DTAL Tuesday Colloquium, 15 November 2011

Default Semantics and Selected Applications

Kasia M. Jaszczolt

(1) Some British people like cricket.(1a) Some but not all British people like cricket.

(2) Tom dropped a camera and it broke.(2a) Tom dropped a camera and as a result it broke.

(3) Everybody read Frege.(3a) Every member of the research group read Frege.

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(4) Child to mother: Everybody has a bike.

(4a) All of the child’s friends have bikes.

(4b) Many/most of the child’s classmates have bikes.

(4c) The mother should consider buying her son a bike.

(4d) Cycling is a popular form of exercise among children.

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(4) Child to mother: Everybody has a bike.

(4a) All of the child’s friends have bikes.

(4b) Many/most of the child’s classmates have bikes.

(4c) The mother should consider buying her son a bike.

(4d) Cycling is a popular form of exercise among children.

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Contextualism, standard view:

The logical form becomes enriched/modulated as a result of pragmatic inference and the entire semantic/pragmatic product becomes subjected to the truth-conditional analysis.

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The logical form becomes ?enriched/modulated as a result of pragmatic inference and the entire semantic/pragmatic product becomes subjected to the truth-conditional analysis.

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?

How far can the logical form be extended? ‘How much pragmatics’ is allowed in the semantic representation?

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The logical form of the sentence can not only be extended but also replaced by a new semantic representation when the primary, intended meaning demands it. Such extensions or substitutions are primary meanings and their representations are merger representations in Default Semantics. There is no syntactic constraint on merger representations.

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Outline

• Default Semanticsunit of analysis sources of information contributing to the unitpragmatic compositionalitymerger representations: towards a formalization

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Outline

• Default Semanticsunit of analysis sources of information contributing to the unitpragmatic compositionalitymerger representations: towards a formalization

• Selected applications: temporal reference reports on epistemic attitudes (‘A believes that B s’)beliefs de se: 1st person reference and ‘cognitive access to

oneself’1111

Radical Contextualism

• The output of syntactic processing often leaves the meaning underdetermined.

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Radical Contextualism

• The output of syntactic processing often leaves the meaning underdetermined.

• The object of study of a theory of meaning is a pragmatically modified representation. (Default Semantics is a radical contextualist theory.)

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Radical Contextualism

• The output of syntactic processing often leaves the meaning underdetermined.

• This pragmatically modified representation is an object of study of a theory of meaning (Default Semantics is a radical contextualist theory).

• There is no syntactic constraint on the object of study.

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Interim summary

• The output of syntactic processing often leaves the meaning underdetermined.

• This pragmatically modified representation is an object of study of a theory of meaning (Default Semantics is a radical contextualist theory).

• There is no syntactic constraint on the object of study.

• Discourse meaning is construed as meaning intended by the Model Speaker and recovered by Model Addressee.

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(5) Child: Can I go to see Contagion?Mother: You are too small.

(5a) The child is too small to see the film Contagion in the cinema.(5b) The child can’t go to see the film.

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(5) Child: Can I go to see Contagion?Mother: You are too small.

(5a) The child is too small to see the film Contagion in the cinema.(5b) The child can’t go to see the film.

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• Interlocutors frequently communicate their main intended content through a proposition which is not syntactically restricted.

Experimental evidence:

Nicolle and Clark 1999Pitts 2005Sysoeva and Jaszczolt 2007

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Merger Representation

• Primary meanings are modelled as the so-called merger

representations.

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Merger Representation

• Primary meanings are modelled as the so-called merger representations.

• The outputs of sources of information about meaning merge and all the outputs are treated on an equal footing.

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Merger Representation

• Primary meanings are modelled as the so-called merger representations.

• The outputs of sources of information about meaning merge and all the outputs are treated on an equal footing. The syntactic constraint is abandoned.

• Merger representations have the status of mental representations.

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Merger Representation

• Primary meanings are modelled as the so-called merger representations.

• The outputs of sources of information about meaning merge and all the outputs are treated on an equal footing. The syntactic constraint is abandoned.

• Merger representations have the status of mental representations.

• They have a compositional structure.

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Sources of information for

(i) world knowledge (WK)(ii) word meaning and sentence structure (WS)(iii) situation of discourse (SD)(iv) properties of the human inferential system (IS)(v) stereotypes and presumptions about society and culture

(SC)

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Inferential System

(6) The winner of the 2011 Man Booker Prize wrote The Sense of an Ending.

