The Representation Of Adverbs, Adjectives and Events In Logical Form

Abstract

The representation of adjectives and their adverbial counterparts in logical form rises a number of issues in the relation of (morpho)syntax to semantics, as well as more specific problems of lexical and grammatical analysis. This paper addresses those issues which have bearing on the relation of properties to events. It is argued that attributes and context play only an indirect role in the relation between properties and events. The body of the paper addresses the criteria for relating surface forms to logical form representations, and offers a unified analysis of adjectives and their adverbial counterparts in logical form while maintaining a clear distinction between operators and predicates; this requires the postulation of a factive sentential operator and the relaxation of the one-to-one syntax-semantics correspondence hypothesis. Criteria for determining the number of arguments for a predicate are established and are used for the analyses of phenomena such as passive-sensitivity, lexical derivational patterns, and gradability.