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According to an intuitive picture of relevant entailment, an entailment is relevant if all the formulas it contains contribute to its validity. In this paper, we provide a ground-theoretic analysis of this notion of contribution, and as a result of relevant entailment. We build a system of bilateral logical grounding within which we can derive classical entailment and analyze the contribution of premises and conclusions, in terms of a certain type of connection between their respective logical grounds. The resulting framework is shown to have a strong unifying and explanatory power by bringing together the notions of grounding and relevance and explaining the commonalities and differences between alternative contribution-based accounts of relevance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literature in semantics and pragmatics provides extensive evidence for the strengthening of linguistic expressions, both in matrix positions and when embedded under various operators. We study the properties of such strengthening using a very simple setting. Specifically, we look at when the expression "crate with a banana" can be understood as a unique crate even though two different crates have a banana in them. By varying the scenarios in which an expression such as "Pick the crate with a banana" is evaluated, we show that the strengthening of "crate with a banana" within the scope of the definite article parallels the entailments of "crate with only a banana" (with an overt exhaustivity operator, 'only'). We use this observation to argue that strengthening in embedded positions follows the logic of an exhaustivity operator rather than that of rational inference. We then note that a similar pattern obtains in matrix positions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indicative and subjunctive conditionals are in non-complimentary distribution: there are conversational contexts at which both are licensed (Stalnaker 1975 ; Karttunen and Peters 1979 ; von Fintel 1998). This means we can ask an important, but under-explored, question: in contexts which license both, what relations hold between the two? In this paper, I'll argue for an initially surprising conclusion: when attention is restricted to the relevant contexts, indicatives and subjunctives are co-entailing. §1 introduces the indicative/subjunctive distinction, along with a discussion of the relevant notion of entailment; §2 presents the main argument of the paper, and §3 considers some of the philosophical implications of the argument in §2. Finally, §4 argues that we can reconcile the equivalence of indicatives and subjunctives with apparently conflicting judgements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Case law retrieval is the task of locating truly relevant legal cases given an input query case. Unlike information retrieval for general texts, this task is more complex with two phases (legal case retrieval and legal case entailment) and much harder due to a number of reasons. First, both the query and candidate cases are long documents consisting of several paragraphs. This makes it difficult to model with representation learning that usually has restriction on input length. Second, the concept of relevancy in this domain is defined based on the legal relation that goes beyond the lexical or topical relevance. This is a real challenge because normal text matching will not work. Third, building a large and accurate legal case dataset requires a lot of effort and expertise. This is obviously an obstacle to creating enough data for training deep retrieval models. In this paper, we propose a novel approach called supporting model that can deal with both phases. The underlying idea is the case–case supporting relation and the paragraph–paragraph as well as the decision-paragraph matching strategy. In addition, we propose a method to automatically create a large weak-labeling dataset to overcome the lack of data. The experiments showed that our solution has achieved the state-of-the-art results for both case retrieval and case entailment phases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work delves into the semantics of Old English lexical paradigms based on strong verbs. Its aim is to describe the patterns of semantic inheritance that exist in these paradigms, which present morphologically related words sharing the form and meaning of the base of derivation. The analysis undertaken enables semantic derivation in these Old English lexical paradigms to be categorized into the lexical entailment relations of troponymy, -troponymy, backward presupposition and cause, and the semantic relations of synonymy and opposition. The research data has been retrieved from the lexical database Nerthus (Martín Arista et al. 2016). On the theoretical side, this examination follows the English lexical database WordNet (Princeton 2010). This research unfolds a systematic methodology that is thoroughly described and illustrated by means of the paradigm (ge)berstan. It has not only been possible to circumscribe semantic derivation into the six semantic relations mentioned, but also to determine how frequently they occur in the paradigms under analysis, which indicates that synonymy and troponymy are the most recurrent semantic relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the discussion on implications of the substantive nature of empirical reasoning. Topics include aim of traditional logic of truth-preservation and creating similar problems even without foundationalist commitments; and non-deductive "links" between experiences, judgments, and non-propositional attitudes, the correctness of a view entailing the truth of propositions going beyond logical entailments.

