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4274 results in Semantics and pragmatics

Page 86 of 214

  • 15 - Modification

  • from Part III - Temporal and aspectual ontology and other semantic structures
  • Edited by Maria Aloni, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Paul Dekker, Universiteit van Amsterdam
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Handbook of Formal Semantics
    Published online:
    05 July 2016
    Print publication:
    07 July 2016, pp 442-464

  • Summary

    Introduction

    The term modifier (and modification, the function a modifier carries out) is difficult to define in intuitive terms. A first informal approximation might be, for example, to say that a modifier adds additional, non-essential descriptive content to that contributed by the expression that it combines with; in this respect, a modifier would contrast with an argument, which would provide descriptive content that is somehow required by the expression it combines with. For instance, one could try to argue that in (1), the content contributed by delightful is less essential to determining the referent of the whole nominal than that contributed by of Susan, and thus we could conclude that the former is a modifier, while the latter is an argument:

    (1) the delightful mother of Susan

    However, this sort of reasoning has long been known to be problematic, as the large literature on the argument/nonargument distinction in the argument structure literature makes clear. For example, consider (2):

    (2) the younger sister of Susan

    If Susan has two sisters, the content contributed by the adjective is arguably as important as that contributed by the prepositional phrase for identifying the referent of the nominal. However, such adjectives are universally treated as modifiers, not arguments. A classic example from the verbal domain involves the verbs buy, sell, rent, and lease: Money is an essential participant in the situations these verbs describe, and yet the for-phrase in (3) is not treated as an argument (see, e.g., Jackendoff, 1972, for an early discussion of this problem):

    (3) We sold the car (to the dealer) for 2000 euros.

    Syntactic obligatoriness is even more problematic as a criterion for defining modifiers, asmany expressions that linguists would agree are arguments are syntactically elidable (such as to the dealer in (3)), and sometimes modifiers are obligatory, if arguably only for pragmatic reasons (see, e.g.,??a built house vs. a well-built house, Goldberg and Ackerman, 2001). Consequently, in this article, modifier and modification will be defined in strictly formal terms.

  • 17 - Conditionals

  • from Part IV - Intensionality and force
  • Edited by Maria Aloni, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Paul Dekker, Universiteit van Amsterdam
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Handbook of Formal Semantics
    Published online:
    05 July 2016
    Print publication:
    07 July 2016, pp 490-524

  • Summary

    Introduction

    Conditional sentences are sentences of the form “if A, (then) C”, as in the following examples:

    (1) If this figure is a square, then it is a rectangle.

    (2) If John comes to the party, Mary will be pleased.

    (3) If John had come to the party, Mary would have been pleased.

    In such sentences, the if-clause A is called the antecedent (sometimes protasis) of the conditional, and the then-clause C is called the consequent (or apodosis, see Carroll, 1894). Traditionally, conditional sentences have been taken to express hypothetical judgments, as opposed to categorical judgments (see the table of judgments in Kant, 1781), in that the speaker who expresses a sentence of the form “if A, C” does not assert C, but makes a weaker commitment, namely that C holds under the hypothesis expressed by A. For instance, in saying (1), the speaker expresses something weaker than if she had asserted this figure is a rectangle, and similarly with (2) and (3).

    The expression of conditionality in language does not necessarily involve explicit if–then constructions, as the following examples show:

    (4)

    1. a. Kiss my dog and you'll get fleas.

    2. b. If you kiss my dog, then you'll get fleas.

    (5)

    1. a. No Hitler, no A-bomb.

    2. b. If there had been no Hitler, there would have been no A-bomb.

    (6)

    1. a. Unless you talk to Vito, you'll be in trouble.

    2. b. If you don't talk to Vito, you'll be in trouble.

    However, all such sentences can be rephrased by means of an if-clause, as shown by the paraphrase given below them, and in this chapter we will focus on the semantic analysis of conditional sentences expressed with if.

