Constructions of Intersubjectivity shows that the meaning of grammatical constructions often has more to do with the human cognitive capacity for taking other peoples' points of view than with describing the world. Treating pragmatics, semantics, and syntax in parallel and integrating insights from linguistics, psychology, and animal communication, Arie Verhagen develops a new understanding of linguistic communication. In doing so he shows the continuity between language and animal communication and reveals the nature of human linguistic specialization. Professor Verhagen (...) uses Dutch and English data from a wide variety of sources and considers the contributions of grammar to the coherence of discourse. He argues that important problems in semantics and syntax may be resolved if language is understood as an instrument for exerting influence and coordinating different perspectives. The grammatical phenomena he discusses include negative expressions, the let alone construction, complementation constructions, and discourse connectives.This powerfully argued and original explanation of the nature and operation of communication will interest a wide range of scholars and advanced students in linguistics, cognitive science, and human evolution. (shrink)

Amongst intellectuals and activists, neoliberalism has become a potent signifier for the kind of free-market thinking that has dominated politics for the past three decades. Forever associated with the conviction politics of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, the free-market project has since become synonymous with the 'Washington consensus' on international development policy and the phenomenon of corporate globalization, where it has come to mean privatization, deregulation, and the opening up of new markets. But beyond its utility as a protest slogan (...) or buzzword as shorthand for the political-economic Zeitgeist, what do we know about where neoliberalism came from and how it spread? Who are the neoliberals, and why do they studiously avoid the label? Constructions of Neoliberal Reason presents a radical critique of the free-market project, from its origins in the first half of the 20th Century through to the recent global economic crisis, from the utopian dreams of Friedrich von Hayek through the dogmatic theories of the Chicago School to the hope and hubris of Obamanomics. The book traces how neoliberalism went from crank science to common sense in the period between the Great Depression and the age of Obama. Constructions of Neoliberal Reason dramatizes the rise of neoliberalism and its uneven spread as an intellectual, political, and cultural project, combining genealogical analysis with situated case studies of formative moments throughout the world, like New York City's bankruptcy, Hurricane Katrina, and the Wall Street crisis of 2008. The book names and tracks some of neoliberalism's key protagonists, as well as some of the less visible bit-part players. It explores how this adaptive regime of market rule was produced and reproduced, its logics and limits, its faults and its fate. (shrink)

For the first time a uniform compositional derivation is given for quantified sentences containing exceptive constructions. The semantics of exceptives is primarily one of subtraction from the domain of a quantifier. The crucial semantic difference between the highly grammaticized but-phrases and free exceptives is that the former have the Uniqueness Condition as part of their lexical meaning whereas the latter are mere set subtractors. Several empirical differences between the two types of exceptives are shown to follow from this basic (...) lexical difference. (shrink)

The paper deals with the semantics of mathematical notation. In arithmetic, for example, the syntactic shape of a formula represents a particular way of specifying, arriving at, or constructing an arithmetical object (that is, a number, a function, or a truth value). A general definition of this sense of "construction" is proposed and compared with related notions, in particular with Frege's concept of "function" and Carnap's concept of "intensional isomorphism." It is argued that constructions constitute the proper subject matter (...) of both logic and mathematics, and that a coherent semantic account of mathematical formulas cannot be given without assuming that they serve as names of constructions. (shrink)

Two centuries after they were published, Kant's ethical writings are as much admired and imitated as they have ever been, yet serious and long-standing accusations of internal incoherence remain unresolved. Onora O'Neill traces the alleged incoherences to attempt to assimilate Kant's ethical writings to modern conceptions of rationality, action and rights. When the temptation to assimilate is resisted, a strikingly different and more cohesive account of reason and morality emerges. Kant offers a `constructivist' vindication of reason and a moral vision (...) in which obligations are prior to rights and in which justice and virtue are linked. O'Neill begins by reconsidering Kant's conceptions of philosophical method, reason, freedom, automony and action. She then moves on to the more familiar terrain of interpretation of the Categorical Imperative, while in the last section she emphasises differences between Kant's ethics and recent 'Kantian' ethics, including the work of John Rawls and other contemporary liberal political philosophers. This reassessment will add significantly to the understanding of Kantian practical philosophy. (shrink)

Some of the ways in which the experience of mothering is shaped by the moral and cultural constructions surrounding breastfeeding discourse are examined using a critical deconstruction of recent Canadian health education material. Connections between the understandings surrounding breastfeeding and cultural constructions of nature and sexuality are raised, as is the overlap between breastfeeding discourse and a number of other social discourses including those surrounding child-centered parenting expertise, the remoralization of pregnancy, and the neoliberal preoccupation with individual responsibility (...) and the cost of social programs. Some of the implications that this understanding poses for mothers are examined. (shrink)

“Stoic Constructions of Virtue in The Vicar of Wakefield” reconceives the commonplace account of the opposition between Stoic and sentimental ethics. My examination of the influence Stoic doctrines had on eighteenth-century moral philosophy regarding universal sympathy, virtue’s disinterest, and its rewards, informs my reading of Primrose’s trials. I contend that Goldsmith presents the limitless extension of sympathy as the basis of disinterested industry within a commercial economy. He thus establishes virtue’s rigor, not its compromise.