While paradigmatic lexical/sense relations are traditionally used to analyse the relations between lexical items, the present article adopts a descriptive qualitative method, based on Cruse's (2000) classification of lexical/sense relations, to find the identity and inclusion relations of two lexical items in two different texts by using the logical entailment relation. The article aims at finding out whether or not lexical items can be substituted by another without changing their meaning; the meaning of one lexical item is included in the meaning of the other; and the validity of these relations in one context can be tested as entailment relations. The study concludes that entailment has a context-bound relation with regard to identity and inclusion relations. Entailment occurs freely with propositional synonymy. Although the two lexical items in near synonymy are close in meanings or related, entailment relation cannot be attained. Entailment in hyponymy is a unilateral relation. i.e., the meaning of one hyponym entails the meaning of the superordinate, but the meaning of the superordinate does not entail the meaning of each hyponym. Entailment in meronymy relation stands if the relation is between patronym to holonym, i.e., the entailment relation does not stand under holonym to partonym. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a pervasive view that inference—as opposed, notably, to a grasp of objects—is an intralinguistic process that does not draw on extralinguistic resources. The present paper aims to show that this dichotomy between inferring and grasping objects can be resisted. Specifically, I offer an alternative view: a phenomenological account according to which our most basic inferences draw on our grasp of objects. I motivate this account on the grounds that, although it is restricted to such basic inferences, it has significant implications for the general question of whether inference involves taking one's premises to support one's conclusion. The proposed account implies that basic inferences need not involve corresponding "takings," (even though such inferences involve conceptual content), but it leaves open the possibility that non‐basic inferences do involve corresponding "takings," while relying on basic inferences. It will turn out that such a disjunctive view, according to which non‐basic reasoning is somewhat parasitic on basic reasoning, manages to avoid many of the problems with which the literature on the "taking condition" deals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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In a recent paper, Reuter, Seinhold and Sytsma (Analysis , 2019) put forward an implicature account to explain the intuitive failure of the pain-in-mouth argument. They argue that utterances such as 'There is tissue damage / a pain / an inflammation in my mouth' carry the conversational implicature that there is something wrong with the speaker's mouth. Appealing to new empirical data, this paper argues against the implicature account and for the entailment account , according to which pain reports using locative locutions, such as 'There is a pain in my mouth', are intuitively understood as entailing corresponding predicative locutions, such as 'My mouth hurts.' On this latter account, the pain-in-mouth argument seems invalid because the conclusion is naturally understood as entailing something which cannot be inferred from the premisses. Implications for the philosophical debate about pain are also drawn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whether or not non-entailment relations generate scalar implicatures is a cutting-edge issue in linguistic pragmatics. The present study intends to argue that, based on the Cognitive Grammar paradigm, non-scalar implicatures generated by non-entailment relations are manifested as cognitive defaults which are conventionally incorporated into symbolic units in schema-instance complexes. Conventions provide a shortcut for the hearer to infer non-scalar implicatures in an unconscious, effortless and automatic way. We maintain that, contrary to neo-Gricean pragmatics, non-entailment relations cannot generate (scalar) Q-implicatures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • We describe a new approach for evaluating the contribution of Answer Validation. • We use real systems in order to obtain better conclusions for future research. • We show how Answer Validation modules improve Question Answering results. • We interpret results in order to offer important lessons for future research. Abstract Question Answering (QA) systems help users to find relevant information. However, current QA systems still return several incorrect answers, which decreases the confidence of users in such systems. Some researchers have suggested the inclusion of validation in QA with the purpose of reducing wrong responses and, therefore, improving results. Nevertheless, there has not been a precise study about how validation contributes to QA results. In this paper, we include a new analysis of the impact of validation on QA results. We reuse data from real QA systems and show that validation enables QA systems to reduce incorrect answers and obtain better results. We think this study will allow researchers to develop better QA systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contrary to a popular reading of his modal epistemology, Berkeley does not hold that inconceivability entails impossibility, and he cannot therefore argue the impossibility of mind‐independent matter by appealing to facts about what we cannot conceive. Berkeley is explicit about this constraint on his metaphysical argumentation, and, I argue, does respect it in practice. Popular mythology about the 'master argument' notwithstanding, the only passages in which he might plausibly seem to employ the principle that