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CLM, engelskSemantics

Introductory Lecture 2tt

A Model of the Language Faculty

an articulatoryinterface

for associating sound with

meaning

LF- a computational

system

Structure

a perceptualinterface

Sound Meaning

an interpretiveinterface

a cognitiveinterface

Delimiting Semantics …Semantics is the study of the meaning of Natural Language

Problems:

Defining ’meaning’: What is it? (continuing from last week)

Locating meanings: Where are they?

Explaining meaning: What does it do?

Representing meaning: How can we talk about it?

Locating NL meanings The Semiotic Triangle

WordsLanguage

IdeasMind

ThingsWorld

Where would you look for NL meaning here?

Locating NL meaning (1)The biplane sign

The sign ’sleep’

Expression

Meaning

/sli:p/

ZZZZZZZZZZ

- so, meanings are in words (signs)!

Splitting up Meaning

• Sense (also sometimes intension)

• Reference

• Denotation (also sometimes extension)

Sense and reference…Basis for the distinction (Frege)

Reference

SenseIf there is an x such that x is a star then x is visible in the morning

If there is an x such that x is a star then x is visible in the evening

The Morning Star is the Evening Star

… sense and referenceReferring and attributive use of phrases (Donellan)

Speaker uses the phrase Smith’s murderer to refer to Clark Kent and says of him that he is insane

Speaker assumes that Smith has been murdered and uses the phrase Smith’s murderer attributively: if there is an x such that x has murdered Smith then x is insane

Smith’s murderer is insane

Reference

Sense

The notion of truth

Those boys are fightingagain - refers to

{the set of all thingsthat are fighting now}

- denotes

If [those boys] are in {the set of things figthing now}, the utterance of the the sentence Those boys are fightning now is true, otherwise false.

Locating NL meaning (2)Reference and denotation …

Reference is a relation between phrases and individuals

Denotation is a relation between lexical items and classes or sets

- it is a term belonging to pragmatics

- it is a term for a particular use of phrases (a speech act)

- it is a term belonging to semantics

- it is a term for the categorization of things

…reference and denotation

The children next door are always noisy

- may be used to refer to a particular set of things as individuals, provided each satisfies two conditions

Children next door are always noisy

- cannot be used to refer to a particular set of things, but specifies what the conditions are: if x is a child and if x lives next door (no matter where), then x is noisy

Locating NL Meaning (3)Mental representation

Transparent and opaque contexts

The girl with green eyes has brown eyes Contradiction

has modelled for

Girl with green eyes (in the picture)

The real life model for the girl in the picture has brown eyes

No contradiction

John believes that…, John thinks that…, I dreamed that….

Words and ConceptsI saw a blue car- OK

The mouse saw a blue car- OK

I saw that the car was blue- OK

The mouse saw that the car was blue- Not OK

What the mouse (presumably) lacks is the concept of

BLUENESS

Concepts are our mental classifications of things AS something

- but they are NOT the same as words

- so, what is NL (word) meaning?

Relational: The meaning of a word is the set of relations which that word contracts with other words

Conditional: The meaning of a word is the set of conditions that something must satisfy to be properly denoted by that word

Instructional: The meaning of a word is the information that word carries for the construction of mental representations

Problem is – we don’t talk in wordswe talk in sentences!

Words Sentences

The Principle of Compositionality

The meaning of a sentence is computed from the meaningof its words, plus the meaning of the structural rules bywhich the sentence is formed

If this were not the case, then we would not be able tounderstand sentences that we haven’t heard before

Semantic intuitionsEntailment

Presupposition

Contradiction

Superman did not kill Smith Smith is dead

Superman killed Smith Smith is deadentails

The cat is on the mat There is a catpresupposes

The cat is on the mat The cat is not on the matcontradicts

The cat is not on the mat There is a catpresupposes

SynonymySentences and propositions

Kirsten found the Golden Horns in that field

It was Kirsten who found the Golden Horns in that field

It was in that field that Kirsten found the Golden Horns

What Kirsten found in that field was the Golden Horns

The Golden Horns were found by Kirsten in that field

That field was where Kirsten found the Golden Horns

Different sentences – same proposition

The representation of propositions

What do the sentences about the Golden Horns have in common?

The same lexical verb, but in different forms: FIND

The same referring expressions: Kirsten and [the Golden Horns]

The same association of thematic roles with the referring expressions: Kirsten = Agent; [the Golden Horns] = Patient

The rest is just grammatical words – and the wordorder is governedby syntactic rules

The same indication of location: [(in) that field]

Predicate Arguments

Kirsten, [the Golden Horns]find ( )

The Predicate Calculus – a type of logical notation

Wordclasses Correspond to NotationV, A, N Predicates A, B, …,Q, …

PN, NPDef Constants a, b, …o

Personal Pronouns Variables x, y, z

Indefinite Pronouns Quantifiers (all), (a, some)

Conjunctions Connectives & (and), (or)

This would be the representation (or translation) of the propositional content of the sentence in predicate calculus form

Kirsten found a Golden Horn x [F(k, x) & G(x) & H(x)]Reads as follows: There’s an x such that Kirsten found x and x is golden and x is a horn

What does meaning do?

beedaggerremark?quaspattitudeI was stung by his

Meaning guides interpretation!

This is the instructional view of meaning

How can we talk about meaning?- The problem of meaning representation

Decomposition of lexical meaning

bull

stallion mare

cow calf

foal

[+ adult][+ male][-female]

[+ adult][- male][+female]

[- adult][- male][-female]

[+bovine]

[+equine]

This isthe relationalview ofmeaning

Sufficient and Necessary Conditions

entityorganism

animalchordate

vertebratewarm-blooded

egg-layingfeatheredwinged

If anything is a

Bird

then it is -This isthe conditionalview ofmeaning

Prototypes