SemPrag2 - Sentence Meaning, Quantification, Utterance Meaning & Speaker Intentions Flashcards

1
Q

If sentence meanings are truth conditions (but we are probably actually talking about propositions - what is said!), what do we need to remember when defining those truth conditions?

A

Yes ‘camels have humps’ is true iff camels have humps. However for any time, t, and individual, i, an utterance by i at t of ‘I’m thirsty’ is true iff i is thirsty at t.
Can also consider location etc…

This basic conception of truth-conditional meaning was proposed by Alfred Tarski, but there must be a set of rules which pairs each sentence with a set of conditions.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
2
Q

Object Language vs Metalanguage

A

Object language is the language being described, whereas metalanguage is the language used to describe the object language (define truth conditional meaning in these cases). (Examples are propositional logic, set theory, predicate logic).

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
3
Q

Propositional logic:

A

enables us to systematically determine the content of a compound, complex sentence if we know the simplest sentence from which it is formed. (Connective rules)

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
4
Q

Set theory

A

Subject is an item, predicate is a set, item is true if subject belongs to that set (at relevant time whatever).

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
5
Q

Predications

A

‘John is strange’: the property of being strange is predicated of John.
Could say any utterance of an English sentence S of the form NP VP describes a situation in which the referent determined by NP has the property expressed by VP.

You can make these rules for names, one place and two place predicates and syntactic rules.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
6
Q

If we have these rules of predications (Napoleon’s list on lecture 4 notes) why do we need propositional logic?

A

Propositional logic deals with truth conditional meaning based on sentential connectives.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
7
Q

What are the logical connectives?

A
Not (very wrong horizontal L) 
And (upside down v) 
Inclusive Or (v) (where both is also an option) 
Exclusive Or (v with a subscript e) 
if - then (arrow) 
iff (double headed arrow)
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
8
Q

Is sentence meaning the only truth-conditional meaning?

Different viewpoints.

A

NO. Just because we define sentence meaning (and what is said) using truth conditions is not to say that implicatures could not be defined using truth-conditions.

The minimalist approach applies truth conditions to the ‘what is said level’, which can only apply to declaratives.

The contextualist approach also applies truth conditions to intended and communicated meanings (implicatures and presuppositions - if they are in context) so can also apply to interrogatives and imperatives.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
9
Q

What is implicature?

A

Speaker meaning. Not implication which could be entailment.

Grice 1975: Conversational implicatures are inferences which arise out of the Gricean maxims of conversation.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
10
Q

How to identify presuppositions?

A

The Projection test: If the sentence is negated the presupposition will still hold, while an entailment or implicature will be negated.

Presupposition is removed if sentence put after ‘if’.

Another test is Shannon 1976 ‘Hey wait a minute’ test. If your ‘hey wait a minute’ just repeats the content of the statement so feels redundant it was an entailment, whereas if the hey wait a minute feels valid it’s a presupposition.
‘I managed to do it.’
‘Hey i didn’t know you managed to do it’. POINTLESS
‘Hey I didn’t know you were trying to do it’ VALID.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
11
Q

If representing the presupposition from ‘John stopped smoking’ in a truth table, what is the truth value of the sentence if the presupposition is false.

A

Some would use zero as it could neither be true nor false if he hadn’t smoked in the first place.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
12
Q

Difference between logical ‘and’ and natural language ‘and’.

A

As a sentential connective, natural language ‘and’ can also indicate causation and/or temporality.

Grice 1975: thinks these additional meanings are implicatures.

Recanati 1989 thinks they are at the What is Said level.

Who’s right?

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
13
Q

How to show that logical disjunction is inclusive (which is why if we want to show exclusive we have to add the e).

A

You can cancel exclusivity?
‘Do you want chicken or pasta? Both.’
You cannot cancel inclusivity.
You can cancel implicatures, so exclusive or is an implicature.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
14
Q

Interesting point about the truth tables of implication (if it rains it’s wet)

A

even if the ‘if’ statement is false, if the then statement is true, the whole statement is true.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
15
Q

Interesting point about the truth tables of equivalence (i’ll help you if you ask me)

A

If one of the statements is false, the whole statement is false. But if they are both false or indeed both true, the statement is true.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
16
Q

What can you cancel/negate without creating contradiction.

A

Implicatures (some cats are not crazy, all of them are), presuppositions (he didn’t manage to do it, it was easy for him), pronunciation/register.

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
17
Q

Discuss the different evaluations of the sentence ‘The king of France isn’t bald’.
Russell 1905 vs Strawson 1950
vs Kempson 1975

A

According to Russell, this sentence is ambiguous. It has two logical forms along the lines of:
1) there is a king of France who is not bald.
2) it is not the case that there is a king of France who is bald.
(1 is narrow scope negation focusing on the property of baldness, 2 is widescope focusing on the whole proposition).

Russell believed that 1 is false but 2 is true. Strawson posits instead a truth value gap. (but surely this assumes the form of statement 1, because 2 is true, there is NO king of France who is bald.)

Kempson disputes that the statement is ambiguous, claiming instead that statement 2 entails statement 1 and thus 2 is the logical form of the statement, and it is true.

18
Q

What is the difference between true sentences which are true simply because of how the sentence is constructed, and true sentences which are true because they correspond to the state of the real world?
(Jaszczolt)

A
A priori (necessary truth (not contingent upon the state of the world) )
A posteriori (Empirical truth (contingent on world)

Sentences whose truth or falsehood follows from the structure of the sentence rather than from the relation with the world are called analytic. This means they are always true.
As opposed to synthetic.