inconceivability entails impossibility are those that argue for the inseparability of primary from secondary qualities. However, an alternative reading of these texts is available that is both consistent with Berkeley's express modal epistemology and credible in its own right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Restrictionism is a response to the Liar and other paradoxes concerning truth. Restrictionists—as I will call proponents of the strategy—respond to these paradoxes by giving up instances of the schema is true iff p. My aim is to show that the current unpopularity of restrictionism is undeserved. I will argue that, whilst cautious versions of the strategy may face serious problems, a radical and previously overlooked version of restrictionism provides a strong and defensible response to the paradoxes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a series of recent articles, Jakob Rigi has formulated an articulate and sophisticated Marxian view about the relationship between digital production and value theory. Anyone interested in the economic dynamics of FAMGA (Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, Google and Amazon) needs to come to terms with the position Rigi stakes out. In this article, I challenge Rigi's thesis that profits from the sale of digital information (DI) constitute rent. I do so by calling into question his conclusions concerning the valuelessness of DI. After summarising Rigi's core position and sketching out its entailments, I make the case that (1) Rigi's assertions about the intrinsic valuelessness of DI are not supported by the model of production he invokes; that (2) Rigi's valuelessness argument in fact presupposes that DI has value; that (3) far from furnishing evidence that DI is valueless and therefore a source of rent income, as Rigi holds, the existence of the intellectual property regime is precisely what allows DI to act as a congealment of value (i.e. labour time) in commodity form; and that (4) Rigi misapplies Marx's notion of reproduction to the sale/copy/distribution of DI. I offer this critique as an invitation for us to rethink, from a Marxian perspective, the status of the digital economy within the order of global capitalist value production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By increasing the amount of data in computer networks, searching and finding suitable information will be harder for users. One of the most widespread forms of information on such networks are textual documents. So exploring these documents to get information about their content is difficult and sometimes impossible. Multi-document text summarization systems are an aid to producing a summary with a fixed and predefined length, while covering the maximum content of the input documents. This paper presents a novel method for multi-document extractive summarization based on textual entailment relations and sentence compression via formulating the problem as a knapsack problem. In this approach, sentences of documents are ranked according to the extended Tf-Idf method, then entailment scores of selected sentences are computed. Through these scores, the final score of each sentence is calculated. Finally, by decreasing the lengths of sentences via sentence compression, the problem has been solved by greedy and dynamic Programming approaches to the knapsack problem. Experiments on standard summarization datasets and evaluating the results based on the Rouge system show that the suggested method, according to the best of our knowledge, has increased F-measure of query-based summarization systems by two per cent and F-measure of general summarization systems by five per cent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To examine the possibility of diagnosing the double burden of malnutrition using estimated deviation values in low- and lower-middle-income countries. Methods: A modified version of the Japanese Diagnostic Tool was used. Data on 194 countries were analyzed, including data from the United Nations International Children’s Fund, World Health Organization and World Bank. After conducting a Box–Cox transformation, deviation values were calculated. The degree to which the values deviated relative to a deviation cutoff value of 50 was assessed. Focusing on countries with low- and middle-income economic levels, we examined the utility of this tool to show characteristic nutritional problems in each country. Results: The deviation values had normal, distorted, bimodal, or trimodal distributions. In the lower-middle-income countries, almost all countries had values ranging from 40 to 60 for education and water environments (urban and rural), and the differences were minimal. However, different causes of noncommunicable disease-related deaths were considered, and the primary cause appeared to be related to lifestyle factors, particularly alcohol consumption and tobacco smoking. In comparison, the deviation values related to death among low-income countries also appeared to be related to differences in education and sanitation in urban and rural areas. Conclusion: The study results can help to determine the status of nutritional inequalities and plan country-specific strategies to reduce the double burden of malnutrition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Infallibilism is commonly rejected because it is apparently subject to easy counter-examples. The author describes a strategy that infallibilists can use to resist this objection. Because the sentences used in the counter-examples to express evidence and belief are context-sensitive, the infallibilist can insist that such counter-examples trade on a vacillation between different readings of these sentences. The author describes what difficulties await those who try to produce counter-examples against which the