Thesis (Ph. D.)--Syracuse University, 2009. / "Publication number: AAT 3388249."

A theory of nominalization should specify the relation between noun meaning and verb meaning. At least for some classes of nouns, such a theory should also provide a general and systematic way of deriving noun meanings from verb meanings. This is the case, for example, for event-denoting $ing\sb{\rm of}$-Nouns. The meaning of these nouns must be derived by a rule from the meaning of the corresponding verb, since there is evidence that they are not listed in the lexicon. A theory of nominalization should also account for the meaning differences and the distributional differences among various kinds of nominals and that-clauses. Following Zeno Vendler, I argue that some of these differences are accounted for by the distinction between propositional entities and event-like entities, and by the semantic selection properties of predicates. I propose a semantics for English nominalization based on Kratzer's (1987) semantics of situations. The central notion of this semantics is the part of-relation among possible situations. This theory provides a general way of recovering the meaning of event-nouns from the meaning of the corresponding verb. Moreover, it is able to account for the distributional and semantic differences among different kinds of nominals and that-clauses. A compositional approach to the semantics of NPs raises the issue of the argument structure of nouns. I discuss different accounts of the role of the of-phrase and of the by-phrase with event-nouns. I provide some evidence that they have argument status. Italian infinitival NPs provide some cross-linguistic evidence for this conclusion. The semantics for English nominalization I develop serves also as a tool for investigating the difference of interpretation derived (and $ing\sb{\rm of}$) NPs show in different contexts. I address the issue of why these NPs are paraphrasable by that-clauses in some context, but not in others.

This dissertation presents a formal theory of markedness, set within Optimality Theory. Two of the leading ideas are (a) hierarchical markedness relations may be ignored, but never reversed and (b) the more marked an element is, the greater the pressure to preserve it. An example of (a) is found in sonority-driven stress systems. In Gujarati, low vowels attract stress away from mid vowels, while Nganasan's stress system makes no distinction between the two categories. So, while stressed mid vowels are more marked than stressed low vowels (as shown by Gujarati), that distinction can be conflated (as in Nganasan). However, in no language is the markedness relation reversed: stressed mid vowels are never preferred over stressed low vowels. An example of (b) is found in Yamphu. /t/ is eliminated through a process of debuccalization. In contrast, the more marked segments /k/ and /p/ remain intact; these segments avoid the debuccalization process because they are highly marked and thereby excite greater preservation. Ideas (a) and (b) are formally expressed as a set of constraint-formation conditions. For constraints on output structures (‘markedness’ constraints), if a constraint assigns a violation to an element p in scale S, then the constraint also assigns a violation to every element that is more marked than p in S. An analogous proposal applies to faithfulness (i.e. preservation) constraints: if a faithfulness constraint bans an unfaithful mapping from element p in scale S, then the constraint also bans unfaithful mappings from all elements that are more marked than p in S. The result is that—regardless of the constraints' ranking—more marked elements are both subject to more stringent output conditions and preserved more faithfully than lesser-marked ones. The constraints are also shown to allow distinctions between scale categories to be collapsed. A wide range of phonological phenomena provide evidence for the theoretical proposals, including analyses and typologies of sonority-driven stress (Nganasan, Gujarati, Kiriwina, and Harar Oromo), tone-driven stress, vowel and consonant epenthesis, vowel reduction (Dutch), coda neutralization (Malay and Yamphu), Place assimilation (Catalan, Ponapean, Korean, Swedish, and Sri Lankan Portuguese Creole), and coalescence (Attic Greek and Pāli).

I am confronted with choices every day. In many cases, I have to make a decision as to which of several options I will pick. Generally, it seems to me as though I am free with respect to this choice. In many cases, the choice is genuinely morally important. These thoughts call to mind two interesting philosophical problems. The first is the problem of freedom and determinism. How can we be free in a world that seems to be governed by physical laws that entail how our bodies, brains and environment will change over time? The second is the problem of how we understand the notion of an alternative action. The ethical theories that fascinate me the most are those according to which the moral status of an action is dependent not only on the nature of that action, but also on the natures of the actions that I could have performed instead. Which of the myriad of unperformed actions count as my options, and how are these options evaluated in the context of an ethical theory? My approach to addressing these problems is to offer a general account of 'can' that works as an account specifically of the 'can' of agent power. After reviewing the relatively diverse literature on power and 'can,' I present my view and argue that it solves many interesting puzzles and has advantages over the accounts I have criticized.

