roles and the compositional semantics of role-denoting

Rolesandthecompositionalsemanticsofrole-denotingrelationaladjectives

CurtAndersonandSebastianLöbnerSFB991,Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf

12th InternationalTbilisiSymposiumonLanguage,LogicandComputationLagodekhi,18−22September2017

(Slidesalsoatbit.ly/2xrZTpp)

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 0.Introduction 2

0.Introduction0.1Theproject• Somenominalssuchaspresident showanambiguitybetweenreadingsrelated toanofficialrole,andtoreadingsonapersonallevel.

Thepresidentvisitedhismother. (personalvisitpreferred)ThepresidentvisitedNetanyahu. (officialvisitpreferred)

• Thesereadingsaredriveninlargepartbyourunderstandingofsocial rolesintheworld:headsarestatearevisitedinthecourseofofficialdutiesofleadingacountry,whileparentsarenot.

• Puzzle:thesesamenominalsadmitforonly arole-related readingwhenusedasadjectives.Thepresidentvisitedhismother.Doesnotentail:Therewasapresidential visittothepresident’smother.

• Findthatdistinctionarisesnotjustwithverbalpredication,butpossessives aswell.thepresidentialdesk apresidentialadvisor (onlyofficial)thepresident’sdesk thepresident’sadvisor (personalorofficial)


0.1Theproject• Presidential(inthisexample) isarelationaladjective (RAs).Otherexamples:

Ukrainiancrisis,technical architect,nuclearwar,dental care,semanticsconference

• Inthistalk,wecallpresidential (andotherlikeadjectives)role-denotingrelational adjectives.Examples:president ::presidential mayor::mayoralsenator::senatorial pope::papal

• Theserole-denoting relational adjectivesforma(semi-)productivesubclassofRAs inEnglish.• Oftenderived fromanoun,butinsomecasesthisisonlyapparentdiachronically(e.g.,royal fromLat.rex ‘king’)


0.1Theproject

Questionsaddressedtoday

1. Howarerelationaladjectives,especiallythoseofthepresidential-type,represented?

2. Howarerolessemanticallyrepresentedanddistinguishedfromordinaryindividuals?


0.1TheprojectOuranswer

• Enrichontology withlevelsofaction (official andpersonal)

• Lexicallydecompose role-denoting nouns. They encode anevent atanofficial level ofaction.

• Role-denoting RAsrelatemeaningofmodified nominal totheofficial actions encoded intheadjective.

• Rolesarederived fromthematicroles ofeventsatanofficial levelofaction.

Bigpicture

• Howadjectives compose withthenouns thattheymodify

• Howworldknowledge andcontextinteractwithlexicalmeaning

• Howournaturallanguageontology isorganized,andwhatkinds ofthingswefind init(e.g.theprojectofnaturallanguagemetaphysics)


0.2Roadmapforthistalk

• Section1:Basicdataonrelationaladjectives

• Section2:PreviousaccountsofRAsandsomecritiques

• Section3:Ontologicalbackgroundforroles

• Section4:Analysisofpresidency,president,presidential

• Section5:Expandingontheanalysis

• Section6:Discussionandconclusion

Note:• Wefocusonpresidential asthebestandclearestexamplecaseinouranalysis.• Butthebasicanalysiscanbeextendedtootherexamplesoftheserole-denotingRAs.

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 1.Relationaladjectives 7

1.Relationaladjectives1.1Variantsofadnominalnon-propertyadjectiveuseClassificatoryuseSemanticsofA+N:Modifyinganounwithaclassificatoryadjectiveyieldsanexpressionforasubclassoftheclassdenotedbythemodifiednounalone.

• Examples:nuclearwarmusicalinstrumentdentalcare pediatricconferencepublicuniversity

• Mostclassificatoryadjectivesaredenominal,orthereisasemanticallyrelatednounmusical musicpediatric pediatricspublic publicdental teeth

• Classificatoryadjectivesarenotgradable.

• Propertyadjectivescanusuallynotbeusedpredicatively,butexceptionsarepossible#thecarewasdental#thisinstrumentismusical??thisconferenceispediatricthisuniversityispublic

• Outofcontext,classificatoryadjectivesdonotdefineaclassintheirownright.


