Number word constructions, degree semantics and the metaphysics of degrees
Number word constructions, degree semantics and the metaphysics of degrees
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数词结构、程度语义和程度形而上学
DOI：
10.1007/s10988-017-9213-z
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发表时间：
2017
影响因子：
1.1
通讯作者：
Brendan Balcerak Jackson (with Doris Penka)
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Brendan Balcerak Jackson (with Doris Penka)
本体论的一个核心问题是数字是否真实存在的问题。但似乎很容易对这个问题做出肯定的回答。像（1）“七个学生来参加聚会”这样的句子的真实性可以通过环顾聚会并数学生来确定。 (1)的简单解释是(2)“参加聚会的学生人数是七人”。但是（2）似乎意味着数字的存在，因此我们似乎必须得出数字存在的结论。这有时被称为“如何从无到有”的难题。大多数现有的解决难题的尝试都理所当然地认为（1）在本体论上是无辜的，并将注意力集中在（2）或从（1）到（2）的过渡上。我们认为，这两种尝试在第一步就出错了：（1）在本体论上是无辜的假设被高度有吸引力且独立且动机良好的数字词结构的基于程度的解释所破坏。因此，基于学位的解释为我们如何从无到有这一难题提供了直接的语言解决方案。但这篇论文还有第二个目标。我们提出的语义将“七”视为指代某种程度的指称表达。但什么是学位呢？我们考虑了各种反柏拉图主义的提议，这些提议试图根据具体实体之间的关系来解释程度，并认为它们与 Fox 和 Hackl 的普遍测量密度假设 (UDM) 不相容 (Linguist Philos 29:537–586, 2006)。虽然 UDM 还不能声称是基于学位的语义学家之间的共识观点，但我们的目的是用它来说明如何通过考虑学位必须具有的属性来评估有关学位性质的观点，如果学位要发挥它们在语言学中被要求发挥的解释作用。在基于程度的语义学的当前发展状态中，关于这些属性是什么还存在一些棘手的开放性问题。如果我们要清楚地了解自然语言语义对本体论和形而上学的贡献，就需要解决这些问题。
A central question for ontology is the question of whether numbers really exist. But it seems easy to answer this question in the affirmative. The truth of a sentence like (1) ‘Seven students came to the party’ can be established simply by looking around at the party and counting students. A trivial paraphrase of (1) is (2) ‘The number of students who came to the party is seven’. But (2) appears to entail the existence of a number, and so it seems that we must conclude that numbers exist. This is sometimes called the puzzle of how we can get something from nothing. Most extant attempts to solve the puzzle take it for granted that (1) is ontologically innocent, and focus their attention either on (2) or on the transition from (1) to (2). We argue that both attempts go wrong at the first step: the assumption that (1) is ontologically innocent is undermined by a highly attractive and independently well-motivated degree-based account of number word constructions. Thus the degree-based account provides a straightforward linguistic resolution of the puzzle of how we can get something from nothing. But the paper also has a second aim. The semantics we present treats ‘seven’ as a referring expression that refers to a degree of a certain sort. But what are degrees? We consider various anti-platonist proposals that seek to account for degrees in terms of relations between concrete entities, and argue that they are incompatible with the Universal Density of Measurement hypothesis (UDM) of Fox and Hackl (Linguist Philos 29:537–586, 2006). While the UDM cannot yet claim to be the consensus view among degree-based semanticists, our aim is to use it to illustrate how views about the nature of degrees can be evaluated by considering the properties degrees must have if they are to play the explanatory roles they are called upon to play in linguistics. In the present state of development of degree-based semantics there are difficult open questions about what these properties are. These questions need to be addressed if we are to develop a clear picture of what natural language semantics has to contribute to ontology and metaphysics.
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DOI：
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发表时间：
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期刊：
影响因子：
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作者：
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DOI：
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期刊：
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DOI：
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发表时间：
1965
期刊：
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DOI：
10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198769835.003.0002
发表时间：
2007
期刊：
Philosopher's Imprint
影响因子：
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影响因子：
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作者：
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