Open AccessOn The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data
Author(s) -
Micha Breakstone,
Alexandre Cremers,
D. G. Fox,
Martin Hackl
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
proceedings from semantics and linguistic theory
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2163-5951
pISSN - 2163-5943
DOI - 10.3765/salt.v0i0.2609
Subject(s) - scope (computer science) , ambiguity , phrase , sentence , computer science , de facto , natural language processing , linguistics , artificial intelligence , philosophy , political science , law , programming language
This paper compares two accounts of an ambiguity that arises when a comparative phrase containing an exactly differential is embedded under an intensional operator (Heim 2000). Under one account, the comparative phrase is responsible for the ambiguity (the er-scope theory), and, under the other, the ambiguity is attributed to the exactly phrase (the exactly-scope theory). We present converging evidence from the distribution of de re and de dicto readings and real time sentence processing that supports the er-scope theory. Since the er-scope theory presupposes a quanticational analysis of the comparative, such an analysis is ipso facto supported by our results.