(6a) Julian Barnes wrote The Sense of an Ending.

psychologism

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world knowledge (WK)

word meaning and sentence structure (WS)

situation of discourse (SD)

stereotypes and presumptions properties of human inferential system (IS) about society and culture (SC)

Fig. 1: Sources of information contributing to a merger representation Σ

merger representation Σ

The model of sources of information can be mapped onto types of processes that produce the merger representation of the primary meaning and the additional (secondary) meanings.

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Primary meaning:

combination of word meaning and sentence structure (WS)

conscious pragmatic inferencepm (from situation of discourse, social and

social, cultural and cognitive defaults (CD) cultural assumptions, and world world-knowledge defaultspm (SCWDpm) knowledge) (CPIpm) Secondary meanings:

Social, cultural and world-knowledge defaultssm (SCWDsm) conscious pragmatic inferencesm (CPIsm)

Fig. 2: Utterance interpretation according to the processing model of the revised version of Default Semantics

merger representation Σ

Mapping between sources and processes

WK SCWD or CPISC SCWD or CPIWS WS (logical form)SD CPIIS CD

In building merger representations DS makes use of the processing model and it indexes the components of with a subscript standing for the type of processing.

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Selected applications of DS

definite descriptionsproper namesbelief reports (de re/de dicto, de se)negation and other sentential connectivespresuppositionnumber termstemporal reference and modality

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Languages:

English, Korean, Thai, Persian, Russian, Polish, French, German, Italian

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Temporal reference

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Main questions

Is the human concept of time a universal concept?

Is it primitive or composed of simpler concepts?

How do linguistic expressions of time reflect it?

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Main questions

Is the human concept of time a universal concept?Probably yes

Is it primitive or composed of simpler concepts?Supervenient on properties of modality

How do linguistic expressions of time reflect it?Representations in Default Semantics

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What is expressed in the lexicon in one language may be expressed by grammar in another.

What is expressed overtly in one language may be left to pragmatic inference or default

interpretation in another.

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Swahili: consecutive tense marker ka(7)a. …wa-Ingereza wa-li-wa-chukua wa-le maiti,

3Pl-British 3Pl-Past-3Pl-take 3Pl-Dem corpses‘…then the British took the corpses,

b. wa-ka-wa-tia katika bao moja,

3Pl-Cons-3Pl-put.on on board oneput them on a flat board,

c. wa-ka-ya-telemesha maji-ni kwa utaratibu w-ote…3Pl-Cons-3Pl-lower water-Loc with order 3Pl-alland lowered them steadily into the water…’

adapted from Givón (2005: 154)

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(8) Lidia played a sonata. The audience applauded. e1 e2

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St’àt’imcets [stɬɛtɬemxəʧ] (Lillooet Salish), British Columbia

only future (kelh) – non-future distinction

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Central Pomo

Future can be realis or irrealis

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Thai

(9) m3ae:r3i:I kh2ian n3iy3ai:

Mary write novel

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Time as Modality: Supervenience

supervenience of the concept of time on the concept of epistemic detachment (temporal properties on modal properties in semantics)

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Merger Representations for the Past

(10) Lidia went to a concert yesterday.(regular past)

(11) This is what happened yesterday. Lidia goes to a concert, meets her school friend and tells her…(past of narration)

(12) Lidia would have gone to a concert (then).(epistemic necessity past)

(13) Lidia must have gone to a concert (yesterday). (epistemic necessity past)

(14) Lidia may have gone to a concert (yesterday).(epistemic possibility past)

(15) Lidia might have gone to a concert (yesterday).(epistemic possibility past)

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a cline of decreasing epistemic commitment

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Fig. 3: Degree of epistemic commitment for selected expressions with past-time reference

rp, pn enp epp

1 0

ACCΔ Σ ├

‘it is acceptable to the degree Δ that Σ is true’

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Merger Representations for the Present

(16) Lidia is at a concert now.(regular present)

(17) Lidia will be at a concert now.(epistemic necessity present)

(18) Lidia must be at a concert now.(epistemic necessity present)

(19) Lidia may be at a concert now.(epistemic possibility present)

(20) Lidia might be at a concert now.(epistemic possibility present)

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Fig. 4: Degree of epistemic commitment for expressions with present-time reference

rn enn epn

1 0

Fig. 5: Σ for example (17) ‘Lidia will be at a concert now’ (epistemic necessity present)

x t Σ' [Lidia]CD (x) now (t) [ACC

enn will ├ Σ'] WS,CPIpm Σ' [x be at a concert]WS

Σ

Merger Representations for the Future (21) Lidia goes to a concert tomorrow evening.