proposed strategy is ineffective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Resource Description Framework (RDF) data represents information linkage around the Internet. It uses Internationalized Resources Identifier (IRI) which can be referred to external information. Typically, an RDF data is serialized as a large text file which contains millions of relationships. In this work, we propose a framework based on TripleID-Q, for query processing of large RDF data in a GPU. The key elements of the framework are 1) a compact representation suitable for a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) and 2) its simple representation conversion method which optimizes the preprocessing overhead. Together with the framework, we propose parallel algorithms which utilize thousands of GPU threads to look for specific data for a given query as well as to perform basic query operations such as union, join, and filter. The TripleID representation is smaller than the original representation 3-4 times. Querying from TripleID using a GPU is up to 108 times faster than using the traditional RDF tool. The speedup can be more than 1,000 times over the traditional RDF store when processing a complex query with union and join of many subqueries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research in Textual Entailment (TE) has been widely conducted, mainly in natural language based systems, since TE can provide solutions to semantic problems. Usually, the researchers focus on method improvement, hence, they use standard data sets, which are specific to a particular language, primarily in English. For low-resource languages, it is very difficult to find data sets to test the TE systems. Therefore, in this paper we propose a model to extract data from the web to serve as data set for TE systems. The model can be used for crosslanguage domains with simple modifications. Two datasets are created and used to evaluate the model, i.e. DS-100-R, which contains facts, and DS-100-W, which contains non-facts. The model produces a set of sentences that are expected to be relevant to the queries. Some algorithms are created to address problems that arise during experiments. Based on the evaluation, the model accuracy for DS-100-R dataset is 79.0%, and for DS-100-W dataset is 70.0%. Hence, the overall model accuracy is 74.5%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the implications for the appropriateness of punishment, withdrawal of good will as it come to attributions of responsibility by citing the book "Talking to Our Selves" by John Doris. It mentions mutual entailment between responsible agency and the expression of values and pervasiveness of self-ignorance. It also mentions existence of evidence that self-ignorance sometimes indirectly helps us achieve goals is important.

In this article, I articulate and explore a novel constructivist approach to metanormativity that is inspired by David Hume's metaesthetics. This view, which I call perfectionist Humean constructivism, rejects the claim that practical reasons are constructed by each individual's valuing attitudes, holding instead that they are constructed (in part) by humanity's shared evaluative nature. I hold that this approach can plausibly respond to a persistent worry for extant versions of Humean constructivism without embracing the commitments of either a Kantian constructivism or a metaphysically robust form of metanormative realism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bayesian confirmation theory is rife with confirmation measures. Many of them differ from each other in important respects. It turns out, though, that all the standard confirmation measures in the literature run counter to the so-called “Reverse Matthew Effect” (“RME” for short). Suppose, to illustrate, that H1 and H2 are equally successful in predicting E in that pE|H1/pE=pE|H2/pE>1. Suppose, further, that initially H1 is less probable than H2 in that p(H1). Then by RME it follows that the degree to which E confirms H1 is greater than the degree to which it confirms H2. But by all the standard confirmation measures in the literature, in contrast, it follows that the degree to which E confirms H1 is less than or equal to the degree to which it confirms H2. It might seem, then, that RME should be rejected as implausible. Festa (Synthese 184:89-100, 2012), however, argues that there are scientific contexts in which RME holds. If Festa’s argument is sound, it follows that there are scientific contexts in which none of the standard confirmation measures in the literature is adequate. Festa’s argument is thus interesting, important, and deserving of careful examination. I consider five distinct respects in which E can be related to H, use them to construct five distinct ways of understanding confirmation measures, which I call “Increase in Probability”, “Partial Dependence”, “Partial Entailment”, “Partial Discrimination”, and “Popper Corroboration”, and argue that each such way runs counter to RME. The result is that it is not at all clear that there is a place in Bayesian confirmation theory for RME. