Ways of scope taking
[The articles of this volume will not be indexed individually.] The book represents a unitary collection of papers devoted to linguistic quantification modelling, viz. an important contribution of the well-known UCLA school on computational linguistics. Some words about the studies contained: (1) Background Notions in Lattice Theory and Generalized Quantifiers (\textit{A. Szabolcsi}) offers an informal introduction to the pertinent notions necessary to (generalized) quantification theory. The paper (2) Variation, Distributivity, and the Illusion of Branching (\textit{F. Beghelli}, \textit{D. Ben-Shalom}, \textit{A. Szabolcsi}) shows that the usual notion of quantifier scope needs to be factored into variation, distributivity, and maximality, making a novel claim on the behaviour of quantifiers within the syntactic structure (branching reading) of a sentence. The paper (3) Distributivity and Negation: The Syntax of Each and Every (\textit{F. Beghelli}, \textit{T. Stowell}) is concerned with the syntax and semantics of quantifier scope construal, focusing on the distributive quantifiers ``every'' and ``each'', and their interaction with negation. (4) Strategies for Scope Taking (\textit{A. Szabolcsi}) proposed that Beghelli and Stowell's logical form (LF) to be quite directly mapped onto a modified discours representation by widening the class of discourse referents, the proposal being supported by Hungarian linguistic data. (5) Computing Quantifier Scope (\textit{E. P. Stabler}) offers a new perspective on the issue of how semantic properties of noun phrases may effect their scopal syntactic abilities. The approach is implemented within a novel formalization of minimalist syntax and applied to Benghelli and Stowell's theory of quantifiers. The aim of (6) Evaluation Indices and Scope (\textit{D. F. Farkas}) is to propose a theory in which the relative scope of two expressions is a matter of possible dependencies between indices; empirical coverage is invstigated on noun phrases, discourse scope of conditionals, modal and intensional expressions. (7) Weak Islands and an Algebraic Semantics for Scope Taking (\textit{A. Szabolcsi}, \textit{F. Zwarts}) explicates a denotational semantic limitation on scope interaction on the basis of some simple notions of lattice theory. (8) The Semantics of Event-Related Readings: A Case for Pair-Quantification (\textit{J. Doetjes}, \textit{M. Honcoop}) proposes quantification over \(\langle\text{event, object}\rangle\) pairs, with events having a join semilattice structure without a bottom element. Two papers in the volume are concerned with the phenomenon of pair-list readings: (9) Quantifiers in Pair-List Readings (\textit{A. Szabolcsi}) shows two distinct interpretations for quantifiers supporting pair-list readings in matrix and in complement contexts, while (10) The Syntax of Distributivity and Pair-List Readings (\textit{F. Beghelli}) distinguishes two types of distributivity patterns that are associated to quantifier phrases. Finally, in (11) Questions and Generalized Quantifiers (\textit{J. Gutiérrez Rexach}) the author interprets questions as functions that assign truth values to answer sets, explores the semantics of argument and modifier questions, multiple questions, and the interaction between declarative and interrogative quantifiers. The book fulfils the highest standards of scientific quality, thus represents the best interests of all the people whose working object is related somehow to natural language analysis.
scientific article; zbMATH DE number 1105207