Online research in philosophy

Formal semantics is an approach to SEMANTICS1, the study of meaning, with roots in logic, the philosophy of language, and linguistics, and since the 1980’s a core area of linguistic theory. Characteristics of formal semantics to be treated in this article include the following: Formal semanticists treat meaning as mind-independent (though abstract), contrasting with the view of meanings as concepts “in the head” (see I-LANGUAGE AND E-LANGUAGE and MEANING EXTERNALISM AND INTERNALISM); formal semanticists distinguish semantics from knowledge of semantics (Lewis 1975, Cresswell 1978), which has consequences for the notion of semantic COMPETENCE. A central part of the meaning of a sentence on this approach is its TRUTH CONDITIONS, and most although not all formal semantics is model-theoretic, relating linguistic expressions to model-theoretically constructed semantic values cast in terms of truth, REFERENCE, and possible worlds. This sets formal semantics apart from approaches which view semantics as relating a sentence just to a representation on another linguistic “level” (LOGICAL FORM) or a representation in an innate LANGUAGE OF THOUGHT. The formal semanticist could accept such representations as an aspect of semantics but would insist on asking what the model-theoretic semantic interpretation of the given representationlanguage is (Lewis 1970). Formal semantics is centrally concerned with COMPOSITIONALITY at the SYNTAX-SEMANTICS INTERFACE, how the meanings of larger constituents are built up from the meanings of their parts on the basis of their syntactic structure, and with the relation between compositional SENTENCE MEANING and meaning in discourse.

In this article a discourse (sequence of sentences) is regarded as a verbalization of some interactive cognitive process (discussion) which may be represented in form of a logical-cognitive scheme as a model of this discourse. Such model is elaborated on the ground of logical-cognitive theory of practical reasoning (Ishmuratov, 1987) by using the definitions of analytical rules for construing model sets (Smullyan, 1968). The discourse's formal language is defined and takes into account the significance of quest schemes (forms of questionable propositions) which are included in different kinds of intensional (intentional, cognitive) contexts of discourse expressions. The discourse model is described in terms of cognitive interpretations which determine conditions of the actualization of cognitive events as elements of the discourse semantic. The pecularities of this model are explalned by deciding one cognitive riddle.

Punctuation has so far attracted attention within the linguistics community mostly from a syntactic perspective. In this paper, we give a preliminary account of the information-based aspects of punctuation, drawing our points from assorted, naturally occurring sentences. We present our formal models of these sentences and the semantic contributions of punctuation marks. Our formalism is a simpli ed analogue of an extension|due to Nicholas Asher|of Discourse Representation Theory.

Discourse Representation Theory is a specific name for the work of Hans Kamp in the area of dynamic interpretation of natural language. Also, it has gradually become a generic term for proposals for dynamic interpretation of natural language in the same spirit. These proposals have in common that each new sentence is interpreted in terms of the contribution it makes to an existing piece of interpreted discourse. The interpretation conditions for sentences are given as instructions for updating the representation of the discourse.

This is a review of From Discourse to Logic: Introduction to Model-theoretic Semantics of Natural Language, Formal Logic and Discourse Representation Theory, by Hans Kamp and Uwe Reyle, published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 1993.

We take em-dash as our sample punctuation mark and examine its usage from a discourse perspective, using sentences from well-known corpora. We particularly comment on how dashes can give hints on information structure, focus, and anaphora. Throughout the paper Discourse Representation Theory is used as a framework. Keywords: Punctuation, Discourse, Discourse Representation Theory, Information Structure..

This paper uses classical logic for a simultaneous description of the syntax and semantics of a fragment of English and it is argued that such an approach to natural language allows procedural aspects of linguistic theory to get a purely declarative formulation. In particular, it will be shown how certain construction rules in Discourse Representation Theory, such as the rule that indefinites create new discourse referents and definites pick up an existing referent, can be formulated declaratively if logic is used as a metalanguage for English. In this case the declarative aspects of a rule are highlighted when we focus on the model theory of the description language while a procedural perspective is obtained when its proof theory is concentrated on. Themes of interest are Discourse Representation Theory, resolution of anaphora, resolution of presuppositions, and underspecification.

This paper embeds the core part of Discourse Representation Theory in the classical theory of types plus a few simple axioms that allow the theory to express key facts about variables and assignments on the object level of the logic. It is shown how the embedding can be used to combine core analyses of natural language phenomena in Discourse Representation Theory with analyses that can be obtained in Montague Semantics.

This volume addresses current issues in the semantics and the pragmatics of discourse and dialogue. Collected papers aim at providing insights on different theoretical approaches, all of them in the dynamic semantics tradition, such as Dynamic Predicate Logic (DPL), Discourse Representation Theory (DRT), and Segmented Discourse Representation Theory (SDRT). They reflect the current move of formal semantics from short multisentential texts towards structured discourses and dialogues, accounting for more and more phenomena at the semantics-pragmatics interface (e.g., subtleties of anaphora and presupposition, the role of temporal connectives in discourse or the establishment of common references in dialogue).