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper concentrates on giving precise content to the general wisdom on the scalar presupposition of even, according to which the prejacent of even, p, is stronger than its relevant focus alternatives, q. To that end I first examine both familiar challenges for the popular 'comparative likelihood' view of the 'stronger than' relation, as well as novel challenges, having to do with the context dependency of even (with entailed and non-entailed alternatives) and with its sensitivity to standards of comparison. To overcome these challenges and to account for the full range of data I develop a revised, 'gradability-based' scalar presupposition for even, which differs from the 'comparative likelihood' one in several respects: instead of directly comparing degrees to which propositions (namely p and q) are more or less likely, we compare extents to which non-focus entities x in p and q (in the accessible p worlds and the exhaustified q worlds) exceed the salient standard on a scale associated with a contextually supplied gradable property G. To capture cases where information about contrastive topics is crucial for fixing two distinct standards on G, I follow theories which view even as a general, two-place alternative-sensitive operator, allowing it to associate with both focus and contrastive topics. Beyond the ability to account for a large range of intricate felicity variations and inferences found with even, a more general contribution of the paper lies in showing the linguistic relevance of tools originally developed in the literature on gradable predicates to the semantics of scalar alternative-sensitive particles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on dispute in epistemology regarding whether knowledge is closed under known entailment and lying in bed dreaming or a brain in a vat. It mentions general agreement on the sorts of things and the sorts of deep philosophical truths and conceptions of knowledge require belief. It also mentions skeptics have generally agreed with at least compared to metaphysical propositions.

We introduce the idea of generalized orthopair fuzzy sets, which provide an extension of intuitionistic fuzzy sets. The basic properties of these generalized orthopair fuzzy sets are discussed. We discuss the use of these sets in knowledge representation. We consider the use of these types of orthopair fuzzy sets as a basis for the system of approximate reasoning introduced by Zadeh. This is referred to as OPAR. The basic operations of OPAR are introduced. A reasoning mechanism in OPAR, based on the idea of entailment, is provided. We look at the formulation of the ideas of possibility and certainty using these orthopair fuzzy sets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article I will consider John D. Caputo's hermeneutics of deconstruction or what he calls 'radical hermeneutics', with 'undecidability' as its major theme, in conversation with Martin Heidegger's notion of 'resolute existence'. Through an examination of the different positions of Caputo, Heidegger, and also Kierkegaard, Derrida and Meister Eckhart on the possibility of repetition, the hermeneutical circle and the mystical way of prayer and faith, I am arguing that deconstruction is not the end of hermeneutics, it is not the final destination of an interpretative task, and thus deconstructive hermeneutics has to concede a reconstructive process. Further, I am arguing that Caputo's 'radical hermeneutics' is too reductionist to keep any meaning for the hermeneutic enterprise to aspire to. I am contending, rather, that it is resolute existence that theology aspires to as it is a move beyond 'undecidability'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several philosophers have recently claimed that if a proposition is cancellable from an uttered sentence then that proposition is not entailed by that uttered sentence. The claim should be a familiar one. It has become a standard device in the philosopher's tool-kit. I argue that this claim is false. There is a kind of entailment-which I call 'modal entailment'-that is context-sensitive and, because of this, cancellable. So cancellability does not show that a proposition is not entailed by an uttered sentence. I close the paper by describing an implication this has for a disagreement between J. L. Austin and Grice concerning the relation between felicity and truth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A semantic relation between a family of sets of formulas and a set of formulas, dubbed generalized entailment, and its subrelation, called con-structive generalized entailment, are defined and examined. Entailment con-strued in the usual way and multiple-conclusion entailment can be viewed as special cases of generalized entailment. The concept of constructive gener-alized entailment, in turn, enables an explication of some often used notion of interrogative entailment, and coincides with inquisitive entailment at the propositional level. Some interconnections between constructive generalized entailment and Inferential Erotetic Logic are also analysed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a general account of metavaluations and their applications, which can be seen as an alternative to standard model-theoretic methodology. They work best for what are called metacomplete logics, which include the contraction-less relevant logics, with possible additions of Conjunctive Syllogism, (A→B) & (B→C) → .A→C, and the irrelevant, A→ .B→A, these including the logic MC of meaning containment which is arguably a good entailment logic. Indeed, metavaluations focus on the formula-inductive properties of theorems of entailment form A→B, splintering into two types, M1- and M2-, according to key properties of negated entailment theorems (see below). Metavaluations have an inductive presentation and thus have some of the advantages that model theory does, but they represent proof rather than truth and thus represent proof-theoretic properties, such as the priming property, if ├ A $\vee$ B then ├ A or ├ B, and the negated-entailment properties, not-├ ∼(A→B) (for M1-logics, with M1-metavaluations) and ├ ∼(A→B) iff ├ A and ├ ∼ B (for M2-logics, with M2-metavaluations). Topics to be covered are their impact on naive set theory and paradox solution, and also Peano arithmetic and Godel’s First and Second Theorems. Interesting to note here is that the familiar M1- and M2-metacomplete logics can be used to solve the set-theoretic paradoxes and, by