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1007Nominals and Event StructureIn Robert Truswell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Event Structure, . 2019.This paper discusses three approaches to the semantics of event nominalizations and adverbial modification: the Davidsonian account, the Kimian account, and the truthmaker account. It argues that a combination of all three accounts is needed for the semantics of the full range of event, trope, and state nominalizations in English.
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127Exception sentences and polyadic quantificationLinguistics and Philosophy 18 (3). 1995.In this paper, I have proposed a compositional semantic analysis of exception NPs from which three core properties of exception constructions could be derived. I have shown that this analysis overcomes various empirical and conceptual shortcomings of prior proposals of the semantics of exception sentences. The analysis was first formulated for simple exception NPs, where the EP-complement was considered a set-denoting term and the EP-associate was a monadic quantifier. It was then generalized in…Read more
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400Abstract Objects and the Semantics of Natural LanguageOxford University Press. 2013.This book pursues the question of how and whether natural language allows for reference to abstract objects in a fully systematic way. By making full use of contemporary linguistic semantics, it presents a much greater range of linguistic generalizations than has previously been taken into consideration in philosophical discussions, and it argues for an ontological picture is very different from that generally taken for granted by philosophers and semanticists alike. Reference to abstract object…Read more
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158Unbound Anaphoric Pronouns: E-Type, Dynamic, and Structured-Propositions ApproachesSynthese 153 (2): 199-260. 2006.Unbound anaphoric pronouns or ‘E-type pronouns’ have presented notorious problems for semantic theory, leading to the development of dynamic semantics, where the primary function of a sentence is not considered that of expressing a proposition that may act as the object of propositional attitudes, but rather that of changing the current information state. The older, ‘E-type’ account of unbound anaphora leaves the traditional notion of proposition intact and takes the unbound anaphor to be replac…Read more
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652Plural Reference and Reference to a Plurality. Linguistic Facts and Semantic AnalysesIn Massimiliano Carrara, Alexandra Arapinis & Friederike Moltmann (eds.), Unity and Plurality. Logic, Philosophy, and Semantics, Oxford University Press. pp. 93-120. 2016.This paper defends 'plural reference', the view that definite plurals refer to several individuals at once, and it explores how the view can account for a range of phenomena that have been discussed in the linguistic literature.
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295Tropes, Bare Demonstratives, and Apparent Statements of IdentityNoûs 47 (2): 346-370. 2011.Philosophers who accept tropes generally agree that tropes act as the objects of reference of nominalizations of adjectives, such as 'Socrates’ wisdom' or 'the beauty of the landscape'. This paper argues that tropes play a further important role in the semantics of natural language, namely in the semantics of bare demonstratives like 'this' and 'that' in what in linguistics is called identificational sentences.
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2387Natural Language OntologyOxford Encyclopedia of Linguistics. 2017.The aim of natural language ontology is to uncover the ontological categories and structures that are implicit in the use of natural language, that is, that a speaker accepts when using a language. This article aims to clarify what exactly the subject matter of natural language ontology is, what sorts of linguistic data it should take into account, how natural language ontology relates to other branches of metaphysics, in what ways natural language ontology is important, and what may be distinc…Read more
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172Presuppositions and Quantifier DomainsSynthese 149 (1): 179-224. 2006.In this paper, I will argue for a new account of presuppositions which is based on double indexing as well as minimal representational contexts providing antecedent material for anaphoric presuppositions, rather than notions of context defined in terms of the interlocutors’ pragmatic presuppositions or the information accumulated from the preceding discourse. This account applies in particular to new phenomena concerning the presupposition of quantifier domains. But it is also intended to be an …Read more
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134Intensional verbs and quantifiersNatural Language Semantics 5 (1): 1-52. 1997.This paper discusses the semantics of intensional transitive verbs such as 'need', 'want','recognize', 'find', and 'hire'. It proposes new linguistic criteria for intensionality and defends two semantic analyses for two different classes of intensional verbs. The paper also includes a systematic classification of intensional verbs according to the type of lexical meaning they involve.
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339Various syntacticians have argued that coordinate structures involve a three-dimensional syntactic structure. This paper proposes an interpretation of three-dimensional syntactic structures in terms of plural reference and argues that such structures give further support for plural reference, the view that plural terms refer to several entities at once, rather than referring to a single plural individual.