Sentences can be analytic but still a posteriori, if their structure specifies that they are always true but knowledge of this truth requires knowledge of the real world.

19
Q

In addition to propositional logic, logical forms need?

A

predicate logic. unless you’re going to represent whole predicates as variables.

20
Q

Upside down A reads as

e.g Ax - but the A is upside down

A

for all xs…

21
Q

Lots of stuff we see in logic takes the form.

All men are mortal.
Socrates is a man.
Socrates is mortal.

What is the name for this rule of logical inference and how does jaszczolt write it?

A

modus ponendo ponens

((p->q)&p)->q

Saeed chap 4 gives 3 more types e.g missing out middle step (if I’m at school i must be learning, if im learning i must be happy, if im at school i must be happy)

22
Q

Can the same proposition be represented by multiple different sentences.

A

Yep, passive form for example.

23
Q

Jaszczolt’s problems with truth conditional sentence meaning.

A

Propositional attitude reports.

Ralph believes that the morning star is venus.
Ralph believes that the evening star is venus.
Both logically true, but if ralph’s sense of the evening star is distinct from the morning star and he has only claimed that the morning star is venus, then number 2 is false.

24
Q

Jazszcolt Possible Worlds: What is a proposition?

A

A function from possible world truth values.

the man is cold
proposition is the aspects of meaning which map all worlds where the man is cold to the value ‘true’.

25
Q

Jaszczolt what is intension (after carnap 1947)

A

a function from possible worlds (possible states of affairs) to the extension of the expression (real world referents)

26
Q

Jaszczolt: two additional aspects of the word ‘and’ you hadn’t explicitly touched on:

A

tom and peter own a car: the word and is introducing an ambiguity between the collective and distributive meanings.

implication: touch me and i will hit you

27
Q

Jaszczolt : an implication expresses a causal connection between

A

an antecedent and a consequent.

28
Q

Jaszczolt: do we use ‘implication’

A

no, when we say ‘if’ we tend to actually be expressing equivalence (iff).
Take: if you mow the lawn i will give you £10.
According to implication, even if you don’t mow the lawn, I will give you £10
where in fact i will give you £10 if and only if you mow the lawn.

29
Q

Jaszczolt: what is neg-raising

A

the tendency to assign a lower clause meaning to a higher clause negation: e.g i don’t think that she will win

30
Q

Saeed: presuppositional failure as a failure of the truth conditional perspective

A

the approach we have looked at is truth conditional where a presupposition holds whether the statement is true or false (as opposed to an interactional approach where the presupposition is simply another proposition in the statement)

presuppositional failure is when the presupposition cannot be true

king of france is bald presupposes that there is a king of france

(interactional approach would be fine because we would signal communication failure.)
truth value approach struggles because if we posit a truth gap then like what is truth lol

31
Q

Saeed: presupposition triggers

A
name / definite description 
cleft: it was X which disgusted me 
subordinate clauses: X happened before Y
A is more gullible than B 
lexical triggers X regrets/realises Y (factive verbs)
32
Q

Saeed: defeasability as a failure of the truth conditional perspective

A

1) she cried before she finished her thesis
2) she died before she finished her thesis

n 2) the presup that she finished her thesis is cancelled by real world knowledge, so can’t be purely truth based

33
Q

Saeed: different clefts as a failure of the truth conditional perspective (Strawson, 1950)

A

a) it was harry who alice loved (alice loved someone)
b) it was alice who loved harry (someone loved harry)

but a) & b) have same truth conditional meaning

34
Q

Saeed: pragmatic theories of presupposition

A

leech 1981: semantic presup (truth conditions), pragmatic presup (interactional approach where truth conditions fail

Stalnaker (1974) interlocuters share common ground, and if someone says something which presupposes something, they are merely making reference to some shared common ground. If they say something which actively contradicts the common ground (king of france) it is a presuppositional failure. If they say something which isn’t in the common ground but could be (e.g Tom’s brother) it is added to the common ground. (tht last bit called accommodation - Lewis, 1979).

35
Q

How does quantification change our previous idea of predication?

A

From previous lecture: [SNP VP] describes referent NP as having property VP.
This doesn’t hold for quantified noun phrases:
No politicians can be trusted, Most students sleep late, Only humans have language, More sheep than people live in australia.

36
Q

What do quantified statements express?

A

relations between sets

37
Q

quick how do representing predicates work

A
L < love
j < john m < mary 
L(j,m) John loves mary
S < sleeps 
S(m) < Mary sleeps
38
Q

logical form (written in words lol) of some boys are sleeping

on lecture 5 notes

A

(there exists an x such that x is a boy and x is sleeping) AND (there exists a y where y is a boy and sleeping) AND (x is not y)

39
Q

logical form in words of every boy is sleeping

A

for all x if c is a boy then he is sleeping AND there exists an x who is a boy

40
Q

logical form of no boy is sleeping

A

it is not the case that there exists a boy x and x is sleeping

41
Q

What are scope ambiguities

A

every boy loves a girl

for all boys x there exists a girl y such that x loves y

there exists a girl who is loved by all boys

They are neither syntactic (2 underlying syntactic structures) nor lexical (one word with 2 meanings), a scope ambiguity concerns the LOGICAL FORM