tag: tag 3rd sumti place
fi'e	created by	finti modal, 1st place (creator) created by ...
fi'i	hospitality	vocative: hospitality – inhospitality; you are welcome/ make yourself at home
finpe	fish	x1 is a fish of species x2 [metaphorical extension to sharks, non-fish aquatic vertebrates]
finti	invent	x1 invents/creates/composes/authors x2 for function/purpose x3 from existing elements/ideas x4
fi'u	fraction slash	digit/number: fraction slash; default “/n”  1/n, “n/”  n/1, or “/” alone  golden ratio
fo	4th sumti place	sumti place tag: tag 4th sumti place
fo'a	it #6	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #6 (specified by goi)
fo'e	it #7	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #7 (specified by goi)
fo'i	it #8	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #8 (specified by goi)
fonxa	telephone	x1 is a telephone transceiver/modem attached to system/network x2
fo'o	it #9	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #9 (specified by goi)
fo'u	it #10	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #10 (specified by goi)
fraso	French	x1 reflects French/Gallic culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
frati	react	x1 reacts/responds/answers with action x2 to stimulus x3 under conditions x4; x1 is responsive
frumu	frown	x1 frowns/grimaces (facial expression)
fu	5th sumti place	sumti place tag: tag 5th sumti place
fusra	rotten	x1 rots/decays/ferments with decay/fermentation agent x2; x1 is rotten/decayed/fermented
fy	f	letteral for f
jagi	fore or	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal or
gacri	cover	x1 is a cover/[lid/top] for covering/concealing/sheltering x2
gai	12	digit/number: hex digit C
gairgau	cover	x1 [person/agent] places x2 as a cover/[lid/top] on x3 (gacri ‘cover’ + gasnu ‘do’)
galfi	modify	x1 (event) modifies/alters/changes/transforms/converts x2 into x3
jaginai	fore only if	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal conditional/only if
ganlo	closed	x1 (portal/passage/entrance-way) is closed/shut/not open, preventing passage/access to x2 by x3
gasnu	do	x1 [person/agent] is an agentive cause of event x2; x1 does/brings about x2
jegi	fore and	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal and
jigi	fore conn?	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal connective question
gerku	dog	x1 is a dog/canine/[bitch] of species/breed x2
gerna	grammar	x1 is the grammar/rules/defining form of language x2 for structure/text x3
gi	connective medial	logical connective: all but tanru-internal forethought connective medial marker
gija	bridi or	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought or
gije	bridi and	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought and
gijenai	bridi but not	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought x but not y
giji	bridi conn?	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought connective question
gijo	bridi iff	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought biconditional/iff/if-and-only-if
gijonai	bridi xor	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought exclusive or
gismu	root word	x1 is a (Lojban) root word expressing relation x2 among argument roles x3, with affix(es)
giju	bridi whether	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought whether-or-not
glare	hot	x1 is hot/[warm] by standard x2
gleki	happy	x1 is happy/gay/merry/glad/gleeful about x2 (event/state)
gletu	copulate	x1 copulates/mates/has coitus/sexual intercourse with x2
glico	English	x1 is English/pertains to English-speaking culture in aspect x2
jogi	fore iff	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal biconditional/iff/if-and-only-if
go'i	last bridi	pro-bridi: preceding bridi; in answer to a yes/no question, repeats the claim, meaning yes
goi	pro-sumti assign	sumti assignment; used to define/assign ko'a/fo'a series pro-sumti
joginai	fore xor	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal exclusive or
grana	rod	x1 is a rod/pole/staff/stick/cane [shape/form] of material x2
jugi	fore whether	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal whether-or-not
jagu	fore or	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal or
janaigu	fore only if	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal conditional/only if
gubni	public	x1 is public/un-hidden/open/jointly available to/owned by all among community x2 (mass)
jegu	fore and	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal and
gugde	country	x1 is the country of peoples x2 with land/territory x3; (people/territory relationship)
jigu	fore conn?	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal connective question
gunjubme	desk	x1 is a desk of worker x2 (gunka ‘work’ + jubme ‘table’)
gunka	work	x1 [person] labors/works on/at x2 [activity] with goal/objective x3
gunro	roll	x1 rolls/trundles on/against surface x2 rotating on axis/axle x3; x1 is a roller
gunta	attack	x1 (person/mass) attacks/invades/commits aggression upon victim x2 with goal/objective x3
guntrusi'o	Communism	x1 is a notion of communism (gunka ‘work’ + turni ‘govern’ + sidbo ‘idea’)
jogu	fore iff	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal biconditional/iff/if-and-only-if
jonaigu	fore xor	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal exclusive or
gusni	illumine	x1 [energy] is light/illumination illuminating x2 from light source x3
gusta	restaurant	x1 is a restaurant/cafe/diner serving type-of-food x2 to audience x3
jugu	fore whether	logical connective: forethought all but tanru-internal whether-or-not
gy	g	letteral for g
ja	tanru/sumti or	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal or
jai	modal conversion	convert tense/modal (tagged) place to 1st place; 1st place moves to extra FA place (fai)
