Intuitions and Competence in Formal Semantics

<p>In formal semantics intuition plays a key role, in two ways. Intuitions about semantic properties of expressions are the primary data, and intuitions of the semanticists are the main access to these data. The paper investigates how this dual role is related to the concept of competence and the role that this concept plays in semantics. And it inquires whether the self-reflexive role of intuitions has consequences for the methodology of semantics as an empirical discipline.</p><p><strong>References</strong></p><p>Baggio, Giosuè, van Lambalgen, Michiel &amp; Hagoort, Peter. 2008. ‘Computing and recomputing discourse models: an ERP study of the semantics of temporal connectives’. Journal of Memory and Language 59, no. 1: 36–53.<br /><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2008.02.005" target="_blank">http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2008.02.005</a><br /><br />Chierchia, Gennaro &amp; McConnell-Ginet, Sally. 2000. Meaning and Grammar. second ed. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.<br /><br />Chomsky, Noam. 1965. Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.<br /><br />Cresswell, Max J. 1978. ‘Semantic competence’. In F. Guenthner &amp; M. Guenther-Reutter (eds.) ‘Meaning and Translation’, 9–27. Duckworth, London. de Swart, Henriëtte. 1998. Introduction to Natural Language Semantics. Stanford: CSLI.<br /><br />Dowty, David, Wall, Robert &amp; Peters, Stanley. 1981. Introduction to Montague Semantics. Dordrecht: Reidel.<br /><br />Heim, Irene &amp; Kratzer, Angelika. 1998. Semantics in Generative Grammar. Oxford: Blackwell.<br /><br />Larson, Richard &amp; Segal, Gabriel. 1995. Knowledge of Meaning. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.<br /><br />Lewis, David K. 1975. ‘Languages and Language’. In Keith Gunderson (ed.) ‘Language, Mind and Knowledge’, 3–35. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.<br /><br />Montague, Richard. 1970. ‘Universal Grammar’. Theoria 36: 373–98.<br /><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-2567.1970.tb00434.x" target="_blank">http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-2567.1970.tb00434.x</a><br /><br />Partee, Barbara H. 1979. ‘Semantics – Mathematics or Psychology?’ In Rainer Bäuerle, Urs Egli &amp; Arnim von Stechow (eds.) ‘Semantics from Different Points of View’, 1–14. Berlin: Springer.<br /><br />Partee, Barbara H. 1980. ‘Montague Grammar, Mental Representation, and Reality’. In S. Ohman &amp; S. Kanger (eds.) ‘Philosophy and Grammar’, 59–78. Dordrecht: Reidel.<br /><br />Partee, Barbara H. 1988. ‘Semantic Facts and Psychological Facts’. Mind and Language 3: 43–52.<br /><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0017.1988.tb00132.x" target="_blank">http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0017.1988.tb00132.x</a><br /><br />Stokhof, Martin. 2007. ‘Hand or Hammer? On Formal and Natural Languages in Semantics’. Journal of Indian Philosophy 35, no. 5: 597–626.<br /><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10781-007-9023-7" target="_blank">http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10781-007-9023-7</a><br /><br />Stokhof, Martin &amp; van Lambalgen, Michiel. 2011a. ‘Abstraction and Idealisation: The Construction of Modern Linguistics’. Theoretical Linguistics 37, no. 1–2: 1–26.<br /><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/THLI.2011.001" target="_blank">http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/THLI.2011.001</a><br /><br />Stokhof, Martin &amp; van Lambalgen, Michiel. 2011b. ‘Comments–to–Comments’. Theoretical Linguistics 37, no. 1–2: 79–94.<br /><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/THLI.2011.008" target="_blank">http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/THLI.2011.008</a><br /><br />Thomason, Richmond H. 1974. ‘Introduction’. In Richmond H. Thomason (ed.) ‘Formal Philosophy. Selected papers of Richard Montague.’, 1–71. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.<br /><br />Weinberg, Jonathan M., Gonnerman, Chad, Buckner, Cameron &amp; Alexander, Joshua. 2010. ‘Are Philosophers Expert Intuiters?’ Philosophical Psychology 23, no. 3: 331–55.<br /><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2010.490944" target="_blank">http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2010.490944</a><br /><br /></p