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52In some recent developments of semantic theory, in particular certain versions of dynamic semantics, ‘internal’ contexts, that is, contexts defined in terms of the interlocutors’ pragmatic presuppositions or the information accumulated in the discourse have come to play a central role, replacing the notion of propositional content in favor of a notion of context change potential as the meaning of sentences. I will argue that there are a number of fundamental problems with this conception of sent…Read more
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473'Truth Predicates' in Natural LanguageIn José Martinez, Achourioti Dora & Galinon Henri (eds.), Unifying the Philosophy of Truth., Springer. pp. 57-83. 2015.This takes a closer look at the actual semantic behavior of apparent truth predicates in English and re-evaluates the way they could motivate particular philosophical views regarding the formal status of 'truth predicates' and their semantics. The paper distinguishes two types of 'truth predicates' and proposes semantic analyses that better reflect the linguistic facts. These analyses match particular independently motivated philosophical views.
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209On the Ontology of 'Cases'In N. Flaux, P. Haas, K. Paykin, V. Mostrov & F. Tayalati (eds.), "De la passion du sens en linguistique: hommages à Danièle Van de Velde", Les Presses Universitaires De Valenciennes. 2017.This paper gives an account of constructions with the noun 'case' based on truthmaking and argues that 'cases' form their own ontological category.
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845Situations, Alternatives, and the Semantics of 'Cases'Linguistics and Philosophy (1): 1-41. 2019.This paper presents a systematic semantic study of constructions with the noun 'case'. It argues that 'cases' are situations acting as truthmakers within a sentential or epistemic case space. It develops a truthmaker-based alternative semantics of 'case'-constructions, based on Fine's recent truthmaker semantics.
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154Reciprocals and Same/Different: Towards a Semantic AnalysisLinguistics and Philosophy 15 (4). 1992.
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518Intensional Relative Clauses and the Semantics of Variable ObjectsIn Manfred Krifka & Schenner Mathias (eds.), Reconstruction Effects in Relative Clauses, De Gruyter. 2018.NPs with intensional relative clauses such as 'the book John needs to write' pose a significant challenge for semantic theory. Such NPs act like referential terms, yet they do not stand for a particular actual object. This paper will develop a semantic analysis of such NPs on the basis of the notion of a variable object. The analysis avoids a range of difficulties that a more standard analysis based on the notion of an individual concept would face. Most importantly, unlike the latter, the propo…Read more
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173Nominalizing quantifiersJournal of Philosophical Logic 32 (5): 445-481. 2003.Quantified expressions in natural language generally are taken to act like quantifiers in logic, which either range over entities that need to satisfy or not satisfy the predicate in order for the sentence to be true or otherwise are substitutional quantifiers. I will argue that there is a philosophically rather important class of quantified expressions in English that act quite differently, a class that includes something, nothing, and several things. In addition to expressing quantification, s…Read more
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132Generalizing Detached Self-Reference and the Semantics of Generic OneMind and Language 25 (4): 440-473. 2010.In this paper I will give an analysis of what I call ‘generalizing detached self-reference’ within a general account of reference to the first person. With generalizing detached self-reference an agent attributes properties to a range of individuals by putting himself into their shoes, or simulating them. I will show that generalizing detached self-reference plays an important role in the semantics of natural language, in particular in the English generic one and in what syntacticians call arbit…Read more
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330Attitude Reports, Cognitive Products, and Attitudinal Objects: A Response to G. Felappi On Product‐Based Accounts of AttitudesThought: A Journal of Philosophy 6 (1): 3-12. 2017.In a range of recent and not so recent work, I have developed a novel semantics of attitude reports on which the notion of an attitudinal object or cognitive product takes center stage, that is, entities such as thoughts claims and decisions. The purpose of this note is to give a brief summary of this account against the background of the standard semantics of attitude reports and to show that the various sorts of criticism that Felappi recently advanced against it are mistaken.