jalge	result	x1 (action/event/state) is a result/outcome/conclusion of antecedent x2 (event/state/process)
jamfu	foot	x1 is a/the foot [body-part] of x2
jamna	war	x1 (person/mass) wars against x2 over territory/matter x3; x1 is at war with x2
janco	shoulder	x1 is a/the shoulder/hip/joint [body-part] attaching limb/extremity x2 to body x3
jarbu	suburb	x1 is a suburban area of city/metropolis x2
jarco	show	x1 (agent) shows/exhibits/displays/[reveals]/demonstrates x2 (property) to audience x3
jatna	captain	x1 is captain/commander/leader/in-charge/boss of vehicle/domain x2
jau	13	digit/number: hex digit D
jbena	born	x1 is born to x2 at time x3 [birthday] and place x4 [birthplace]; x1 is native to (fo)
jbonunsalci	Logfest	x1 is an event of celebrating/recognizing/honoring Lojban with activity/[party] x2
jdima	price	x1 [amount] is the price of x2 to purchaser/consumer x3 set by vendor x4
jdini	money	x1 is money/currency issued by x2; (adjective:) x1 is financial/monetary/pecuniary/fiscal
je	tanru/sumti and	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal and
jecta	polity	x1 is a polity/state governing territory/domain x2; [government/territory relationship]
jecyga'ibai	revolutionary	x1 revolts against/deposes regime x2 (jecta ‘polity’ + galfi ‘modify’ + bapli ‘force’)
je'e	roger	vocative: roger (ack) – negative acknowledge; used to acknowledge offers and thanks
ji	tanru/sumti conn?	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal connective question
jelca	burn	x1 burns/[ignites/is flammable/inflammable] at temperature x2 in atmosphere x3
jemna	gem	x1 is a gem/polished stone/pearl of type x2 from gemstone/material/source x3
jenai	tanru/sumti but not	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal x but not y
jgari	grasp	x1 grasps/holds/clutches/seizes/grips/[hugs] x2 with x3 (part of x1) at locus x4 (part of x2)
jgira	pride	x1 (person) feels/has pride in/about x2 (abstraction)
jgita	guitar	x1 is a guitar/violin/fiddle/harp [stringed musical instrument] with actuator/plectrum/bow x2
jgitrgitara	guitar	x1 is a guitar
jgitrviolino	violin	x1 is a violin
ji	tanru/sumti conn?	logical connective: tanru/sumti afterthought connective question
ji'a	in addition	discursive: additionally
jikca	socialize	x1 interacts/behaves socially with x2; x1 socializes with/is sociable towards x2
jimpe	understand	x1 understands/comprehends fact/truth x2 (du'u) about subject x3; x1 understands (fi) x3
jinvi	opine	x1 thinks/opines x2 [opinion] (du'u) is true about subject/issue x3 on grounds x4
jipci	chicken	x1 is a chicken/[hen/cock/rooster]/small fowl [a type of bird] of species/breed x2
jisra	juice	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of juice/nectar from-source/of-type x2
jmina	add	x1 adds/combines x2 to/with x3, with result x4; x1 augments x2 by amount x3
jmive	live	x1 lives/is alive by standard x2; x1 is an organism/living thing
jo	tanru/sumti iff	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal biconditional/iff/if-and-only-if
joi	in a mass with	non-logical connective: mixed conjunction; ‘and’ meaning ‘mixed together’, forming a mass
jonai	tanru/sumti xor	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal exclusive or
ju	tanru/sumti whether	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal whether-or-not
jubme	table	x1 is a table/flat solid upper surface of material x2, supported by legs/base/pedestal x3
ju'i	attention	vocative: attention – at ease – ignore me
jukpa	cook	x1 cooks/prepares food-for-eating x2 by recipe/method x3 (process)
jundi	attentive	x1 is attentive towards/attends/tends/pays attention to object/affair x2
jungo	Chinese	x1 reflects Chinese [Mandarin, Cantonese, Wu, etc.] culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
junri	serious	x1 (person) is serious/earnest/has gravity about x2 (event/state/activity)
ju'o	certainty	attitudinal modifier: certainly – uncertain – certainly not
ka	property abstract	abstractor: property/quality abstractor (-ness); x1 is quality/property exhibited by [bridi]
kabri	cup	x1 is a cup/glass/tumbler/mug/vessel/[bowl] containing contents x2, and of material x3
kakne	able	x1 is able to do/be/capable of doing/being x2 (event/state) under conditions x3 (event/state)
kanla	cup	x1 is a/the eye [body-part] of x2; [metaphor: sensory apparatus]; (adjective:) x1 is ocular
kansa	with	x1 is with/accompanies/is a companion of x2, in state/condition/enterprise x3 (event/state)
karbi	compare	x1 [observer] compares x2 with x3 in property x4 (ka), determining comparison x5 (state)
karce	car	x1 is a car/automobile/truck/van [a wheeled motor vehicle] for carrying x2, propelled by x3
karni	journal	x1 is a journal/periodical/magazine/[newspaper] with content x2 published by x3 for audience x4
kau	indirect question	discursive: marks word serving as focus of indirect question
ke	start grouping	start grouping of tanru, etc; ... type of ... ; overrides normal tanru left grouping
ke'a	relativized it	pro-sumti: relativized sumti (object of relative clause)
ke'e	end grouping	elidable terminator: end of tanru left grouping override (usually elidable)
kei	end abstraction	elidable terminator: end abstraction bridi (often elidable)
kensa	outer space	x1 is outer space near/associated with celestial body/region x2
ke'o	please repeat	vocative: please repeat
kerfa	hair	x1 is a/the hair/fur [body-part] of x2 at body location x3
ki'a	textual confusion	attitudinal question: confusion about something said
ki'e	thanks	vocative: thanks – no thanks to you
kijno	oxygen	x1 is a quantity of/contains/is made of oxygen (O)
ki'o	number comma	digit/number: number comma; thousands
kisto	Pakistani	x1 reflects Pakistani/Pashto culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
ki'u	because of reason	krinu modal, 1st place (justified by) justifiably; because of reason ...
