Dynamic Semantics
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Recent papers in Dynamic Semantics
It is a somewhat vexed question whether presuppositions are always accommodated into the global context of utterance of the sentence, or whether they may sometimes be accommodated into a local context - the context of some subsentential... more
Contemporary natural-language semantics began with the assumption that the meaning of a sentence could be modeled by a single truth-condition, or by an enti- ty with a truth-condition. But with the recent explosion of dynamic semantics... more
This entry focuses on foundational issues in dynamic semantics and static semantics, specifically on what is conceptually at stake between the dynamic framework and the classic, truth-conditional framework, and consequently what kinds of... more
This paper offers a unified semantic explanation of two observations that prove to be problematic for classical analyses of modals, conditionals, and disjunctions: (i) the fact that disjunctions scoping under possibility modals give rise... more
Donkey sentences have existential and universal readings, but they are not often perceived as ambiguous. We extend the pragmatic theory of nonmaximality in plural definites by Križ (2016) to explain how context disambiguates donkey... more
We distinguish three ways that a theory of linguistic meaning and communication might be considered dynamic in character. We provide some examples of systems which are dynamic in some of these senses but not others. We suggest that... more
The fact that counterfactuals in general license simplification of disjunctive antecedents is a familiar problem for the traditional Lewis-Stalnaker variably strict analysis of counterfactuals. This paper argues that recent semantic... more
According to a popular family of theories, assertions and other communicative acts should be understood as attempts to change the context of a conversation. Contexts, on this view, are publicly shared bodies of information that evolve... more
A dynamic semantics for epistemically modalized sentences is an attractive alternative to the orthodox view that our best theory of meaning ascribes to such sentences truth-conditions relative to what is known. I demonstrate that a... more
The standing tradition in theorizing about meaning, since at least Frege (1892), identifies meaning with propositions, which are, or determine, the truth-conditions of a sentence in a context. But a recent trend has advocated a departure... more
Metaethical noncognitivists have trouble arriving at a respectable semantic theory for moral language. The goal of this paper is to make substantial progress toward demonstrating that these problems may be overcome. Replacing the... more
Several authors have observed that the tools and techniques developed within the field of nonmonotonic logic provide a fruitful framework for the theoretical study of deontic discourse and reasoning. The prominent sources of inspiration... more
This paper critically discusses situation-based E-type approaches and dynamic approaches to unbound anaphoric pronouns. It outlines a novel account based on structured propositions and background attitudes.
Von Fintel (Curr Stud Linguist Ser 36:123–152, 2001) and Gillies (Linguist Philos 30(3): 329–360, 2007) have proposed a dynamic strict conditional account of counterfactuals as an alternative to the standard variably strict account due to... more
An examination of conditionals in di¤erent languages leads to a distinction of three types of conditionals instead of the usual two (indicative and subjunctive). The three types can be explained by the degree of acceptance or as-if... more
Folklore has it that counterfactual Sobel sequences favor a variably strict analysis of conditionals over its plainly strict alternative. Recent discussions of the lore have focussed on the question whether data about reverse... more
Kripke (1980) hypothesizes a link between rigidity and scope: a singular term is rigid over a space S of possibilities just in case it is scopeless with respect to modals that quantify over S. Kripke's hypothesis works well when we... more
Dynamic theories of discourse interpretation seek to describe and explain antecedent- anaphor relations with the help of discourse referents. In a dynamic framework, it is the function of indefinite expressions to introduce new discourse... more
This is my Candidate of Sciences (PhD equivalent) dissertation, defended on June 26, 2017. It is put here as is, with numerous mishaps, partly pointed out by the reviewers, with only a dedication added anew. I also attach a slightly... more
This paper argues for a new notion of domain presupposition and proposes a novel general account of presuppositions in terms of a condition of pre-identification, relating the presupposition either to the local discourse context or else... more
Von Fintel (Curr Stud Linguist Ser 36:123–152, 2001) and Gillies (Linguist Philos 30(3): 329–360, 2007) have proposed a dynamic strict conditional account of counterfactuals as an alternative to the standard variably strict account due to... more
There is a longstanding debate in the literature about static versus dynamic approaches to meaning and conversation. A formal result due to van Benthem (1986, 1996) is often thought to be important for understanding what, conceptually... more
One of the central topics in semantic theory over the last few decades concerns the nature of local contexts. Recently, theorists have tried to develop general, non-stipulative accounts of local contexts (Schlenker, 2009; Ingason, 2016;... more
This squib studies the order in which elements are added to the shared context of interlocutors in a conversation. It focuses on context updates within one hierarchical structure and argues that structurally higher elements are entered... more
I show that standard dynamic approaches to the semantics of epistemic modals invalidate the classical laws of excluded middle and non-contradiction, as well as the law of 'epistemic non-contradiction'. I argue that these heretofore... more
The aim of this paper is to introduce a certain kind of information state representation in a dynamic system of propositional logic, using finite state automatons and highlight its advantages, including relation to inquisitive semantics... more
This paper develops a type of dynamic semantics in which contexts include not only information, but also questions, whose answers are ranked by strength. The questions can be local to the restrictor of a quantifier, and the quantifier can... more