Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

How why-interrogatives work

  • Published:
Synthese Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

How do why-interrogatives work? How do they express the questions they express, in the contexts in which they express them? In this essay, I argue that, at a fundamental level, why-interrogatives work just like other wh-interrogatives, particularly other adjunct wh-interrogatives, and they express the questions they express, in the contexts in which they express them, by the same means that other wh-interrogatives do. These conclusions go against a trend in recent work on why-interrogatives, which holds that they are syntactically and semantically unlike other wh-interrogatives. Since the claim that why-interrogatives are unlike other wh-interrogatives has been taken to support various philosophical theses about the nature of why-questions and explanation, showing that why-interrogatives are just like other wh-interrogatives undermines this line of support for these theses.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. See Groenendijk and Stokhof (2011), p. 1060 for discussion.

  2. As this quotation from Hintikka and Halonen demonstrates, exceptionalism has also been defended for how-interrogatives. Indeed, how-interrogatives have been the subject of much recent debate. See the essays in Bengson and Moffett (2011), for instance. The view that how-interrogatives are filler-gap constructions is widely assumed in these debates, however. So, how-interrogatives are at least treated as syntactically like other wh-interrogatives. The debates primarily concern ascriptions of know-how and whether these ascribe propositional knowledge or not.

  3. The claim that why-interrogatives are syntactically unlike other wh-interrogatives is widespread in mainstream generative grammar. See Rizzi (2001), Ko (2005, 2006), Thornton (2008) and Tsai and Stepanov (2008). Other linguists and linguistically oriented philosophers treat why-interrogatives as fundamentally syntactically like other wh-interrogatives. See Groenendijk and Stokhof (1982), Koura (1988), Collins (1991), Haegeman (1994), Higginbotham (1993, 1997), Asher and Lascarides (1998), Ginzburg and Sag (2000), Stanley and Williamson (2001), Sag (2010), George (2011), Shlonsky and Soare (2011) and Stanley (2011).

  4. Contrastive theories of why-questions and explanation are widespread. See van Fraassen (1980), Ruben (1987, 1992), Temple (1988), Lipton (1990, 1991, 2004) and Sandborg (1998).

  5. See Bromberger (1992). Bromberger was, of course, reacting to the influential work of Hempel (1965). Bromberger’s approach to explanation via abnormic laws has been taken in new directions by Winiewski (1999).

  6. van Fraassen attributes the observation that why-interrogatives are contrast-sensitive to Bengt Hansson (van Fraassen 1980, p. 127). In a footnote he traces it to Hansson’s “Explanations-of-What?”, mimeographed and circulated, Stanford University, 1974. He adds that “[t]he idea was independently developed, by Jon Dorling in a paper circulated in 1976, and reportedly by Alan Garfinkel ...” (van Fraassen 1980, p. 224, fn. 34). Garfinkel’s work was unpublished at the time, but was published as Garfinkel (1981). See also Achinstein (1983) and Bromberger (1992) for seminal discussions.

  7. For a defence of such context-shifting arguments see Szabó (2006) and for criticism see Cappelen and Lepore (2005).

  8. I recognise that these judgements about how-interrogatives may be controversial. This is certainly an area that deserves further investigation. If it turns out that how-interrogatives are also contrast sensitive, then the question arises as to whether this motivates a kind of exceptionalism about how-interrogatives or whether such contrast sensitivity can be accommodated on the usual syntax and semantics of how-interrogatives. My view is that if how-interrogatives are contrast-sensitive, this can be accommodated on the usual syntax and semantics and that something along the lines of the account given for why-interrogatives in the final section of this paper might be modified to accommodate how-interrogatives.

  9. A suggestion along these lines is made in Skow (2016), p. 63.

  10. This label isn’t meant to have too much theoretical significance. See Gazdar et al. (1985), Chap. 7 for discussion. See also Engdahl (1986), Chap. 2, Pollard and Sag (1994), p. 157, Borsley (1996), Chap. 9, Huddleston and Pullum (2002), p. 914 and Sag (2010), p. 505.

  11. The phrase structure approach has been developed in various ways. In addition to Gazdar (1981) and Gazdar et al. (1985), see Pollard and Sag (1994), Hukari and Levine (1995), Bouma et al. (2001), Culicover and Jackendoff (2005) and Ginzburg and Sag (2000). Much of the discussion to follow can be recast in terms of the GB theory of Chomsky (1988). See also Chomsky (1977) and Chomsky (1986). For an overview of the GB syntax of wh-interrogatives in a philosophical setting see Higginbotham (1997), Sect. 2.

