Click Here ">
« July 2005 »
S M T W T F S
1 2
3 4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 22 23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31
You are not logged in. Log in
Entries by Topic
All topics  «
Counterfactuals
defl@tionism
GENERAL LOGIC
HUMAN SEMANTICS
Interconnections
PARACONSISTENCY
Polemics
SCIENCE & NEWS
Cognition & Epistemology
Notes on Pirah?
Ontology&possible worlds
PRAGMATICS
PROPAEDEUTICS
Syn-Sem Interface
Temporal Logic
Blog Tools
Edit your Blog
Build a Blog
RSS Feed
View Profile
Translate this
INTO JAPANESE
BROTHER BLOG
MAIEUTIKOS
LINGUISTIX&LOGIK, Tony Marmo's blog
Monday, 4 July 2005

Topic: Interconnections

The Elimination of Self-Reference
(Generalized Yablo-Series and the Theory of Truth)


By Phillippe Schlenker

Although it was traditionally thought that self-reference is a crucial ingredient of semantic paradoxes, Yablo showed that this is not so by displaying an infinite series of non-referential sentences which, taken together, are paradoxical (e.g. Yablo 2004). We generalize Yablo's result along two dimensions.
1. First, we investigate the behavior of Yablo-style series of the form {<s(i), [Qk: k> i] f[(s(k)) k≥i ]>: i≥0}, where for each i s( i) is a term that denotes the sentence [Qk: k> i] f[(s(k)) k≥i] ] (for some generalized quantifier Q and for some (fixed) truth function f). We show that for any n-valued compositional semantics and for any quantifier Q that satisfies certain natural properties, all the sentences in the series must have the same value. We derive a characterization of those values of Q for which the series is paradoxical in a natural trivalent logic.
2. Second, we show that in the Strong Kleene trivalent logic, Yablo's results are a special case of a much more general phenomenon: given certain assumptions, any semantic phenomenon that involves self-reference can be reproduced without self-reference (Cook 2004 proves a special case of this result, which only applies to logical paradoxes).

Specifically, we can associate to each pair <s, F> of a formula F named by a term s in a language L' a series of translations {<s( i), [Qk: k> i] [F] k>: i≥0} (where [F] kis a certain modification of F) in a quantificational language L* in such a way that
(i) none of the translations are self-referential,
(ii) in any fixed point I* of L*, all the translations of a given formula of L have the same value according to I*, and
(iii) there is a correspondence between the fixed points of L' and the fixed points of L* which ensures that the translations really do have the same semantic behavior as the sentences they translate.

We give a characterization of those generalized quantifiers Q which can be used in the translation.
Source: Online Papers in Philosophy

Posted by Tony Marmo at 07:15 BST
Updated: Monday, 4 July 2005 07:24 BST
Saturday, 2 July 2005

Topic: Cognition & Epistemology

Reference Determination and Conceptual Change


By Ingo Brigandt

The paper discusses reference determination from the point of view of conceptual change in science. The first part of the discussion uses the homology concept, a natural kind term from biology, as an example. It is argued that the causal theory of reference gives an incomplete account of reference determination even in the case of natural kind terms. Moreover, even if descriptions of the referent are taken into account, this does not yield a satisfactory account of reference in the case of the homology concept. I suggest that in addition to the factors that standard theories of reference invoke the scientific use of concepts and the epistemic interests pursued with concepts are important factors in determining the reference of scientific concepts. In the second part, I argue for a moderate holism about reference determination according to which the set of conditions that determine the reference of a concept is relatively open and different conditions may be reference fixing depending on the context in which this concept is used. It is also suggested that which features are reference determining in a particular case may depend on the philosophical interests that underlie reference ascription and the study of conceptual change.

Source: Online Papers in Philosophy

Posted by Tony Marmo at 07:20 BST
Tuesday, 28 June 2005

Now Playing: FROM COUNTERFACTUALS WEEK (UPDATED)
Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS

On the Lumping Semantics of Counterfactuals


By Makoto Kanazawa, Stefan Kaufmann and Stanley Peters

Kratzer (1981) discussed a naïve premise semantics of counterfactual conditionals, pointed to an empirical inadequacy of this interpretation, and presented a modification— partition semantics— which Lewis (1981) proved equivalent to Pollock's (1976) version of his ordering semantics. Subsequently, Kratzer (1989) proposed lumping semantics, a different modification of premise semantics, and argued it remedies empirical failings of ordering semantics as well as of naïve premise semantics. We show that lumping semantics yields truth conditions for counterfactuals that are not only different from what she claims they are, but also inferior to those of the earlier versions of premise semantics.