1.1Variantsofadnominaladjectiveuse

Thematicuse

TheadjectiveisdenominalorotherwiselexicallycorrespondingtoanounNA.

SemanticsofA+N:ModifyinganounwithathematicadjectiveamountstothecharacterizationofaneventargumentoftheheadnounasacaseofNA.

• Examples: presidentialvisitFrenchpolicysemanticsworkshop

• Thematicadjectivesarenotgradable.

• Thematicadjectives canusuallynotbeusedpredicatively#thisvisitispresidential#thispolicyisFrench??thisworkshopissemantics

• Outofcontext,thematicadjectivesdonotdefineaclassintheirownright.


1.2Relationaladjectivesproper

RelationalA+Ncompositionally resultsinasense thatrelatesthesense ofNtoNA.

Therearethreenear-equivalent waysofsemantically joining twoNsenses:

English German Russian

deNA +N presidential visit prezidentN-skijA visit

NNcompound Präsidentenbesuch

possessive NN president’s visit Besuch desPräsidenten visitprezidentN-aGEN

deNA +N Ukrainian crisis

NNcompound UkraineNkrise

possessive NN

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 2.Previousaccounts 10

2.Previousaccounts2.1 PreviousaccountsI:Recoverablepredicates,thematicandclassificatoryadjectives

• Levi(1978)analyses compounds andRAsasbeingtransformationally derived frompredications thatmakeuseof asetofabstract“RecoverablyDeletable Predicates.”

CAUSE,HAVE,MAKE,USE,BE,IN,FOR,FROM,ABOUT

stresscausedbyheat->heatstress->thermalstress

• Raisesquestions ofwherethesepredicates comefrom, andwhyonly thesepredicates.

• Previous syntacticaccounts(Bosque andPicallo 1996,Alexiadou andStavrou 2011, a.o.)assumeadistinctionbetweenthematic andclassificatory uses ofRAs.

• Inthese accounts, thematicRAssyntactically saturateanargumentposition. Classificatory RAsaretrueadjectives (inmanyaccounts) andnotargument-saturating.

• Arsenijevic etal.(2014) provide argumentsagainstthis viewandforaviewthatRAsarealwaystrueadjectiveswithout syntacticargument-saturatingbehavior.

• Argument-saturatingbehavior isonly apparent.Product ofsemanticcomposition.

AndersonandLöbner:RelationalAdjectives2.Previousaccounts 11

2.2PreviousaccountsIIMcNally andBoleda (2004) arguethatrelationaladjectives areproperties of kinds andnotindividuals.

• Propose anintersective analysis ofRAs,adapting Larson’s (1998) analysis ofcertainevent-relatedadjectives(e.g.beautiful dancer,skillful surgeon), successfully capturingentailment patterns.

• Assume thatcommonnouns haveanargumentforaCarlsonian kind𝑥" inaddition toanargumentforanordinary individual 𝑦$ .Ordinary individual andkind relatedviaCarlson’s R(ealization) relation.

architect = 𝜆𝑥"𝜆𝑦$[𝑅 𝑥", 𝑦$ ∧ architect 𝑥" ]

• RAsareproperties ofkinds.

technical = 𝜆𝑥"[technical 𝑥" ]

• Intersectivemodification viathekind argument.

technicalarchitect = 𝜆𝑦$∃𝑥"[𝑅 𝑥", 𝑦$ ∧ architect 𝑥" ∧ technical 𝑥" ]


2.3 Objection:Paraphraseswithkind

• Givenakind-based analyses, wemightexpectparaphraseswithkind tobepossible withroleadjectives(e.g.anAkind ofN).

• Generally, paraphrases ofthissortarenotpossiblewithroleadjectives ordon’tcapturetherole-relatedmeaning.presidential election electionofthepresident (THEME) #presidential kind ofelectionpresidential office office [position] ofbeingpresident #presidential kind ofofficepresidential office office [room]usedbythepresident #presidential kind ofofficepresidential desk desk usedbythepresident #presidential kind ofdeskpresidential advisor advisor ofthepresident (GOAL) #presidential kind ofadvisorpresidential visit(1) visit bythepresident #presidential kind ofvisitpresidential visit(2) visit tothepresident #presidential kind ofvisitpresidential order orderissued bythepresident (AGENT) #presidential kind oforderpresidentialmotorcade motorcadeescorting thepresident #presidential kind ofmotorcade

• This suggeststhatkinds arenottheontological sortrelevantforananalysis ofadjectives likepresidential.