klaji	street	x1 is a street/avenue/lane/drive/cul-de-sac/way/alley/[road] at x2 accessing x3
klaku	weep	x1 weeps/cries tears x2 about/for reason x3 (event/state)
klama	come	x1 goes/comes to x2 from x3 via x4 by means x5
ko	imperative	pro-sumti: you (imperative); make it true for you, the listener
ko'a	it #1	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #1 (specified by goi)
ko'e	it #2	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #2 (specified by goi)
ko'i	it #3	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #3 (specified by goi)
ko'o	it #4	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #4 (specified by goi)
ko'u	it #5	pro-sumti: he/she/it/they #5 (specified by goi)
krasi	origin	x1 (site/event) is a source/start/beginning/origin of x2 (object/event/process)
kratrsenatore	senator	x1 is a senator representing x2 in senate x3
krinu	reason	x1 (event/state) is a reason/justification/explanation for/causing/permitting x2 (event/state)
krixa	cry out	x1 cries out/yells/howls sound x2; x1 is a crier
ku	end sumti	elidable terminator: end description, modal, or negator sumti; often elidable
kucli	curious	x1 is curious/wonders about/is interested in/[inquisitive about] x2 (object/abstract)
ku'i	however	iscursive: however/but/in contrast
kukte	delicious	x1 is delicious/tasty/delightful to observer/sense x2 [person, or sensory activity]
kumfa	room	x1 is a room of/in structure x2 surrounded by partitions/walls/ceiling/floor x3 (mass/jo'u)
kunti	empty	x1 [container] is empty/vacant of x2 [material]; x1 is hollow
ku'o	end relative clause	elidable terminator: end NOI relative clause; always elidable, but preferred in complex clauses
kurji	take care of	x1 takes-care-of/looks after/attends to/provides for/is caretaker for x2 (object/event/person)
ky	k	letteral for k
kybu	q	letteral for q
la	that named	name descriptor: the one(s) called ... ; takes name or selbri description
la'a	probability	discursive: probably – improbably
lacpu	pull	x1 pulls/tugs/draws/drags x2 by handle/at locus x3
ladru	milk	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of milk from source x2; (adjective:) x1 is lactic/dairy
la'e di'u	last utterance it	pro-sumti: the referent of the last utterance; the state described
la'e	the referent of	the referent of (indirect pointer); uses the referent of a sumti as the desired sumti
la'i	the set of named	name descriptor: the set of those named ... ; takes name or selbri description
lai	the mass of named	name descriptor: the mass of individual(s) named ... ; takes name or selbri description
lamji	adjacent	x1 is adjacent/beside/next to/in contact with x2 in property/sequence x3 in direction x4
lanli	analyze	x1 analyzes/examines-in-detail x2 by method/technique/system x3 [process/activity]
lanme	sheep	x1 is a sheep/[lamb/ewe/ram] of species/breed x2 of flock x3
lante	can	x1 is a can/tightly sealed/pre-sealed container for perishable contents x2, made of x3
la'o	the non-Lojban named	delimited non-Lojban name; the resulting quote sumti is treated as a name
le	the one known from context	non-veridical descriptor: the one(s) known from context as ...
lebna	take	x1 takes/gets/gains/obtains/seizes/[removes] x2 (object/property) from x3 (possessor)
le'e	the typical known from context	non-veridical descriptor: the stereotype of those known from context as ...
le'i	the set known from context	non-veridical descriptor: the set of those known from context as ..., treated as a set
lei	the mass known from context	non-veridical descriptor: the mass of individual(s) known from context as ...
lerci	late	x1 (event) is late by standard x2
le'u	end error quote	end quote of questionable or out-of-context text; not elidable
li	the number	the number/evaluated expression; convert number/operand/evaluated math expression to sumti
lidne	precede	x1 precedes/leads x2 in sequence x3; x1 is former/preceding/previous; x2 is latter/following
lifri	experience	x1 [person/passive/state] undergoes/experiences x2 (event/experience); x2 happens to x1
lindi	lightning	x1 is lightning/electrical arc/thunderbolt striking at/extending to x2 from x3
lo	that which is/does	veridical descriptor: the one(s) that is/are/does/do ...
lo'e	the typical	veridical descriptor: the typical one(s) who is/are/does/do ...
logji	logic	x1 [rules/methods] is a logic for deducing/concluding/inferring/reasoning to/about x2 (du'u)
lo'i	the set which really is	veridical descriptor: the set of those that is/are/does/do ..., treated as a set
loi	the mass which really is	veridical descriptor: the mass of individual(s) that is/are/does/do ...
lojbo	Lojbanic	x1 reflects [Loglandic]/Lojbanic language/culture/nationality/community in aspect x2
lo'o	end mex sumti	elidable terminator: end math expression (mex) sumti; end mex-to-sumti conversion; usually elidable
lo'u	error quote	start questionable/out-of-context quote; text should be Lojban words, but needn't be grammatical
lu'a	the individuals of	the members of the set/components of the mass; converts another description type to individuals
lujvo	affix compound	x1 (text) is a compound predicate word with meaning x2 and arguments x3 built from metaphor x4
lunra	lunar	x1 is Earth's moon (default); x1 is a major natural satellite/moon of planet x2
lu'o	the mass composed of	the mass composed of; converts another description type to a mass composed of the members
ly	l	letteral for l
ma	sumti?	pro-sumti: sumti question (what/who/how/why/etc.); appropriately fill in sumti blank
ma'a	we with you	pro-sumti: me/we the speaker(s)/author(s) and you the listener(s) and others unspecified
mabla	execrable; very bad	x1 is execrable/deplorable/wretched/shitty/awful/rotten/miserable/contemptible/crappy/inferior/low-quality in property x2 by standard x3; x1 stinks/sucks in aspect x2 according to x3.
