scholarly journals Alternating conj/disjunctions: the case of Japanese "-toka" and "-tari"

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 ◽  
pp. 393-406
Author(s):  
Ryan Walter Smith ◽  
Ryoichiro Kobayashi
Keyword(s):  
Alternative Semantics ◽  
Downward Entailing

This paper investigates the interpretation of Japanese -toka and -tari, two nonexhaustiveparticles that receive conjunctive interpretations in upward-entailingenvironments, but disjunctive interpretations in downward-entailing and question contexts.We analyze -toka and -tari as items that introduce unstructured sets of alternatives in aHamblin-style alternative semantics (Hamblin, 1973; Kratzer and Shimoyama, 2002), andderive their conjunctive and disjunctive readings via an interaction between these sets and thesemantics of the environment containing them.Keywords: -toka, -tari, Japanese, alternative semantics, conjunction, disjunction

scholarly journals Indefinites and free choice

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marco Degano ◽  
Maria Aloni
Keyword(s):  
Free Choice ◽  
Historical Linguistics ◽  
Formal Semantics ◽  
Alternative Semantics ◽  
Current Usage ◽  
Diachronic Study ◽  
Grammatical Theories ◽  
Indefinite Pronouns

AbstractIndefinites display a great functional variety and they give rise to different pragmatic effects. We focus on free choice indefinites and in particular on the Italian qualsiasi. Our aim is to reconstruct the grammaticalization path of this item and understand how diachronic data might shed some light on existing semantic theories of free choice. We employ corpus-based tools to build a database containing occurrences of qualsiasi from its origin and early forms to its current usage. We show that qualsiasi emerged from a particular unconditional construction and we outline the different stages which led to its grammaticalization. We analyze the compatibility of our diachronic study with formal accounts of free choice inferences, with a focus on Alternative Semantics analyses for indefinite pronouns and so-called grammatical theories of free choice. Our work shows that an integration between formal semantics and historical linguistics is fruitful and worth pursuing.

scholarly journals Indefinites in Comparatives

2015 ◽  
pp. 19
Author(s):  
Maria Daria Aloni ◽  
Floris Roelofsen
Keyword(s):  
Free Choice ◽  
Alternative Semantics

The goal of this paper is to explain the meaning and distribution of indefinites in comparatives, focusing on the case of English 'some' and 'any' and German 'irgend'-indefinites. We combine three competing theories of comparatives with an alternative semantics of 'some' and 'any', and a novel account of stressed 'irgend'-indefinites. One of the resulting theories, based on Heim's (2006) analysis of comparatives, predicts all the relevant differences in quantificational force, and explains why free choice indefinites are licensed in comparatives.

scholarly journals The Interpretation of Disjunction in the Scope of Dou in Child Mandarin

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shasha An ◽  
Peng Zhou ◽  
Stephen Crain
Keyword(s):  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Free Choice ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Judgment Task ◽  
Recent Theory ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Value Judgment ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
Downward Entailing ◽  
The Right

A recent theory provides a unified cross-linguistic analysis of the interpretations that are assigned to expressions for disjunction, Negative Polarity Items, Free Choice Items, and the non-interrogative uses of wh-phrases in languages such as Mandarin Chinese. If this approach is on the right track, children should be expected to demonstrate similar patterns in the acquisition of these linguistic expressions. Previous research has found that, by age four, children have acquired the knowledge that both the existential indefinite renhe “any” and wh-words in Mandarin Chinese are interpreted as Negative Polarity Items when they are bound by downward entailing operators, but the same expressions are interpreted as Free Choice Items (with a conjunctive interpretation) when they are bound by deontic modals (Mandarin keyi) or by the Mandarin adverbial quantifier dou “all”. The present study extends this line of research to the Mandarin disjunction word huozhe. A Truth Value Judgment Task was used to investigate the possibility that disjunction phrases that are bound by the adverbial quantifier dou generate a conjunctive interpretation in the grammars of Mandarin-speaking 4-year-old children. The findings confirmed this prediction. We discuss the implications of the findings for linguistic theory and for language learnability.

scholarly journals On Vendler’s freedom of choice

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. e460
Author(s):  
Ana Clara Polakof
Keyword(s):  
Free Choice ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
Alternative Semantics ◽  
Freedom Of Choice ◽  
Proper Understanding ◽  
Existential Import ◽  
The One ◽  
Short Essay

In this short essay, we will provide some contemporary remarks to Vendler (1962 and 1974). We will propose that his characterization of the Free Choice Item any can be properly explained if we take into account an alternative semantics framework. We will assume with Menéndez-Benito (2010) that it is a universal indeterminate pronoun, and with Aloni (2007) that it involves an exhaustification operator to explain its behavior. We will show that, if we take into account this approach, we will be able to explain what Vendler called freedom of choice, lack of existential import, lawlike propositions, among other characteristics. In addition, we will try to do some linguistics in philosophy, and try to explain how a proper understanding of FCI may help to better understand some reference related problems. Finally, we will show that if we take into account a speech act theory, as the one proposed by Searle (1985), we may account for some of the FCI particular behavior with regard to free choice.

scholarly journals An Alternative Semantics for Argumentative Systems.

2006 ◽  
Vol 10 (32) ◽  
Author(s):  
A.G. Stankevicius ◽  
G.R. Simari
Keyword(s):  
Alternative Semantics

scholarly journals The power of modal separation logics

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (8) ◽  
pp. 1139-1184 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stéphane Demri ◽  
Raul Fervari
Keyword(s):  
Separation Logic ◽  
Satisfiability Problem ◽  
Alternative Semantics ◽  
Temporal Logics ◽  
Original Language ◽  
Modal Operators ◽  
Logical Connectives ◽  
Np Complete ◽  
Memory States ◽  
The Difference

Abstract We introduce a modal separation logic MSL whose models are memory states from separation logic and the logical connectives include modal operators as well as separating conjunction and implication from separation logic. With such a combination of operators, some fragments of MSL can be seen as genuine modal logics whereas some others capture standard separation logics, leading to an original language to speak about memory states. We analyse the decidability status and the computational complexity of several fragments of MSL, obtaining surprising results by design of proof methods that take into account the modal and separation features of MSL. For example, the satisfiability problem for the fragment of MSL with $\Diamond $, the difference modality $\langle \neq \rangle $ and separating conjunction $\ast $ is shown Tower-complete whereas the restriction either to $\Diamond $ and $\ast $ or to $\langle \neq \rangle $ and $\ast $ is only NP-complete. We establish that the full logic MSL admits an undecidable satisfiability problem. Furthermore, we investigate variants of MSL with alternative semantics and we build bridges with interval temporal logics and with logics equipped with sabotage operators.

Alternative semantics for temporal logics

1983 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 213
Author(s):  
E. Allen Emerson
Keyword(s):  
Alternative Semantics ◽  
Temporal Logics
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