Vocab and Terminology File 6

Question 1

Sense

Answer 1

An expression as some kind of mental representation of its meaning, or perhaps some kind of concept.

Question 2

Referents

Answer 2

The particular entities in the world to which some expression refers.

Question 3

Sister terms

Answer 3

We say two words are this if their reference is, intuitively, on the same level in the hierarchy.

Question 4

Proposition

Answer 4

The claim expressed by a sentence.

Question 5

Truth value

Answer 5

The ability to be true or false.

Question 6

Truth conditions

Answer 6

The conditions that would have to hold in the world in order for some proposition to be true.

Question 7

Mutual entailment

Answer 7

When two propositions entail one another, we refer their relationship as this.

Question 8

Principle of compositionality

Answer 8

The meaning of a sentence (or any other multi-word expression) is a function of the meanings of the words it contains, and how these words are syntactically combined.

Question 9

Hyponymy

Answer 9

A meaning relationship between words, where the reference of same word X is included in the reference of some word Y. X is then said to be a hyponym of Y.

Question 10

Synonymy

Answer 10

A meaning relationship between words where their reference is exactly the same.

Question 11

Subsective Adjectives

Answer 11

Adjectives whose reference is included in the set of things that the noun they modify refers to.

Question 12

Antonymy

Answer 12

A meaning relationship between words where their meanings are in some sense opposite.

Question 13

Anti-intersection Adjective

Answer 13

An adjective whose referents are not in the set referred to by the noun that it modifies.

Question 14

Gradable Antonyms

Answer 14

Words that are antonyms and denote opposite ends of a scale.

Question 15

Entailment

Answer 15

A relationship between propositions where a proposition p is said to entail another proposition q just in case if p is true, q has to be true as well.

Question 16

Incompatible

Answer 16

The relationship between two propositions where it is impossible for both of them to be true simultaneously.

Question 17

Compositional

Answer 17

The meaning of a phrasal expression that is predictable from the meanings of smaller expression it contains and how they are syntactically combined.

Question 18

Pure intersection

Answer 18

The relationship between the reference of an adjective and a noun it modifies such that each picks out a particular group of things, and the reference of the resulting phrase is all of the things that are in both the reference set of the adjective and the reference set of the noun.

Question 19

Intersective adjectives

Answer 19

An adjective whose reference is determined independently from the reference of the noun that it modifies.

Question 20

Relative intersection

Answer 20

Type of relationship between adjective and noun reference where the reference of the adjective is determined relative to the noun reference.

Question 21

Subsective adjective

Answer 21

Adjectives whose reference is included in the set of things that the noun they modify refers to.

Question 22

Non-intersection adjective

Answer 22

An adjective whose reference is a subset of the set that the noun it modifies refers to, but that does not, in and of itself, refer to any particular set of things.

Question 23

Anti-intersection adjective

Answer 23

An adjective whose referents are not in the set referred to by the noun that it modifies.

Question 24

Idioms

Answer 24

A multi word lexical expression whose meaning is not compositional.

Question 25

Converses

Answer 25

Antonyms in which the first word of the pair suggests a point of view opposite to that of the second word.

Question 26

Prototype

Answer 26

For any given set, a member that exhibits the typical qualities of the members of that set.

Question 27

Mental image

Answer 27

A conception of a word’s sense as a picture in the mind of the language user that represents its meaning.

Question 28

Complementary Antonyms

Answer 28

Pair of antonyms such that everything must be described by the first word, the second word, or neither.

Question 29

Reverses

Answer 29

Antonyms in which one word in the pair suggests movement that “undoes” the movement suggested by the other.

Question 30

Reference

Answer 30

A component of linguistic meaning that relates the sense of some expression to entities in the outside world.