malglico	derogatorily English	x1 is English/pertains to English-speaking culture in aspect x2, and is derogatorily viewed by x3 (mabla ‘derogative’ + glico ‘English’)
malrarbau	derogatorily natural language	x1 is a natural language, and is derogatorily viewed by x2 (mabla ‘derogative’ + rarna ‘natural’ + bangu ‘languge’)
mamta	mother	x1 is a mother of x2; x1 bears/mothers/acts maternally toward x2; [not necessarily biological]
manci	wonder	x1 feels wonder/awe/marvels about x2
manku	dark	x1 is dark/lacking in illumination
mansa	satisfy	x1 satisfies evaluator x2 in property (ka)/state x3
masti	month	x1 is x2 months in duration (default is 1 month) by month standard x3
matcrflokati	flokati rug	x1 is a flokati rug
mau	exceeded by	zmadu modal, 1st place (a greater) exceeded by ... ; usually a sumti modifier
me	sumti to selbri	convert sumti to selbri/tanru element; x1 is specific to [sumti] in aspect x2
mebri	brow	x1 is a/the brow/forehead [projecting flat/smooth head/body-part] of x2
melbi	beautiful	x1 is beautiful/pleasant to x2 in aspect x3 (ka) by aesthetic standard x4
menli	mind	x1 is a mind/intellect/psyche/mentality/[consciousness] of body x2
mensi	sister	x1 is a sister of/sororal to x2 by bond/tie/standard/parent(s) x3; [not necessarily biological]
merko	American	x1 pertains to USA/American culture/nationality/dialect in aspect x2
mi	me	pro-sumti: me/we the speaker(s)/author(s); identified by self-vocative
mi'a	we, not you	pro-sumti: me/we the speaker(s)/author(s) and others unspecified, but not you, the listener
mi'ai	we (I and at least one other person)	pro-sumti: me/we the speaker(s)/author(s) and at least one other person
mi'e	self-introduction	self vocative: self-introduction – denial of identity; identifies speaker
mikce	doctor	x1 doctors/treats/nurses/[cures]/is physician/midwife to x2 for ailment x3 by treatment/cure x4
milxe	mild	x1 is mild/non-extreme/gentle/middling/somewhat in property x2 (ka); x1 is not very x2
minra	reflect	x1 reflects/mirrors/echoes x2 [object/radiation] to observer/point x3 as x4; x2 bounces on x1
mintu	same	x1 is the same/identical thing as x2 by standard x3; (x1 and x2 interchangeable)
mi'o	me and you	pro-sumti: me/we the speaker(s)/author(s) and you the listener(s)
misno	famous	x1 (person/object/event) is famous/renowned/is a celebrity among community of persons x2 (mass)
mlatu	cat	x1 is a cat/[puss/pussy/kitten] [feline animal] of species/breed x2; (adjective:) x1 is feline
mo	bridi?	pro-bridi: bridi/selbri/brivla question
mo'i	space motion	mark motions in space-time
moi	ordinal selbri	convert number to ordinal selbri; x1 is (n)th member of set x2 ordered by rule x3
morji	remember	x1 remembers/recalls/recollects fact(s)/memory x2 (du'u) about subject x3
morsi	dead	x1 is dead/has ceased to be alive
mo'u	completive	interval event contour: at the natural ending point of ...; completive
mrilu	mail	x1 mails/posts [transfer via intermediary service] x2 to x3 from x4 by carrier/network/system x5
mrobi'o	die	x1 dies under conditions x2 (morsi ‘dead’ + binxo ‘become’)
mu	5	digit/number: 5
mu'i	because of motive	mukti modal, 1st place because of motive ...
mukti	motive	x1 (action/event/state) motivates/is a motive/incentive for action/event x2, per volition of x3
mulno	complete	x1 (event) is complete/done/finished; x1 (object) has become whole in property x2 by standard x3
munje	universe	x1 is a universe/cosmos [complete and ordered entirety] of domain/sphere x2 defined by rules x3
mu'o	over	vocative: over (response OK) – more to come
mupli	example	x1 is an example/sample/specimen/instance/case/illustration of common property(s) x2 of set x3
mutce	much	x1 is much/extreme in property x2 (ka), towards x3 extreme/direction; x1 is, in x2, very x3
mu'u	exemplified by	mupli modal, 1st place exemplified by ...
my	m	letteral for m
naja	tanru/sumti only if	logical connective: tanru/sumti afterthought conditional/only if
na	bridi negator	bridi contradictory negator; scope is an entire bridi; logically negates in some cmavo compounds
nabmi	problem	x1 (event/state) is a problem to/encountered by x2 in situation/task/inquiry x3
na'e	scalar contrary	contrary scalar negator: other than ...; not ...; a scale or set is implied
nagija	bridi only if	logical connective: bridi-tail afterthought conditional/only if
nai	negate last word	attached to cmavo to negate them; various negation-related meanings
naja	tanru/sumti only if	logical connective: tanru/sumti-internal conditional/only if
namcu	number	x1 (li) is a number/quantifier/digit/value/figure (noun); refers to the value and not the symbol
nanba	bread	x1 is a quantity of/contains bread [leavened or unleavened] made from grains x2
nanca	year	x1 is x2 years in duration (default is 1 year) by standard x3; (adjective:) x1 is annual
nandu	difficult	x1 is difficult/hard/challenging for x2 under conditions x3; x1 challenges (non-agentive) x2
nanmu	man	x1 is a man/men; x1 is a male humanoid person [not necessarily adult]
narju	orange	x1 is orange [color adjective]
ne'a	next to	location tense relation/direction; approximating/next to ...
ne'i	within	location tense relation/direction; within/inside of/into ...
nelci	fond	x1 is fond of/likes/has a taste for x2 (object/state)
nenri	in	x1 is in/inside/within x2; x1 is on the inside/interior of x2 [totally within the bounds of x2]
ni	amount abstract	abstractor: quantity/amount abstractor; x1 is quantity/amount of [bridi] measured on scale x2
ni'a	below	location tense relation/direction; downwards/down from ...
nibli	necessitate	x1 logically necessitates/entails/implies action/event/state x2 under rules/logic system x3
nicte	night	x1 is a nighttime of day x2 at location x3; (adjective:) x1 is at night/nocturnal
ni'i	because of logic	nibli modal, 1st place logically; logically because ...
nimre	citrus	x1 is a quantity of citrus [fruit/tree, etc.] of species/strain x2
ninmu	woman	x1 is a woman (any female humanoid person, not necessarily adult)
ninpe'i	meet	x1 meets x2 for the first time at location x3 (cnino ‘new’ + penmi ‘meet’)
ni'o	new topic	discursive: paragraph break; introduce new topic
nitcu	need	x1 needs/requires/is dependent on/[wants] necessity x2 for purpose/action/stage of process x3
ni'u	negative number	digit/number: minus sign; negative number); default any negative
no	0	digit/number: 0
nobli	noble	x1 is noble/aristocratic/elite/high-born/titled in/under culture/society/standard x2
no'e	scalar midpoint not	midpoint scalar negator: neutral point between je'a and to'e; ‘not really’
noi	incidental clause	non-restrictive relative clause; attaches subordinate bridi with incidental information
no'u	incidental identity	non-restrictive appositive phrase marker: which incidentally is the same thing as ...