  12. For more detail, see Gazdar (1981) and Gazdar et al. (1985) or Culicover and Jackendoff (2005), pp. 330–331.

  13. Such an argument is given in Haegeman (1994) for thinking that adjunct wh-interrogatives are filler-gap constructions. See also Borsley (1996), p. 161.

  14. Here I am drawing on Hamblin (1958, 1973), Karttunen (1977), Belnap (1982) and Groenendijk and Stokhof (1984). The theory I offer is closest to the theory of Hamblin (1973).

  15. Propositional function views have a venerable history. See Cohen (1929), p. 353 and Hull (1975), p. 35.

  16. This observation is made by Belnap (1982), pp. 172–174.

  17. This approach is taken in Stanley and Szabó (2007), Stanley (2007, 2011), Groenendijk and Stokhof (2011) and George (2011).

  18. Unfortunately, Bromberger doesn’t provide any details about the source of this ‘well-known argument’.

  19. In the philosophical literature, both van Fraassen (1980) and Hintikka and Halonen (1995) take their cue directly from Bromberger without mentioning his arguments. Tsai and Stepanov (2008) is a representative example in the linguistics literature where Bromberger’s arguments are wheeled out and slightly modified in support of exceptionalism.

  20. See Cattell (1978) for some critical discussion of this line of argument.

  21. See Hukari and Levine (1995), pp. 206–207 for discussion of the data from McCloskey (1979), pp. 171–172.

  22. See also Huddleston (1984), Haegeman (1994), pp. 517–518, Higginbotham (1997), Sect. 3, Asher and Lascarides (1998), p. 268, Stanley and Williamson (2001), Stanley (2011), Pietroski (2006), p. 834 and Sag (2010), p. 533.

  23. I’d like to thank a reviewer for Synthese for bringing the following evidence to my attention.

  24. Again, I am thankful to a reviewer from Synthese for this point.

  25. The main advantage this theory has over the similar proposal in Higginbotham (1993) is that it does not assume that why-interrogatives are ambiguous with respect to ‘because’ and ‘in order to’.

  26. See, for instance, Skow (2016), p. 26, Huddleston and Pullum (2002), p. 725, Huddleston and Pullum (2005), p. 166, Stanley (2011), p. 45, Achinstein (1983), p. 30, and George (2011), p. 29.

  27. It is related to the Old English ’hw’-words ’hwa’ (who) and ’hwæt’ (what). ’Hwy’ is in the instrumental case (Hogg 2002, p. 71).

  28. See Traugott (1992), p. 253.

  29. For statements of this intuitive idea see Huddleston (1984), p. 366 and Stanley and Williamson (2001), p. 422.

  30. Salmon and Kitcher discuss one possible way of doing this, drawing on van Fraasen’s remarks (Kitcher and Salmon 1987, pp. 319–322).

  31. See Beaver and Clark (2008) for further discussion of focus and domains of quantification.

  32. For a particularly sophisticated model applied particularly to the case of how-interrogatives see Asher and Lascarides (1998). See also van Rooy (2003), Ginzburg (2012) and Roberts (2012).

  33. See Nickel (2010) for a similar conclusion about ‘because’-constructions.

References

  • Achinstein, P. (1983). The nature of explanation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Asher, N., & Lascarides, A. (1998). Questions in dialogue. Linguistics and Philosophy, 21(3), 237–309.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beaver, D. I., & Clark, B. Z. (2008). Sense and sensitivity: How focus determines meaning. Chichester: Wiley Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Belnap, N. D. (1982). Questions and answers in montague grammar. In S. Peters & E. Saarinen (Eds.), Processes, beliefs, and questions (pp. 165–198). Dordrecht: Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bengson, J., & Moffett, M. A. (Eds.). (2011). Knowing how: Essays on knowledge, mind, and action. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Borsley, R. D. (1996). Modern phrase structure grammar. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bouma, G., Malouf, R., & Sag, I. A. (2001). Satisfying constraints on extraction and adjunction. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 19(1), 1–65.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bromberger, S. (1992). On what we don’t know. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cappelen, H., & Lepore, E. (2005). Insensitive semantics: A defense of semantic minimalism and speech act pluralism. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cattell, R. (1978). On the source of interrogative adverbs. Language, 54(1), 61–77.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chomsky, N. (1977). On wh-movement. In P. W. Culicover, T. Wasow, A. Akmajian, & A. Akmajian (Eds.), Formal syntax. New York, NY: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chomsky, N. (1986). Knowledge of langauge: Its nature, origin, and use. New York, NY: Praeger Scientific.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chomsky, N. (1988). Lectures on government and binding. Dordrecht: Foris Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, F. S. (1929). What is a question? The Monist, 39, 350–364.