2.4 Objection:Relationsencodedintheadjective

• Arsenijević etal.(2014) propose thatcertainadjectives (French,Danish)domorethansimple intersectivemodification, butalsoencode anOrigin relation, relatingakind toalocation.

• But,therearemanypossible relations involved withpresidential.

presidential election electionwiththeaimofdeterminingthenext presidentincumbent (“thematic”)presidential office (1) theoffice of presidentrolepresidential office (2) office forcertaintypes ofofficial actionby thepresidentpresidential advisor advisor tothepresident forofficial actionpresidential visit (1) visitby thepresidentasthepresident (“thematic”)presidential visit (2) visitto thepresidentasthepresident (“thematic”)presidential order orderby thepresidentaspartofexecutingpresidentialrights (“thematic”)presidentialmotorcade motorcade[for] escorting thepresident onofficial travel

• Encoding therelationwithin theadjective istoostrong.Notageneralstrategyforrole-denoting RAs.

• Therelationmustcome fromthemodified noun and/or abridging relationprovided bycontext.


2.5 Objection:Predicationswithrelationaladjectives

• Theaccountofrelationaladjectives asproperties ofkinds predicts thattheyshould beabletotakekind-denoting DPsasarguments(such asBPsorkind-denoting indefinites) whenused predicatively.

This ispossible, thoughnotalwaysso.

Forwomenconcernedabouttheirfuturefertilityforreasonsthat aremedical, socialorfinancial…

*Doctors/*Adoctorcanbemedical.

• Additionally, RAsusedpredicatively cansometimespredicateofnon-kind-denoting DPs,which should resultinatypemismatch.

Thisuniversity ispublic, butprivateuniversities and collegesarealso ontheisland.

Anearlygoalofdiagnosis istodeterminewhetherthe condition isviral or bacterial.

• This distribution isn’t straightforwardlypredictedbyRAsaspredicatesofkinds; otherpragmaticandsemantic propertiesmustbeinvolved.

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 3.Ontologicalbackground 15

3.Ontologicalbackground3.1Socialontology

• Asocial ontology provides forsocial entitiessuch aspersons andinstitutions, roles, offices, functions, andactions bysocial agents(e.g.voters, politicians, police, parents,spouses, teachers,etc.).

• Essential tothesocial ontology aresocial actsperformed bysocialagentsthatproduce social factsby acting,implementing social roles, etc.

• Entitiesinthesocial ontology are(ultimately) implemented byentities inaphysical ontology:persons areimplemented byhuman animals, andsocial actsareimplemented bydoings thatunderappropriate circumstances countas particularsocialacts(Searle1995).

• Thesocial ontology ofourworld isinitselfmulti-level.Forexample, persons aresocialentities thatmaytakeinsocial roles(ahigherlevel).

• Thesocial ontology isgroundedby anddependent onthephysical ontology.


3.2Officeandpersonlevelsofaction• Asocial office, like‘president oftheUS’, isdefined atanon-basic, abstractlevelofsocial ontology.Thereisanincumbent oftheoffice, aperson.

• Certaintypes ofactsareconsidered actsbytheoffice(ratherthantheindividual).

• Beinganabstractinstitution, theoffice cannotexecutetheact.

• Official actshavetobeimplemented by theperson in office.

• Whatoffice-holders dowhentheyimplement anofficial actisnot theofficial actbecause theofficial actisanactby theoffice, notbyitsincumbent.

office

incumbent

AGENT

implementationofofficialactAGENT

office level

person level

officialact


3.3Connectionsbetweenlevels

• Thereisafunction INC thatreturns theincumbent fortheoffice.

• Thereisafunction IMPL thatreturns theimplementing actA↧ fortheofficial actA.AandA↧havethesametemporalextension τ.

• Thereisa(partialfunction) CONST thatreturnstheimplemented actA↥ fortheimplementary act.This relationisGoldman’s (1970) “level-generation”.

office

incumbent

AGENT

implementationofofficialactAGENT

officialactoffice level

person level

INC IMPLCONST


3.3Anoteonnotation• FrameSemantics asformalizedbyPetersen(2007) andLöbner (2014).