nu	event abstract	abstractor: generalized event abstractor; x1 is state/process/achievement/activity of [bridi]
nu'e	promise	vocative: promise – promise release – un-promise
nupre	promise	x1 (agent) promises/commits/assures/threatens x2 (event/state) to x3 [beneficiary/victim]
ny	n	letteral for n
pa	1	digit/number: 1
pagbu	part	x1 is a part/component/piece/portion/segment of x2 [where x2 is a whole/mass]; x2 is partly x1
pai	pi	digit/number: pi (approximately 3.1416..).
palci	evil	x1 is evil/depraved/wicked [morally bad] by standard x2
patlu	potato	x1 is a potato [an edible tuber] of variety/cultivar x2
pavbudjo	first Buddhist	x1 is the first Buddhist (pa ‘1' + budjo ‘Buddhist’)
pe	restrictive phrase	restrictive relative phrase marker: which is associated with ...; loosest associative/possessive
pe'i	I opine	evidential: I opine (subjective claim)
pei	emotion?	attitudinal: attitudinal question; how do you feel about it? with what intensity?
pelxu	yellow	x1 is yellow/golden [color adjective]
pencu	touch	x1 (agent) touches x2 with x3 [a locus on x1 or an instrument] at x4 [a locus on x2]
pendo	friend	x1 is/acts as a friend of/to x2 (experiencer); x2 befriends x1
penmi	meet	x1 meets/encounters x2 at/in location x3
pensi	police	x1 thinks/considers/cogitates/reasons/is pensive about/reflects upon subject/concept x2
pesxu	paste	x1 is paste/pulp/dough/mash/mud/slurry [soft, smooth-textured, moist solid] of composition x2
pe'u	please	vocative: please
pi so'e	most of	number: most of of; used to refer to a greater portion of something
pi	decimal point	digit/number: radix (number base) point; default decimal
pi'e	digit separator	digit/number:separates digits for base >16, not current standard, or variable (e.g. time, date)
pilno	use	x1 uses/employs x2 [tool, apparatus, machine, agent, acting entity, material] for purpose x3
pinsi	pencil	x1 is a pencil/crayon/stylus applying lead/marking material x2, frame/support [of material] x3
pinxe	drink	x1 (agent) drinks/imbibes beverage/drink/liquid refreshment x2 from/out-of container/source x3
pi'o	used by	pilno modal, 1st place used by ...
pipno	piano	x1 is a piano/harpsichord/synthesizer/organ; a keyboard musical instrument
plise	apple	x1 is an apple [fruit] of species/strain x2
pluja	complicated	x1 is complex/complicated/involved in aspect/property x2 (ka) by standard x3
po	is specific to	restrictive relative phrase marker: which is specific to ...; normal possessive physical/legal
po'e	which belongs to	restrictive relative phrase marker: which belongs to ... ; inalienable possession
poi	restrictive clause	restrictive relative clause; attaches subordinate bridi with identifying information to a sumti
ponse	possess	x1 possesses/owns/has x2 under law/custom x3; x1 is owner/proprietor of x2 under x3
po'u	restrictive identity	restrictive appositive phrase marker: which is the same thing as
prami	love	x1 loves/feels strong affectionate devotion towards x2 (object/state)
prenu	person	x1 is a person/people (noun) [not necessarily human]; x1 displays personality/a persona
reisku	ask	x1 asks question x2 (reported speech with sedu'u/text with zo or lu ... li'u/or a concept with lu'e) to x3 via expressive medium x4, about subject x5.
pritu	right	x1 is to the right of x2 facing x3
pu	before	time tense relation/direction: did [selbri]; before/prior to [sumti]; default past tense
pulji	police	x1 is a police officer/[enforcer/vigilante] enforcing law(s)/rule(s)/order x2
pu'o	anticipative	interval event contour: in anticipation of ...; until ... ; inchoative
purci	past	x1 is in the past of/earlier than/before x2 in time sequence; x1 is former; x2 is latter
purlamcte	last night	x1 is the night preceding x2 (purci ‘past’ + lamji ‘adjacent’ + nicte ‘night’)
py	p	letteral for p
ra	recent sumti	pro-sumti: a recent sumti before the last one, as determined by back-counting rules
ractu	rabbit	x1 is a rabbit/hare/[doe] of species/breed x2
rafsi	affix	x1 is an affix/suffix/prefix/combining-form for word/concept x2, form/properties x3, language x4
ralte	keep/own	x1 retains/keeps/holds x2 in its possession.
rarna	natural	x1 is natural/spontaneous/instinctive, not [consciously] caused by person(s)
rasyjukpa	fry	x1 fries x2 (grasu ‘grease’ + jukpa ‘cook’)
re	2	digit/number: 2
rectu	meat	x1 is a quantity of/contains meat/flesh from source/animal x2
re'i	ready to receive	vocative: ready to receive – not ready to receive
rei	14	digit/number: hex digit E
remna	human	x1 is a human/human being/man (non-specific gender-free sense); (adjective:) x1 is human
ri	last sumti	pro-sumti: the last sumti, as determined by back-counting rules
ri'a	because of cause	rinka modal, 1st place (phys./mental) causal because ...
rinka	cause	x1 (event/state) effects/physically causes effect x2 (event/state) under conditions x3
rinsa	greet	x1 (agent) greets/hails/[welcomes/says hello to]/responds to arrival of x2 in manner x3 (action)
rirni	parent	x1 is a parent of/raises/rears x2; x1 mentors/acts parental toward child/protege x2
ri'u	on the right of	location tense relation/direction; rightwards/to the right of ...