inference, the Liar Paradox and key semantic paradoxes. For M1-logics, in particular, the final metavaluation that is used to prove the simple consistency is far simpler than its correspondent in the model-theoretic proof in that it consists of a limit point of a single transfinite sequence rather than that of a transfinite sequence of such limit points, as occurs in the model-theoretic approach. Additionally, it can be shown that Peano Arithmetic is simply consistent, using metavaluations that constitute finitary methods. Both of these results use specific metavaluational properties that have no correspondents in standard model theory and thus it would be highly unlikely that such model theory could prove these results in their final forms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is commonly argued that weak negative polarity items (NPIs) (e.g. any) can occur in any (Strawson) downward-entailing environment. This generalization, however, is challenged by Wagner's (2006) observations with the NPI-licenser only, although an only-clause is (Strawson) downward-entailing in its unfocused part, NPIs are not necessarily licensed there. In particular, DP-only does not license an NPI that appears within the unfocused part of its left argument (as seen in *Only a chair of any HUMANITIESF department met with the president), and VP-only does not license an NPI if this NPI and the focused item appear within the same island (as seen in *The president only met with a chair of any HUMANITIESF department). These observations suggest that the licensing status of an NPI in an only-sentence is not just determined by the polarity pattern of the environment where this NPI gets interpreted. To explain Wagner's (2006) observations, I argue that only is not just an NPI-licenser but also an 'NPI-unlicenser.' Following Chierchia (2006, 2013), I assume that an NPI carries a domain feature [D] which activates domain alternatives, and that an NPI is unlicensed if exhaustifying its domain alternatives yields a contradiction. I further propose that only can check off the [D] feature of an NPI that appears within its syntactic argument. If the argument of only is downward-entailing with respect to an NPI, using only to check off the [D] feature of this NPI would return an inference that contradicts the prejacent presupposition and make this NPI unlicensed. In the case of VP-only association, if an NPI is not focused and doesn't appear within a focus-contained island, the contradiction can be avoided by F-movement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting from the notions of q-entailment and p-entailment, a two-dimensional notion of entailment is developed with respect to certain generalized q-matrices referred to as B-matrices. After showing that every purely monotonic singleconclusion consequence relation is characterized by a class of B-matrices with respect to q-entailment as well as with respect to p-entailment, it is observed that, as a result, every such consequence relation has an inferentially four-valued characterization. Next, the canonical form of B-entailment, a two-dimensional multiple-conclusion notion of entailment based on B-matrices, is introduced, providing a uniform framework for studying several different notions of entailment based on designation, antidesignation, and their complements. Moreover, the two-dimensional concept of a B-consequence relation is defined, and an abstract characterization of such relations by classes of B-matrices is obtained. Finally, a contribution to the study of inferential many-valuedness is made by generalizing Suszko's Thesis and the corresponding reduction to show that any B-consequence relation is, in general, inferentially four-valued. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I discuss three observations about backtracking counterfactuals not predicted by existing theories, and then motivate a theory of counterfactuals that does predict them. On my theory, counterfactuals quantify over a suitably restricted set of historical possibilities from some contextually relevant past time. I motivate each feature of the theory relevant to predicting our three observations about backtracking counterfactuals. The paper concludes with replies to three potential objections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Textual Entailment is a directional relation between two text fragments. The relation holds whenever the truth of one text fragment, called Hypothesis (H), follows from another text fragment, called Text (T). Up until now, using machine learning approaches for recognizing textual entailment has been hampered by the limited availability of data. We present an approach based on syntactic transformations and machine learning techniques which is designed to fit well with a new type of available data sets that are larger but less complex than data sets used in the past. The transformations are not predefined, but calculated from the data sets, and then used as features in a supervised learning classifier. The method has been evaluated using two data sets: the SICK data set and the EXCITEMENT English data set. While both data sets are of a larger order of magnitude than data sets such as RTE-3, they are also of lower levels of complexity, each in its own way. SICK consists of pairs created by applying a predefined set of syntactic and lexical rules to its T and H pairs, which can be accurately captured by our transformations. The EXCITEMENT English data contains short pieces of text that do not require a high degree of text understanding to be annotated. The resulting AdArte system is simple to understand and implement, but also effective when compared with other existing systems. AdArte has been made freely available with the EXCITEMENT Open Platform, an open source platform for textual inference. