Semantics and Philosophy in Europe 4, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, 30 September 2011
Kasia M. Jaszczolt
University of Cambridge http://people.pwf.cam.ac.uk/kmj21
1

The scenario:
(1) The person who agreed to organise the drinks is to blame.
(2) I am to blame. I completely forgot I was put in charge.
2

‘I once followed a trail of sugar on a supermarket floor, pushing my cart down the aisle on one side of a tall counter and back the aisle on the other, seeking the shopper with the torn sack to tell him he was making a mess. With each trip around the counter, the trail became thicker. But I seemed unable to catch up. Finally it dawned on me. I was the shopper I was trying to catch.’
Perry (1979: 3)
3

Early discussions:
• the status of the objects of attitudes
• exorcising propositions, introducing properties and ‘relations to oneself’ (Lewis 1979; Chisholm 1981, Perry 1979; Feit 2008)
• propositions revindicated (Cresswell 1985; Kaplan 1989a; Crimmins and Perry 1989; Schiffer 1992; Perry 2001)
4

 Grammar/pragmatics interface in conveying the intended de
se meaning
 De se reports in minimalist and contextualist approaches
 Representing de se reports in Default Semantics
5

 The role of self-ascription, self-reference, self-attribution and self-awareness (conscious access to oneself)
 A contextualist but grammar-based account of de se
6

referential semantics conflates (1) with (2):
(1)
(2)
The person who agreed to organise the drinks is to blame.
I am to blame. I completely forgot I was put in charge.
 x [to-blame(x)] (kasia jaszczolt)
Perry (2001, 2009): referential content as the ‘default’ content
7

? Grammar produces the self-referring function
Chierchia (1989: 28): The cognitive access to oneself is ‘systematically excluded from the interpretation of (non-pronominal) referential expressions. It is systematically present in the interpretation of overt pronouns. It is systematically and unambiguously associated with the interpretation of PRO the null subject of infinitives and gerunds. It is associated with the interpretation of long-distance reflexives (at least in some languages)’.
8

? Grammar produces the self-referring function
Chierchia (1989: 28): The cognitive access to oneself is ‘ systematically excluded from the interpretation of (non-pronominal) referential expressions. It is systematically present in the interpretation of overt pronouns. It is systematically and unambiguously associated with the interpretation of PRO the null subject of infinitives and gerunds. It is associated with the interpretation of long-distance reflexives (at least in some languages)’.
9

Long-distance reflexives (e.g. Chinese ziji, Japanese zibun, or Korean
caki) are not specified for person, number of gender (have no

features) and can have many functions such as subject, object, indirect object, or possessor.
Takasi-ga zibun-ga tensai da to omotteiru.
Takasi-SUBJ self-SUBJ genius is COMP think
Takasi
1 thinks that he
1 is a genius.
(adapted from Huang 2000: 191)
10


11

An argument from non-pronominal expressions
(but not the one you expect) x
Pace Chierchia, cognitive access to oneself is not so ‘systematically’ excluded from the interpretation of non-pronominal expressions:
Sammy wants a biscuit.
Mummy will be with you in a moment.
honorifics (e.g. Thai ‘mouse’)
12

Kaplan (1989a: 491): uttering ‘I’ and pointing at someone else is ‘irrelevance or madness or what?’
But:
‘I t1+t2
I t1 believe I should have prepared the drinks party. In a way also believed that I t1+t2 should have done it when I t1 into the room. The fact is, the person appointed by the walked
Faculty Board should have done it and as I was this person.’ t1 later realised I t1+t2
13

Wiem t1+t2
, know 1SgPres że to ja t1+t2 powinnam była that Dem I Nom should 1SgFPast t1+t2 przygotować te prepare Inf this AccPl drinki. drink PlMAcc
W pewnym
In certain wtedy też wiedziałam t1
, ponieważ then also know 1SgFPast because
SgMInstr miała be-to sensie, senseS
SgFPast gMInstr je they NMAcc przygotować osoba prepare Inf person SgFNom wybranaprzez selected by
Radę
Board SgFAcc
Wydziału,
Faculty SgMGen a to ja t1+t2 byłam tą osobą. and Dem I Nom be SgFPast Dem SgFInstr person SgFInstr
14

st
Kratzer (2009): pronouns can be ambiguous between a referential and a bound-variable interpretation
I’m the only one around here who can take care of my children.
Only I admitted what I did wrong.
‘Only you can eat what you cook.’
15

only 1Sg soleSgMNom admit1SgPastM Refl to mistakeSgMGen
Tylko ja jedna tutaj potrafię zajmować się
Only 1Sg soleSgFNom here can1SgPres careInf Refl swoimi dziećmi.
ReflPronPl Instr childPl Instr
16

