[Lingtyp] what is designated by a complement clause

[Christian Lehmann]

Dear Jürgen,

thank you very much. On the condition that the language in question uses 
two different grammatical constructions with the two classes of 
predicates which you use as criterial, it seems that the procedure that 
you propose would produce the distribution of these two constructions 
over kinds of complement-taking verbs, subdividing thus the set of these 
verbs into two subsets. However, the two constructions in question are 
language-specific, so the two subsets thus defined in one language will 
not coincide semantically with the subsets produced by two constructions 
in another language.

Moreover, I am not sure that the members of either of the categories of 
superordinate predicates that you propose behave structurally in a 
unified way even in one language. Salvo errore, English has /Linda 
believes John to be mistaken/, but not /Linda doubts John to be mistaken/.

I had hoped that semanticists would have a semantically-based 
comprehensive categorization of predicates taking a propositional 
argument which would take into account the kind of entity represented by 
the proposition. Putting it differently: You are naming three categories 
of such predicates, cognitive attitude predicates, phasal predicates and 
psych action predicates. Is there a comprehensive classification of 
propositional-argument taking predicates which comprises these three 
categories and possibly the entire rest, like 'fear', 'ask', 'forget' 
and what not?

Best,
Christian
-- 

Prof. em. Dr. Christian Lehmann
Rudolfstr. 4
99092 Erfurt
Deutschland

Tel.: 	+49/361/2113417
E-Post: 	christianw_lehmann at arcor.de
Web: 	https://www.christianlehmann.eu
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