    From a typological point of view, at least three different kinds of conditional sentences are usually distinguished on semantic grounds, namely indicative conditionals, counterfactual conditionals (sometimes called subjunctive conditionals, although, as we will see below, the two notions are not exactly coextensional), and relevance conditionals (also known as biscuit conditionals, based on Austin's example reproduced below). An illustration of the indicative–counterfactual distinction is given by (2) vs. (3) above. In (2), the speaker entertains as an open possibility that John comes to the party.

  • 7 - Generalized quantifiers

  • from Part II - Theory of reference and quantification
  • Edited by Maria Aloni, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Paul Dekker, Universiteit van Amsterdam
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Handbook of Formal Semantics
    Published online:
    05 July 2016
    Print publication:
    07 July 2016, pp 206-237

  • Summary

    Thirty years of generalized quantifiers

    It is now more than thirty years since the first serious applications of Generalized Quantifier (GQ) theory to natural language semantics were made: Barwise and Cooper (1981); Higginbotham and May (1981); Keenan and Stavi (1986). Richard Montague had in effect interpreted English NPs as (type 〈1〉) generalized quantifiers (see Montague, 1974), but without referring to GQs in logic, where they had been introduced by Mostowski (1957) and, in final form, Lindström (1966). Logicians were interested in the properties of logics obtained by piecemeal additions to first-order logic (FO) by adding quantifiers like ‘there exist uncountably many’, but they made no connection to natural language. Montague Grammar and related approaches had made clear the need for higher-type objects in natural language semantics. What Barwise, Cooper, and the others noticed was that generalized quantifiers are the natural interpretations not only of noun phrases but also in particular of determiners (henceforth Dets).

    This was no small insight, even if it may now seem obvious. Logicians had, without intending to, made available model-theoretic objects suitable for interpreting English definite and indefinite articles, the Aristotelian all, no, some, proportional Dets like most, at least half, 10 percent of the, less than two-thirds of the, numerical Dets such as at least five, no more than ten, between six and nine, finitely many, an odd number of, definite Dets like the, the twelve, possessives like Mary's, few students’, two of every professor's, exception Dets like no … but John, every … except Mary, and Boolean combinations of all of the above. All of these can – if one wants! – be interpreted extensionally as the same type of second-order objects, namely (on each universe of discourse) binary relations between sets. Given the richness of this productive but seemingly heterogeneous class of expressions, a uniform interpretation scheme was a huge step. Further, the tools of logical GQ theory could be brought to bear on putative Det interpretations, which turned out to be a subclass of the class of all type 〈1, 1〉 quantifiers with special traits. The three pioneer papers mentioned above offered numerous cases of novel description, and sometimes explanation, of characteristic features of language in terms of model-theoretic properties of the quantifiers involved.

The Cambridge Handbook of Formal Semantics
  • Edited by Maria Aloni, Paul Dekker
  • Published online:
    05 July 2016
    Print publication:
    07 July 2016
  • Formal semantics - the scientific study of meaning in natural language - is one of the most fundamental and long-established areas of linguistics. This Handbook offers a comprehensive, yet compact guide to the field, bringing together research from a wide range of world-leading experts. Chapters include coverage of the historical context and foundation of contemporary formal semantics, a survey of the variety of formal/logical approaches to linguistic meaning and an overview of the major areas of research within current semantic theory, broadly conceived. The Handbook also explores the interfaces between semantics and neighbouring disciplines, including research in cognition and computation. This work will be essential reading for students and researchers working in linguistics, philosophy, psychology and computer science.

