Q.
This is the part of the course where I explain the true nature of Laiqbun words. Up until this point, everything I have said about how they work has been said in a very Englishy manner so that it makes sense and can work as a base. “Verbs” and “nouns” are weird and can be turned into one another, because in reality, they are variations of the same kind of word, the predicate.
A predicate’s definition isn’t like an English word’s definition, they are more like functions in a programming language, or words in a language like Lojban or Toaq. They look more like this.
Those x1, x2 and x3 things simply mean that you can put a “noun” (from here on out called an argument) into them to form sentences. heo sha maq puts sha in the x1 and maq in the x2, making it mean “that which is me consumes that which is food.”
When you put a predicate after another, you’re basically putting its definition in the x2 of the previous one (or the x1, if it only had one place). Like this:
- sheo heo: x1 wants (x1 consumes x2) to be the case.
sheo heo has two x1. This is normal, it means that they are filled as the same thing.
Predicates stacked like this are called serial predicates.
Words that have y as their first vowel are not predicates and can’t be turned into the other forms of a word, they are called “particles.” Similarly, predicates can’t be turned into particles.
And that’s it, really! You now have a more accurate understanding of how Laiqbun words work. From now on, all the verb definitions will use the form you just learnt. Feel free to join the Discord server or the Matrix space