ro	each	digit/number: each, all
rokci	rock	x1 is a quantity of/is made of/contains rock/stone of type/composition x2 from location x3
ru	earlier sumti	pro-sumti: a remote past sumti, before all other in-use backcounting sumti
ru'e	weak emotion	attitudinal: weak intensity attitude modifier
rufsu	rough	x1 is rough/coarse/uneven/[grainy/scabrous/rugged] in texture/regularity
rupnu	dollar	x1 is measured in major-money-units (dollar/yuan/ruble) as x2 (quantity), monetary system x3
ry	r	letteral for r
sa	erase utterance	erase complete or partial utterance; next word shows how much erasing to do
sabji	provide	x1 (source) provides/supplies/furnishes x2 [supply/commodity] to x3 [recipient]
sa'e	precisely speaking	discursive: precisely speaking – loosely speaking
sai	strong emotion	attitudinal: moderate intensity attitude modifier
sakta	sugar	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of sugar [sweet edible] from source x2 of composition x3
salci	celebrate	x1 celebrates/recognizes/honors x2 (event/abstract) with activity/[party] x3
sanga	sing	x1 sings/chants x2 [song/hymn/melody/melodic sounds] to audience x3
sanli	stand	x1 stands [is vertically oriented] on surface x2 supported by limbs/support/pedestal x3
sanmi	meal	x1 (mass) is a meal composed of dishes including x2
saske	science	x1 (mass of facts) is science of/about subject matter x2 based on methodology x3
sazri	operate	x1 operates/drives/runs x2 [apparatus/machine] with goal/objective/use/end/function x3
se ba'i	instead of	basti modal, 2nd place instead of ...
se cau	without	claxu modal, 2nd place (lacking) without ...
se du'u	sentence abstract	compound abstractor: sentence/equation abstract; x1 is text expressing [bridi] which is x2
se ja'e	results because	jalge modal, 2nd place (event causal) results because of ...
se pa'u	as a part of	pagbu modal, 2nd place (whole) partially; as a part of ...
se si'u	assisting	sidju modal, 2nd place assisting ... (in doing/maintaining something)
se	2nd conversion	2nd conversion; switch 1st/2nd places
se'i	self-oriented	attitudinal modifier: self-oriented – other-oriented
selbri	predicate relation	x2 (text) is a predicate relationship with relation x1 among arguments (sequence/set) (= se bridi)
selpeicku	manifesto	x1 is a manifesto about topic x2 by author x3 for audience x4 preserved in medium x5 (pensi ‘thought’ + cukta ‘book’)
sepli	apart	x1 is apart/separate from x2, separated by partition/wall/gap/interval/separating medium x3
si	erase word	erase the last Lojban word, treating non-Lojban text as a single word
sidbo	idea	x1 [person] labors/works on/at x2 [activity] with goal/objective x3
sidju	help	x1 helps/assists/aids object/person x2 do/achieve/maintain event/activity x3
simlu	seem	x1 seems/appears to have property(ies) x2 to observer x3 under conditions x4
simsa	similar	x1 is similar/parallel to x2 in property/quantity x3 (ka/ni); x1 looks/appears like x2
simxu	mutual	x1 (set) has members who mutually/reciprocally x2 (event [x1 should be reflexive in 1+ sumti])
si'o	concept	abstractor: idea/concept abstractor; x1 is x2's concept of [bridi]
sisku	seek	x1 seeks/searches/looks for property x2 among set x3 (complete specification of set)
sisti	cease	x1 ceases/stops/halts activity/process/state x2 [not necessarily completing it]
skapi	pelt	x1 is a pelt/skin/hide/leather from x2
skicu	describe	x1 tells about/describes x2 (object/event/state) to audience x3 with description x4 (property)
skori	cord	x1 is cord/cable/rope/line/twine/cordage/woven strands of material x2
slabu	familiar	x1 is old/familiar/well-known to observer x2 in feature x3 (ka) by standard x4
sluni	onion	x1 is a quantity of/contains onions/scallions of type/cultivar x2
smagau	quieten	x1 acts so that x2 is quiet/silent/[still] at observation point x3 by standard x4 (smaji ‘quiet’ + gasnu ‘do’)
smaji	quiet	x1 (source) is quiet/silent/[still] at observation point x2 by standard x3
snanu	south	x1 is to the south/southern side of x2 according to frame of reference x3
snuti	accidental	x1 (event/state) is an accident/unintentional on the part of x2; x1 is an accident
so	9	digit/number: 9
so'a	almost all	digit/number: almost all (digit/number)
sodva	soda	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of a carbonated beverage/soda of flavor/brand x2
so'e	most	digit/number: most
so'i	many	digit/number: many
sonci	soldier	x1 is a soldier/warrior/fighter of army x2
so'o	several	digit/number: several
so'u	few	digit/number: few
spaji	surprise	x1 (event/action abstract) surprises/startles/is unexpected [and generally sudden] to x2
spati	plant	x1 is a plant/herb/greenery of species/strain/cultivar x2
spebi'o	marry	x1 marries x2; x1 becomes a spouse of x2 under law/custom/tradition/system/convention x3 (speni ‘spouse’ + binxo ‘become’)
speni	married	x1 is married to x2; x1 is a spouse of x2 under law/custom/tradition/system/convention x3
spita	hospital	x1 is a hospital treating patient(s) x2 for condition/injuries/disease/illness x3
spoja	explode	x1 bursts/explodes/violently breaks up/decomposes/combusts into pieces/energy/fragments x2
spusku	reply	x1 gives reply/answer/responds with x2 (reported speech with sedu'u/text with zo or lu ... li'u/or a concept with lu'e) to x3 via expressive medium x4, about subject x5.
sruma	reply	x1 assumes/supposes that x2 (du'u) is true about subject x3
stali	remain	x1 remains/stays at/abides/lasts with x2
stedu	head	x1 is a/the head [body-part] of x2
stela	lock	x1 is a lock/seal of/on/for sealing x2 with/by locking mechanism x3
su'e	at most	digit/number: at most (all); no more than
su'i	plus	n-ary mathematical operator: plus; addition operator; [(((a + b) + c) + ...)]
