Someone can say fraction, decimal numbers etc in toki pona?

[Raphaël]

Hello, I would like to know if somebody can say fractions, decimals numbers, exponentiation, etc in toki pona.

[janMato]

Hello, I would like to know if somebody can say fractions, decimals numbers, exponentiation, etc in toki pona.

Yes and no. In a language with an incomplete definition, by necessity the community must innovate-- coin new phrases and sometimes by accident coin new grammatical rules (e.g. tempo X la for tense). If the community doesn't argue about them too much, they become part of the language.

There are lots of proposals to express mathematical concepts using toki pona, but none have caught on. I think this is for cultural reasons because the original design of toki pona said it was inappropriate to use fancy math and instead one should speak as if one had the mathematical capabilities as a person from a tribe that could only count 1-2-many.

Ironically, when I need to coin a phrase, I'm first drawn to mental models that rely on geometric and other measurement based descriptions. I'd be more likely to say something has 3 sides than to say something is like a well known shape of a lizard or a particular leaf of a particular plant.

The official numbers now take you up to about 150 or so before they get laughably long and cumbersome.

[jan Kanso]

tenpo mute la jan sin pi toki pona li wile sona e ni. taso nanpa suli li ike tawa jan pi toki pona.
sina ken toki e ni :
mi jo e kili mute li moku e kili wan. (I ate one of my many bananas)
anu :
mi jo e kili wan li moku e wan lili pi kili ni. (I ate a bit of my apple)
pona. mi tawa.

[Raphaël]

Yes, but if toki pona hasn't fractions, decimals numbers, etc. It can't be an international language because when we're talking, we use these numbers, for example:
Give me one third of the pie.
10.3 per cent of the population were killed during that war.

[janMato]

Per jan Sonja's design, toki pona is not an international aux language. It has few of the goals or design criteria of Esperanto.

Toki pona is a game, it is a innovative idea for treating depression, it is an extended experiment in learning what is the fewest root words one needs to communicate a broad set of ideas, it is a way of inducing a sense of simplicity in thought and speech. It is also remarkably easy to learn, albeit at the cost of making some things--certain vocab categories and certain grammatical constructions-- very difficult.

These goals are a long way from world peace, being easy for indo european speakers, or being useful as a neutral intermediate 2nd language for discussion between two groups of people who don't want to speak the national lingua franca of the moment.

[jan Ote]

but if toki pona hasn't fractions, decimals numbers, etc. It can't be an international language because when we're talking, we use these numbers

Then English can't be an international language because when we are talking, we use "milczeć". English hasn't got it.

But seriously: toki pona hasn't been designed to be an international language, an auxlang, like Esperanto, Latina sine flexione or Interlinguaga.

[jan Kanso]

"Give me one third of the pie" :

o pana e ijo pi pan suwi !

"10.3 per cent of the population were killed during that war" :

jan mute li moli lon utala.

[janKipo]

'wan pi pan suwi' Why 'ijo'?

[jan Kanso]

wan : part
ijo : something

wan pi pan suwi ni : a part of this cake
ijo pi pan suwi ni : some of this cake (?)

Frankly, I don't know if my use of "ijo" in this case is correct ! Perhaps, I have been misled by thinking in German (etwas = something = some).

[janMato]

As a noun, a kipisi would mean either the action of cutting, or the result of cutting (parts)

e kipisi