tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Apr 07 05:07:01 1994

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Re: KLBC: jIbuDlaHbe'bej

>Ack! Not this again! Please look up {Hech} in your KD's. It means "mean" as
>in "intend". It does NOT mean "mean" as in "signify".
>
>You cannot use it to say something like "<puq> means <child>".
>*{<child> Hech <puq>} is incorrect, sorry to say.
>
>This sentence could only mean "<puq> intends <child>", which is rather
>nonsensical.
>
>Please, Grammarian, step in and explain to them why they're using {Hech}
>wrong here.

While unsigned, I think this was from Guido.


Sorry, d00d, you lose.  You have an irksome tendency to treat your own
personal micro-reading of Okrand's frustratingly-minimal definitions as
gospel truth.  This one is *certainly* far from unambiguous, and indeed,
the very meaning of "intend" could well be construed as "good enough".
"word X intends meaning Y"-- why not?

Now, let me state clearly that *I personally agree with you*, that it's
kind of a reach and not a great translation.  Since the first time you
brought this up, I have agreed with you as for as my own interpretation,
and have stopped using Hech in this way.  BUT:  That is a far cry from
establishing it as definite law, it is still up for debate and
interpretation, and in particular, NOBODY can be called "wrong" for using
it in this way-- *especially* not people on the beginners conv (which I'm
pretty sure the original usage was from).  It is absolutely NOT the job of
the Grammarians to enforce specific readings of clearly ambiguous
word definitions.

The same comments may or may not apply to less ambiguous definitions. That
is, I might be willing to call someone on using "pong" for making a
telephone call, for instance.  But even there, if they argued back (as,
for example, Glen Proechel does), there's no objective basis by which to
settle it. People have to make their best interpretations in the case of
ambiguities.  I suppose that if it ever really got out of hand to the
extent that people are having trouble understanding each other that I
would make a standard for the purpose of the list, but I'm understandably
quite reluctant to do that.

In the end, it comes down to how we read the comma embedded in multi-word
definitions.  When a Klingon word is given a two word English definition
of "X, Y", does that mean "X, in the sense of Y" or simply "X or Y".
There is no absolute answer.  My experience is that you have to look at
each one individual and try to decide; sometimes the former interpretation
seems eminantly reasonable, sometimes the latter makes more sense.  I
would absolutely claim that in the case of pong, it is "call in the sense
of name".  On the other hand, the sundry meanings given in the definition
of ghoS definitely call for a reading of simple "or".

                        --Krankor

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