  • 5 - Long-Distance Meaning Relationships

  • Yoad Winter
  • Book:
    Elements of Formal Semantics
    Published by:
    Edinburgh University Press
    Published online:
    11 August 2018
    Print publication:
    08 April 2016, pp 139-189

  • Summary

    This chapter addresses challenges for the composition of meanings in more complex syntactic constructions than those we have treated so far. As we will see, the framework of Chapters 3–4 systematically fails in analyzing meaning relations between expressions that are not adjacent to each other. One such case is sentences where multiple noun phrases are in semantic relations with the same verb.We solve this problem by adding to the system of Chapter 3 a compositional principle of hypothetical reasoning, or function abstraction, which acts as a dual to function application. Our use of hypothetical reasoning motivates a revision of one of our foundational assumptions in Chapter 3. Instead of interpreting pre-generated binary trees over strings, as we have done so far, our revised grammar architecture derives semantic denotations simultaneously with the derivation of syntactic forms. Forms and meanings are paired together in integrative linguistic resources called linguistic signs. In the ensuing grammatical framework, Abstract Categorial Grammar, the composition of meanings is only one of the two dimensions within the derivation of complex linguistic signs.

    In the framework laid out in Chapter 3 we have interpreted binary syntactic structures by using functional types and denotations. Function application was our semantic tool for deriving denotations of complex expressions from the denotations of their parts. The semantic system only allowed denotations of constituents to combine when they are analyzed as sisters in the syntactic structure. Sisters in the binary tree correspond to two strings that are linearly adjacent to each other. Consequently, only denotations of adjacent expressions could be glued together. For instance, consider the generalized quantifier for the noun phrase every tall student. Under our assumptions so far, when deriving a meaning for this expression, we first combine the denotation of the adjective tall with the denotation of the noun student, and then combine the result with the denotation of the determiner every. In an alternative analysis, which is syntactically dubious but analytically possible, we might let every and tall be sisters.

  • 2 - Meaning and Form

  • Yoad Winter
  • Book:
    Elements of Formal Semantics
    Published by:
    Edinburgh University Press
    Published online:
    11 August 2018
    Print publication:
    08 April 2016, pp 12-43

  • Summary

    This chapter introduces some of the key notions about the analysis of meaning in formal semantics. We focus on entailments: relations between premises and valid conclusions expressed as natural language sentences. Robust intuitions about entailment are distinguished from weaker types of reasoning with language. Speaker judgments on entailments are described using models: abstract mathematical structures, which emanate from semantic analyses of artificial logical languages. Model-theoretical objects are directly connected to syntactic structures by applying a general principle of compositionality.We see how this principle helps to analyze cases of structural ambiguity and to distinguish them from other cases of under-specification.

    What do dictionaries mean when they tell us that semantics is “the study of meaning”? The concept that people intuitively refer to as “meaning” is an abstraction inspired by observing how we use language in everyday situations. However, we use language for many different purposes, and those various usages may inspire conceptions of meaning that are radically different from one another. We cannot reasonably expect a theory of meaning to cover everything that people do with their languages. A more tractable way of studying meaning is by discerning specific properties of language use that are amenable to scientific investigation. These aspects of language use, if stable across speakers and situations, will ultimately guide us toward a theory of language “meaning”.

    ENTAILMENT

    One of the most important usages of natural language is for everyday reasoning. For example, let us consider sentence (2.1):

    (2.1) Tina is tall and thin.

    From this sentence, any English speaker is able to draw the conclusion in (2.2) below:

    (2.2) Tina is thin.

    Thus, any speaker who considers sentence (2.1) to be true, will consider sentence (2.2) to be true as well. We say that sentence (2.1) entails (2.2), and denote it (2.1)⇒(2.2). Sentence (2.1) is called the premise, or antecedent, of the entailment. Sentence (2.2) is called the conclusion, or consequent.

    The entailment from (2.1) to (2.2) exemplifies a relation that all English speakers will agree on. This consistency is remarkable, and all the more so since words like Tina, tall and thin are notoriously flexible in the way that they are used.