See also the Journal of Semantics 2005 22(2):129-151


Constraining Premise Sets for Counterfactuals


By Angelika Kratzer


This note is a reply to "On the Lumping Semantics of Counterfactuals" by Makoto Kanazawa, Stefan Kaufmann, and Stanley Peters. It argues first that the first triviality result obtained by Kanazawa, Kaufmann, and Peters does not apply to the analysis of counterfactuals in Kratzer (1989). Second, and more importantly, it points out that the results obtained by Kanazawa, Kaufmann, and Peters are obsolete in view of the revised analysis of counterfactuals in Kratzer (1990, 2002).

Posted by Tony Marmo at 00:01 BST
Updated: Tuesday, 28 June 2005 08:39 BST
Friday, 24 June 2005

Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS

On the practice of indirect reports


by Alessandro Capone

In this paper, I shall deal with the practice of indirect speech reports. I shall argue that indirect speech reports are transformations of original speech events (or speech acts), subject to severe limitations, which it is my aim in this paper to spell out in detail. I shall study the interactions with the theory of pragmemes, of indexicals, and of modes of presentation. I end this paper suggesting, given appropriate evidence, that a key to the understanding of indirect reports is the exploration of analogies with the theory of speech acts and that analogies with the theory of propositional attitudes may be misleading.

Source: Semantics Archive

Posted by Tony Marmo at 23:19 BST
Wednesday, 22 June 2005

Topic: GENERAL LOGIC

On the Storeyed Revenge of Strengthened Liars


By Jordan Howard Sobel

The Strengthened Liar observes that if we follow a partiality theorist and declare the Liar sentence neither true nor false (or failing to express a proposition, or suffering from some sort of grave semantic defect), then the paradox is only pushed back. For we can go on to conclude that whatever this status may be, it implies that the Liar sentence is not true. This claim is true, but it is just the Liar sentence again. We are back in paradox. (Glanzberg 2002, p. 468; 2004, p. 29; 2001, p. 222, “We are back in our contradiction.”)

There are problems with this charge that strengthened liar sentences avenge would be disparagements that they do not express propositions, by reappearing as claims that are easy consequences of these disparagements. For one thing, if, as one supposes, claims would be propositions not sentences, [t]his claim cannot be the Liar sentence again. (Cf., Grim 1991, p. 19.) For another thing, while it does follow from the disparagement that a Liar sentence does not express a proposition, that this sentence does not express a true proposition, it is a consequence of that disparagement that this claim or proposition is not expressed by the Liar sentence itself. However, there are ways in which informal and formal revelations that Liar sentences do not express propositions and seem to bring them back with vengeance. This is their story.

Source: Online Papers in Philosophy

Posted by Tony Marmo at 03:55 BST
Updated: Wednesday, 22 June 2005 04:03 BST
Tuesday, 21 June 2005

Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS

Standard and Non-Standard Quantifiers in Natural Language


By Edward L. Keenan

Since the early 1980s we have been witnessing an explosive growth in our knowledge of natural language quantifiers, specifically of their denotations as opposed to their form, distribution, or compositional interpretation. Our concern here is to unify and extend these results, highlighting generalizations of linguistic interest. We present first an inventory of semantically defined classes of quantifiers expressible in English, and then a list of linguistic generalizations stated in terms of these classes and their defining concepts. We close with two types of quantification that lie outside these classes and which invite further research as less is known about them.

Source: Online Papers in Philosophy

Posted by Tony Marmo at 03:03 BST
Thursday, 16 June 2005

Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS

Zero Tolerance for Pragmatics


By Christopher Gauker

The proposition expressed by a sentence is relative to a context. But what are the values of the context variables? Many theorists would include among these values aspects of the speaker's intention in speaking. My thesis is that, on the contrary, the values of the context variables never include the speaker's intention. My argument for this thesis turns on a consideration of the role that the concept of proposition expressed in context is supposed to play in a theory of linguistic communication and on a consideration of what a speaker and a hearer can reasonably expect of one another. Although I call this thesis zero tolerance for pragmatics, it is not an expression of intolerance for everything that might be called pragmatics.

