SynSem_Problems_ScopalNonScopal

Distinguishing Scopal from Non-Scopal Semantic Arguments

Background

We take it as given (for now) that certain predicates have scopal argument positions, i.e. contribute to the articulation of the scope tree. Examples are the sole argument of seem and not and the second argument of deny in the examples below:

• It seems that Kim left.

• The dog did not bark.

• Kim denies that the dog barked.

In calling these argument positions scopal, we believe we are making at least the following claims:

1. Quantifiers may scope in between the predicate and its scopal argument.

   • The dog did not chase every cat.

   • Kim denied that every dog barked.

2. A proposition embedded as a scopal argument is not necessarily (for the purposes of e.g. presupposition calculation) in the same context as the embedding predicate.
   • Kim believes that every dog barked.

Currently, in the English Resource Grammar (and DELPH-IN grammars more generally), we distinguish two types of elements which are adverbial modifiers syntactically and functors semantically, which we call scopal and non-scopal modifiers. The former take the syntactic head they combine with as a scopal argument:

• Kim never left.

While the latter instead are predicated of the event variable of the head they combine with:

• Kim left quickly.

Problem Statement

While we feel that some items are fairly clearly in one category (scopal modifiers) or the other, we find it difficult to categorize many other times. Accordingly, we have the following questions:

1. Is this distinction in fact well-defined?
2. If so, what tests can we use to classify particular predicates?
3. If not, what representation should we use? (Underspecification, assimilate all modifiers to one type, other?)

Key Examples

Possible Tests