RAMBLINGS ABOUT LUPA

In an airplane
by lipamanka

(NOTE: I don’t have access to my community usage data right now [because airplane], so that won’t been incorporated here! So far these are only my opinions.)

Greetings! I’d like to write a little bit about lupa. Many people describe lupa in completely different ways. Some say it’s a hole cut into something, others say it’s a space where the material is different when compared with the surrounding material. and others (including myself, before giving out my form) described it as the potential for something to travel into or through it. Which of these is most accurate? As I write this, I’ll try to figure it out, so come find out with me!

First I think it’s important (and useful, probably!) to talk about what “into” and “through” mean for toki pona. “ijo li tawa insa lupa” for “the object goes into the hole” works pretty well, and through implies the object comes out the other end, which you could describe too. So the concepts here we’re identifying is a distinction between going into something and staying there or coming out the other end. Both of these situations usually unambiguously contain a lupa, which is the the object a thing either goes into or goes through. Let’s examine some examples of the “through” meaning to see what we can make of it.

A window lets air and light through. if we make that impossible by closing the window, painting it with black paint, and then gluing it shut, would it still be a lupa? likewise, A door lets people through, and whatever they want to come through. If a doorway was sealed shut so that it could not be opened, would it still be a lupa? I think between these two examples it’s important to see what you’d need to do in order to make it not a lupa. For both of these, something would need to become similar to everything around it in order to not be considered a lupa anymore, but the quality that it would share in common with all of those things is that it wouldn’t let things through it.
A hole in a bagel is a lupa. Nowadays we don’t think about why that much, but they have holes in them because they used to be sold on sticks in shtetls. Recently in New York bagels have been getting slightly bigger and many of them no longer have a hole in them. Do those bagels still have a lupa? They could. Usually they’re still made as if there was a hole in them, but they’re just made really thick and the hole closes up during proofing. Because of this, there are little divots in them that people don’t really think about, but those are still lupa! Why are they lupa? Is it because they’re different from the things around them? Is it because things can go inside of them?

Let’s look at some “into” situations with lupa to help see and figure out what we’d need to do to them in order to stop them from being lupa.

Let’s say I were to dig a hole in the ground. This is close to prototypical. If I wanted to un-lupa-ify it, I would need nothing more than to put the dirt I dug out back into it. Is this changing the stuff in where the lupa is to be like the stuff around it, or preventing stuff from going inside? It seems like it’s both, so if we want to figure out if it’s one of those two or both we’ll need to look at more examples.
What if I cut out a block of wood from my wall? that’s a lupa. but if I put a block of glass into it, would it still be a lupa? The matter is different from that which surrounds it and nothing can go inside it, right? Well what about light? Light can travel into it. So this doesn’t help us very much.
What if I filled it in with metal? The material is different, but nothing can go inside it. Or can it? Maybe the material/matter in the area has to be significantly different, to the point where something could go inside of it. Let’s look at another interesting example that is similar to the “through” meaning.
Is the inside of a stethoscope a lupa? Even though it’s made out of metal, the metal it’s made out of is a way better conductor of sound than air. Not only is the material different from that which surrounds it, but it also lets something through it, and both of those things are relevant to its design.
This is the last example, which I remember talking about with jan Seli. In a painting, if most of the painting is red but a medium sized circle is green, assuming the observing toki ponist isn’t colorblind, would that circle be a lupa? I think it would, specifically because the material is different from the material around it, and things can go inside it.

I think I figured it out. The material being different is only relevant if the material lets something through it that the surrounding material can’t let through. It’s both of those at once. To clarify, air and a vacuum could be these “materials.” I used the word material here because it seemed more useful and specific than “thing,” which I was already using a lot. I don’t think that “a hole in something” is specific enough.

One lingering thought: considering that light, or the image of something, is a “thing,” could lupa be used for transparency? I think it could, and it should be used in such a way! not only are traditionally “transparent” objects like windows already called lupa by many speakers, lupa already covers most of the transparent things we think about. Are there any transparent things that aren’t covered by lupa? Not entirely sure. A peephole in a door is a lupa. A porthole in a boat is a lupa, and could also be described as a window.

