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From: erkyrath@netcom.com (Andrew Plotkin)
Subject: Re: Context-sensitive pronouns (was annoying pronouns)
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Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 17:43:13 GMT
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Erik Max Francis (max@alcyone.com) wrote:
> Jason Melancon wrote:

> > How about this idea, just out of the blue:
> > 
> > In conversation, if someone brings up a new concept or something, we
> > say, for example, "What's that?"  something else with "that," not
> > "it."  Do we need a new word here as well?

> It's a good idea (making up a new word, that is), but does this sample
> script make sense?

>     > EXAMINE DESK
>     On top of the wooden desk sits a stapler.

>     > GET THAT
>     [the stapler]
>     Taken.

> It certainly works, but does it sound right?  It doesn't sound quite right
> to me.

It took my the duration of typing in my previous "that" post to get used 
to it. :) I'm happy with it.

>  The demonstrative pronouns are usually used to indicate something
> of the same type that was referred to, but a different instance of it:
> "The apple you gave me tasted awful, but _that_ one is fine."

I think there is an equally common English usage, which notionally 
involves pointing, which is the usage I want to buy into. "Give me 
*that*. <pointing at screwdriver>" 

One thing I should explain is that I just finished re-reading a wacky 
little math/logic book called _The Liar_, which is about the liar's 
paradox ("This sentence is false.") And the authors analyze it by using a 
very restricted English syntax, just to make life easier. The words are 
"Max", "Claire", "has", "doesn't have", "the three of clubs" (and the 
other 51 card names), "is", "isn't", "true", "this sentence", and "that 
sentence <point at another sentence>". 

So I've gone through about a week of reading "This sentence is false." 
"That sentence <the previous one> is true." "This sentence is false and 
that sentence <the previous one> is true." I'm heavily set in the idea of 
"that" as a formal parameter which is set by demonstrative conventions, 
namely, pointing -- or taking the last object mentioned by the computer.

> Still, in an interactive fiction context, where what the user types doesn't
> always represent a real English phrase (like NORTH), for our purposes I'm
> sure it would suit just fine.

Yep.

--Z

-- 

"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the
borogoves..."
