A flexible scope theory of intensionality

Bibliographic Data

ID21461970
AuthorsPatrick D Elliott (0000-0002-5275-001X, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume46
Issue2
Pages333-378
Publication date2023-04-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueLinguistics and Philosophy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0165-0157 • E-ISSN: 1573-0549
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s10988-022-09367-w
OpenAlexW4307157623
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited25

Extant attempts to incorporate intensionality into the grammar either systematically over-generate, or systematically under-generate. In this paper, building on Keshet (Linguist and Philos 33(4):251–283, 2011), we aim to reconcile a scopal account of de re with the possibility of de re readings out of scope islands. By adapting compositional techniques for dealing with exceptionally scoping indefinites (Charlow, in On the semantics of exceptional scope, PhD thesis, Rutgers University, 2014; The scope of alternatives: indefiniteness and islands. Linguist and Philos 43(4):427–472, 2020), we develop an intensional grammar in which exceptional de re is achieved via cyclic scope . World-sensitive expressions are converted into scope-takers via a constrained inventory of type-flexible operators. Type flexibility explains the possibility of apparently island-violating de re by predicting the possibility of cyclic scope-taking. We argue that the resulting theory—which we dub the flexible scope theory —is sufficiently expressive to address the under-generation issues of current accounts, while still capturing constraints on de re in an explanatory fashion

Economics · Epistemology · Extant taxon · Grammar · Linguistics · Management · Metaphysics · Philosophy of language · Programming language · Computer Science · Historical Linguistics and Language Studies · Logic, programming, and type systems · Philosophy · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

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