Talk by Yoad Winter
The Square of Individuals
The main objective of this paper is to account for the seemingly exceptional
behaviour of singular and plural NP conjunction. Cases of apparent "non-
Boolean" semantics of NP and N' conjunction in collective predication are shown
to be explained by one simple property of generalized quantifiers in Boolean
domains. Consequently, conjunction is standardly treated as cross-categorially
"intersective" without any ambiguity stipulation.\\
The way proper name and indefinite NP coordinations get the "union" reading
is accounted for by the flexible interpretation of singular and plural NP's.
This is done using a polymorphic scheme, called {\em The Square of Individuals\/}.
The scheme generalizes {\em The Partee Triangle\/} from Partee(1986) which treats
mainly singular NP's.\\
Some relations between this general mechanism and other theories of
indefinites, genericity and quantification are studied. This shows some new
connections between different models for NP interpretation.
Paul Dekker, November 2, 1995