• Frameisarecursive attribute–valuestructure.

• Model lexicalandworld-knowledge within thesamerepresentation.

• Frameattributesarefunctions.

• Wemovebackandforthbetweenusing first-orderformalizations of framesandgraph-theoretic framediagrams.But,nothing crucial isgainedorlostwitheitherformalization.

• Arcsrepresentattributes, nodes representvalues.

• Distinguished node (in yellow) represents thereferentialargumentoftheframe.

baATTRIBUTE

A

𝜆𝑎.𝐀 𝑎 ∧ ATTRIBUTE 𝑎 = 𝑏

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 4.Presidency–president- presidential 19

4.Presidency−president−presidential4.1*Presideandpresidency• Thenotions of‘president’ and‘presidency’ aredefined (by socialregulation) attheofficelevel.

• Weassume thatthebasic notion istheoneof ‘presidency’.

• Apresidency isaneventwithtwoarguments, anORG[ANIZATION] andaHEAD.We introduce ahypothetical verb*preside forthistypeofevent.

• Likeforanyevent, thereisatemporal extension τ foreverypresidency. We assume thatpresidencies aretemporally uninterrupted.

λe(*preside(e) ˄ HEAD(e)=p ˄ ORG(e)=o ˄ τ(e)=t)

peHEAD

officeleveloORG

t

τ

*preside


4.1*Presideandpresidency

• Evidenceforanevent*preside fromderivationalmorphology.

• president->presidency.Shiftfrompresidentindividualattheofficeorpersonalleveltothe*preside eventattheofficelevel.

BarackObama’spresidencylastedeightyears.

BecausehispresidencyoccurredbetweenthoseofGroverClevelandandTheodoreRoosevelt,McKinley’saccomplishmentshaveoftenbeenoverlooked.

• Note:Notcrucialforouranalysisthatpresidencyitself denoteanevent.

• But,wedoneedaneventincorporatedintothemeaningofpresident.

• SimilarmoveismadebyLarson(1998)fornouns likeking thatalsodonotobviouslyhaveanevent.


4.2President• Thenounpresidentisindiscriminately used attheofficeand theperson level.

• Wederiveitsmeaning fromthe*presideframe,aseithertheheadorincumbent.

• Assumption: Foreverytimet,every organizationo, thereisatmostonepresidency obtaining.

presidentoffice(t, o) =def HEAD (ιe(*preside(e) ˄ tin τ(e)˄ ORG(e)=o)presidentperson(t, o) =def INC (HEAD (ιe(*preside(e) ˄ tin τ(e)˄ ORG(e)=o)

peHEAD

officeleveloORG

τ

*preside

p↧

INC

personlevel

president:


4.3Presidential• Theadjectivepresidential, inthemeaningunderlying itsRAuse, relatestotheoffice level.

• ItIsalsobasedontheconcept*preside.

• ItappearstolacktheORG andtheτ arguments.

peHEAD officelevel

*preside

presidential:

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 5.Compositionalanalysis 23

5.Compositionalanalysis5.1Reminder:Possiblereadingsforvisiting-presidentconstructions

officialreading personalreading

(1) TheUSpresidentvisitstheRussianpresident. available* available

(2) TrumpvisitsPutin. worldknowledge:available available

(3) Trumpvisitshisson. worldknowledge:notavailable available

(4) presidentialvisit available notavailable

(5) thepresident’svisit available available

NoteThe“official”readingisalso possible witharbitrarydenotations oftheoffice-holders ifsupportedbyworldknowledge (cf.(2)and(3)).


5.1Possiblereadingsforvising-presidentsconstructionsNote

• OnlytheNposs N variantallowsforboththepersonreadingandtheofficereading.

• TheNposs Nvariantistheonly onewherethefirstN refers.

• Nroots ofdenominal words donotrefer.

• Comparepresidential advisor regularadvisor forofficial presidentialmattersvs.president’s advisor advisor ofthepresident inarbitrarymatters

(including suchunrelated topresident’s office)

presidential desk desk forthepresident forhis official usevs.president’s desk desk usedbythepresident foranypurpose

(possibly unrelated topresident’s office)


5.2Generalassumptionsoncomposition

Weassumethat…

• Thebasicmechanismofcompositionisunification,ratherthanfunctionapplication.