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562Variable Objects and TruthmakingIn Mircea Dumitru (ed.), Metaphysics, Meaning, and Modality. Themes from Kit Fine, Oxford University Press. 2020.This paper will focus on a philosophically significant construction whose semantics brings together two important notions in Kit Fine’s philosophy, the notion of truthmaking and the notion of a variable embodiment, or its extension, namely what I call a ‘variable object’. This is the construction of definite NPs like 'the number of people that can fit into the bus', 'the book John needs to write', and 'the gifted mathematician John claims to be'. Such NPs are analysed as standing for variable ob…Read more
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712Quantification with Intentional and with Intensional VerbsIn Alessandro Torza (ed.), Quantifiers, Quantifiers, and Quantifiers, Springer. 2015.The question whether natural language permits quantification over intentional objects as the ‘nonexistent’ objects of thought is the topic of a major philosophical controversy, as is the status of intentional objects as such. This paper will argue that natural language does reflect a particular notion of intentional object and in particular that certain types of natural language constructions (generally disregarded in the philosophical literature) cannot be analysed without positing intentional …Read more
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666Two kinds of universals and two kinds of collectionsLinguistics and Philosophy 27 (6). 2004.This paper argues for an ontological distinction between two kinds of universals, 'kinds of tropes' such as 'wisdom' and properties such as 'the property of being wise'. It argues that the distinction is parallel to that between two kinds of collections, pluralities such as 'the students' and collective objects such as 'the class'. The paper argues for the priortity of distributive readings with pluralities on the basis of predicates of extent or shape, such 'large' or 'long'.
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1243Nominalizations: The Case of Nominalizations of Modal PredicatesIn Lisa Matthewson, Cécile Meier, Hotze Rullman & Thomas Ede Zimmermann (eds.), Blackwell Companion to Semantics, Wiley. 2020.Nominalizations of modal predicates have received little, if any, attention in the semantic or philosophical literature. This paper will argue that nominalizations of modal predicates require recognizing a novel ontological category of modal objects and it will outline a new semantics of modals based on modal objects.
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359Propositional attitudes without propositionsSynthese 135 (1). 2003.The most common account of attitude reports is the relational analysis according towhich an attitude verb taking that-clause complements expresses a two-placerelation between agents and propositions and the that-clause acts as an expressionwhose function is to provide the propositional argument. I will argue that a closerexamination of a broader range of linguistic facts raises serious problems for thisanalysis and instead favours a Russellian `multiple relations analysis' (which hasgenerally be…Read more
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400Coordination and ComparativesDissertation, MIT. 1992.This thesis explores the syntax and semantics of coordinate structures on the basis of three-dimensional syntactic structures. In particular it gives an analysis of sentences of the sort 'a man came and a woman left who knew each other well' on the basis of implicit coordination of NPs, made available within three-dimensionional syntactic structures..
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125Measure adverbialsLinguistics and Philosophy 14 (6). 1991.This papers argues that the apparent constraint of adverbials like 'for two hours' (or 'throughout the house') should not be viewed as a restriction to telic events or event predicates, but should be explained entirely in terms of the quantificational status of such adverials, acting as quantifiers over (contextually individuated) parts of a time interval (or spatial region).
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45The most common analyses of comparatives make use of degrees, abstract objects that form a total ordering. In this paper, I will explore a novel analysis of comparatives in which the central notion is not the notion of a degree, but rather the notion of a concrete property manifestation, a particularized property, or a trope, as it is most commonly called in contemporary metaphysics. This trope-based analysis, I argue, has some major conceptual and empirical advantages over a degree-based accoun…Read more
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534Unity and Plurality. Philosophy, Logic, and SemanticsOxford University Press. 2016.This volume brings together new work on the logic and ontology of plurality and a range of recent articles exploring novel applications to natural language semantics. The contributions in this volume in particular investigate and extend new perspectives presented by plural logic and non-standard mereology and explore their applications to a range of natural language phenomena. Contributions by P. Aquaviva, A. Arapinis, M. Carrara, P. McKay, F. Moltmann, O. Linnebo,…Read more
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780The semantics of existenceLinguistics and Philosophy 36 (1): 31-63. 2013.The notion of existence is a very puzzling one philosophically. Often philosophers have appealed to linguistic properties of sentences stating existence. However, the appeal to linguistic intuitions has generally not been systematic and without serious regard of relevant issues in linguistic semantics. This paper has two aims. On the one hand, it will look at statements of existence from a systematic linguistic point of view, in order to try to clarify what the actual semantics of such statement…Read more
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454Propositions, attitudinal objects, and the distinction between actions and productsCanadian Journal of Philosophy, Supplementary Volume on Propositions, Edited by G. Rattan and D. Hunter 43 (5-6): 679-701. 2013.This paper argues that attitudinal objects, entities of the sort of John's judgment, John's thought, and John's claim, should play the role of propositions, as the cognitive products of cognitive acts, not the acts themselves.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
PhD, 1992
La Terrasse, Rhone-Alpes, France
Areas of Specialization
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Language |