tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Apr 23 18:15:09 2004
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Re: Probability
- From: "QeS lagh" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Probability
- Date: Sat, 24 Apr 2004 11:14:00 +1000
- Bcc:
ghItlhpu' SuStel:
>Oh, gimme a break! I'm all for learning, probing, and questioning, but the
>intent of this thread has been to try to find a single formulaic way to
>express probabilities. That's not a particularly useful or helpful thing
>to
>do. Learn to express your concepts, not translate the way English does
>something. Different concepts may require different constructions.
I'll stick up for myself here. I have been trying to find a way of saying
*only* "the chance of snowing". Sure, {X-meH DuH} does look pretty general
in retrospect, but {peDmeH DuH} was something I thought would work *in that
situation*. I was attempting to express my concept, not find a generality.
Particularly since general cases are so rare in Klingon anyway... :)
>I'm sorry I don't have THE way to express probability in Klingon. What's
>wrong with a bunch of different ways, depending on the situation? Why is
>this such a horrible alternative?
I'm going to stick up for SuStel here, because we appear to agree completely
on this issue. I said the same thing when we were arguing over ways to say
"about". There IS no "The Way". There are often a multitude of different
ways, sometimes in what one would imagine are the most basic, everyday
situations. That's what learning a language is about; in that, Klingon's no
different to French, Japanese, Navajo, or !Kung Bushman for that matter.
However, the recent suggestion {vaghmaH vatlhvI' DIch 'oH DuH'e'} seems to
fill most of the blanks. {vaghmaH vatlhvI' DIch} appears to work similarly
to {cha'maH vagh vatlhvI' Hong}. Playing devil's advocate, though, I'm not
sure whether you can have fifty percent of a certainty; it strikes me as
somewhat weird, like saying "half a hole" or "a little bit pregnant" in
English.
Savan.
QeS lagh
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