<p> In recent years, work has emerged suggesting that a wide range of languages lack paradigms of overt, fully grammaticalized morphemes to express tense and aspect distinctions. This dissertation asks how a language without such dedicated morphology might express these meanings by exploring the following two strategies for expressing tense/aspect distinctions in Hungarian.</p><p> No systematic marking of grammatical/viewpoint aspect categories (e.g. Progressive, Imperfective) exists in Hungarian. These semantic distinctions are instead retrieved through the interaction of several factors, including facts about the discourse context, properties of the predicate, word order, and the presence/absence of verbal particles and temporal frame expressions. <i> &Eacute;ppen</i>, which I argue is best analyzed as a discourse particle in the tradition of Beaver &amp; Clark (2008), is used to specify aspectual distinctions in a variety of aspectually ambiguous contexts, and gives rise to a separate but related range of precisifying effects when it occurs with scalar expressions. I propose that <i>&eacute;ppen</i> presupposes the existence of a unique strongest alternative to the current question, and asserts that the prejacent be construed as that alternative, thereby picking out the strongest reading from a set of possible alternatives. This analysis provides a first sketch of a heretofore undocumented strategy for expressing aspectual distinctions, and allows for a unified account of seemingly diverse distributions and interpretations.</p><p> The only overt, grammaticalized marker of tense in Hungarian is the Past morpheme (<i>-t</i>). Future reference is expressed either with the null/unmarked Non-past tense or with <i>fog</i>, which I argue is a modal verb. Analyses of English future-referring strategies (e.g. `will', `be going to', Present, Present Progressive) that are proposed to be cross-linguistic fall short for Hungarian, suggesting that there is greater diversity in how languages express future reference cross-linguistically than previously thought. I suggest that the facts can be explained based on interactions of context, properties of the predicate, and the semantics of the Non-past and <i> fog</i>. If <i>fog</i> has a metaphysical modal base, which forces fog's obligatorily future reference, we can account for a distribution in which <i>fog</i> is preferred for expressing future reference in some contexts and the Non-past is preferred in others by appealing to pragmatic blocking relationships and speaker preferences familiar from the domains of scalar implicatures and indirect speech acts. The Hungarian facts suggest that languages can succeed at expressing nuanced temporal information with relatively few dedicated markers. This analysis allows for these complex distributional differences between future-referring expressions to be accounted for with a fairly rudimentary semantics if properties of the context of utterance are sufficiently spelled out.</p><p> This project provides novel insights into the understudied topic of the semantics of tense and aspect in Hungarian, and contributes to the growing understanding of the range of strategies available to express tense and aspect cross-linguistically. I suggest that at least for Hungarian, the role of context is crucial for the specification of temporal and aspectual reference.</p>

<p> Modern, Western people often conceive the universe as a mindless void full of lifeless objects. This mistaken conception perpetuates a deep-seated loneliness and disconnection from the larger universe. German philosopher and sociologist Max Weber (1864-1920) used the term <i>disenchantment </i> to describe how modern humans experience the universe without any magical or mystical explanations for its or their own existence. Mythology, religion, philosophy, and science are all attempts to orient to myriad beings and the vast universe. Thus far, none of these endeavors has provided an adequate feeling of being at home in the universe. </p><p> Many scholars of language have attributed the disenchantment of the world with the invention of the alphabet and the formation of language. This thesis argues it was not language that separated humans from the universe, but instead a changing relationship to the stars. The works of philologist Owen Barfield (1898-1997) focus specifically on word etymology and offer insights into humanity's ever-evolving consciousness and correlating worldview orientations. His studies reveal meaningful correlations between the way humans think and their vocabularies. </p><p> Since the earliest recorded Proto-Indo-European language, Sanskrit, the word <i>star</i> has remained the same in its meaning and transliteration into English. Through a brief linguistic explanation of how the word <i>star</i> came into modern English, it is possible to appreciate not only its history, but the mystical power of the word itself. When correlated with humanity's most original worldview orientation, the word <i> star</i> brings back the language and consciousness of our early ancestors whose influence might otherwise be forgotten. Behind words and letters that seem to signify a lifeless, meaningless universe, is a worldview imbued with sacredness. This thesis argues for the revival and excavation of English etymologies (through Barfieldian philology) and an appreciation of language itself to move humanity towards a re-enchanted relationship with the stars and the larger universe.</p>

<p> Determining the semantic content of sentences, and uncovering regularities between linguistic form and meaning, requires attending to both morphological and syntactic properties of a language with an eye to the notional categories that the various pieces of form express. In this dissertation, I investigate the morphosyntactic devices that English speakers (and speakers of other languages) can use to talk about comparisons between things: comparative sentences with, in English, <i>"more... than", "as... as", "too", "enough",</i> and others. I argue that a core component of all of these constructions is a unitary element expressing the concept of measurement. </p><p> The theory that I develop departs from the standard degree-theoretic analysis of the semantics of comparatives in three crucial respects: first, gradable adjectives do not (partially or wholly) denote measure functions; second, degrees are introduced compositionally; and three, the introduction of degrees arises uniformly from the semantics of the expression <i> "much".</i> These ideas mark a return to the classic morphosyntactic analysis of comparatives found in Bresnan (1973), while incorporating and extending semantic insights of Schwarzschild (2002, 2006). Of major interest is how the dimensions for comparison observed across the panoply of comparative constructions vary, and these are analyzed as a consequence of what is measured (individuals, events, states, etc.), rather than which expressions invoke the measurement. </p><p> This shift in perspective leads to the observation of a number of regularities in the mapping between form and meaning that could not otherwise have been seen. First, the notion of measurement expressed across comparative constructions is familiar from some explications of that concept in measurement theory (e.g. Berka 1983). Second, the distinction between gradable and non-gradable adjectives is formally on a par with that between mass and count nouns, and between atelic and telic verb phrases. Third, comparatives are perceived to be acceptable if the domain for measurement is structured, and to be anamolous otherwise. Finally, elaborations of grammatical form reflexively affect which dimensions for comparison are available to interpretation.</p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Philosophy, 2007. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-07, Section: A, page: 2977. Adviser: Anil Gupta. Title from dissertation home page (viewed Apr. 9, 2008).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Philosophy, 2005. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Dec. 2, 2008). Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 66-02, Section: A, page: 0620. Chairs: Lawrence Moss; Michael Dunn.

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