Abstract
The idea to use choice functions in the semantic analysis of indefinites has recently gained increasing attention among linguists and logicians. A central linguistic motivation for the revived interest in this logical perspective, which can be traced back to the epsilon calculus of Hilbert & Bernays (1939), is the observation by Reinhart (1992, 1997) that choice functions can account for the problematic scopal behaviour of indefinites and interrogatives. On-going research continues to explore this general thesis, which I henceforth adopt. In this paper I would like to address the matter from two angles. First, given that the semantics of indefinites involves functions, it still does not follow that these have to be choice functions. The common practise is to stipulate this restriction in order to get existential semantics right. However, a so-far open question is whether there is any way to derive choice function interpretation from more general principles of natural language semantics. Another question that has not been formally accounted for yet concerns the relationships between choice functions and the “specificity”/“referentiality” intuition of Fodor & Sag (1982) about indefinites. Is there a sense in which choice functions capture this popular pre-theoretical notion?
I would like to thank Johan van Benthem, Jaap van der Does, Danny Fox, Tanya Reinhart, Eddy Ruys and Henk Verkuyl for discussions.
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Winter, Y. (2000). What Makes Choice Natural?. In: von Heusinger, K., Egli, U. (eds) Reference and Anaphoric Relations. Studies in Linguistics and Philosophy, vol 72. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3947-2_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3947-2_12
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