The formal semantics that we have proposed for definite and indefinite descriptions analyzes them both as variable-binding operators and as referring terms. It is the referential analysis which makes it possible to account for the facts outlined in Section 2, e.g. for the purely ‘instrumental’ role of the descriptive content; for the appearance of unusually wide scope readings relative to other quantifiers, higher predicates, and island boundaries; for the fact that the island-escaping readings are always equivalent to maximally wide scope (...) quantifiers; and for the appearance of violations of the identity conditions on variables in deleted constituents. We would emphasize that this is not a random collection of observations. They cohere naturally with each other, and with facts about other phrases that are unambigously referential.We conceded at the outset of this paper that the referential use of an indefinite noun phrase does not, by itself, motivate the postulation of a referential interpretation. Our argument has been that the behavior of indefinites in complex sentences cannot be economically described, and certainly cannot be explained, unless a referential interpretation is assumed. It could be accounted for in pragmatic terms only if the whole theory of scope relations and of conditions on deletion could be eliminated from the semantics and incorporated into a purely pragmatic theory. But this seems unlikely. (shrink)

The book from which these sections are excerpted is concerned with the prospects for assimilating the study of human intelligence and its products to the natural sciences through the investigation of cognitive structures, understood as systems of rules and representations that can be regarded as These mental structui′es serve as the vehicles for the exercise of various capacities. They develop in the mind on the basis of an innate endowment that permits the growth of rich and highly articulated structures along (...) an intrinsically determined course under the triggering and partially shaping effect of experience, which fixes parameters in an intricate system of predetermined form. It is argued that the mind is modular in character, with a diversity of cognitive structures, each with its specific properties arid principles. Knowledge of language, of the behavior of objects, and much else crucially involves these mental structures, and is thus not characterizable in terms of capacities, dispositions, or practical abilities, nor is it necessarily grounded in experience in the standard sense of this term. (shrink)

This paper claims that indefinite descriptions, singular and plural, have different scope properties than genuine quantifiers. This claim is based on their distinct behavior in island constructions: while indefinites in islands can have intermediate (and maximal) scope readings, quantifiers cannot. Further, the simplest in situ interpretation strategy for indefinites results in incorrect truth conditions for intermediate (and maximal) scope readings. I introduce a mechanism which “auto-matically” preserves the restriction on free variables corresponding to indefinites, in a way which allows the (...) restriction to be carried up in the course of semantic interpretation and to be used at the level where the variable is quantified. This mechanism is a realization of the “indefinites-as-free-variables” proposal of Lewis, Kamp, and Heim, but emphasizes the role of the restriction. I then show that distributive readings of plural indefinites also display island-escaping behavior and argue for an independent, island-insensitive distribution mechanism. (shrink)

This thesis explores the syntax and semantics of coordinate structures on the basis of three-dimensional syntactic structures. In particular it gives an analysis of sentences of the sort 'a man came and a woman left who knew each other well' on the basis of implicit coordination of NPs, made available within three-dimensionional syntactic structures..

Chapter. 1. Logical. Form. as. a. Level. of. Linguistic. Representation. What is the relation of a sentence's syntactic form to its logical form? This issue has been of central concern in modern inquiry into the semantic properties of natural ...

This study synthesizes current information from the various fields of cognitive science in support of a new and exciting theory of mind. Most psychologists study horizontal processes like memory and information flow; Fodor postulates a vertical and modular psychological organization underlying biologically coherent behaviors. This view of mental architecture is consistent with the historical tradition of faculty psychology while integrating a computational approach to mental processes. One of the most notable aspects of Fodor's work is that it articulates features not (...) only of speculative cognitive architectures but also of current research in artificial intelligence. (shrink)

Along the way, Zero Syntax also examines issues of broad significance to current theoretical linguistic research in syntax and lexical semantics.Zero Syntax ...

The Antisymmetry of Syntax proposes a restrictive theory of word order and phrase structure that denies this assumption.

In these essays the minimalist approach to linguistic theory is formulated and progressively developed.

Our paper presents a novel theory of weak crossover effects, based entirely on quantifier scope preferences and their consequences for variable binding. The structural notion of 'crossover' play no role. We develop a theory of scope preferences which ascribes a central role to the AGR-P System.

It is widely believed that existential quantifiers can bring about the semantic effects of a scope which is wider than their actual syntactic scope (See Fodor & Sag (1982), Cresti (1995), Kratzer (1995), Reinhart (1995) and Winter (1995), among many others.) On the other hand, it is assumed that the syntactic scope of universal quantifiers can be determined unequivocally by the semantics. This paper shows that this second assumption is wrong; universal quantifiers can also bring about scope illusions, though in (...) a very specific environment. In particular, we argue that in the environment of generic tense, universal quantifiers can show the semantic effects of a scope which is wider than the one that is actually realized at LF. Our argument has four steps. First, we show that in generic contexts, universal quantifiers escape standard “scope-islands” (Section 1). Second, we show how the effects of wide scope in generic contexts can be achieved without syntactic wide scope (Section 2.1). Third, we show that this result is actually forced on us, once we take seriously certain independent issues concerning the interpretation of generic tense (Sections 2.2 - 2.4). Finally, the semantics of generic tense and, in particular, its interaction with focus, will yield some intricate new predictions, which, as we show, are borne out (Sections 3 - 5). (shrink)

The paper investigates the scope properties of indefinites.

In this dissertation, I examine the effects of deaccenting--the removal of phonological accent from a constituent--on interpretation. In general, deaccenting of an element is possible only if that element is salient in the discourse context. Salience alone, however, is not a sufficient condition for deaccenting. ;I propose that deaccenting plays a role in identifying the focus-related topic of a sentence, where it is a necessary condition for a sentence to be felicitous in a given context that the focus-related topic of (...) that sentence be instantiated in the context. The focus-related topic of a sentence is generated by replacing all focused constituents by variables and combining the resulting structure so as to end up with the smallest structure within which all properties of the remaining lexical elements are satisfied. The resulting structure will be instantiated in a context if there is another element in the context with which it is non-distinct, where variables count as non-distinct from other elements of the same semantic type. ;The felicity or infelicity of a sentence in a larger discourse context is based upon the focus structure of the sentence and the composition of the context. While the analysis of this phenomenon is of some interest by itself, even more important is the use to which the analysis can be put in accounting for certain phenomena typically associated with VP deletion. Since Sag and Williams , it has standardly been assumed that restrictions on pronominal interpretations in VP deletion contexts are to be explained in terms of the mechanism that assigns an interpretation to an empty VP. However, we find that identical restrictions appear in contexts in which a VP has been deaccented but not deleted. (shrink)