Jonathan Ginzburg
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195389364
- eISBN:
- 9780199932368
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195389364.003.0009
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General, Metaphysics/Epistemology
It is argued that intellectualism is incompatible with the facts about complementation in a variety of languages. It is also argued that one of the main empirical bases for anti-intellectualism (the ...
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It is argued that intellectualism is incompatible with the facts about complementation in a variety of languages. It is also argued that one of the main empirical bases for anti-intellectualism (the alleged existence of ability-denoting ‘how to’ clauses) does not survive close scrutiny. At the same time, the chapter demonstrates the need to have abilities in the ontology of abstract entities that serve as arguments of attitude predicates; exemplifies the existence of epistemically oriented attitude predicates that select for both facts and abilities; sketches an ontology formalized in type theory with records for events, propositions, questions, outcomes, and abilities; indicates how a single verb can select for factive, resolutive, and ability-denoting infinitives without assuming lexical ambiguity; and shows how a semantic account of resolutive complementation (interrogatives embedded by predicates such as know, learn, and understand) extends to ‘how to’ clauses without introducing any additional mechanisms.Less
It is argued that intellectualism is incompatible with the facts about complementation in a variety of languages. It is also argued that one of the main empirical bases for anti-intellectualism (the alleged existence of ability-denoting ‘how to’ clauses) does not survive close scrutiny. At the same time, the chapter demonstrates the need to have abilities in the ontology of abstract entities that serve as arguments of attitude predicates; exemplifies the existence of epistemically oriented attitude predicates that select for both facts and abilities; sketches an ontology formalized in type theory with records for events, propositions, questions, outcomes, and abilities; indicates how a single verb can select for factive, resolutive, and ability-denoting infinitives without assuming lexical ambiguity; and shows how a semantic account of resolutive complementation (interrogatives embedded by predicates such as know, learn, and understand) extends to ‘how to’ clauses without introducing any additional mechanisms.
Osamu Sawada
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- December 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780198714224
- eISBN:
- 9780191782633
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198714224.003.0008
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Semantics and Pragmatics, Psycholinguistics / Neurolinguistics / Cognitive Linguistics
Chapter 8 investigates the interpretation of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers and considers the semantic mechanism behind subject- and speaker-oriented interpretations of embedded pragmatic scalar ...
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Chapter 8 investigates the interpretation of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers and considers the semantic mechanism behind subject- and speaker-oriented interpretations of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers and CIs. For a subject-oriented reading, it is argued that there is a shift from a CI to a secondary at-issue entailment at the clausal level when the embedded clause combines with an attitude predicate and has a subject-oriented reading. For a speaker-oriented reading of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers, it is claimed that the lower-level pragmatic scalar modifiers have the distinctive property of projection: unlike higher-level pragmatic scalar modifiers/typical CIs, lower-level pragmatic scalar modifiers can project out of the complement of a belief predicate only if there is a speaker-oriented modal in the main clause. This chapter shows that the interpretation of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers is not only a matter of context and involves semantic and pragmatic mechanisms.Less
Chapter 8 investigates the interpretation of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers and considers the semantic mechanism behind subject- and speaker-oriented interpretations of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers and CIs. For a subject-oriented reading, it is argued that there is a shift from a CI to a secondary at-issue entailment at the clausal level when the embedded clause combines with an attitude predicate and has a subject-oriented reading. For a speaker-oriented reading of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers, it is claimed that the lower-level pragmatic scalar modifiers have the distinctive property of projection: unlike higher-level pragmatic scalar modifiers/typical CIs, lower-level pragmatic scalar modifiers can project out of the complement of a belief predicate only if there is a speaker-oriented modal in the main clause. This chapter shows that the interpretation of embedded pragmatic scalar modifiers is not only a matter of context and involves semantic and pragmatic mechanisms.
