7.470, Sum: MUST

[The Linguist List]

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LINGUIST List:  Vol-7-470. Thu Mar 28 1996. ISSN: 1068-4875. Lines:  60
 
Subject: 7.470, Sum: MUST
 
Moderators: Anthony Rodrigues Aristar: Texas A&M U. <aristar at tam2000.tamu.edu>
            Helen Dry: Eastern Michigan U. <hdry at emunix.emich.edu> (On Leave)
            T. Daniel Seely: Eastern Michigan U. <dseely at emunix.emich.edu>
 
Associate Editor:  Ljuba Veselinova <lveselin at emunix.emich.edu>
Assistant Editors: Ron Reck <rreck at emunix.emich.edu>
                   Ann Dizdar <dizdar at tam2000.tamu.edu>
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Editor for this issue: dseely at emunix.emich.edu (T. Daniel Seely)
 
---------------------------------Directory-----------------------------------
1)
Date:  Tue, 26 Mar 1996 20:47:00 EST
From:  joel at exc.com (Joel M. Hoffman)
Subject:  7.464, Sum: "MUST"
 
---------------------------------Messages------------------------------------
1)
Date:  Tue, 26 Mar 1996 20:47:00 EST
From:  joel at exc.com (Joel M. Hoffman)
Subject:  7.464, Sum: "MUST"
 
>      On February 6, l996, I posted the following query on LINGUIST:
>
>      [Why is (1) ungrammatical?]
>
>	  l. *The books sell well (in order) to raise money.
>	  2. The books must sell well (in order) to raise money.
>	  3. It is necessary that the books sell well (in order) to
>	     raise money.
>[...]
>      The general consensus was that 1. was ill-formed not for
>      syntactic but for semantic reasons. [...]
 
Further support for semantic conflict in (1) comes from possible
readings in which it >is< grammatical.  For example, the god of a
small city, manipulating every facet of every transaction, might
explain to another god why things in the city work out so well:
 
      ``Well, the books sell well in order to raise money, and then
        the money is used to to pay people in order that the people
        have enough money to buy the books.  That's my secret.''
 
In other words, if "the books sell well" can be construed to mean "I
have the books sell well" then (1) "becomes" grammatical.  But
syntactic violations are seldom overcome by semantic
re-interpretation.
 
-Joel Hoffman
(joel at exc.com)
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