Indefinites, Skolem Functions, and Arbitrary Objects

2020 ◽  
pp. 98-112
Author(s):  
Gabriel Sandu
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
Dynamic Logic ◽  
Choice Functions ◽  
Alternative Framework ◽  
Team Semantics ◽  
Skolem Functions ◽  
Arbitrary Objects

In this chapter I will look at the semantic analysis of indefinites in English, and their treatment in the framework of Dynamic Logic, choice functions (epsilon terms), and Kit Fine’s arbitrary objects. In the end I will make some comparative remarks about the latter and the account in terms of Skolem functions that Fine criticized, and propose an alternative framework (team semantics).

The Way of Ideas and the Way of Reference

2019 ◽  
pp. 38-75
Author(s):  
Kenneth A. Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
First Order ◽  
Semantic Values ◽  
The Way

In the current chapter, I consider two competing metasemantic outlooks and their consequences for the metaphysical modesty or immodesty of first order semantic analysis. The two metasemantic approaches are rooted in what I call referential semantics and what I call ideational semantics. The foundational assumptions of referential metasemantics and ideational metasemantics are outlined with a focus on how each approach attempts to solve the determination problem. It is argued that different approaches to the determination problem lead to two different approaches to the metaphysics of the assigned semantic values. Finally, the way of ideas in metaphysics is distinguished from the way of reference in metaphysics.

scholarly journals "Different" as a Restriction on Skolem Functions

2016 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 546
Author(s):  
David Lahm
Keyword(s):  
Choice Function ◽  
Choice Functions ◽  
Lexical Resource ◽  
Skolem Functions ◽  
Resource Semantics

An analysis of different as in every child watched a different movie is developed that is based on an analysis of indefinites in terms of Skolemised choice functions. The internal reading of the sentence, which expresses that the movies covary with the children, is analysed as stating that the children can be mapped injectively to movies they watched. This is achieved by letting the Skolemised choice function that interprets the indefinite pick, for each child, an element from the set of movies that the same function does not assign to any other individual, which allows for analysing different in a manner parallelling ordinary intersective adjectives. Simply replacing this set of movies with the set of contextually salient movies then also gives the external reading. An implementation at the syntax-semantics interface is provided, employing Lexical Resource Semantics.

Uniformization and skolem functions in the class of trees

1998 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shmuel Lifsches ◽  
Saharon Shelah
Keyword(s):  
Order Theory ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Choice Functions ◽  
Skolem Functions ◽  
The Way

AbstractThe monadic second-order theory of trees allows quantification over elements and over arbitrary subsets. We classify the class of trees with respect to the question: does a tree T have definable Skolem functions (by a monadic formula with parameters)? This continues [6] where the question was asked only with respect to choice functions. A natural subclass is defined and proved to be the class of trees with definable Skolem functions. Along the way we investigate the spectrum of definable well orderings of well ordered chains.

Comments on Gabriel Sandu’s “Indefinites, Skolem Functions, and Arbitrary Objects”

2020 ◽  
pp. 423-428
Author(s):  
Kit Fine
Keyword(s):  
Skolem Functions ◽  
Arbitrary Objects ◽  
Independence Friendly Logic

Gabriel Sandu has made important contributions to the development of independence-friendly logic and I am grateful to him for his searching and sympathetic critique of my own work on arbitrary objects in relation both to independence friendly logic and to other treatments of quantificational and anaphoric dependence....

Feel Thine Own Self – Mood Congruency Evaluation of Emotional State Adjectives

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Szczepan J. Grzybowski ◽  
Miroslaw Wyczesany ◽  
Jan Kaiser
Keyword(s):  
Mood Induction ◽  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
Emotional State ◽  
Time Window ◽  
Event Related Potential ◽  
Negativity Bias ◽  
Positive Potential ◽  
Semantic Access ◽  
Current Mood ◽  
Component Time

Abstract. The goal of the study was to explore event-related potential (ERP) differences during the processing of emotional adjectives that were evaluated as congruent or incongruent with the current mood. We hypothesized that the first effects of congruence evaluation would be evidenced during the earliest stages of semantic analysis. Sixty mood adjectives were presented separately for 1,000 ms each during two sessions of mood induction. After each presentation, participants evaluated to what extent the word described their mood. The results pointed to incongruence marking of adjective’s meaning with current mood during early attention orientation and semantic access stages (the P150 component time window). This was followed by enhanced processing of congruent words at later stages. As a secondary goal the study also explored word valence effects and their relation to congruence evaluation. In this regard, no significant effects were observed on the ERPs; however, a negativity bias (enhanced responses to negative adjectives) was noted on the behavioral data (RTs), which could correspond to the small differences traced on the late positive potential.

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