Source: Online Papers in Philosophy

Posted by Tony Marmo at 07:48 BST
Updated: Thursday, 16 June 2005 07:59 BST
Friday, 10 June 2005

Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS

Questioning Contextualism


By Brian Weatherson


There are currently a dizzying variety of theories on the market holding that whether an utterance of the form S knows that p is true depends on pragmatic or contextual factors. Even if we allow that pragmatics matters, there are two questions to be answered. First, which kind of pragmatic factors matter? Broadly speaking, the debate here is about whether practical interests (the stakes involved) or intellectual interests (which propositions are being considered) are most important. Second, whose interests matter? Here there are three options: the interests of S matter, the interests of the person making the knowledge ascription matter, or the interests of the person evaluating the ascription matter.
This paper is about the second question. I’m going to present some data from the behaviour of questions about who knows what that show it is not the interests of the person making the knowledge ascription that matter. This means the view normally known as contextualism about knowledge-ascriptions is false. Since that term is a little contested, and for some suggests merely the view that someone’s context matters, I’ll introduce three different terms for the three answers to the second question.
• Environmentalism – The interests of S, i.e. her environment, matter.
• Indexicalism – The interests of the person making the knowledge ascription matter, so ‘know’ behaves like an indexical term.
• Relativism – The interests of the person evaluating the knowledge ascription matter, so knowledge ascriptions are not true or false simpliciter but only relative to an evaluator.

Posted by Tony Marmo at 05:40 BST
Updated: Friday, 10 June 2005 05:42 BST
Saturday, 4 June 2005

Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS
This post is also available here.

The Stanley-Rett Debate


Nominal Restriction


By Jason Stanley

Extra-linguistic context appears to have a profound effect on the determination of what is expressed by the use of linguistic expressions. For a bewildering range of very different linguistic constructions, adhering to relatively straightforward linguistic intuition about what is expressed leads us to the conclusion that facts about the nonlinguistic context play many different roles in determining what is said. Furthermore, that so many different constructions betray this sort of sensitivity to extra-linguistic context understandably leads to pessimism about rescuing the straightforward intuitions while preserving any sort of systematicity in the theory of meaning.
A presumption motivating the pessimistic inclination is that, if we accept the ordinary intuitions, what appears to be very different ways in which context affects semantic content in fact are different ways in which context affects linguistic content. Pessimism is a natural reaction to those who adopt this presumption, because if appearance is a good guide to the facts in this domain, then there are just too many ways in which context affects semantic content to preserve systematicity. One common and natural reaction to these facts is, therefore, to deny the semantic significance of the ordinary intuitions, thereby relegating the project of explaining the apparent effects of extra-linguistic context on semantic content to a domain of inquiry outside the theory of meaning proper. So doing removes the threat context poses to the systematicity of semantic explanation, but at the cost of reducing the interest of the semantic project.
In this paper, I explore a different reaction to the situation. My purpose is to undermine the presumption that what appear to be very different effects of context on semantic content are very different effects. My challenge is of necessity rather limited, since it is too implausible to trace all effects of extra-linguistic context on semantic content to the very same source. Rather, I will take, as a case study, three superficially very different effects of context on semantic content, and show that they are due to the very same mechanism, what I call Nominal Restriction. I thereby hope to provide convincing evidence of the promise of the project of reducing all apparent effects of context on semantic content to a small number of sources.


Published in Logical Form and Language, edited by Peters and Preyer, Oxford University Press (2002)


Context, Compositionality and Calamity


By Jessica Rett

This paper examines an attempt made in a series of articles (Stanley 2002, a.o.) to create a syntactic placeholder for contextual information. The initial shortcoming of Stanley’s proposal is that it does not easily integrate these placeholders with domain-restricting information syntactically encoded elsewhere in the utterance. Thus, Stanley erroneously predicts that a sentence in which quantifier restricting information encoded in (for example) a prepositional phrase conflicts with quantifier-restriction valued by context is internally incoherent.
I continue by exploring the space of possible solutions to this problem that are available to Stanley, demonstrating how each of these possible solutions results in its own interpretation problem and, ultimately, fails. In doing so, I argue that Stanley’s syntactic/semantic approach to context is ultimately untenable.