Kratzer:
(i) bound variable pronouns are underlyingly referential pronouns whose meaning can be accounted for through context-shifting. or:
(ii) they are unspecified and obtain the meaning through feature transmission from their binders in functional heads.
17

 Grammatical foundation of self-reference cannot be excluded.
18

Kasia
Kasia Nom self-reference wie, know 3SgPres że
 jest that be 3SgPres
Kasia wie, że to ona jest winna.
Dem she optional self-reference but strongly entrenched
Kasia przyznała, że
 jest
Kasia Nom admit 3SgPast optional self-reference that be 3SgPres winna.
guilty SgFN winna.
guilty SgFN
19

Lidia wants to be a scientist.
no underlying ‘I’-reference ‘I want to be a scientist.’
20

Alice wants what Lidia wants. underlying ‘I’-reference (  self-attribution of property)
But:
Lidia’s mother wants what Lidia wants and that’s why she is buying her lots of scientific books.
no underlying ‘I’-reference (  propositionalism)
21

Romanian: Subjunctive 1 embedded in the scope of some verbs (‘want’, ‘intend’, ‘try’ + IEM verbs) is the carrier of the
de se meaning (and coreference).
Maria vrea s ă m ă nânce fursecul.
Maria want3Sg Subj eat3Sg
Maria wants to eat the cookie.
cookieDef
Subj 2 (ca + ea (she) + s ă : no systematic trigger of coreference or de se.
after Folescu & Higginbotham (forthcoming).
22


23

The cognitive access to oneself is
?
‘systematically excluded from the interpretation of (nonx pronominal) referential expressions’;
?
‘systematically present in the interpretation of overt pronouns’;
‘systematically and unambiguously associated with the interpretation of PRO the null subject of infinitives and gerunds’;

‘associated with the interpretation of long-distance reflexives
(at least in some languages)’.
24


25

Kasia believes that she is to blame.
quasi-indexical self-ascription self-reference self-attribution self-awareness
26

27

Maier’s (2009) default de se:
(i) syntactic processing results in a de dicto reading;
(ii) presuppositions added (‘equality first’), coreference is established as a default link;
(iii) if
 recognize (x,x), then no coreference and search continues.
 Default Semantics (Jaszczolt 2005, 2010, forthcoming)
28

Kasia x believes that she x is to blame.
a strong tendency for coreference , van der Sandt’s (1992)
(presupposition as anaphora) grammar delivers contextualist default contents
29

•
•
•
•
30

?
Grammar conveys self-awareness
Allocation of self-awareness to grammar is a matter of an agreement as to what we want the grammar to do : capture strong tendencies or capture patterns that underdetermine meaning.

31

Semantic representation (or: the truth-conditionally evaluable representation) comprises information about utterance meaning that comes from a variety of sources.
32

33

John Perry: ‘I am making a mess.’
John Perry believes that he is making a mess.
FM, HIT, LF: John Perry believes of himself that he is making a mess.
34


It is methodologically more judicious to assume that grammar produces standard readings.
(from: the conceptual universal of self-reference; the omission of the pronoun in pro-drop languages without introducing ambiguity)
35

syntactic representation of de se at large, as a universal conceptual category
36

• Self-awareness persists as a strong tendency across selfattribution and third-person attribution.
• Contextualist orientation to truth-conditional content does not preclude deriving some of the optional aspects of meaning, such as de se reading of third-person pronouns in belief reports, from the grammar.
37

Minimal semantics (Borg, e.g. 2004, 2007, ‘liberal truth conditions’);
• Insensitive semantics (Cappelen and Lepore, e.g. 2005, basic set of context-sensitive expressions);
• Radical Semantic Minimalism (Bach, e.g. 2004, 2006, 2007, rejection of propositionalism from semantics)
38

‘I believe I am making a mess.’
= self-attributive reading with self-awareness?
But cancellation is marginally possible:
Look, I t1
I t1 believe in this scene, in a sense, that I don’t know it is me t1+t2
.
t1+t2 am making a mess but
Or instead: the default output of grammar à la Chierchia (2004)
(incompatible with minimalism!)
39

vs. no self-attributive content in minimalism:
I believe the person spilling the sugar is making a mess.
I believe that man is making a mess.
40

MS and RSM fulfil their raison d’être with respect to the semantics in a language system but at the expense of misrepresenting the power of grammar . The grammar/pragmatics interface does not allow for a theoretical divide in that when we attribute strong tendencies to grammar (partially supported), there has to be an option for them not to be realised in a particular situation of discourse.
41