    Google Scholar 

  • Collins, C. (1991). Why and how come. In L. L. S. Cheng & H. Demirdache (Eds.), MIT working papers in linguistics 15: More papers on wh-movement (pp. 31–45). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cross, C. B. (1991). Explanation and the theory of questions. Erkenntnis, 34, 237–260.

    Google Scholar 

  • Culicover, P. W., & Jackendoff, R. (2005). Simpler syntax. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Engdahl, E. (1986). Constituent questions: The syntax and semantics of questions with special reference to Swedish. Dordrecht: D. Reidel Publishing Company.

    Google Scholar 

  • Garfinkel, A. (1981). Forms of explanation. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gazdar, G. (1981). Unbounded dependencies and coordinate structure. Linguistic Inquiry, 12(2), 155–184.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gazdar, G., Klein, E., Pullum, G. K., & Sag, I. A. (1985). Generalized phrase structure grammar. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • George, B. R. (2011). Question embedding and the semantics of answers. UCLA Dissertation.

  • Ginzburg, J. (2012). The Interactive Stance. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ginzburg, J., & Sag, I. A. (2000). Interrogative investigations. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Groenendijk, J., & Stokhof, M. (1982). The semantic analysis of wh-compliments. Linguistics and Philosophy, 5, 175–233.

    Google Scholar 

  • Groenendijk, J., & Stokhof, M. (1984). Studies on the semantics of questions and the pragmatics of answers. Ph.D. thesis, University of Amsterdam.

  • Groenendijk, J., & Stokhof, M. (2011). Questions. In J. van Bentham & A. ter Meulen (Eds.), Handbook of logic and language (2nd ed., pp. 1133–1146). Amsterdam: Elsevier.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haegeman, L. (1994). Introduction to government and binding theory. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hamblin, C. L. (1958). Questions. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 36(3), 159–168.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hamblin, C. L. (1973). Questions in montague english. Foundations of Language, 10(1), 41–53.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hempel, C. G. (1965). Aspects of scientific explanation and other essays in the philosophy of science. New York, NY: The Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Higginbotham, J. (1993). Interrogatives. In K. Hale & S. J. Keyser (Eds.), The view from building 20. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Higginbotham, J. (1997). The semantics of questions. In S. Lappin (Ed.), The handbook of contemporary semantic theory. Blackwell.

  • Hintikka, J., & Halonen, I. (1995). Semantics and pragmatics for why-questions. The Journal of Philosophy, 92(12), 636–657.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hitchcock, C. (1999). Contrastive explanation and the demons of determinism. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 50(4), 585–612.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hogg, R. (2002). An introduction to old English. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Huddleston, R. (1984). Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Huddleston, R., & Pullum, G. K. (2002). The Cambridge grammar of the English language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Huddleston, R., & Pullum, G. K. (2005). A student’s introduction to English grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hukari, T. E., & Levine, R. D. (1995). Adjunct extraction. Journal of Linguistics, 31, 195–226.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hull, R. D. (1975). A semantics for superficial and embedded questions in natural language. In E. L. Keenan (Ed.), Formal semantics of natural language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Karttunen, L. (1977). Syntax and semantics of questions. Linguistics and Philosophy, 1, 3–44.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kitcher, P., & Salmon, W. (1987). Van fraassen on explanation. The Journal of Philosophy, 84(6), 315–330.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ko, H. (2005). Syntax of why-in-situ: Merge into [spec, cp] in the overt syntax. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 23, 867–916.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ko, H. (2006). On the structural height of reason wh-adverbials: Acquisition and consequences. In L. L. S. Cheng & N. Corver (Eds.), Wh-movement: Moving on. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Koura, A. (1988). An approach to why-questions. Synthese, 74(2), 191–206.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, D. (1987). Causal explanation. In Philosophical papers (Vol. 2). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

  • Lipton, P. (1990). Contrastive explanation. Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement, 27, 247–266.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lipton, P. (1991). Contrastive explanation. Philosophy of Science, 58(4), 687–697.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lipton, P. (2004). Inference to the best explanation. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • McCloskey, J. (1979). Transformational syntax and model theoretic semantics: A case study in modern Irish. Dordrecht: D. Reidel Publishing Company.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nickel, B. (2010). How general do theories of explanation need to be? Noûs, 44(2), 305–328.