sumti	argument	x1 is a/the argument of predicate/function x2 filling place x3 (kind/number)
su'o	at least	at least some); no less than
sutra	fast	x1 is fast/swift/quick/hastes/rapid at doing/being/bringing about x2 (event/state)
su'u	unspecified abstract	abstractor: generalized abstractor (how); x1 is [bridi] as a non-specific abstraction of type x2
sy	s	letteral for s
ta	that there	pro-sumti: that there; nearby demonstrative it; indicated thing/place near listener
ta'a	interruption	vocative: interruption
tadni	study	x1 studies/is a student of x2; x1 is a scholar; (adjective:) x1 is scholarly
tamne	cousin	x1 is cousin to x2 by bond/tie x3; [non-immediate family member, default same generation]
ta'o	by the way	discursive: by the way – returning to the subject
tarci	star	x1 is a star/sun with stellar properties x2
tartcita	star label	x1 is a star-shaped label/tag of x2 showing information x3 (tarci ‘star’ + tcita ‘label’)
tarti	behave	x1 behaves/conducts oneself as/in-manner x2 (event/property) under conditions x3
tavla	talk	x1 talks/speaks to x2 about subject x3 in language x4
tcadu	city	x1 is a town/city of metropolitan area x2, in political unit x3, serving hinterland/region x4
tcetoi	try hard	x1 tries hard to do/attain x2 (event/state/property) by actions/method x3 (mutce ‘much’ + troci ‘try’)
tcica	deceive	x1 (event/experience) misleads/deceives/dupes/fools/cheats/tricks x2 into x3 (event/state)
tcidu	talk	x1 [agent] reads x2 [text] from surface/document/reading material x3; x1 is a reader
tcika	time of day	x1 [hours, {minutes}, {seconds}] is the time/hour of state/event x2 on day x3 at location x4
tcita	label	x1 is a label/tag of x2 showing information x3
te me'e	as a name used by	cmene modal, 3rd place as a name used by ...
te	3rd conversion	3rd conversion; switch 1st/2nd places
telgau	lock	x1 (agent) makes x2 be a lock/seal of/on/for sealing x3 with/by locking mechanism x4 (stela ‘lock’ + gasnu ‘do’)
terdi	earth	x1 is the Earth/the home planet of race x2; (adjective:) x1 is terrestrial/earthbound
ti	this here	pro-sumti: this here; immediate demonstrative it; indicated thing/place near speaker
ti'a	behind	location tense relation/direction; rearwards/to the rear of ...
tigni	perform	x1 performs x2 [performance] for/before audience x3
tinbe	obey	x1 obeys/follows the command/rule x2 made by x3; (adjective:) x1 is obedient
tirna	hear	x1 hears x2 against background/noise x3; x2 is audible; (adjective:) x1 is aural
tirse	iron	x1 is a quantity of/contains/is made of iron (Fe)
ti'u	associated with time	tcika modal, 1st place (for letters) associated with time ... ; attach time stamp
tivni	television	x1 [broadcaster] televises programming x2 via media/channel x3 to television receiver x4
to	start parenthesis	left parenthesis; start of parenthetical note which must be grammatical Lojban text
to'e	polar opposite	polar opposite scalar negator
toi	end parenthesis	elidable terminator: right parenthesis/end unquote; seldom elidable except at end of text
to'o	away from point	location tense relation/direction; departing from/directly away from ...
traji	superlative	x1 is superlative in property x2 (ka), the x3 extreme (ka; default ka zmadu) among set/range x4
trene	train	x1 is a train [vehicle] of cars/units x2 (mass) for rails/system/railroad x3, propelled by x4
troci	try	x1 tries/attempts/makes an effort to do/attain x2 (event/state/property) by actions/method x3
tu	that yonder	pro-sumti: that yonder; distant demonstrative it; indicated thing far from speaker and listener
tu'a	the bridi implied by	extracts a concrete sumti from an unspecified abstraction; equivalent to lo nu/su'u [sumti] co'e
tu'e	start text scope	start of multiple utterance scope; used for logical/non-logical/ordinal joining of sentences
tugni	agree	x1 [person] agrees with person(s)/position/side x2 that x3 (du'u) is true about matter x4
turni	govern	x1 [person] labors/works on/at x2 [activity] with goal/objective x3
tutra	territory	x1 is territory/domain/space of/belonging to/controlled by x2
tu'u	end text scope	elidable terminator: end multiple utterance scope; seldom elidable
ty	t	letteral for t
va	there at	location tense distance: near to ... ; there at ...; a medium/small distance from ...
vai	15	digit/number: hex digit F
vajni	important	x1 (object/event) is important/significant to x2 (person/event) in aspect/for reason x3 (nu/ka)
valsi	word	x1 is a word meaning/causing x2 in language x3; (adjective: x1 is lexical/verbal)
vanbi	environment	x1 (ind./mass) is part of an environment/surroundings/context/ambience of x2
vanju	wine	x1 is made of/contains/is a quantity of wine from fruit/grapes x2
va'o	under conditions	vanbi modal, 1st place (conditions 1) under conditions ...; in environment ...
vau	end simple bridi	elidable: end of sumti in simple bridi; in compound bridi, separates common trailing sumti
ve	4th conversion	4th conversion; switch 1st/4th places
vecnu	sell	x1 [seller] sells/vends x2 [goods/service/commodity] to buyer x3 for amount/cost/expense x4
venfu	revenge	x1 takes revenge on/retaliates against x2 (person) for wrong x3 (nu) with vengeance x4 (nu)
vensa	spring	x1 is spring/springtime [warming season] of year x2 at location x3; (adjective:) x1 is vernal
vi	here at	location tense distance: here at ... ; at or a very short/tiny distance from ...