It has been known since the seventies that the formulas of modal logic are invariant for bisimulations between possible worlds models — while conversely, all bisimulation-invariant first-order formulas are modally definable. In this paper, we extend this semantic style of analysis from modal formulas to dynamic program operations. We show that the usual regular operations are safe for bisimulation, in the sense that the transition relations of their values respect any given bisimulation for their arguments. Our main result is a (...) complete syntactic characterization of all first-order definable program operations that are safe for bisimulation. This is a semantic functional completeness result for programming, which may be contrasted with the more usual analysis in terms of computational power. The 'Safety Theorem' can be modulated in several ways. We conclude with a list of variants, extensions, and further developments. (shrink)

This work mainly concerns the—here introduced—category of \(\mathscr {Q}\) -sets and functional morphisms, where \(\mathscr {Q}\) is a commutative semicartesian quantale. We prove it enjoys all limits and colimits, that it has a classifier for regular subobjects (a sort of truth-values object), which we characterize and give explicitly. Moreover: we prove it to be \(\kappa \) -locally presentable, (where \(\kappa =max\{|\mathscr {Q}|^+, \aleph _0\}\) ); we also describe a hierarchy of monoidal structures in this category.

According to Kant, justifying the application of mathematics to objects in natural science requires metaphysically constructing the concept of matter. Kant develops these constructions in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (MAdN). Kant’s specific aim is to develop a dynamic theory of matter to replace corpuscular theory. In his Preface Kant claims completely to exhaust the metaphysical doctrine of body, but in the General Remark to MAdN ch. 2, “Dynamics,” Kant admits that once matter is reconceived as basic forces, (...) it is no longer possible to construct the concept of matter. I argue that Kant’s admission is only the tip of the problem, and that none of Kant’s commentators has fully grasped the problems infecting the MAdN that underlie Kant’s admission. I show that Kant’s proof that matter consists of forces is fallacious. I then re-analyze the circularity in Kant’s definition of density, criticizing both Adickes’ formulations and his later dissolution of it. I also show that a third circularity infects the relations between Kant’s treatment of “Dynamics” and “Mechanics” (MAdN ch. 3). These three fundamental problems demonstrate the untenability of Kant’s metaphysical method, and they require the radical revision of the relation between mathematics and metaphysics Kant undertakes in his opus postumum. I show that some of Kant’s most surprising and critical later claims about the Critical philosophy are correct, and that they require the sorts of remedies Kant contemplates in the opus postumum. (I defend the essentially correct analyses offered by Burkhard Tuschling and Eckart Forster against criticisms by Michael Friedman.). (shrink)

This paper gives a novel analysis of the logical structure underlying three classes of vague adjectival predicates (relative adjectives, i.e., tall; total adjectives, i.e., straight; and partial adjectives, i.e., wet) and the realisation of this structure in arguments formed with comparative constructions (i.e., John is taller than Mary). I analyse three classes of valid arguments that can be formed with different types of gradable predicates in comparative constructions: scalarity arguments (i.e., Mary is taller than John and John is (...) tall Mary is tall), maximality arguments (i.e., Stick A is straighter than Stick B Stick B is not straight), and evaluativity arguments (i.e., This towel is wetter than that towel this towel is wet) I show how a previously proposed multi-valued logical system (called Delineation TCS; see Burnett, 2012b; Burnett, 2013) based on the trivalent framework of (Cobreros et al., 2012) can be used to model the reasoning patterns described in the paper. In this system, we derive the scalarity, maximality and evaluativity properties of different classes of adjectives from statements about the properties of cognitive indifference relations associated with these predicates. I therefore conclude that systems such as DelTCS give us valuable insight into the relationship between cognitive judgements of indifference and reasoning patterns with scalar terms. (shrink)

This article is a study of geometric constructions. We consider, as an illustration, the methods used for dividing the straight line into n equal parts (n-section). Architects and practicioners of classical Europe had at their disposal a broad range of geometric constructions: ancient ones were edited and translated, whereas new solutions were constantly published. The wide variety and reasons for selection of these geometric constructions are puzzling: the most widespread construction was not the simplest one. This article (...) wonders why so many constructions were used to solve the same problem and why tedious methods were used. It is argued that the practical conditions and scale at which the problem was tackled could account for such diversity. (shrink)

Naomi Scheman argues that the concerns of philosophy emerge not from the universal human condition but from conditions of privilege. Her books represents a powerful challenge to the notion that gender makes no difference in the construction of philosophical reasoning. At the same time, it criticizes the narrow focus of most feminist theorizing and calls for a more inclusive form of inquiry.

