arXiv:2608.12598cs.CL2026-08

解释为何某些句子中代词能指代可能世界中的事物,而另一些不能。

Intensional Anaphora

  • 用描述存在而非值存在的方式解释代词回指机制。
  • 发现非真实语境下仍可出现回指,挑战传统理论。
  • 提出新逻辑系统PIP,支持描述基础的回指分析。

意向性算子常被视作对可能世界的量化,类似于确定词对个体的量化。然而,意向性语境中引入的个体难以像在纯量化语境中那样充当后继代词的先行成分。例如,'每个人都吃一个芝士汉堡'可接续为'它们很大',其中'它们'指代正在吃的汉堡。但正如Stone(1999)指出,类似句式'安德里亚可能在吃一个芝士汉堡'却无法支持'它很大'或'它们很大'这类回指。尽管Stone(1999)、Stone和Hardt(1999)以及Brasoveanu(2010)通过要求代词值必须存在于评价世界来排除非真实性意向语境中的回指,我们却发现存在反例:某些情况下即使指称对象明显存在,回指仍被禁止;另一些情况下,即使指称对象未必存在,回指依然成立。因此,我们主张采用基于描述而非基于值的回指理论。代词预设其对应先行描述在语境集中的每个世界都得到实现。故要使'安德里亚可能在吃一个芝士汉堡'之后接'它很大'合宜,必须在所有候选世界中都有安德里亚正在吃的一个芝士汉堡。我们通过一种新逻辑——多元意向预设谓词演算(PIP)实现该观点,该逻辑建立于Keshet(2018)和Abney与Keshet(2022)工作之上,每个PIP公式可直接转化为标准一阶谓词演算带集合抽象,为本研究提供经典基础。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Intensional operators are often treated as quantifiers over possible worlds, parallel to the treatment of determiners as quantifiers over individuals. Yet individuals introduced in intensional contexts cannot serve as antecedents to later pronouns as easily as those introduced in merely quantificational contexts. For instance, "Everyone is eating a cheeseburger" may be followed by "They are large", where "they" refers to the cheeseburgers being eaten. However, as Stone (1999) points out, the similar "Andrea might be eating a cheeseburger" does not support later anaphoric references such as "It is large" or "They are large". Stone (1999), Stone and Hardt (1999), and Brasoveanu (2010) address this by requiring a pronoun's value (its referents) to exist in the world of evaluation, ruling out anaphora from non-veridical intensional contexts. We show, however, both cases where such anaphora is disallowed even when the pronoun's referents clearly exist and cases where it is allowed even though they might not exist. We argue that intensional anaphora is best captured using a description-based rather than value-based account. A pronoun presupposes that its corresponding antecedent description is instantiated in each world of the context set. Thus, there must be a cheeseburger being eaten by Andrea in every candidate world for "It is large" to be felicitous after "Andrea might be eating a cheeseburger". We implement our proposal via a new logic, building on Keshet (2018) and Abney and Keshet (2022), called Plural Intensional Presuppositional predicate calculus (PIP). Each PIP formula translates directly into standard first-order predicate calculus with set abstraction, providing a classical foundation for this work.

语义学代词回指可能世界

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