Ah! But what about say, a drinking cup made out of glass? Is that a lupa? This is where things get interesting, because right away I suspect different toki ponists would answer differently. But the way I usually answer questions like this is “maybe. let’s try it out.” After thinking about it I don’t think it really works. And it makes sense too, because the thing the cup would be letting through (light/image) is already let through by its surroundings (air). Now let’s be pedantic and try to embed the cup in a wall so that it’s surrounded by wood, a material that can’t let light through. Then it’s a lupa! So it turns out that in the end, the answer involves both material and what can pass through it.

drops mic and screams

Future thoughts:

I’m also thinking about how different lupa is from English’s “hole.” I think it’s different, mostly because we don’t think of windows as holes usually. Or do we? I’m not sure actually.
I’d like to figure out how to tie this together with ideas about containment. I do think it was a mistake to make one form for ALL of those words. In fact, my next few forms are probably going to examine them individually more closely. Or perhaps I’ll save those for later on. I do think that the idea of containment is the same as the idea of “is there being a thing inside of it core ot what it is?” and for lupa the answer is definitely “yes!” just like selo, tomo, and poki. Not sure about len though. len might be out. who knows.
For my final book thing, I know in the past there have been jokes about a dictionary with an essay for each word, but after sitting down and typing out over 1500 words about just lupa without bringing in community usage yet, that seems plausible! I was originally going to write like a paragraph for each word but that doesn’t seem like it would be enough.
Once I’ve landed and settled in to my dorm room (lol) I’ll consider making a community usage section (to be released early, or with the book? idk yet) and have a bunch of quotes. but then again, I don’t have that many responses so that could definitely wait.

If you skimmed and you want a nice summary, here it is: a lupa is made from a different material (which can include air or a vacuum) when compared to its surroundings (which could also be air or a vacuum). However, that material has to differ from surrounding materials in one key manner: The material has to let something through it that its surroundings can’t let through.

I hope this last bit at the end makes the whole thing more accessible for people with dyslexia (like me!) or ADHD (like me!) or other things that impact reading comprehension/ability/speed/focus etc

Wow I wrote a lot

Do I have time to ramble about something else? checks flight info it says I land in a half hour. So maybe? … what about though… What about more about lupa? Why not? Okay please let me know if you have mind boggling thoughts about any of these things

Do all (physical) poki have a lupa? Yeah I think so. What about tomo? Yeah. Or not? if a hollow space is sealed shut inside of something, is that space a lupa? Now THAT’S a question. But is that thing a poki if it’s empty and you can’t put anything inside of it? If you were somehow able to put something inside of it without unsealing it, would that method be a lupa? Like a portal. I have discussed that with people before and i think a portal is definitely a lupa, though it doesn’t really exist in real life, conceptually it is a lupa. But what if it was teleportation? I guess it depends how teleportation works. but if the hollow space is empty and it is sealed, without breaking the laws of physics (or the seal) it’s impossible to get something inside it, so I don’t think it’s even a poki. So yes, all poki have a lupa, and all tomo have a lupa too. (I think?) Now selo is where this breaks down. selo can have lupa, but they don’t need them! Like skin has lots of little lupas everywhere and also larger lupas like the mouth and nose. So the human body is surrounded by a selo, and that selo has lupas in it. but a layer of paint around a rock is a selo too, and it has no holes in it. So that’s really interesting! But hm. What if we put a person inside a tomo and then seal it shut completely so that it has no lupas? is it still a tomo? or what about say a set of keys in a poki? In order to fully remove the lupas we would have to completely remove any trace of them having been there, because a locked door is still a lupa. Right? So in this wild hypothetical where we remove the trace of the thing that made it possible to put the thing inside, is it still a poki or a tomo? I don’t think it is anymore! At least for poki. Maybe not for tomo. Or is it? idk I’m getting tired and also my plane is landing so I think I’m gonna just. Finish this. Maybe make a bit LUPA form later on to talk about all these questions.

Okay in these rambles I somehow amassed about two thousand words which is very impressive all about lupa! exciting. Okay bye