The Category of the Conjuction in Categorial Grammar

En aquest treball es proposa un tipus categorial per a les conjuncions (i, o, etc.) dins del formalisme de la Gràmatica Categorial. En primer lloc s'exposen tres característiques fonamentals que qualsevol tractament de la conjunció ha de poder explicar. Després es contemplen les diferents aportacions que s'han fet dins aquest formalisme per a delinear una categoria de la conjunció que permeti donar compte dels fenòmens del llenguatge natural. Totes aquestes aportacions es comenten respecte de la seva adequació amb les tres característiques de la conjunció exposades al principi. Seguidament, es proposa una categoria per a les conjuncions que pot donar compte de les característiques esmentades. Aquesta categoria introdueix un nou operador n-tuple que resulta també molt útil per a l'anàlisi d'altres fenòmens del llenguatge natural.In this work a categorial type for conjunctions (and, or, etc) is proposed within the Categorial Grammar formalism. First of all, I present three main characteristics that have to be accounted for in any analysis of conjunction. Secondly, I explain the different contributions that have been made within this formalism to fmd a category for conjunction that allows us to account for natural language phenomena. All those proposals are commented on with regard to the three properties to be explained. Next, a categorial type for conjunctions is proposed which can account for those characteristics. This category introduces a new n-tuple operator which is also useful for analysing other natural language phenomena

Surface Structure, Intonation, and Meaning in Spoken Language

The paper briefly reviews a theory of intonational prosody and its relation syntax, and to certain oppositions of discourse meaning that have variously been called topic and comment , theme and rheme , given and new , or presupposition and focus . The theory, which is based on Combinatory Categorial Grammar, is presented in full elsewhere. the present paper examines its consequences for the automatic synthesis and analysis of speech

Animation From Instructions

We believe that computer animation in the form of narrated animated simulations can provide an engaging, effective and flexible medium for instructing agents in the performance of tasks. However, we argue that the only way to achieve the kind of flexibility needed to instruct agents of varying capabilities to perform tasks with varying demands in work places of varying layout is to drive both animation and narration from a common representation that embodies the same conceptualization of tasks and actions as Natural Language itself. To this end, we are exploring the use of Natural Language instructions to drive animated simulations. In this paper, we discuss the relationship between instructions and behavior that underlie our work and the overall structure of our system. We then describe in some what more detail three aspects of the system - the representation used by the Simulator, the operation of the Simulator and the Motion Generators used in the system

A Lazy Way to Chart-Parse with Categorial Grammars

ht capture the obvious intuitions concerning constituency in a sentence like John must leave by identifying the VP leave and the NP John as the arguments of the tensed verb must, and the verb itself as a function combin- ing to its right with a VP, to yield a predicate -- that is, a leftward-combining function-from-NPs-into-sentences. One common "slash" notation for the types of such functions expresses them as lriples of the form <result, direction, argu. me. hi>, where result and argument are themselves syntactic types, and direction is indicated by "f' (for rightwardcombining functions) or ' (for leftward). Must then gets the following type-assignment: (1) must :- (SNP}/VP In pure categorial grammar, the only other element is a single "combinatory" rule of Functional Application, which gives rise to the following two instances: 1 1 All combinatory mlus are written as productions in the present paper, in contrast with the reduction rule notation used in the earlier papers. The ch

Gapping as Constituent Coordination

A number of coordinate constructions in natural languages conjoin sequences which do not appear to correspond to syntactic constituents in the traditional sense. One striking instance of the phenomenon is afforded by the gapping construction of English, of which the following sentence is a simple example: (1) Harry eats beans, and Fred, potatoes Since all theories agree that coordination must in fact be an operation upon constituents, most of them have dealt with the apparent paradox presented by such constructions by supposing that such sequences as the right conjunct in the above example, Fred, potatoes, should be treated in the grammar as traditional constituents, of type S, but with pieces missing or deleted

Grammars and Processors

The paper discusses the role of grammars in sentence processing, and explores some consequences of the Strong Competence Hypothesis of Bresnan and Kaplan for combinatory theories of grammar

Implementing Theorem Provers in Logic Programming

Logic programming languages have many characteristics that indicate that they should serve as good implementation languages for theorem provers. For example, they are based on search and unification which are also fundamental to theorem proving. We show how an extended logic programming language can be used to implement theorem provers and other aspects of proof systems for a variety of logics. In this language first-order terms are replaced with simply-typed λ-terms, and thus unification becomes higher-order unification. Also, implication and universal quantification are allowed in goals. We illustrate that inference rules can be very naturally specified, and that the primitive search operations of this language correspond to those needed for searching for proofs. We argue on several levels that this extended logic programming language provides a very suitable environment for implementing tactic style theorem provers. Such theorem provers provide extensive capabilities for integrating techniques for automated theorem proving into an interactive proof environment. We are also concerned with representing proofs as objects. We illustrate how such objects can be constructed and manipulated in the logic programming setting. Finally, we propose extensions to tactic style theorem provers in working toward the goal of developing an interactive theorem proving environment that provides a user with many tools and techniques for building and manipulating proofs, and that integrates sophisticated capabilities for automated proof discovery. Many of the theorem provers we present have been implemented in the higher-order logic programming language λProlog