morphosyntactic feature geometries

[Martha McGinnis]

Rolf, thanks very much for your response!

It's true, the two possibilities (feature geometries = Vocabulary,
feature geometries = syntax) should indeed make the different
empirical predictions you mentioned.  The syntactic agreement
predictions might be hard to test, since agreement Vocabulary should
be subject to the same feature geometry as pronoun Vocabulary... but
one can imagine syntactic distinctions between e.g. number+gender
agreement (as on French participles) vs. person+number agreement (as
on French finite verbs) -- e.g. in French, the former type of
syntactic agreement relation doesn't seem to block further syntactic
movement of the nominal, while the latter type does.  If H&R's
geometry is correct, we might expect to find other syntactic evidence
for these kinds of agreement splits, rather than a person+gender vs.
number split.

>The idea that plurals in a language with duals mean "three or more"
>does not strike me as being the result of a specifically interpreted
>"minus dual" value of some sort, but rather a blocking effect. If
>the speaker had meant two (s)he would have used a dual; thus using
>the plural implies three or more. As a pragmatic or functional
>inference however, one might expect this to be cancellable in the
>appropriate discourse context.

Good point.  It's important to know whether or not what we call
"plural" really means "dual or plural" in languages with dual number
morphology.  I (blush) don't know the number literature well enough
to know this.  Reportedly though, what we call "1st exclusive plural"
really doesn't mean "exclusive or inclusive plural" in languages with
inclusive person morphology... so similar questions arise in the
person domain in any case.

>Since I am committed (as I think many of us are) to a semantics
>which interprets the syntax rather than generates it, I don't
>understand what it means to say "it uses the most specific
>morphosyntactic category compatible with the intended meaning"
>except as a kind of pragmatic rule of the Gricean sort "be as
>informative as possible".

Yes, me too -- that's what I find so disturbing about the notion that
that's how these categories are used / interpreted.  If the feature
geometries are Vocabulary items only, then it makes sense to me that
they could be inserted into fully specified syntactic nodes whose
features straightforwardly determine the way the category is
interpreted.  So, for example, if it's true that 1st person exclusive
Vocabulary can't be used in an inclusive context, then we could
insert it into a node that's [-Addressee] -- even if the 1st
exclusive Vocabulary item itself doesn't have this feature.

But what if the feature geometries are syntactic?  Then we can't work
any interpretive magic with negative-valued syntactic features.  That
is, we really NEED to know if "plural" really does mean "not dual" in
languages with dual number morphology (ditto "exclusive" and "not
inclusive").

Looking at cancellable implicatures is a fascinating idea!  That
really made me think.  But I think I've convinced myself that this is
actually *not* the way to determine the syntactic/semantic features
of morphosyntactic categories.  At first, it seems promising.  For
example, suppose you're an Arabic speaker and you hear (1), which is
designed to cancel the plural's implicature of "greater than 2".  My
guess is that the implicature CAN be cancelled -- that (1) in Arabic
would not be a contradiction.  (Any Arabic speakers out there to
confirm?)

(1) Only they (pl.) are lucky -- in fact, only they (du.) are lucky.

Anyway, suppose, for the sake of argument, that the implicature IS
cancellable. From this, we might conclude that the plural really can
be used for groups of two. But actually, I don't think that would be
the correct conclusion.  Here's why: (2)-(4) all sound fine to me as
well, given the right context.  There's a strong contrast with (5),
for example.  But surely we DON'T want to say that first plural in
English really can be used for a set consisting of just the speaker,
or just the addressee, or just a 3rd person!

(2)  Only we are lucky -- in fact, only I am lucky.
(3)  Only we are lucky -- in fact, only you are lucky.
(4)  Only we are lucky -- in fact, only he is lucky.
(5) #Only I am lucky -- in fact, only he is lucky.

I think these implicatures actually tell us about semantic relations
between the two pronouns -- that is, "we" is a set that can *include*
(not consist of) the sets "I", "you", and "he", while "I" is not a
set that can include the set "he".  Likewise, "they (pl)" can include
the set "they (du)". That doesn't tell us whether it can *consist of*
such a set.

So... oh well.  But what about just finding out whether a verb with a
subject like "Rolf and Martha" can be plural, or whether it has to be
dual?  Would that be a good enough way to find out if plural can
refer to sets of two?  Suppose the verb in this context really does
have to be marked as dual. If so, it seems to me that we WOULD need
negative feature values in order to ensure this (e.g. plural
morphology is inserted into [+Group, -Minimal] number in languages
with dual morphology).  If there are negative feature values in the
syntax, then H&R's privative feature geometry could only be in the
Vocabulary. (Actually, I once tried to imagine what their feature
geometry would look like with binary +/- feature values, but... my
head exploded.  Perhaps others can do better than I..!)

Best,
Martha