    Google Scholar 

  • Parsons, T. (1990). Events in the semantics of English. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Partee, B. H. (1991). Topic, focus, and quantification. In: S. Moore & A. Z. Wyner (Eds.), Proceedings of SALT 1, Cornell working papers in linguistics, pp 159–187.

  • Pietroski, P. (2006). Logical form and lf. In E. Lepore & B. C. Smith (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of philosophy of language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pollard, C., & Sag, I. A. (1994). Head-driven phrase structure grammar. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rizzi, L. (2001). On the position int(errogative) in the left periphery of the clause. In G. Cinque & C. Salvi (Eds.), Current studies in Italian syntax: Essays offered to Lorenzo Rizzi. Amesterdam: Elsevier.

    Google Scholar 

  • Roberts, C. (2012). Information structure in discourse: Towards an integrated formal theory of pragmatics. Semantics and Pragmatics, 5, 1–69.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rooth, M. E. (1985). Association with focus. Ph.D. thesis, University of Massachusetts.

  • Rooth, M. E. (1992). A theory of focus interpretation. Natural Language Semantics, 1, 75–116.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rooth, M. E. (1996). Focus. In S. Lappin (Ed.), The handbook of contemporary semantic theory. Basil: Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ruben, D. H. (1987). Explaining contrastive facts. Analysis, 47(1), 35–37.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ruben, D. H. (1992). Explaining explanation. Abingdon, OX: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sag, I. A. (2010). English filler-gap constructions. Language, 86(3), 486–545.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sandborg, D. (1998). Mathematical explanation and the theory of why-questions. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 49(4), 603–624.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shlonsky, U., & Soare, G. (2011). Where’s ‘why’? Linguistic Inquiry, 42(4), 651–669.

    Google Scholar 

  • Skow, B. (2016). Reasons why. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stanley, J. (2007). Language in context. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stanley, J. (2011). Know how. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stanley, J., & Szabó, Z. G. (2007). On quantifier domain restriction. In Language in context. Oxford University Press.

  • Stanley, J., & Williamson, T. (2001). Knowing how. The Jounral of Philosophy, 98(8), 411–444.

    Google Scholar 

  • Szabó, Z. G. (2006). Sensitivity training. Mind and Language, 21(1), 31–38.

    Google Scholar 

  • Temple, D. (1988). The contrast theory of why-questions. Philosophy of Science, 55(1), 145–151.

    Google Scholar 

  • Thornton, R. (2008). Why continuity. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 26, 107–146.

    Google Scholar 

  • Traugott, E. C. (1992). Syntax. In The Cambridge history of the English language: Volume I the begginings to 1066, Cambridge University Press.

  • Tsai, W. T. D., & Stepanov, A. (2008). Cartography and licensing of wh-adjuncts: A cross-linguistic perspective. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 26(3), 589–638.

    Google Scholar 

  • van Fraassen, B. (1980). The scientific image. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • van Rooy, R. (2003). Questioning to resolve decision problems. Linguistics and Philosophy, 26(6), 727–763.

    Google Scholar 

  • Winiewski, A. (1999). Erotetic logic and explanation by abnormic hypotheses. Synthese, 120(3), 295–309.

    Google Scholar 

  • Woodward, J. (2003). Making things happen: A theory of causal explanation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

I’d like to thank members of the Forschungskolloquium: Sprache & Welt at the University of Hamburg for comments on an earlier version of this essay. I’d also like to thank an audience at the ANU Philosophy of Mind Work in Progress Group for comments on a more recent version of this essay. I’d especially like to thank Benjamin Schnieder and Daniel Stoljar for many helpful discussions on these and related topics. Finally, I’d like to thank three anonymous reviewers for Synthese for comments which significantly improved the essay. My time at the University of Hamburg was funded by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

    Ryan Cox

Authors
  1. Ryan Cox
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ryan Cox.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Cox, R. How why-interrogatives work. Synthese 198, 4651–4688 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02364-w

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02364-w

Keywords

Search

Navigation