tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Nov 09 20:25:49 1997
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Re: Sentence as Object
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Sentence as Object
- Date: Sun, 9 Nov 1997 23:26:59 -0500 (Eastern Standard Time)
- Priority: NORMAL
On Sat, 8 Nov 1997 21:44:01 -0800 (PST) [email protected] wrote:
> In a message dated 97-11-07 08:57:42 EST, you write:
>
> << Well, if you could provide a translation of a question as an
> object IN ITS ENTIRETY without removing the question mark,
> dropping the "that" and fudging the words around until it looks,
> in English, like a relative clause, then perhaps I could begin
> to take your argument a little bit seriously. Meanwhile, you
> have not managed to do this even once. You just dodge the issue.
> You ignore it. >>
>
> peHruS here:
>
> Okay, you have started to understand the difference in our points. You think
> I am trying to substitute relative clause translations for SAO/QAO
> translations. Wrong!!!
No, peHruS. I am utterly and completely right. I am purely
right. jIlughchu'. Every molocule of my argument is correct. You
are blinded by the light of my absolute correctness of this
argument.
You cannot know a question. You cannot ask a statement. The only
way to pretend that QAO as it has been presented in every
argument here is valid is to pretend like it has the same
meaning as a relative clause. It doesn't, but you repeatedly
make translations of your QAO examples which really are relative
clauses. Meanwhile, we tell you that they don't really mean what
you think they mean and you try to tell us that you are NOT
pretending that they are relative clauses, even though your
translations into English really are relative clauses.
> I am trying to point out clearly for you all what TKD 6.2.5 really says. You
> have been refusing to believe it.
6.2.5 says nothing about questions. Nothing. Combining a
question and a statement in a Sentence As Object would require
special instructions because, well, is the result a question or
a statement? I personally don't know for sure, but I suspect the
result would have to be a question. Otherwise, what happened to
the questioning nature of the question? Did it just evaporate
because SAO can't transfer that questioning nature from the
original sentence into that to which it acts as object?
> You merely ramble on about a different
> topic altogether: relative clauses. I have always said they work just fine
> with the TKD section regarding realtive clauses, TKD 6.2.3.
The English translations you offer for your QAO examples relate
to the English meanings described in 6.2.3, not 6.2.5. You admit
that in every case when I take the English translations you
offer and translate them into Klingon with relative clauses that
the result is valid and expresses the meaning you seek to
express with QAO, and then you try to claim that QAO is not
related to relative clauses.
And then you accuse ME of ignoring things.
> You understand now? There are two completely distinct sections in Klingon
> grammar.
I know that. Relative clauses express the meanings you seek to
express in all of your examples and SAO fails to do so in every
case. Relative clauses and SAO are completely unrelated, but you
keep trying to express relative clauses in the form of SAO using
questions as the first sentence of SAO. It is wrong. It doesn't
work. Lots of reasonable people agree on this, but you keep
ignoring that it doesn't work and insist that everybody else is
failing to understand what you understand.
> But, do you see that you, not I, have been trying to confuse
> them??? Equate them?
I am not equating them. I am telling you that to express the
meaning you wish to express, you need to use relative clauses.
Nothing else works.
I am also telling you that QAO fails to work, especially with
the verb {Sov} in the second sentence because one cannot know a
question, just as one cannot ask a statement. Questions have a
different function than relative clauses, even though in
English, relative pronouns and question words are spelled the
same way. That is why QAO fails to function as you mistakenly
think it does. You are using Klingon question words as if they
were relative pronouns. They aren't.
That is the point you have never acknowledged. That is what you
are ignoring while you acuse me of ignoring that a question is
just another kind of sentence. Well, a dead horse is just
another kind of horse, but you can't really get very far while
trying to ride one.
> peHruS
charghwI'