Conjunctions - Exclusive "Or," Joining Nouns

Today, we are looking at the conjunction ghap exclusive or.

ghap

ghap joins nouns together. It means or; either one option or the other, but not both. As with je, ghap goes after the nouns it joins together.

Example:-

tlhIngan tera'ngan ghap

means A Klingon or a Terran, but not both.

Mercy Or Power

There is a famous Klingon proverb,

pung HoS ghap

Often written ungrammatically (but traditionally) as pung ghap HoS, the proverb reads Mercy or power. The use of ghap exclusive or reveals the Klingon philosophy - in order to be strong, a Klingon cannot show mercy.

Gate Logic

ghap is the equivalent of the XOR logic gate with two inputs A and B, which returns 1 only if A is 1 and B is 0, or if A is 0 and B is 1, but returns 0 if both A and B are 0 or if A and B are both 1.

tlhIngan tera'ngan ghap	a Klingon or a Terran
chab HIq ghap	a pie or an ale
taj mupwI' ghap	a knife or a hammer
DIpmey wotmey ghap	nouns or verbs
moHaqmey mojaqmey ghap	prefixes or suffixes
loDpu' be'pu' ghap	Men or women
jIH SoH ghap	me or you
jIp rup ghap Segh 'oH	It's a type of penalty or a fine
qama'pu' ray' ghap bIH	They're targets or prisoners
Soj veQ ghap rurbej	Clearly, it looks like food or trash

Next: Exclusive "Or," joining sentences.

Conjunctions - "Or," Joining Nouns

Just as there are two types of conjunction for and - je joining nouns, coming after the joined nouns, and 'ej joining sentences, coming between the sentences, so too there are conjunctions for or.

Now here's the thing. There are four conjunctions for or.

Today, we are looking at one of them - the conjunction joq and/or.

joq

joq joins nouns together. It means and/or; either one option or the other, or both. As with je, joq goes after the nouns it joins together.

Example:-

tlhIngan tera'ngan joq

means A Klingon or a Terran, or both.

There is a conjunction describing exclusive or - a Klingon or a Terran but not both - but that is covered in another article.

tlhIngan tera'ngan joq	a Klingon or a Terran
chab HIq joq	a pie, an ale or both
taj mupwI' joq	a knife and/or a hammer
DIpmey wotmey joq	nouns and/or verbs
moHaqmey mojaqmey joq	prefixes and/or suffixes
loDpu' be'pu' joq	Men or women
jIH SoH joq	me or you (or both)
chab HIq qIj joq ra'ta' 'Iv	Who ordered the pie and/or black ale?
jIp rup joq Segh 'oH	It's a type of penalty or a fine
qama'pu' ray' joq bIH	They're targets or prisoners (or both)
Soj veQ joq rurbej	Clearly, it looks like food and/or trash

This is the equivalent of the logical OR gate with two inputs, which would return 1 if either or both inputs were 1, and would return 0 if both inputs were 0.

Note: unlike je, there is no additional meaning for joq.

Next: "Or," joining sentences.