Quantifying semantic and pragmatic effects on scalar diversity

Scalar inference (SI), the process by which we systematically infer meanings stronger than what was explicitly said, has long been a central topic of investigation in semantics-pragmatics. A recent experimental finding that has generated interest is scalar diversity: that the robustness of SI calculation varies across lexical scales. For instance, the some but not all SI is much more likely to arise than good but not excellent. In this paper, we take a first step toward more rigorously quantifying the observed variation across scales using relative entropy. We then turn to the question of how factors independent of scalar diversity can make SI calculation both more likely and more uniform. We find that a supportive discourse context and overt exhaustification with the focus particle only both increase inference rates and reduce variation across scales, with the effect of only being stronger. However, there still remains a lot of scalar diversity; only when we combine context with semantic exhaustification do we find uniformity across lexical scales

A Language Description is More than a Metamodel

Within the context of (software) language engineering, language descriptions are considered first class citizens. One of the ways to describe languages is by means of a metamodel, which represents the abstract syntax of the language. Unfortunately, in this process many language engineers forget the fact that a language also needs a concrete syntax and a semantics. In this paper I argue that neither of these can be discarded from a language description. In a good language description the abstract syntax is the central element, which functions as pivot between concrete syntax and semantics. Furthermore, both concrete syntax and semantics should be described in a well-defined formalism

Are explicatures cancellable?

Explicatures are not cancellable. Theoretical considerations

Some Concerns Regarding Ternary-relation Semantics and Truth-theoretic Semantics in General

This paper deals with a collection of concerns that, over a period of time, led the author away from the Routley–Meyer semantics, and towards proof- theoretic approaches to relevant logics, and indeed to the weak relevant logic MC of meaning containment

A genetic approach to management education and the science of teaching

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.In this thesis the philosophy and mechanisms of Cybernetics are applied to Management Education. A philosophical analysis of Management Education is developed and the notion of teleology introduced. Change, dynamic stability and a concept of self-renewal are employed in a cybernetic framework for managing conflicting curricula demands from: (A) academics who are concerned with the intellectual good and analytical ability of their students; (B) representatives of industry, commerce and government who ate concerned with manpower demands, and (C) students' demand for freedom to make up their own curricula from a menu of subjects chosen by them. A model of a regulatory system is developed for controlling a teaching/learning situation to achieve a desired level of mastery. Such a system would contribute towards an improvement in the science of teaching. The mechanisms of communication being parts of the study of Cybernetics are directly relevant to the teaching/learning situation. They form a means to an end relationship, between a teacher and students in the transmission of knowledge. A "black-box" approach to the processes of learning and problem solving is developed. From this approach evolved five essential phases to designing a protocol on how management students should learn what we (teachers) want them to learn. A case is presented to illustrate a learning process. A reflective approach giving teachers a more realistic view (than that given by Newell, Shaw and Simon (1958) and Newell and Simon (1972) ) of the important components for modelling how management students actually learn what we want them to learn is developed. A curriculum design is presented in section 8 which contains basic forms of knowledge and arrangements for a worthwhile management scheme. SYSTEM TWO is an operations system designed to implement the curriculum. It has advantages over committee arrangements and designed to accommodate co-operative educational programs for Management Education. This research has a positive value in that it demonstrates, among other things that Cybernetics is a worthwhile field of discipline which is needed to improve: the state of Management; pedagogy, and Management Education

LSB - Live and Safe B: Alternative semantics for Event B

We define two lifted, total relation semantics for Event B machines: Safe B for safety-only properties and Live B for liveness properties. The usual Event B proof obligations, Safe, are sufficient to establish Safe B refinement. Satisfying Safe plus a simple additional proof obligation ACT REF is sufficient to establish Live B refinement. The use of lifted, total relations both prevents the ambiguity of the unlifted relational semantics and prevents operations being clairvoyant

What working memory is for

Glenberg focuses on conceptualizations that change from moment to moment, yet he dismisses the concept of working memory (sect. 4.3), which offers an account of temporary storage and on-line cognition. This commentary questions whether Glenberg's account adequately caters for observations of consistent data patterns in temporary storage of verbal and visuospatial information in healthy adults and in brain-damaged patients with deficits in temporary retention.</jats:p