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72VaguenessIn Maria Aloni & Paul Jacques Edgar Dekker (eds.), The Cambridge Handbook of Formal Semantics, Cambridge University Press. pp. 389-441. 2016.Vagueness is an ultimate challenge. An enormous diversity of literature on the topic has accumulated over the years, with no hint of a consensus emerging. In this light, Section 1 presents the main aspects of the challenge vagueness poses, focusing on the category of adjectives, and then gives some brief illustrations of the pervasive manifestations of vagueness in grammar.Section 2 deals with theSorites paradox, which for many philosophers is th…Read more
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28The semantics of gradability, vagueness and scale structureSpringer. 2018.This volume is the first to focus specifically on experimental studies of the semantics of gradability, scale structure and vagueness. It presents support for and challenges to current formal analyses of these phenomena in view of experimentally collected data, highlighting the ways semantic and pragmatic theory can benefit from experimental methodologies. The papers in the volume contribute to an explicit and detailed account of the use, representation, and online processing of gradable and vag…Read more
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Proceedings of the Amsterdam Graduate Conference - Truth, Meaning, and Normativity (edited book)ILLC Publications. 2011.
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88The degree functions of negative adjectivesNatural Language Semantics 18 (2): 141-181. 2010.This paper provides a new account of positive versus negative antonyms. The data includes well-known linguistic generalizations regarding negative adjectives, such as their incompatibility with measure phrases (cf. two meters tall/ *short) and ratio phrases (twice as tall/ #short) as well as the impossibility of truly crosspolar comparisons (*Dan is taller than Sam is short). These generalizations admit a variety of exceptions, e.g., positive adjectives that do not license measure phrases (cf. #…Read more
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17Three sources of vagueness in degree constructionsIn Arndt Riester & Torgrim Solstad (eds.), Proceedings of Sinn Und Bedeutung 13, . pp. 469--483. 2009.This paper presents a novel semantic analysis of unit names and gradable adjectives, inspired by measurement theory (Krantz et al 1971). Based on measurement theory's typology of measures, I claim that different predicates are associated with different types of measures whose special characteristics, together with features of the relations denoted by unit names, explain the puzzling limited distribution of measure phrases.
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20This book presents a study of the connections between vagueness and gradability, and their different manifestations in adjectives (morphological gradability effects) and nouns (typicality effects). It addresses two opposing theoretical approaches from within formal semantics and cognitive psychology. These approaches rest on different, apparently contradictory pieces of data. For example, for psychologists nouns are linked with vague and gradable concepts, while for linguists they rarely are. Th…Read more
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17Vagueness in Degree ConstructionsIn Arndt Riester & Torgrim Solstad (eds.), Proceedings of Sinn Und Bedeutung 13, . 2009.This paper presents a novel semantic analysis of unit names and gradable adjectives, inspired by measurement theory (Krantz et al 1971). Based on measurement theory's typology of measures, I claim that different predicates are associated with different types of measures whose special characteristics, together with features of the relations denoted by unit names, explain the puzzling limited distribution of measure phrases.
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151Measurement theory in linguisticsSynthese 174 (1): 151-180. 2010.This paper presents a novel semantic analysis of unit names (like pound and meter) and gradable adjectives (like tall, short and happy), inspired by measurement theory (Krantz et al. In Foundations of measurement: Additive and Polynomial Representations, 1971). Based on measurement theory’s four-way typology of measures, I claim that different adjectives are associated with different types of measures whose special characteristics, together with features of the relations denoted by unit names, e…Read more
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Bar-Ilan University, Ramat GanRegular Faculty
Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Language |
Philosophy of Cognitive Science |
Areas of Interest
Philosophy of Language |
Philosophy of Cognitive Science |