'Quantifying' Superlatives and Homo Sapiens  

Oleh:

VELOUDIS, IOANNIS

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: Journal of Semantics (Sebagian Full Text) vol. 15 no. 3 (Aug. 1998), page 215-237.
Topik: Quantifying; Superlatives; Pragmatic Scalanty;
Fulltext: vol 15, no 3, p 215-237.pdf (1.04MB)

Isi artikel

The hypothesis that two logical schemes are, more or less directly, involved in the so-called 'quantification*!' readings of superlatives is defended in the present paper. It is argued, in particular, that sentences like, eg.John can solve the most difficult problem and John cannot solve the easiest problem can be associated with their corresponding 'quantificationaT interpretations, Le. 'John can solve any problem' and 'John cannot solve any problem', only in die contexts in which they are uttered, and understood, as the key premises, A and not B, of modus ponendo ponens and modus tollendo tollens, respectively. This hypothesis, it is also argued, gains some generalizations missed in Fauconnier's (1975a, b, 1979, 1980) well-known analysis of the relevant phenomena in terms of 'pragmatic scalanty'. In particular, (1) it can dearly distinguish between contexts in which diese 'quantificational' readings are welcome and contexts in which they are not, (ii) it can naturally account for die alleged 'similarity' between (existential/universal) any and 'quantifying' superlatives like the most difficult, the easiest, etc, and, what is important, (iii) it can uniformly characterize the mosaic of the environments in which 'scalarity' phenomena occur, allowing us to explain what it is about exactly these environments (and not others) diat makes them licensers of the 'quantificational' readings.

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