Source: Semantics Archive
To appear in Mind & Language



Of related interest:

Context Dependence and Compositionality


By Francis Jeffrey Pelletier

Some utterances of sentences such as ?Every student failed the midterm exam? and ?There is no beer? are widely held to be true in a conversation despite the facts that not every student in the world failed the midterm exam and that there is, in fact, some beer somewhere. For instance, the speaker might be talking about some particular course, or about his refrigerator. Stanley and Szabo (in Mind & Language , 15, 2000) consider many different approaches to how contextual information might give meaning to these ?restricted quantifier domains?, and find all of them but one wanting. The present paper argues that their considerations against one of these other theories, considerations that turn on notions of compositionality, are incorrect.

Appeared in Mind & Language, April 2003, vol. 18, no. 2, pp. 148-161(14)

Posted by Tony Marmo at 00:01 BST
Updated: Saturday, 4 June 2005 12:55 BST
Thursday, 2 June 2005

Topic: Interconnections

Many-valued logic vs. many-valued semantics


By Jaroslav Peregrin

Hence the task of the logician, viewed from this perspective, is the delimitation of the range of acceptable truth-valuations of the sentences of the given language – taking note of all the "lawful" features of the separation of true sentences from false ones. Let us call this the separation problem.
Consider the language of classical propositional calculus (and consequently the part of natural language which it purports to regiment). Here the ensuing "laws of truth" are quite transparent:
(i) ¬A is true iff A is not true
(ii) A^B is true iff A is true and B is true
(iii) A∨B is true iff A is true or B is true
(iv) A→B is true iff A is not true or B is true

Every truth-valuation which fulfills these constraints is acceptable and every acceptable truth-valuation does fulfill them. But the situation is, as is well known, not so simple once we abandon the calm waters of the classical propositional calculus.

Posted by Tony Marmo at 00:01 BST
Wednesday, 1 June 2005

Topic: Cognition & Epistemology

Knowledge and Explanation


By Carrie Jenkins

In this paper I attempt a project of this kind. I propose a necessary and sufficient condition for A knows that p which is, although recognizably similar to the traditional sets of conditions, arguably immune to the kind of counterexample which tends to deter philosophers from thinking that any illuminating conditions can be found. I present this condition, however, not as an analysis of knowledge, but rather as a way of getting a handle on the concept and furthering the effort to understand what its role in our lives might be. Taken in this spirit, the current proposal is not at odds with the principles that motivate Craig?s view.
In denying my proposal the status of a reductive analysis, I am mindful of the fact that it will tell us little more than that knowledge is ?non-accidental true belief?. What it offers is a (hopefully fruitful) way of spelling out what is meant by ?non-accidental? in this context. In what follows, I shall write ?KAp? for ?A knows that p? and ?BAp? for ?A believes that p.? I shall propose that KAp just in case BAp and it can be said (under specific circumstances, to be described shortly) that A believes p because p is true. But this is not a causal account of knowledge. The ?because? signals not causation, but explanation.


To appear in the Canadian Journal of Philosophy
Source: Online Papers in Philosophy

Posted by Tony Marmo at 17:41 BST
Updated: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 17:53 BST
Tuesday, 24 May 2005

Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS

The Proper Treatment of Coreference Relations


By Louis-H. Desouvrey

A novel approach to coreference relations is proposed. It is shown that there are no coreference principles per se in the grammar. Rather three constraints independently needed account for this phenomenon: the Oligatory Contour Principle (OCP), the Avoid Ambiguity Constraint (AAC), and the Freedom Constraint. The OCP and the AAC deal with features lexical elements are specified for. Referring elements are indeed distinguished from each other by a relational feature, which represents what the element stands for in the real world. Given nonlinear phonological representations whereby each feature belongs to its own plane, R-features spread from a referential expression to an adjacent referring element, either a pronoun or an anaphor. The ban on line crossing in the representation, which constrains the spreading, accounts for the adjacency between anaphors and their antecedents. The complementarity in the distribution of anaphors and pronouns follows from the feature specification of these elements as well as the interaction of the OCP and the Ambiguity Constraint.