Coherent Integration of Databases by Abductive Logic Programming

We introduce an abductive method for a coherent integration of independent data-sources. The idea is to compute a list of data-facts that should be inserted to the amalgamated database or retracted from it in order to restore its consistency. This method is implemented by an abductive solver, called Asystem, that applies SLDNFA-resolution on a meta-theory that relates different, possibly contradicting, input databases. We also give a pure model-theoretic analysis of the possible ways to `recover' consistent data from an inconsistent database in terms of those models of the database that exhibit as minimal inconsistent information as reasonably possible. This allows us to characterize the `recovered databases' in terms of the `preferred' (i.e., most consistent) models of the theory. The outcome is an abductive-based application that is sound and complete with respect to a corresponding model-based, preferential semantics, and -- to the best of our knowledge -- is more expressive (thus more general) than any other implementation of coherent integration of databases

Using Ontologies for the Design of Data Warehouses

Obtaining an implementation of a data warehouse is a complex task that forces designers to acquire wide knowledge of the domain, thus requiring a high level of expertise and becoming it a prone-to-fail task. Based on our experience, we have detected a set of situations we have faced up with in real-world projects in which we believe that the use of ontologies will improve several aspects of the design of data warehouses. The aim of this article is to describe several shortcomings of current data warehouse design approaches and discuss the benefit of using ontologies to overcome them. This work is a starting point for discussing the convenience of using ontologies in data warehouse design.Comment: 15 pages, 2 figure

Four Lessons in Versatility or How Query Languages Adapt to the Web

Exposing not only human-centered information, but machine-processable data on the Web is one of the commonalities of recent Web trends. It has enabled a new kind of applications and businesses where the data is used in ways not foreseen by the data providers. Yet this exposition has fractured the Web into islands of data, each in different Web formats: Some providers choose XML, others RDF, again others JSON or OWL, for their data, even in similar domains. This fracturing stifles innovation as application builders have to cope not only with one Web stack (e.g., XML technology) but with several ones, each of considerable complexity. With Xcerpt we have developed a rule- and pattern based query language that aims to give shield application builders from much of this complexity: In a single query language XML and RDF data can be accessed, processed, combined, and re-published. Though the need for combined access to XML and RDF data has been recognized in previous work (including the W3C’s GRDDL), our approach differs in four main aspects: (1) We provide a single language (rather than two separate or embedded languages), thus minimizing the conceptual overhead of dealing with disparate data formats. (2) Both the declarative (logic-based) and the operational semantics are unified in that they apply for querying XML and RDF in the same way. (3) We show that the resulting query language can be implemented reusing traditional database technology, if desirable. Nevertheless, we also give a unified evaluation approach based on interval labelings of graphs that is at least as fast as existing approaches for tree-shaped XML data, yet provides linear time and space querying also for many RDF graphs. We believe that Web query languages are the right tool for declarative data access in Web applications and that Xcerpt is a significant step towards a more convenient, yet highly efficient data access in a “Web of Data”

An adequate logic for full LOTOS

We present a novel result for a logic for symbolic transition systems based on LOTOS processes. The logic is adequate with respect to bisimulation defined on symbolic transition systems

A Fully Abstract Symbolic Semantics for Psi-Calculi

We present a symbolic transition system and bisimulation equivalence for psi-calculi, and show that it is fully abstract with respect to bisimulation congruence in the non-symbolic semantics. A psi-calculus is an extension of the pi-calculus with nominal data types for data structures and for logical assertions representing facts about data. These can be transmitted between processes and their names can be statically scoped using the standard pi-calculus mechanism to allow for scope migrations. Psi-calculi can be more general than other proposed extensions of the pi-calculus such as the applied pi-calculus, the spi-calculus, the fusion calculus, or the concurrent constraint pi-calculus. Symbolic semantics are necessary for an efficient implementation of the calculus in automated tools exploring state spaces, and the full abstraction property means the semantics of a process does not change from the original

Modality and expressibility

When embedding data are used to argue against semantic theory A and in favor of semantic theory B, it is important to ask whether A could make sense of those data. It is possible to ask that question on a case-by-case basis. But suppose we could show that A can make sense of all the embedding data which B can possibly make sense of. This would, on the one hand, undermine arguments in favor of B over A on the basis of embedding data. And, provided that the converse does not hold—that is, that A can make sense of strictly more embedding data than B can—it would also show that there is a precise sense in which B is more constrained than A, yielding a pro tanto simplicity-based consideration in favor of B. In this paper I develop tools which allow us to make comparisons of this kind, which I call comparisons of potential expressive power. I motivate the development of these tools by way of exploration of the recent debate about epistemic modals. Prominent theories which have been developed in response to embedding data turn out to be strictly less expressive than the standard relational theory, a fact which necessitates a reorientation in how to think about the choice between these theories