• Whentwomeaningsareunified,theremaybemorethanonpossibilityforunification.Compositionisnotnecessarilydeterministic.

• Expressionswithmulti-leveldenotationlendthemselvesforunificationatalllevelsinvolved.

• Semanticconceptsarebasedon,andembeddedin,ourgeneralontologyandknowledgeoftheworld.

• Contextualknowledgemayenableorpreventparticularchoicesforunification.


5.3OfficialvisitThepresident visitedNetanyahu.

Reading1:Official visitofficial byvisitor inoffice tohost insomeoffice.• visitofficial requires agentandhost attheoffice level• Theagentnodeunifieswiththeoffice-level nodeofthe‘president’frame.• Theoffice ofcorresponding toNetanyahucomes fromworld knowledge.• ReferencetothepersonofNetanyahunecessitates elaboration ofthepersonal level.

pHEAD

oORG

τ

*preside

p↧

INC

e

visitofficial

INC

Netanyahu

HOST

e↧

IMPL

AGENT

HOSTAGENT

visitofficial↧

officelevel

personlevel


5.4PersonalvisitThepresident visitsNetanyahu.

Reading2:Personal visit.

• visit asaverbof non-institutional personal actionrequires agentandhostatthepersonal level

• Theagentnodeunifies withtheincumbentnodeof thepresident frame.

pHEADo ORG

τ

*preside

p↧

INC

NetanyahueHOSTAGENT

visit

officelevel

personlevel


5.5Presidentialvisitpresidential visit

• Theframeforpresidential does notprovide nodes attheperson level.

• Theonly targetforunification istheoffice-level president node.

Possible unifications: The‘president’ node canunifywitheither theagentorthehostnodeof‘visit’.

peHEAD

*preside

e

visitofficialHOSTAGENT officelevel

peHEAD

*preside

e

visitofficialHOSTAGENT

officelevel

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 6.Conclusion 29

6.Conclusions6.1Socialontology

• Theanalysis ofrole-denoting adnominal adjectives requiresarichontologythatincludes asocial ontologyandisabletodistinguish between levelsthatconstitute, orimplement eachothers.

• Roles, atleastsome, canbederived fromeventsofrole-incumbency atanappropriate levelinthesocialontology. Theyarethematicrolesinthistypeofevent.

• Rolesasabstractentitiesinthesocial ontology arelinkedbytheincumbentrelation toentitiesatthelevelofpersons inthesocial ontology.

• Theontology levelof rolesandoffices provides forroleandoffice acts by agentsatthislevel.These actsarelevel-generated (Goldman1970) bydoings ofagentsatlowerlevels.

• Referencetoactsatoffice levelnecessarily requires lowerlevelimplementary action bytheincumbent oftheoffice.

• Thereisnocommitment to‘kinds’ or‘roles’ asprimitive ontological types.Kinds arenotinvolved. Rolesarethematicrolesof incumbency events.

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives 6.Conclusion 30

6.2Compositionalanalysis• Aframe-based lexicalsemantics allows theapplication ofunificationasthebasicmechanism ofcomposition.

• Composition allowsformultiple readings fromthesamelexicalinput, ifunification ispossible inmorethanoneway.Thus composition isnotnecessarily deterministic.

• Theontology connects lexicalconcepts toworldknowledge.

• Some lexicalconcepts involvemorethanoneontological level.

• Composition requires level-selectionforunification.

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives Acknowledgments 31

Thankyou!

Acknowledgments

Theresearchreportedinthis presentationwassupported by theGermanScience Foundation (DFG),grantCRC991“TheStructure ofRepresentations inLanguage,Cognition, andScience”.

Thespeakersareobliged totheircolleaguesHenk Zeevat,Willi Geuder,Wiebke Petersen, Katja Gabrovska,GottfriedVosgerau,GerhardSchurz, andMarkusSchrenk forextendeddiscussion of thesemantic andontological issues involved.

Contact

CurtAnderson email:[email protected]

Sebastian Löbner email:[email protected]

CRC991ProjectC10 http://www.sfb991.uni-duesseldorf.de/en/c10/

Anderson&Löbner:Rolesandrelationaladjectives References 32

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roles and the compositional semantics of role-denoting

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