(‘tenseless’ future)(22) Lidia is going to a concert tomorrow evening.

(futurate progressive)(23) Lidia is going to go to a concert tomorrow evening. (periphrastic future)(24) Lidia will go to a concert tomorrow evening. (regular future)(25) Lidia must be going to a concert tomorrow evening. (epistemic necessity

future)(26) Lidia may go to a concert tomorrow evening. (epistemic possibility future)(27) Lidia might go to a concert tomorrow evening. (epistemic possibility future)

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Fig. 6: Degree of modal detachment for selected expressions with future-time reference

epf enf rf pf fp tf

1 0

(9) m3ae:r3i:I kh2ian n3iy3ai:

Mary write novel

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x y '

[m3ae:r3i:I]CD (x)

[n3iy3ai:]CD (y) ' [x kh2ian y]WS [ACC

rp ├ ']WS, CPIpm

Fig. 7: for example (3) ‘Mary wrote a novel’ (regular past)

Other applications vis-à-vis cross-linguisitic differences:some examples

Realis/irrealis future (Central Pomo): ACCΔ Σ ├

Consecutive tense (Swahili): WS + CPIpm

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Propositional attitude reports

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A believes that B φsB=CA believes that C φs

Substitution of coreferential terms in intensional contextssalva veritate

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(28) Tom believes that the author of Wolf Hall is coming to Cambridge this spring.

[Hilary Mantel]CD(x) default de re[Michael Morpurgo]CPI1(x) de dicto with a referential

mistake[the author of Wolf Hall]CPI1(x) de dicto proper

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‘x believes that ’. ’ Bel (x, ’)

The individual that corresponds to x on a certain interpretation has the cognitive state that correspondsto ’ on that interpretation.

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Fig. 8: Partial of the default de re reading of (28)

x y ’ [Tom]CD (x) [Hilary Mantel]CD (y) [[x]CD [believes]CD ’]WS

’: [[y]CD is coming to Cambridge this spring]WS

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Fig. 9: Partial of the reading de dicto with a referential mistake of (28)

x y ’ [Tom]CD (x) [Michael Morpurgo]CPIpm (y) [[x]CD [believes]CD ’]WS

’: [[y]CPIpm is coming to Cambridge this spring]WS

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Fig. 10: of the reading de dicto proper of (28)

x y ’ [Tom]CD (x) [the author of Wolf Hall]CPIpm (y) [[x]CD [believes]CPIpm ’]WS

’: [[y]CPI 1is coming to Cambridge this spring]WS

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The scenario:

(29) The person who agreed to organise the drinks is to blame.

(30) I am to blame. I completely forgot I was put in charge.

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Grammar/pragmatics interface in conveying the intended de se meaning

Representing de se reports in Default Semantics

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referential semantics conflates (1) with (2):

(29) The person who agreed to organise the drinks is to blame.

(30) I am to blame. I completely forgot I was put in charge.

x [to-blame(x)] (kasia jaszczolt)

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? Grammar produces the self-referring function

Chierchia (1989: 28): The cognitive access to oneself is ‘systematically excluded from the interpretation of (non-pronominal) referential expressions. It is systematically present in the interpretation of overt pronouns. It is systematically and unambiguously associated with the interpretation of PRO the null subject of infinitives and gerunds. It is associated with the interpretation of long-distance reflexives (at least in some languages)’.

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Interim results:

The cognitive access to oneself is

?‘systematically excluded from the interpretation of (non-pronominal) referential expressions’;

?‘systematically present in the interpretation of overt pronouns’; x ‘systematically and unambiguously associated with the

interpretation of PRO the null subject of infinitives and gerunds’;

‘associated with the interpretation of long-distance reflexives (at least in some languages)’.

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lexicon/grammar/pragmatics trade-offs

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(31) Kasia believes she is to blame.

readings: (i) de se(ii) de re about oneself

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Fig. 11: the non-default reading of (31), ‘de re about oneself’

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x y ’

[Kasia Jaszczolt]CD (x) [Kasia Jaszczolt]CPIpm (y) [y=x]WS [[x]CD [believes]CPIpm ’]WS

’: [[y]CPI is to blame]WS

Representing De Se Beliefs

Forthcoming. ‘Contextualism and minimalism on de se belief ascription’. In: N. Feit & A. Capone (eds). Attitudes De Se: Linguistics, Epistemology, Metaphysics. Stanford: CSLI Publications.

In preparation. ‘First-person reference and cognitive access to oneself’. Intercultural Pragmatics, special issue ‘Focus on the Speaker’.

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