 Proposal: We should not ‘split’ the power of grammar into that pertaining to the system and that pertaining to how grammar functions in utterance processing.
 De se belief ascription provides strong support for a contextualist, grammar-triggered construal
42

Jaszczolt 2005, 2007, 2010, forthcoming a,b
Sources of meaning information
(i) world knowledge (WK)
(ii) word meaning and sentence structure (WS)
(iii) situation of discourse (SD)
(iv) properties of the human inferential system (IS)
(v) stereotypes and presumptions about society and culture
(SC)
43

Types of processes that interact in producing the merger representation:
(i) processing of word meaning and sentence structure (WS)
(ii) pragmatic inference (from situation of discourse, social and cultural assumptions, and world knowledge) (CPI)
(iii) automatic production of cognitive defaults (CD)
(iv) automatic production of social, cultural and worldknowledge defaults (SCWD)
44

• methodological assumption: a shift of compositionality requirement to the level of interaction of semantic and pragmatic properties (Recanati 2004, 2010; Jaszczolt 2005a,
2010)
• a supervenience relation between linguistic expressions and a metaphysical (compositional) foundation (Szabó 2000;
Schiffer, e.g. 1992, 1996, 2003)
45

Bel (x,

’) the individual x has the cognitive state represented as an embedded representation

’
46

(i) CD  default status of de re
(ii) coreference x=y
(iii)  de se (= from CD, WS)
47


‘I believe I am making a mess.’ x y

’
[John Perry]
CD
(x)
[John Perry]
CD
(y)
[y=x]
WS
[[x]
CD
[believes]
CD,WS

’ ]
WS

’ : [[y]
CD
is making a mess]
WS
48

I t1 believed I t1+t2 was making a mess.
?/

In a sense, I t1 believed I t1+t2 didn’t know that the person I t1 was making a mess. I t1 referred to was I t1+t2
. just
49

• coreference: condition [y=x]
WS
• the lack of self-awareness: differentiation of indexing on x and
y (CD vs CPI) and the non-default use of the belief operator
(CPI)
50


‘I believed, in a sense, I was making a mess.’ (marked reading) x y
 ’
[John Perry]
CD
(x)
[John Perry]
CPI
(y)
[y=x]
WS
[[x]
CD
[believe]
CPI
 ’ ]
WS
 ’ : [[y]
CPI
is making a mess]
WS
51

‘John Perry believes that he is making a mess.’ (default reading)
 x y

’
[John Perry]
CD
(x)
[John Perry]
CD
(y)
[y=x]
WS, CD
[[x]
CD
[believes]
CD,WS

’ ]
WS

’ : [[y]
CD
is making a mess]
WS
52

‘John Perry believes that he is making a mess.’ (non-default coreferential reading)
 x y
 ’
[John Perry]
CD
(x)
[John Perry]
CPI
(y)
[y=x]
WS
[[x]
CD
[believes]
CPI
 ’ ]
WS
 ’ : [[y]
CPI
is making a mess]
WS
53

Summary and Conclusion
• There is substantial cross-linguistic evidence that there is no reliable representation of self-awareness in the grammar or the lexicon. Instead, there is a lexicon/grammar/pragmatics trade-off, allowing for various degrees of salience of communicating cognitive access to oneself.
54

Summary and Conclusion
• There is substantial cross-linguistic evidence that there is no reliable representation of self-awareness in the grammar or the lexicon. Instead, there is a lexicon/grammar/pragmatic trade-off, allowing for various degrees of salience of communicating cognitive access to oneself.
• Self-awareness (cognitive access to oneself) can be construed as conveyed by the grammar only when grammar is allowed to produce cancellable interpretations. This is best achieved on a contextualist account.
55

• When compositionality is shifted to the level of the merger of information (

), as in DS, the differences between syntactic and pragmatic solutions to de se are rendered unimportant.
56

• When compositionality is shifted to the level of the merger of information (

), as in DS, the differences between syntactic and pragmatic solutions to de se are rendered unimportant.
• In DS, rather than make a case for conscious self-reference as derived from the grammar or from pragmatic enrichment, we acknowledge its default status triggered by the grammar and aided by the CD process that produces an interpretation pertaining to the strongest intentionality of the speaker’s mental state and the strongest referential intention.
57

No overt marker of de se  no special status of de se thought
(e.g. Carruthers 2011, Higginbotham 2010,...)
58

Chalmers (1996: 85)

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