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Is there a principled difference between entailments in natural language that are valid solely in virtue of their form or structure and those that are not? This paper advances an affirmative answer to this question, one that takes as its starting point Gareth Evans's suggestion that semantic theory aims to carve reality at the joints by uncovering the semantic natural kinds of the language. I sketch an Evans-inspired account of semantic kinds and show how it supports a principled account of structural entailment. I illustrate the account by application to a case study involving the entailment properties of adverbs; this involves developing a novel proposal about the semantics for adverbs like 'quickly' and 'slowly'. In the course of the discussion I explore some implications of the account for the place of model-theoretic tools in natural language semantics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I defend a grammatical account of scalar implicatures. In particular, I submit new evidence in favor of the contextual blindness principle, assumed in recent versions of the grammatical account. I argue that mismatching scalar implicatures can be generated even when the restrictor of the universal quantifier in a universal alternative is contextually known to be empty. The crucial evidence consists of a hitherto unnoticed oddness asymmetry between formally analogous existential sentences with reference failure NPs. I conclude that the generation of mismatching scalar implicatures does not require contextual access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Past perfective on the Spanish possibility modal poder (“can”, “be able to”) can trigger either an actuality or a counterfactuality effect on the prejacent. This is surprisingly different from other languages with an overt perfective vs. imperfective distinction (French, Hindi, Greek, etc.), where past perfective morphology on a possibility modal leads to actuality entailments ( Bhatt, 1999; Hacquard, 2006 ). Contrary to previous work ( Borgonovo and Cummins, 2007; Borgonovo, 2011 ), in this paper I argue that the effects observed in Spanish are best characterized as arising pragmatically from the interaction between the discourse model of the Question Under Discussion ( Büring, 2003 ) and the Levinsonian maxims of Quantity and Informativeness. I propose that constructions with past perfective poder can be potentially ambiguous between the two readings, whereas those with past imperfective poder are just vague. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modus ponens is the argument from premises of the form If A, then B and A to the conclusion B (e.g., from If it rained, Alicia got wet and It rained to Alicia got wet). Nearly all participants agree that the modus ponens conclusion logically follows when the argument appears in this Basic form. However, adding a further premise (e.g., If she forgot her umbrella, Alicia got wet) can lower participants' rate of agreement-an effect called suppression. We propose a theory of suppression that draws on contemporary ideas about conditional sentences in linguistics and philosophy. Semantically, the theory assumes that people interpret an indicative conditional as a context-sensitive strict conditional: true if and only if its consequent is true in each of a contextually determined set of situations in which its antecedent is true. Pragmatically, the theory claims that context changes in response to new assertions, including new conditional premises. Thus, the conclusion of a modus ponens argument may no longer be accepted in the changed context. Psychologically, the theory describes people as capable of reasoning about broad classes of possible situations, ordered by typicality, without having to reason about individual possible worlds. The theory accounts for the main suppression phenomena, and it generates some novel predictions that new experiments confirm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A recent study questioned the adherence of children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) to a linguistic constraint on the use of reflexive pronouns (Principle A) in sentences like Bart's dad is touching himself. This led researchers to question whether children with ASD are able to compute the hierarchical structural relationship of c-command, and raised the possibility that the children rely on a linear strategy for reference assignment. The current study investigates the status of c-command in children with ASD by testing their interpretation of sentences like (1) and (2) that tease apart use of c-command and a linear strategy for reference assignment. (1) The girl who stayed up late will not get a dime or a jewel (C-command) (2) The girl who didn't go to sleep will get a dime or a jewel (Non C-command) These examples both contain negation (not or didn't) and disjunction (or). In (1), negation c-commands the disjunction phrase, yielding a conjunctive entailment. This gives rise to the meaning that the girl who stayed up late won't get a dime and she won't get a jewel. In (2), negation is positioned inside a relative clause and it does not c-command disjunction. Therefore, no conjunctive entailment follows. Thus, (2) is true if the girl just gets a dime or just a jewel, or possibly both. If children with ASD lack c-command, then (1) will not give rise to a conjunctive entailment. In this case, children might rely on a linear strategy for reference assignment. Since negation precedes disjunction in both (1) and (2), they might be interpreted in a similar manner. Likewise, children who show knowledge of c-command should perform well on sentences governed by Principle A. These hypotheses were tested in experiments with 12 Australian children with