This article explores the influence of idiomatic syntactic constructions (i.e., constructions whose phrase structure rules violate the rules that underlie the construction of other kinds of sentences in the language) on the acquisition of phrase structure. In Experiment 1, participants were trained on an artificial language generated from hierarchical phrase structure rules. Some participants were given exposure to an idiomatic construction (IC) during training, whereas others were not. Under some circumstances, the presence of an idiomatic construction in the (...) input aided learners in acquiring the phrase structure of the language. Experiment 2 provides a replication of the first experiment and extends the findings by showing that idiomatic constructions that strongly violate the predictive dependencies that define the phrase structure of the language do not aid learners in acquiring the structure of the language. Together, our data suggest that (a) idiomatic constructions aid learners in acquiring the phrase structure of a language by highlighting relevant structural elements in the language, and (b) such constructions are useful cues to learning to the extent that learners can keep their knowledge of the idiomatic construction separate from their knowledge of the rest of the language. (shrink)

This study investigated the role of cross-linguistic influence in L2 learners’ integration of a verb and a construction during online English sentence processing. In a self-paced reading task, L1-English speakers and Chinese-L1 learners of English read the English double-object and prepositional dative constructions with verbs whose Chinese translation equivalents are either compatible or incompatible with each dative form. When including only a subset of trials for which participants provided expected translations for the target sentences (i.e., translating the English prepositional (...) dative construction into a Chinese prepositional dative sentence and translating the English double-object construction into a Chinese double-object sentence), the effect of cross-linguistic influence emerged only in a certain type of verbs. When including all trials in the analysis, we found the effect of cross-linguistic influence for all verb types. These results provide some evidence that the cross-linguistic activation of verbs can influence verb-construction integration in L2 processing. The study highlights how bilingual co-activation of verbs extends beyond the lexical and structural levels to influence the integration of multiple sources of information. (shrink)

Organisational planning processes often materialise as a series of meetings, where the future of the organisation is jointly discussed and negotiated as a part of local decision-making sequences. Using conversation and discourse analytical approaches, this article investigates how proposals concerning the future can also be resisted by employing a specific device, a conditional construction. The data for the study originate from a city organisation, whose customer services are being developed. The results show how the conditional constructions work in two (...) interrelated ways. First, by introducing a problematic hypothetical situation, they outline the undesirable consequences of the proposed idea in real work life. Second, by highlighting the experience of the customer, they present the organisation as benefitting from the potential rejection of the idea. The article discusses the implications of the results for the study of proposal and decision-making sequences in longitudinal, multisemiotic discursive processes. (shrink)

This paper examines the suggestion that infinitivaltoomission errors in English-speaking children can result from competition between two constructions (Kirjavainen et al., First Language 29: 313–339, 2009a). Kirjavainen et al. suggested that the acquisition of two (or more) constructions (e.g., WANT-X and WANT-to) for verbs takingto-infinitival complement clauses can lead to infinitivaltoomissions, reflecting the relative frequencies of the constructions in the input. In the present study we analysed 13 English children's corpora to determine whether the presence of a (...) variety of utterance types in the immediate discourse context preceding WANT-to-VP (e.g.,I want to eat it) and erroneous *WANT-zero-VP (e.g., *I want__drink it) constructions was associated with infinitivaltoproduction/omission. This was done separately for the children's own and their interlocutors' discourse utterances. The data show that the occurrence of WANT-toand WANT-X constructions in the prior discourse was associated with differing proportions of infinitivaltoprovision in the WANT-to/zero-VP construction. This together with Kirjavainen et al.'s (First Language 29: 313–339, 2009a) data suggests that children are learning at least two constructions for the verb WANT, that competition contributes to infinitivaltoomissions, and that the strength of competing representations is affected by overall input frequencies and the preceding discourse. (shrink)

The idea that correspondences relating grammatical relations and semantics (argument structure constructions) are needed to account for simple sentence types is reviewed, clarified, updated and compared with two lexicalist alternatives. Traditional lexical rules take one verb as ‘input’ and create (or relate) a different verb as ‘output’. More recently, invisible derivational verb templates have been proposed, which treat argument structure patterns as zero derivational affixes that combine with a root verb to yield a new verb. While the derivational template (...) perspective can address several problems that arise for traditional lexical rules, it still faces problems in accounting for idioms, which often contain specifications that are not appropriately assigned to individual verbs or derivational affixes (regarding adjuncts, modification, and inflection). At the same time, it is clear that verbs play a central role in determining their distribution. The balance between verbs and phrasal argument structure constructions is addressed via the Principles of Semantic Coherence and Correspondence together with a usage-based hierarchy of constructions that contains entries which can include particular verbs and other lexical material. (shrink)

Initially motivated by their relevance in foundations of quantum mechanics and more recently by their applications in different contexts of quantum information science, violations of Bell inequalities have been extensively studied during the last years. In particular, an important effort has been made in order to quantify such Bell violations. Probabilistic techniques have been heavily used in this context with two different purposes. First, to quantify how common the phenomenon of Bell violations is; and second, to find large Bell violations (...) in order to better understand the possibilities and limitations of this phenomenon. However, the strong mathematical content of these results has discouraged some of the potentially interested readers. The aim of the present work is to review some of the recent results in this direction by focusing on the main ideas and removing most of the technical details, to make the previous study more accessible to a wide audience. (shrink)

Distinguished international scholars examine the neglected issue of the body and its status in classical antiquity.