Directions proposal

Tinkerers Anonymous: Some people can't help making changes to "fix" Toki Pona. This is a playground for their ideas.
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janAetherStar
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Directions proposal

Post by janAetherStar »

So I had this idea for directions based on the elements. Basically, the associations of the 4 western elements are used to make the directions. I also added extra stuff in the corners for the sake of filling those up, and for more reference for anyone learning tp. Here it is:
nasin (marie).png
ale li pona. :)
sina o sona e ni.
janKipo
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by janKipo »

I forget the traditional directional relations of the four elements, but that is ultimately irrelevant. Something like this seems the most sensible way to deal with the issue, since definitional compounds just don't work. 2-d representations of 3-space are problematic, but I assume that 'nasin kiwen' means "straight ahead" and 'nasin seli' means "behind" (but note that we do have definitional compounds for these; it is only "left" and "right" that are problematic).
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janAetherStar
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by janAetherStar »

It's based on NSEW, so 'nasin kiwen' is, although technically North, can easily be modified to 'north of the person' and thus 'straight ahead'. Of course, you can always use 'nasin sinpin' (is that it?) or 'nasin monsi' for forward/back. This system's just for anyone arguing over left and right, if they want to use this instead. :)
ale li pona. :)
sina o sona e ni.
janSilipu
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by janSilipu »

Interesting. We have natural (no cultural) words for east and west and for front and back, but no easy way to use the one set to fill out the other, since we have no standard way for a person to face. Given that, say, one took directions from facing north, as you have it, we can do left and right. Of course, that doesn't help us tell a person to face north. We need at least on of north, south, left and right to get started.
Kuti
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by Kuti »

We can use context and pick something that we can see right here.
At left i have a door, ar right a radiator. poka lupa, poka ilo seli.
And it will change in each context.
janKipo
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by janKipo »

Yes, but we would like something we could use when we are not face to face (or, better, facing in the same direction). When we are together, we can just point or hold the appropriate hand, etc.

Up above, it is worth noting that if we have our person face the rising sun (which we can tell them to do), then north is on the left, but we can't tell them about the left. So the two systems are equivalent as far as definitional problems go.
Kuti
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by Kuti »

That is why i wanted to use tokipona in a tridimentional context, like Second Life, but this was not sucessful due to the lack of people.
It would be more efficient in real life but we all live very far from each others.

We have a problem with directions because we only have text without pictures.
sewi en anpa li pona
sinpin en monsi li pona kin
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janAetherStar
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by janAetherStar »

I get that most people would point to things, I just mean for directions as in 'where's the bathroom' kind of directions. Here's a demonstration of said language, if you were just talking or had a foreign exchange student or whatever:
'tomo telo li lon seme?'
'o tawa nasin kon, telo, telo. tomo telo li lon ni.'
'a. mi weka!'
(this is used in a house setting.)
If used to describe streets and stuff in the city, all could be accompanied with gestures and other street names as well of course. Once directions get started, if there's a lot of them, then you'd probably not need to keep using 'nasin' if all is understood.
I shared this stuff as there was a discussion in a tp facebook group about directions. While it may have originated from compass directions, my ultimate plan was to just use them to define left, right, forward and back rather than all that fancy NSEW compass stuff. Besides, North's changing or something, isn't it?
ale li pona. :)
sina o sona e ni.
janKipo
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by janKipo »

Always but very slightly (not even inches a year) and not consistently. Well, that depends upon what you mean by "North" (geographic pole, magnetic pole, stellar alignment, etc.)
Kuti
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Re: Directions proposal

Post by Kuti »

Once i seen a documentary about an Australian native tribe. They didn't have words for directions. So to tell a way to travel from a village to another, they learn a song. In the songs there are descriptions of the way, with things like «turn after the rock» «not far from the big tree» etc… All the things in the songs are made from geographical context, and they manage to find the way.
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