Adjectives: A Uniform Semantic Approach - University of Windsor

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Adjectives: A Uniform Semantic Approach 339 This reflects the intuition that the sentence Jane is an attractive (blond woman) expresses a different proposition from that expressed by the sentence Jane is an attractive, blond woman. The latter reading would result in the inclusion of the element “w: woman” in the set Attractive. Finally, narrow-scope readings are computed differently. The narrow scopereading of an (attractive blond) woman is attributing “attractive-blond-ness” to the denotation of Jane. Such a reading is depicted in Fig 3. Fig. 3. Narrow-scope reading of Jane is an attractive blond woman Notice that the set Attractive-blond is of type “attractive-blond”. This results from applying the type formation rule of (11-c). The set representation of the narrow-scope reading is as follows: Attractive-blond = {w:T}: attractive-blond Woman = {w: woman}: woman Attractive-blond ∩ Woman = {w:attractive-blond:woman}: attractive-blond: woman Thus, a semantic interpreter will have two or more different syntactic trees as input, each of which is treated differently semantically. 4 Consequences • This work emphasizes the semantic unity of the category called “adjective”, contrary to [16]. In this regards, this work agrees with [8]. However, it does so without “stretching” the ontology to contain events/states, as [8] does. Furthermore, using typed sets, we were able to account for the semantics of phrases with multiple adjectives. • This approach is compositional. It is true, at least in the case of adjectives in English, that adjectives can syntactically appear exclusively predicative (e.g. ‘asleep’), exclusively attributive (e.g. ‘veteran’), or in on both positions (e.g. ‘good’), but there is always a single semantic rule that computes the respective meaning of the adjective noun-combination, namely the intersection of the denotation of adjective(s) and the head noun. • This approach is easily applied in a natural language processing system. This is because it is based on a well-defined mathematical system, i.e. set theory.
340 N. Abdullah and R.A. Frost • Finally, this approach shows promising results in accommodating modal adjectives, e.g. ‘possible’, ‘potential’, ‘alleged’, etc. This type of adjectives has proved to be difficult to account for without resorting to approaches such as modal logics, which are not readily mapped into computer programs. For example, the sentence John is an alleged criminal can be represented as follows: Criminal= {j: criminal :┴}: criminal where j = ||John|| Alleged= {j: criminal: ┴}:┴. The symbol “┴” represents the absurd type, i.e. the subtype of every type. In the set Criminal, above, we want to indicate that John may or may not end up a member of it. Thus, by indicating that j is of type “┴” we mean to capture john’s partial membership in the set Criminal. Note that the above representation blocks all invalid inferences. For example, the answer to the query, “Is John a criminal?” would be negative. For, given the current state of affairs, j is not of type “criminal”. In other words, John’s membership in the set Criminal is partial or “pending”. References 1. Chierchia, G. and McConnell-Ginet, S.: Meaning and Grammar: An Introduction to Semantics. Cambridge, MA, The MIT Press. (1990) 2. Guarino, N., Carrara, M., and Giaretta, P.: An Ontology of Meta-Level Categories. In: Knowledge Representation: (1994) 270-280 3. Kamp H.: Two theories about adjectives. In: Keenan, E. L. (ed.): Formal semantics for natural languages, Cambridge, UK (1975) 4. Kamp, H., and Partee, P.: Prototype theory and compositionality. Cognition 57, (1995) 129-191 5. Lahav, R.: Against compositionality: the case of adjectives. Philosophical Studies 57: (1989) 261–279 6. Larson, R.K.: The grammar of intensionality. In: Preyer, G. (ed.): On Logical Form, Oxford University Press (2002) 7. Larson, R.K.: Events and modification in nominals. In: Strolovitch, D, and Lawson, A. (eds.): Proceedings from Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT) VIII, Cornell University. Ithaca, NY (1998) 8. Larson, R.K.: Olga is a beautiful dancer. Winter Meetings of The Linguistic Society of America, New Orleans, 5-8 de Janeiro (1995) 9. Levi, J. N.: The syntax and semantics of complex nominals. Academic Press New York (1978) 10. McConnell-Ginet, S.: Adverbs and Logical Form. In: Language 58: (1982) 144-84. 11. Nowak, A.: On split PPs in Polish. Ms. Amherst (unpublished General Paper,UMass.) (2000) 12. Partee, B. H.: Privative adjectives: subsective plus coe`rcion. To appear in Zimmermann, T.E. (ed.): Studies in Presupposition (2001) 13. Peters, I. and Peters, W.: The Treatment of Adjectives in SIMPLE: Theoretical Observations. The 2nd International Conference on Language Resources & Evaluation. (LREC'2000), Athens, Greece (2000) 14. Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G. and Svartvik, J.: A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. Longman (1985)
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