Semantics out of context: nominal absolute denotations for first-order logic and computation

Call a semantics for a language with variables absolute when variables map to fixed entities in the denotation. That is, a semantics is absolute when the denotation of a variable a is a copy of itself in the denotation. We give a trio of lattice-based, sets-based, and algebraic absolute semantics to first-order logic. Possibly open predicates are directly interpreted as lattice elements / sets / algebra elements, subject to suitable interpretations of the connectives and quantifiers. In particular, universal quantification "forall a.phi" is interpreted using a new notion of "fresh-finite" limit and using a novel dual to substitution. The interest of this semantics is partly in the non-trivial and beautiful technical details, which also offer certain advantages over existing semantics---but also the fact that such semantics exist at all suggests a new way of looking at variables and the foundations of logic and computation, which may be well-suited to the demands of modern computer science

Denotation and connotation in the human-computer interface: The ‘Save as...’ command

This paper presents a semiotic technique as a means of exploring meaning and understanding in interface design and use. This is examined through a study of the interaction between the ‘file’ metaphor and ‘save as’ command metaphor. The behaviour of these (from a functional or computational basis) do not exactly match, or map onto, the meaning of the metaphor. We examine both the denotation of a term to the user, i.e. its literal meaning to that person, and the term’s connotations, i.e. any other meanings associated with the term. We suggest that the technique applied is useful in predicting future problems with understanding the use of metaphor at the interface and with designing appropriate signification for human-computer interaction. Variation in connotation was expected but a more fundamental difference in denotation was also uncovered. Moreover, the results clearly demonstrate that consistency in the denotation of a term is critical in achieving a good user understanding of the command

WITHIN THE BUSINESS WORDS AND THEIR DENOTATIVE MEANINGS

Our ideas must be conveyed in a strategic manner by catching the attention of the listeners. So, words become very important and their power is enhanced by their denotation and connotation. Denotation or the explicit meaning, the dictionary definition helps for a better understanding of words which have to be chosen carefully for what they imply or suggest. In the business area we must be very precise in the explanation in a dynamic, positive and action oriented language.communication, word, language, information, success

Reflexion, Denotation, Aspektualisierung

In der neunten Vorlesung spricht Hans Ulrich Reck über die Epistemologie im Vergleich zur Ontologie von Bildern und diskutiert Konzepte der Visualität als Hintergrund des Konzeptes 'Kunst'. Zur Pointierung und als maßgebende Beispiele aus der Gegenwartskunst werden Gary Hill und Dan Graham thematisiert. Darüber hinaus geht es um byzantinische Bildkonzeption, die dreidimensionale naturalistische Illusionsinszenierung des Barock in Gestalt von heiligen Bildern (Sacri Monti u.a.), um Bilderstreit und Bilderkriege, um die Bildverbote im 20. Jahrhundert (Duchamp, Adorno u.a.) sowie Theorien der Photographie. Zusammenfassend und als Überleitung zur folgenden Vorlesung werden semiotische Diagramme zu Sprach- und Zeichenstrukturen sowie um das komplexe Modell künstlerisch-kunsttheoretischer-semiotischer Referenzsysteme am Beispiel Malewitsch (Abkoppelung von Zeichen und Bedeutung) vorgestellt. - Audiolectures 05,9

Computer-Assisted Program Reasoning Based on a Relational Semantics of Programs

We present an approach to program reasoning which inserts between a program and its verification conditions an additional layer, the denotation of the program expressed in a declarative form. The program is first translated into its denotation from which subsequently the verification conditions are generated. However, even before (and independently of) any verification attempt, one may investigate the denotation itself to get insight into the "semantic essence" of the program, in particular to see whether the denotation indeed gives reason to believe that the program has the expected behavior. Errors in the program and in the meta-information may thus be detected and fixed prior to actually performing the formal verification. More concretely, following the relational approach to program semantics, we model the effect of a program as a binary relation on program states. A formal calculus is devised to derive from a program a logic formula that describes this relation and is subject for inspection and manipulation. We have implemented this idea in a comprehensive form in the RISC ProgramExplorer, a new program reasoning environment for educational purposes which encompasses the previously developed RISC ProofNavigator as an interactive proving assistant.Comment: In Proceedings THedu'11, arXiv:1202.453

A continuation semantics of interrogatives that accounts for Baker's ambiguity

Wh-phrases in English can appear both raised and in-situ. However, only in-situ wh-phrases can take semantic scope beyond the immediately enclosing clause. I present a denotational semantics of interrogatives that naturally accounts for these two properties. It neither invokes movement or economy, nor posits lexical ambiguity between raised and in-situ occurrences of the same wh-phrase. My analysis is based on the concept of continuations. It uses a novel type system for higher-order continuations to handle wide-scope wh-phrases while remaining strictly compositional. This treatment sheds light on the combinatorics of interrogatives as well as other kinds of so-called A'-movement.Comment: 20 pages; typo fixe

Reflexives and reciprocals in LTAG

This paper presents an LTAG analysis of reflexives like himself and reciprocals like each other. These items need to find a c-commanding antecedent from which they retrieve (part of) their own denotation and with which they syntactically agree. The relation between anaphoric item and antecendent must satisfy the following important locality conditions (Chomsky (1981))

Compositional Semantic Parsing on Semi-Structured Tables

Two important aspects of semantic parsing for question answering are the breadth of the knowledge source and the depth of logical compositionality. While existing work trades off one aspect for another, this paper simultaneously makes progress on both fronts through a new task: answering complex questions on semi-structured tables using question-answer pairs as supervision. The central challenge arises from two compounding factors: the broader domain results in an open-ended set of relations, and the deeper compositionality results in a combinatorial explosion in the space of logical forms. We propose a logical-form driven parsing algorithm guided by strong typing constraints and show that it obtains significant improvements over natural baselines. For evaluation, we created a new dataset of 22,033 complex questions on Wikipedia tables, which is made publicly available