HFA, aged 5;4 to 12;7, and 12 typically-developing controls, matched on non-verbal IQ. There was no significant difference in the pattern of responses by children with HFA and the control children on either (1) and (2) or the Principle A sentences. The findings provide preliminary support for the proposal that knowledge of c-command and Principle A is intact in HFA children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I examine al-Fārābī's and Avicenna's conceptions of the conditional. I show that there are significant differences between the two frames, despite their closeness. Al-Fārābī distinguishes between an accidental conditional and two "essential" conditionals. The accidental conditional can occur only once and pragmatically involves succession. In the first "essential" conditional, the consequent follows regularly the antecedent; pragmatically it involves likeliness. The second "essential" conditional can be either complete or incomplete. Semantically the former means "if and only if"; pragmatically it means "necessarily if and only if". The latter is expressed by 'if, then' and means entailment; pragmatically, it involves necessity and the inclusion of the antecedent into the consequent. As to Avicenna, he rejects explicitly al-Fārābī's complete conditional and distinguishes between the luzūm (real implication) and what he calls ittifāq. He quantifies over situations (or times) to express the various conditionals. The two universals AC and EC are expressed by "In all situations, if..., then...", while the two particulars IC and OC are expressed by "In some situations, if..., then..". This gives them a modal connotation, and makes the universals close to strict implications. Pragmatically, AC presupposes the truth of the antecedent, but there is no such presupposition in EC, while what is presupposed in both IC and OC is a (possible) conjunction. Despite these differences, in both systems, the conditional is not truth functional, unlike the Stoic conditional. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent work in the domain of scalar implicatures argues for the existence of a grammatical device of covert exhaustification exh (Krifka 1995; Chierchia 2006; Fox 2007; Fox and Spector 2009; Chierchia et al. 2011; Sauerland 2012). This covert operator strengthens sentence meanings in a way similar to neo-Gricean quantity inferences, but is crucially different in that it can strengthen embedded propositions. Embedded exhaustification can interact with higher operators, and many arguments for exh rest on these effects. This article presents another argument for the presence of a covert exhaustification operator in the grammar from its interaction with the approximative modifier almost. Intuitively, almost α might be paraphrased as 'close to but not quite α'. I motivate, and take as a starting point, a denotation for almost which derives both its proximal ('close to') inference and its negative ('not quite') inference as entailments (Horn 2002, 2005, 2011; Penka 2006). I present a new instance of a puzzle noted in Nouwen (2006) that poses a challenge to such an analysis: in certain environments, almost α can have an interpretation in which it seems that the negative inference has disappeared, and instead a monotonic inference arises (i.e. α is inferred rather than negated). I revisit and spell out the previously suggested solution (Horn 2005; Penka 2006; Spector 2015) that almost may take logical scope higher than other operators which c-command its surface position. The analysis of the novel case that I present assumes this scopal mobility, but crucially also relies on covert exhaustification. Under this proposal, the negative inference does not actually disappear, but is interpreted in a position where its contribution is obscured. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Here is a puzzle, which I learned from Terence Parsons in his "True Contradictions" [8]. First Degree Entailment (fde) is a logic which allows for truth value gaps as well as truth value gluts. If you are agnostic between assigning paradoxical sentences gaps and gluts (and there seems to be no very good reason to prefer gaps over gluts or gluts over gaps if you're happy with fde), then this looks no different, in effect, from assigning them a gap value? After all, on both views you end up with a theory that doesn't commit you to the paradoxical sentence or its negation. How is the fde theory any different from the theory with gaps alone?. In this paper, I will present a clear answer to this puzzle an answer that explains how being agnostic between gaps and gluts is a genuinely different position than admitting gaps alone, by using the formal notion of a bitheory, and showing that while such positions might agree on what is to be accepted, they differ on what is to be rejected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the greatest compliments I've ever received came from a gentleman who approached me after I had delivered a paper in Vancouver, British Columbia. He said: "You're from the future, aren't you?" He was responding to the manner in which I had considered logical entailments of how future episodes may play out. Although I was trained as a philosopher of science, the majority of my work for the last two decades has been interdisciplinary and collaborative with other fields in the social and physical sciences. As a pioneer in my field - sometimes referred to as experimental philosophy - I often employ the use of thought experiments or "what if?" scenarios to imagine possible future worlds. Thought experiments have been around for thousands of years; from Plato's allegory of the cave (Figure 1), to Rene Descartes' malin genie (Figure 2), to Hilary Putnam's brains in vats (Figure 3). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]