Re: HeadFirst

On Sun, May 07, 2000 at 01:37:19AM -0700, Jim Grossmann wrote:
> Well, so far, I don't think you've restricted your parts of speech
> to nouns & connectives.   Is "me" a noun, or a pronoun?    Does
> "me" describe the whole HP, or does it name the topic?
>
> To get rid of the pronouns, you may want to just name
> everybody, and compound the names with the names of
> conversational roles for first and second person:
The difference between nouns and pronouns is not a concern to me.

> > Having with agent me and patient brother with name Steve.
>
> Having a brother is not an act, and "me" is not an agent in this
> sentence, nor is "brother" a patient.
Again, at this stage, this kind of detail is completely unimportant.

> I'm not sure that the ambiguity you've named is that big.
> There's no law against context resolving ambiguities in
> natlangs.   The identification of "earth" as another patient, and
> the meaning of "earth" as opposed to "heaven," is probably
> sufficient to let the listener know that "earth" is not just
> another attribute of the heavens.
>
> But I don't think you have a sufficiently clear way of indicating
> which attributive nouns describe which other nouns.   You
> could start by specifying that "and" connects constituents of
> equal rank, whereas "with" introduces an attributive NP
> associated with the previous NP.
Yep, that's what I was intending.

>   You might also add "then"
> to your repertoire of connectives, which could shorten some
> sentences considerably by allowing the two heads to be
> together in chronological order in one clause.
>
> If I'm all wet, here's hoping someone says why.
>
> BTW, it is most important to try your grammar out on complex
> sentences.
>
> He who lives by the sword dies by the sword.
>
> Becoming with life then death with human-agent and
> sword-instrument.
>
> DV betrayed and murdered your father.
>
> Betrayal and Murder with DV agent and father-patient with
> this listener-son.
I hadn't thought of co-ordinating heads!  Not a bad idea!

> (Wow!   I'm beginning to enjoy writing like this!   No joke, just fact.)
>
> 4.    Getting rid of pronouns won't be easy and may not be desireable.   How
> about variables?  e.g.   "Anyone who goes to school will need pencils."
> Try that in Headfirst.
It's definitely not desireable.  Variables/words like "anyone" are a
matter of vocabulary, I think, not syntax, so I hadn't considered them
in detail yet.

>
> Writing-source-Jim