Keywords: coreference, constraints, domains, pronouns, anaphors, syntactic features.
Source: Semantics Archive


The three principles mentioned above are:
(1) Freedom Constraint (FC)
Referring elements must be free in their minimal domain.

(2) Obligatory Contour Principle (OCP)
Two elements bearing identical R-features are banned in the same syntactic domain.

(3) Avoid Ambiguity Constraint (AAC)
Morphological ambiguity must be avoided whenever possible.

Posted by Tony Marmo at 00:01 BST
Updated: Tuesday, 24 May 2005 14:37 BST
Sunday, 15 May 2005

Topic: HUMAN SEMANTICS

Tense and Choice Functions


By Mean-Young Song

In this paper, I argue against the two major approaches to the semantics of tense: the quantificational approach and the referential approach. The difference between them lies in the fact that the former is in favor of the indefinite view of tense, whereas the latter the definite view of tense. Tenses are characterized by the variability in the sense that they can be interpreted as being indefinite in some context or definite in other context. The difficulty the two approaches are faced with is that neither takes an appropriate account of the variability of tense. To provide a proper semantic treatment of tense, I propose in this paper a treatment of tense which incorporates choice functions. The choice functions, which apply to a non-empty set of intervals, picks the most salient time the speaker might have in mind at the utterance time. This might assist in capturing the variability of tense.

Key words: tense, definite tense, indefinite tense, the quantification approach, the referential approach, choice functions, presuppositions, temporal predicates

Source: Semantics Archive


Posted by Tony Marmo at 08:10 BST
Saturday, 14 May 2005

Topic: Interconnections

Counterfactuals and historical possibility


by Tomasz Placek and Thomas Muller

We show that truth conditions for counterfactuals need not always be given in terms of a vague notion of similarity. To this end, we single out the important class of historical counterfactuals and give formally rigorous truth conditions for these counterfactuals, employing a partial ordering relation called ``comparative closeness'' that is defined in the framework of branching space-times. Among other applications, we provide a detailed analysis of counterfactuals uttered in the context of lost bets. In an appendix we compare our theory with the branching space-times based reading of counterfactuals recently proposed by Belnap [1992].

Keywords: branching space-times, historical counterfactuals, comparative closeness,
betting


Source: PhilSci Archive, Online Papers in Philosophy

Posted by Tony Marmo at 00:01 BST
Updated: Sunday, 15 May 2005 08:14 BST
Sunday, 8 May 2005

Topic: PARACONSISTENCY
Another interesting introduction to Paraconsistent Logic:

PARACONSISTENT LOGICS INTRODUCTION


By Anthony Hunter
In practical reasoning, it is common to have “too much” information about some situation. In other words, it is common for there to be classically inconsistent information in a practical reasoning database [Besnard et al., 1995]. The diversity of logics proposed for aspects of practical reasoning indicates the complexity of this form of reasoning. However, central to practical reasoning seems to be the need to reason with inconsistent information without the logic being trivialized [Gabbay and Hunter, 1991; Finkelstein et al., 1994]. This is the need to derive reasonable inferences without deriving the trivial inferences that follow the ex falso quodlibet proof rule that holds in classical logic.
[Ex falso quodlibet]
α ¬α
β

So for example, from a database {α, ¬α, α→β, δ} reasonable inferences might include α, ¬α, α→β, and δ by reflexivity, β by modus ponens, α^;β by introduction, ¬α→¬β and so on. In contrast, trivial inferences might include γ, γ^¬δ, etc, by ex falso quodlibet.
Solutions to the problem of inconsistent data include database revision and
paraconsistent logics. The first approach effectively removes data from the database to produce a new consistent database. In contrast, the second approach leaves the database inconsistent, but prohibits the logics from deriving trivial inferences. Unfortunately, the first approach means we may loose useful information— we may be forced to make a premature selection of our new database, or we may not even be able to make a selection. We consider here the advantages and disadvantages of the paraconsistent approach.
The primary objective of this chapter is to present a range of paraconsistent logics that give sensible inferences from inconsistent information.



Posted by Tony Marmo at 09:36 BST

Newer | Latest | Older