21.4306, Qs: Philosophy of Lang: Expressions like 'the fact that p'

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LINGUIST List: Vol-21-4306. Thu Oct 28 2010. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 21.4306, Qs: Philosophy of Lang: Expressions like 'the fact that p'

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1)
Date: 20-Oct-2010
From: Arianna Betti [ariannabetti at gmail.com]
Subject: Philosophy of Lang: Expressions like 'the fact that p'
 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2010 14:52:42
From: Arianna Betti [ariannabetti at gmail.com]
Subject: Philosophy of Lang: Expressions like 'the fact that p'

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Dear LINGUIST subscribers,

I am a philosopher doing research on facts. Many philosophers 
(especially those sympathetic to ordinary language philosophy) think 
that we can discover what's in the world by examining the way we 
speak.

For a book I am writing I am researching the application of this 
methodology to the phrase 'the fact that p' (where 'p' stands for 
whatever sentence of the language). Some would like to say that this is 
what we call a 'definite description'.

My questions are the following: 

(1) Is a phrase like 'the fact that p' present in all languages? If not (as I 
presume), is there a type of language in which there isn't such a 
phrase? I wonder if one can indicate some groups of languages in 
which a construction of that kind would not occur, perhaps?

(2) Is the expression 'fact' present in all languages? If not, is there a 
way to group languages in which that expression does not occur? 
(examples of languages in which 'fact' does not occur would already 
help me greatly!). 

(3) Can I solve similar questions myself by using some online 
database? If not, what's the second best method?

(4) Is there recent cross-linguistic research done specifically on the 
expression 'fact'? (I already know and have used work by Kiparsky & 
Kiparsky, Vendler, Peterson & co).

I would be most grateful to be able (with or without additional 
research) to include the answer to this in my book!

Best wishes,
Arianna Betti

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam,
ERC Starting Grantee & Member of De Jonge Akademie of KNAW, The 
Netherlands

http://home.telfort.nl/oranjegracht/index.html

Selected Bibliography:
Kiparsky and Kiparsky (1971). Fact. Semantics: An Interdisciplinary
Reader. Steinberg and Jakobovits. Cambridge: 345-69.

Peterson, P. L. (1997). Fact, Proposition, Event. 
Dordrecht/Boston/London, Kluwer.

Vendler, Z. (1967). Linguistics in Philosophy. Ithaca, NY, Cornell
University Press.

Vendler, Z. (1972). Res Cogitans - An Essay in Rational Philosophy.
Ithaca and London, Cornell University Press. 

Linguistic Field(s): Philosophy of Language
                     Semantics
                     Typology




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