  • 4 - Quantified Noun Phrases

  • Yoad Winter
  • Book:
    Elements of Formal Semantics
    Published by:
    Edinburgh University Press
    Published online:
    11 August 2018
    Print publication:
    08 April 2016, pp 99-138

  • Summary

    This chapter addresses noun phrases (NPs) that involve counting and other statements about quantity. We compositionally analyze complex NP structures by letting them denote (et)t functions, or generalized quantifiers. Quantificational elements within the noun phrase are analyzed as denoting (et)((et)t) functions, or determiner relations. This analysis accounts for many entailments with quantified NPs: monotonicity-based entailments, entailments with various coordinations, and a possibly universal entailment pattern in natural language, known as conservativity.When studying NP coordinations, we reveal new facts about the behavior of proper names. To deal with these facts, we reanalyze proper names using generalized quantifiers, so that they end up being treated similarly to quantified NPs.

    Many expressions intuitively involve processes of counting ormeasuring. Consider for instance the italicized expressions in the following sentences:

  • 1) John rarely/usually eats meat.

  • 2) We are close to/far from Beijing.

  • 3) There is little/a lot of work to do today.

  • 4) Many/few people admire Richard Wagner.

    • We refer to such items as quantificational expressions. Intuitively, in sentence (4.1) the adverbs refer to the frequency of John's carnivorousness; in (4.2) the prepositional phrases estimate the distance to Beijing; in (4.3) the mass term expressions evaluate an amount of work. Similarly, in (4.4) the quantificational expressions many and few evaluate the number ofWagner's admirers.

    In general, words like many and few combine with count nouns, such as tables or people in (4.4). In the previous chapter, we have described the denotations of such nouns using sets of entities from the domain E. The members of the E domain are assumed to be distinct, separated objects, without any smooth variation from one to the other. For instance, in our entity domain, we have no entity that “lies between”, say, different entity denotations for Tina and Mary. This is unlike the situation in sets of real numbers, geometrical shapes etc., where there are endless variations between any two different entities. Because the E domain has this property, we refer to it as being discrete.

  • 6 - Intensionality and PossibleWorlds

  • Yoad Winter
  • Book:
    Elements of Formal Semantics
    Published by:
    Edinburgh University Press
    Published online:
    11 August 2018
    Print publication:
    08 April 2016, pp 190-231

  • Summary

    This chapter deals with expressions that refer to attitudes, beliefs or possibilities, which we lump together under the title intensional expressions. The ‘psychological’ aspects of these expressions systematically challenge the system that we developed in the previous chapters. To address these challenges we add to our models a domain of possible worlds. Denotations involving possible worlds are used as a basic account of intensional expressions.We illustrate systematic ambiguities that appear with these expressions, known as de dicto/de re ambiguities, and show that the ACG mechanism of the previous chapter readily treats them as instances of scope ambiguity.

    Language is a rich instrument for discussing psychological aspects of life. All natural languages have means for expressing knowledge, beliefs, wishes, doubts, misunderstandings and errors. We refer to expressions that invoke such concepts as intensional expressions. This chapter characterizes some important semantic properties of such expressions and the way they interact with entailments in natural language. When studying entailment with intensional expressions, we will first realize that such expressions systematically block entailment patterns that are otherwise valid with the expressions that we have treated so far. Accordingly, the entailment patterns that we study in this chapter distinguish pre-theoretically between the intensional expressions and other expressions that have so far been treated in this book. Because of their special inferential behavior, intensional expressions reveal a problem for semantic systems like the one we have developed so far, which are based on the basic types e and t. The system we develop in this chapter is based on our system from Chapters 2–5, but it also deals with intensional expressions. To overcome the limitations of our system so far, we will add to it semantic entities known as possible worlds or indices. The mapping from non-intensional semantics to possible world semantics is pleasantly regular, and involves no new mathematical concepts. This gives us an immediate account of a puzzle that systematically appears with intensional sentences: the problem known as their de dicto/de re interpretations. Following our treatment in Chapter 5, we straightforwardly treat such interpretations as manifestations of scope ambiguities.

Page 86 of 214