Dynamic semantics

Research exposition (monographs, survey articles) pertaining to mathematical logic and foundations (03-02) Philosophical and critical aspects of logic and foundations (03A05) Modal logic (including the logic of norms) (03B45) Logic of natural languages (03B65) Logic in computer science (03B70)

Review text

The author's view of `dynamic semantics' differs from such ones that consider meanings as being dynamic (such views be however admitted): what is dynamic is rather interpretation. The study concentrates on the composition of meanings as influenced by the role of pronouns. This characteristic is the content of Chapter 1 (``Introduction). In Chapter 2 the system of predicate logic with anaphora (PLA) is described (first, DRT and DPL are mentioned including their solutions of `donkey sentences') and the topics `first-order satisfaction', `conjunction and resolution' and `logical properties of PLA' are analyzed. The topic `representation of information' is treated in connection with DRT, DPL and Cresswell. Chapter 3, ``Information update and support, lifts the extensional system to an intensional level. Here the static notion of meaning is combined with a dynamic notion of conjunction. The set of possibilities is being diminished so that an approximation to actual world can be produced. Groenendijk's (et alii) system GSV is applied with two kinds of information: discourse information and information about the world. The problems with combining existential quantifier with modality (epistemic modality) are described, the intensional notion of the contents of PLA formulas is introduced. Kripkean possible worlds are exploited, PLA update defined. Updates are defined in terms of contents and vice versa. The section ``Contextualist debate is a rather philosophical section, where the author argues that dynamic semantics is a `real' semantics wearing its pragmatic roots on its sleeves. The last chapter, ``Quantification and modality, argues that ``a standard and independently motivated analysis of quantification and modality can be directly imported into a PLA-style semantics. Definite and indefinite descriptions need a specific category of terms (against Russell's quantifiers conception). Their satisfaction is made possible due to the sequences of wittnesses. In the next section, ``Knowing who and believing what, concerns belief reports and `knowing who' reports with some examples. (The reviewer states however that if a more fine-grained analysis is applied, some of the author's claims can be refuted -- see, e.g., the Observation 20.) In the section ``Alethic and epistemic modality an analysis of `might' is suggested. The subsection ``On situations and states compares the preceding analysis based on `pragmatic notion of a dynamic composition of meaning' with rivals like those based on `situation' or `information states'. In Chapter 5, ``Conclusion, the author sums up the characteristic features of his book. He stresses that the rival theories may be useful (they can even ``flourish, but that ``dynamic semantics can survive, and be fruitfully practised, without any of these commitments (viz. the commitments made by those theories).

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