In this paper, we discuss the question whether phrasal comparatives should be
given a direct interpretation, or require an analysis as elliptic
constructions, and answer it with Yes and No. The most adequate analysis of
wide reading attributive (WRA) comparatives seems to be as cases of ellipsis,
while a direct (but asymmetric) analysis fits the data for narrow scope
attributive comparatives. The question whether it is a syntactic or a semantic
process which provides the missing linguistic material in the complement of WRA
comparatives is also given a complex answer: Linguistic context is accessed by
combining a reconstruction operation and a mechanism of anaphoric reference.
The analysis makes only few and straightforward syntactic assumptions. In part,
this is made possible because the use of Generalized Functional Application as
a semantic operation allows us to model semantic composition in a flexible way.Comment: Postscript, 15 page
