tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Nov 17 20:36:40 1997
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Re: negative integers
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: negative integers
- Date: Mon, 17 Nov 1997 23:38:23 -0500 (Eastern Standard Time)
- Priority: NORMAL
On Thu, 13 Nov 1997 06:10:05 -0800 (PST) "Anthony.Appleyard"
<[email protected]> wrote:
> A.Appleyard wrote:-
> > If we go a step further: How does Klingon express negative integers, e.g.
> > "The apparatus's temperature gauge reads -3." or "It is in position -4."?
wej chelHa'pu'bogh pagh cha' tuj juvwI'. I don't understand your
second example well enough to translate it.
> <[email protected]> replied:-
> > You could try something like wejpa' pagh (three before zero -3) or
> > loSpa' pagh (four before zero -4) maybe shortened to wejpa'
Numbers definitely can't take verb suffixes. Being closer to
nouns, they would more likely be interpreted as
mysterious compound nouns. "room4"?
> That is not legal at the moment. -pa' is a suffix for verbs only: e.g. if
> {jatlh} = "he says", then {jatlhpa'} = "before he says". Perhaps put this in
> the list of queries and suggestions for Marc Okrand's attention. Another
> suffix here could be -Ha': wejHa' = "the reverse of 3", i.e. "-3". But that
> also is currently illegal. Or he could provide a word for "-1": if this word
> is {Z}, then {Zlogh wej} or {wej Z} would = "-3".
Well, mostly I think it is an area of math he has not addressed
yet. There are so many different ways he could do this, but most
would have to be original without tying into what we already
have.
Perhaps just {chelHa'bogh wej}?
charghwI'