Interpreting plural predication: homogeneity and non-maximality

Abstract

Plural definite descriptions across many languages display two well-known properties. First, they can give rise to so-called non-maximal readings, in the sense that they ‘allow for exceptions’ (Mary read the books on the reading list, in some contexts, can be judged true even if Mary didn’t read all the books on the reading list). Second, while they tend to have a quasi-universal quantificational force in affirmative sentences (‘quasi-universal’ rather than simply ‘universal’ due to the possibility of exceptions we have just mentioned), they tend to be interpreted existentially in the scope of negation (a property often referred to as homogeneity, cf. Löbner in Linguist Philos 23:213–308, 2000). Building on previous works (in particular Krifka in Proceedings of SALT VI, Cornell University, pp 136–153, 1996 and Malamud in Semant Pragmat, 5:1–28, 2012), we offer a theory in which sentences containing plural definite expressions trigger a family of possible interpretations, and where general principles of language use account for their interpretation in various contexts and syntactic environments. Our theory solves a number of problems that these previous works encounter, and has broader empirical coverage in that it offers a precise analysis for sentences that display complex interactions between plural definites, quantifiers and bound variables, as well as for cases involving non-distributive predicates. The resulting proposal is briefly compared with an alternative proposal by Križ (Aspects of homogeneity in the semantics of natural language, University of Vienna, 2015), which has similar coverage but is based on a very different architecture and sometimes makes subtly different predictions.

Free choice, simplification, and Innocent Inclusion

“…One might consider the following fix for salvaging the ambiguity approach, in light of ( 7) and (i): allowed A or B gives rise to a special kind of ambiguity, which requires truth on all of its resolutions (along the lines of the ambiguity approach to homogeneity phenomena in Spector 2013, Križ and Spector 2017, Spector 2018. Since it does not seem to extend to every kind of ambiguity resolution we do not pursue this route.…”

Ignorance implicatures of modified numerals

“…12 An anonymous reviewer points out that the range of interpretations would need to be contextually restricted, otherwise pronouns would systematically violate this constraint. 13 Similar principles have been proposed in Spector (2017) and Križ and Spector (2020) to account for homogeneity effects with definite descriptions. The idea has roots in supervaluationism (an idea first proposed to account for vague expressions) and Krifka's (1996) Strongest Meaning Hypothesis.…”

The Role of Alternatives in Language

“…Another explanation is that plural definites are semantically underdetermined, and may receive an existential or a universal reading, depending on the context (downwardentailing/upward-entailing, Krifka, 1996; /non-monotonic, Malamud, 2012). The existential and the universal reading are scalar alternatives, which can be the basis for scalar strengthening (Krifka, 1996;Magri, 2014;Križ 2015;Bar-Lev, 2018;Križ and Spector, 2020). In the sections Alternatives in the Lab and Alternatives for All?…”