WordNet is an on-line lexical reference system whose design is inspired by current

Selectional constraints are limitations on the applicability of predicates to arguments. For example, the statement “The number two is blue” may be syntactically well formed, but at some level it is anomalous — BLUE is not a predicate that can be applied to numbers. According to the influential theory of (Katz and Fodor, 1964), a predicate associates a set of defining features with each argument, expressed within a restricted semantic vocabulary. Despite the persistence of this theory, however, there is widespread agreement about its empirical shortcomings (McCawley, 1968; Fodor, 1977). As an alternative, some critics of the Katz-Fodor theory (e.g. (Johnson-Laird, 1983)) have abandoned the treatment of selectional constraints as semantic, instead treating them as indistinguishable from inferences made on the basis of factual knowledge. This provides a better match for the empirical phenomena, but it opens up a different problem: if selectional constraints are the same as inferences in general, then accounting for them will require a much more complete understanding of knowledge representation and inference than we have at present. The problem, then, is this: how can a theory of selectional constraints be elaborated without first having either an empirically adequate theory of defining features or a comprehensive theory of inference? In this dissertation, I suggest that an answer to this question lies in the representation of conceptual

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This thesis examines the relation between aspect, argument structure, and case. The approach developed in this thesis assumes that Dowty-style aspectual operators are zero affixes of the type discussed in Pesetsky 1995, that can head syntactic projections, and enter into semantic composition in the manner determined by the compositional semantics. The analysis of argument projection explored in this thesis follows Hoekstra and Mulder 1990 and Borer 1994 who proposed that arguments are not specified in the lexicon as being external or internal, and there are no linking conventions concerning projection of arguments. The present analysis develops this approach by using tools of compositional semantics to filter out impossible tree-verb combinations. This analysis is supported in this thesis by the relation between the syntactic position of the argument and semantic interpretation; the existence of verbs of variable behavior with respect to argument projection; the obligatoriness of internal arguments of telic verbs; and typology of the resultative constructions. This thesis further develops an Optimality-Theoretic approach to case, which assumes that distribution of cases is governed by the violable principles that require verbal heads to check their nominal features. This approach, combined with the analysis of argument structure assumed

this paper we show that the aspectual and selectional criteria for implicit objects are accounted for within the framework described by Hopper and Thompson's (1980; H&T) transitivity hypothesis. We locate English implicit object constructions on a continuum of transitivity, with indefinite implicit object constructions (1a) closer to intransitives, and definite implicit object constructions (1b) closer to transitives. Our account unifies the apparently disparate aspectual and selectional criteria for these constructions and provides additional evidence for distinguishing indefinite and definite implicit objects. 2. Transitivity Hypothesis

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The first part of the paper develops a novel, sortally-based approach to the problem of aspectual composition. The account is argued to be superior on both empirical and computational grounds to previous semantic approaches relying on referentiai homogeneity tests. While the account is restricted to manner-of-motion verbs, it does cover their interaction with mass terms, amount phrases, locative PPs, and distance, frequency, and temporal modifiers.

This paper investigates the interaction between counting quantifiers (more than three boys, how many girls), collective predicates (meet, be a team), and adverbial quantification. This interaction results in three sets of facts, which obtain across many languages (at least German, Italian, Slovenian, Uyghur). First: Although most collective predicates are compatible with counting quantifiers

A note to the reader of these draft chapters These are my final draft chapters of Verbs: aspect and argument structure, to be published by Oxford University Press. Although they present a (somewhat revised) version of the model of aspect and argument structure in the draft chapters from 2000 that were formerly available on my website