nasin toki pi toki pona

[janKipo]

Well, the English version provided are now ambiguous in new ways, I think. The goal of the original was a group both musical and English, the "incorrect" was a group doing English music. We now have a group from musical England, too.

As far as I can tell, all these examples (and the judgments on them) are Lope's, not taken over from Pije or Sonja (who, so far as I can tell, don't object to nested 'pi's on grammatical grounds, though likely on aesthetic and semantic ones).

'la' differs because being a condition for something else inevitably sets up a hierarchy: you can't swap around the "if" and the "then" part with sentences, for example.

[jan_Lope]

Changing the order of pi phrases is a good means for illustrating the point. And I would contrast these variants with the (bad) recursion-reading:
...

In general, btw, it would be interesting to see which of your explanations are your own observations and which ones are quotations.

I agree about pi, li, e. But la differs. Strange. Never noticed.

I think it is not a good idea to show false examples in a lesson. But changing the order of pi phrases is a good point for the lessons.

You can see the quotations if you read pu and the lessons of Pije (pi is used for complex compound nouns). The rest is logical. A big help for this is this: http://rowa.giso.de/languages/toki-pona/dcg/ or viewtopic.php?f=29&t=2462&start=20

You are right "la" differs because of "A la B" = "If A then B". But is this condition a recursion?

[janTepanNetaPelin]

I think it is not a good idea to show false examples in a lesson. But changing the order of pi phrases is a good point for the lessons.

OK. Understood.

You can see the quotations if you read pu and the lessons of Pije (pi is used for complex compound nouns). The rest is logical. A big help for this is this: http://rowa.giso.de/languages/toki-pona/dcg/ or viewtopic.php?f=29&t=2462&start=20

Yes. I meant, it would be better not having to read pu / Pije in order to sort out which parts come directly from you. Or put in other words: I have already read Pije and pu. Someone in my situation is likely to leave your grammar, because it might seem like there's nothing new it. It was just a suggestion.

I don't know if I'll have the time to checkout out that program soon, but thanks for the link(s).

You are right "la" differs because of "A la B" = "If A then B". But is this condition a recursion?

I don't know. I have tried to avoid multiple "la" so far. I'll add it to my grammar when I stumble upon it again.

[janKipo]

Well, it is recursive if your rule is S: S la S, but there are other ways of doing it which are not recursive, even when they give multiple 'la's.

[jan_Lope]

You are right "la" differs because of "A la B" = "If A then B". But is this condition a recursion?

I thought about it again. I think Toki Pona has a recursion. In a la
phrase could be a whole nested sentences (If A la B.). In contrast to
the other separators you can't change the order of a condition la
phrase.

[janTepanNetaPelin]

You are right "la" differs because of "A la B" = "If A then B". But is this condition a recursion?

I thought about it again. I think Toki Pona has a recursion. In a la
phrase could be a whole nested sentences (If A la B.). In contrast to
the other separators you can't change the order of a condition la
phrase.

I'm still procrastinating this issue. I think I also need to find out if I understood the concept of recursion correctly. (In computer science it might be different than in linguistics?) So, does recursion apply to particles only or also to prepositions? Hm. Now that I think of it, this might be a silly question, since I can't see a difference at least in this example:

- jan lon tomo lon ma (person in house in land)

The person is both in the house and in the land (because the house is in the land). So it doesn't matter if we assume a recursion or not, right?

For a moment I thought that the "no-recursion" rule alone keeps us from having too complex structures in Toki Pona, but that isn't enough: "lukin e sitelen li pona tawa mi" has no recursive "e", yet the "e" is wrong. Which other rule prevents us from forming such sentences?

[jan_Lope]

I'm still procrastinating this issue. I think I also need to find out if I understood the concept of recursion correctly. (In computer science it might be different than in linguistics?) So, does recursion apply to particles only or also to prepositions? Hm. Now that I think of it, this might be a silly question, since I can't see a difference at least in this example:

- jan lon tomo lon ma (person in house in land)

The person is both in the house and in the land (because the house is in the land). So it doesn't matter if we assume a recursion or not, right?

For a moment I thought that the "no-recursion" rule alone keeps us from having too complex structures in Toki Pona, but that isn't enough: "lukin e sitelen li pona tawa mi" has no recursive "e", yet the "e" is wrong. Which other rule prevents us from forming such sentences?

Here is an interesting link:
http://linguistics.stackexchange.com/qu ... -recursion

A impossibility of changing the order of phrases are not a proof of recursion.

"lukin e sitelen li pona tawa mi." is wrong because Toki Pona sentences have to have the order noun phrase, verb phrase. In the verb phrase could be a direct object after the verb.

[janTepanNetaPelin]

Here is an interesting link:
http://linguistics.stackexchange.com/qu ... -recursion

A impossibility of changing the order of phrases are not a proof of recursion.

"lukin e sitelen li pona tawa mi." is wrong because Toki Pona sentences have to have the order noun phrase, verb phrase. In the verb phrase could be a direct object after the verb.

Thanks.
This means that "la" is different as a particle, but not because of recursion (it is't recursive, in fact), but because it "binds to the left", so to say.

[janKipo]

Well, if you have the rule S: S la S, as is handy to have, it is recursive. But it does not bind in one direction or the other always (unlike NA) since the next 'S la S' could arise from either S in the formula: (S la S) la S or S la (S la S). And there is not generally a mark to tell which is which.

[jan_Lope]

This means that "la" is different as a particle, but not because of recursion (it is't recursive, in fact), but because it "binds to the left", so to say.

Yes, it does not mean that there are nested la phrases. For example you can't use a sentence with a la phrase in a la phrase. We can say in Toki Pona it is illogical to build nested phrases with several using of a separator like "li", "e", "pi", "la", ",", ":", ".", "!", "?" and """. These phrases are linear. But it doesn't mean that you can change the order in any case. For example it makes no sense to put an answer before a question. This is not only a grammar issue.