vi'irku'a	toilet	x1 is a toilet in structure x2 (vikmi ‘excrete’ + kumfa ‘room’)
vikmi	excrete	x1 [body] excretes waste x2 from source x3 via means/route x4
vimcu	remove	x1 removes/subtracts/deducts/takes away x2 from x3 with/leaving result/remnant/remainder x4
vinji	airplane	x1 is an airplane/aircraft [flying vehicle] for carrying passengers/cargo x2, propelled by x3
vi'o	wilco	vocative: wilco (ack and will comply)
viska	see	x1 sees/views/perceives visually x2 under conditions x3
vitke	guest	x1 is a guest/visitor of x2 at place/event x3; x1 visits x2/x3
vlipa	powerful	x1 has the power to bring about x2 under conditions x3; x1 is powerful in aspect x2 under x3
vo	4	digit/number: 4
vo'a	x1 it	pro-sumti: repeats 1st place of main bridi of this sentence
vo'e	x2 it	pro-sumti: repeats 2nd place of main bridi of this sentence
vofli	fly	x1 flies [in air/atmosphere] using lifting/propulsion means x2
vo'i	x3 it	pro-sumti: repeats 3rd place of main bridi of this sentence
voksa	voice	x1 is a voice/speech sound of individual x2
vo'o	x4 it	pro-sumti: repeats 4th place of main bridi of this sentence
vo'u	x5 it	pro-sumti: repeats 5th place of main bridi of this sentence
vrude	virtue	x1 is virtuous/saintly/[fine/moral/nice/holy/morally good] by standard x2
vu	yonder at	location tense distance: far from ... ; yonder at ... ; a long distance from ...
vy	v	letteral for v
vybu	w	letteral for w
xa	6	digit/numeral: 6
xabju	dwell	x1 dwells/lives/resides/abides at/inhabits/is a resident of location/habitat/nest/home/abode x2
xadba	half	x1 is exactly/approximately half/semi-/demi-/hemi- of x2 by standard x3
xadni	body	x1 is a/the body/corpus/corpse of x2; (adjective:) x1 is corporal/corporeal
xajmi	funny	x1 is funny/comical to x2 in property/aspect x3 (nu/ka); x3 is what is funny about x1 to x2
xalfekfri	drunk	x1 is inebriated, drunk (xalka ‘alcohol’ + fenki ‘crazy’ + lifri ‘experience’)
xalka	alcohol	x1 is a quantity of/contains/is made of alcohol of type x2 from source/process x3
xamgu	good	x1 is good/beneficial/acceptable for x2 by standard x3
xanka	nervous	x1 is nervous/anxious about x2 (abstraction) under conditions x3
xanto	elephant	x1 is an elephant of species/breed x2
xatra	letter	x1 is a letter/missive/[note] to intended audience x2 from author/originator x3 with content x4
xe	5th conversion	5th conversion; switch 1st/5th places
xebni	hate	x1 hates/despises x2 (object/abstraction); x1 is full of hate for x2; x2 is odious to x1
xelso	Greek	x1 reflects Greek/Hellenic culture/nationality/language in aspect x2
xendo	kind	x1 (person) is kind to x2 in actions/behavior x3
xindo	Hindi	x1 reflects Hindi language/culture/religion in aspect x2
xlali	bad	x1 is bad for x2 by standard x3; x1 is poor/unacceptable to x2
xlura	influences	x1 (agent) influences/lures/tempts x2 into action/state x3 by influence/threat/lure x4
xo	number?	digit/number: number/digit/lerfu question
xrabo	Arabic	x1 reflects Arabic-speaking culture/nationality in aspect x2
xu	true–false?	discursive: true–false question
xukmi	chemical	x1 is an instance of substance/chemical/drug x2 (individual or mass) with purity x3
xumske	chemistry	x1 is chemistry based on methodology x2 (xukmi ‘chemical’ + saske ‘science’)
xunre	red	x1 is red/crimson/ruddy [color adjective]
xy	x	letteral for x
za	medium time	time tense distance: medium distance in time
zanru	approve	x1 approves of/gives favor to plan/action x2 (object/event)
zbasu	make	x1 makes/assembles/builds/manufactures/creates x2 out of materials/parts/components x3
zdani	nest	x1 is a nest/house/lair/den/[home] of/for x2
zdile	amusing	x1 (abstract) is amusing/entertaining to x2 in property/aspect x3; x3 is what amuses x2 about x1
ze	7	digit/number: 7
ze'a	medium time interval	time tense interval: a medium length of time
ze'i	short time interval	time tense interval: an instantaneous/tiny/short amount of time
zekri	crime	x1 (event/state) is a punishable crime/[taboo/sin] to people/culture/judges/jury x2
zergle	sexual crime	x1 copulates with x2, which is a punishable crime to people/culture/judges/jury x3 (zekri ‘crime’ + gletu ‘copulate’)
zerle'a	steal	x1 takes/gets/gains/obtains/seizes/[removes] x2 (object/property) from x3 (possessor), which is a punishable crime/[taboo/sin] to people/culture/judges/jury x4 (zekri ‘crime’ + lebna ‘take’)
ze'u	long time interval	time tense interval: a long amount of time
zgana	observe	x1 observes/[notices]/watches/beholds x2 using senses/means x3 under conditions x4
zgike	music	x1 is music performed/produced by x2 (event)
zi	short time	time tense distance: instantaneous-to-short distance in time
zi'e	relative clause joiner	joins relative clauses which apply to the same sumti
zirpu	purple	x1 is purple/violet [color adjective]
ziryrai	purplest	x1 is the most purple/violet [color adjective] among set/range x2 (zirpu ‘purple’ + traji ‘superlative’)
zmadu	more	x1 exceeds/is more than x2 in property/quantity x3 (ka/ni) by amount/excess x4
zo	one-word quote	quote next word only; quotes a single Lojban word (not a cmavo compound or tanru)
zo'e	unspecified it	pro-sumti: an elliptical/unspecified value; has some value which makes bridi true
zoi	non-Lojban quote	delimited non-Lojban quotation; the result treated as a block of text
zo'o	humorously	attitudinal modifier: humorously – dully – seriously
zu	long time	time tense distance: long distance in time
zu'a	on the left of	location tense relation/direction; leftwards/to the left of ...
zutse	sit	x1 sits [assumes sitting position] on surface x2
zu'u	on the one hand	discursive: on the one hand – on the other hand
zvati	at	x1 (object/event) is at/attending/present at x2 (event/location)
zy	z	letteral for z