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Potential Questions in Discourse and Grammar
Thesis · July 2013

DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.1888.1128
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Potential Questions
in Discourse and Grammar
Edgar Onea
University of Göttingen
Courant Research Centre
“Text structures”
August 8, 2013
2
Acknowledgement
This research has been supported by the German Initiative of Excellence at the Courant
Research Centre ”Text Structures” at the University of Göttingen from 2010-2013,
which I gratefully acknowledge.
I acknowledge that discussion with the following colleagues has helped in developing
the ideas presented in this book. The order is alphabetical: David Beaver, Anton Benz,
Regine Eckardt, Klaus von Heusinger, Anke Holler, Katja Jasinskaja, Floris Roelofsen,
Markus Steinbach, Anna Volodina, Jingyang Xue, Henk Zeevat, Ede Zimmermann,
Malte Zimmermann. I am indebted to Jeroen Groenendijk for helping me clarify my
thoughts on questions by reviewing an earlier version of some ideas presented here. I
am indebted to Christine Günther for helping me eliminate some of my stylistic and
grammatical mistakes.
Of course, all mistakes in what follows are my own.

Contents
0 Introduction 7
0.1 Potential questions in discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
0.2 Potential questions in grammar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
0.2.1 Indefinites and potential questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
0.2.2 Specification and appositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
0.2.3 Appositives and non-restrictive material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
0.3 The structure of this book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
1 Questions and Answers 23

1.1 The architecture of meanings and terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
1.2 Questions in inquisitive semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
1.2.1 Support based basic inquisitive semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
1.2.2 Algebraic inquisitive semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
1.2.3 The notion of context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
1.3 Answerhood in inquisitive semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
1.3.1 Valid discourse moves and valid responses . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
1.3.2 Answers and direct answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
1.3.3 Extended answers and complete answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
1.4 The compositional semantics of interrogatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
1.4.1 Alternative semantics or Structured Meanings . . . . . . . . . . . 53
1.4.2 Alternative semantics for simple wh-questions . . . . . . . . . . . 54
1.4.3 Extension to polar questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
1.4.4 which-questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
1.4.4.1 The domain narrowing (de re style) approach . . . . . . 67
1.4.4.2 The informative extension (de dicto style) approach . . 70
1.4.4.3 Domain restriction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
1.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
2 Question-Answer Congruence 77
2.1 The question-answer congruence informally . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
2.1.1 Focus as an abstract category . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
2.1.2 The notion of focus congruence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
2.1.2.1 wh-questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
3
4 CONTENTS
2.1.2.2 Polar questions and verum focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92

2.2 Alternative Semantics for focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
2.3 The question-focus congruence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
2.4 Intervention effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
2.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
3 Potential questions in discourse 121

3.1 Strategic discourse and sub-questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
3.1.1 Discourse is about answering a question . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
3.1.2 Strategic discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
3.1.2.1 The notion of strategy and planning . . . . . . . . . . . 132
3.1.2.2 Application to discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
3.1.3 Sub-questions in discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
3.1.3.1 The notion of sub-questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
3.1.3.2 Discourse rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
3.2 Loosely strategic discourse and potential questions . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
3.2.1 Licensing question by assertions in discourse informally . . . . . 160
3.2.2 The notion of potential questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
3.2.3 Licensing of discourse moves in a discourse state . . . . . . . . . 173
3.2.3.1 Discourse as a tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
3.2.3.2 Construction rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
3.3 Two applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
3.3.1 Over-answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
3.3.2 Unexpected foci . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
4 Appositives and non-restrictive relative clauses 193

4.1 Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
4.1.1 Syntax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
4.1.2 Projection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
4.2 Appositives and potential questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
4.2.1 Grammatical constraints on potential questions . . . . . . . . . . 201
4.2.2 An interesting prediction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
4.2.3 Not-at-issueness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
4.2.4 Potential questions and rhetorical relations . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
4.3 Potential questions and projection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
4.4 Conclusion and problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
5 Specificational constructions 215

5.1 The common core of specificational particles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
5.1.1 Specification of indefinites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
5.1.2 Similar constructions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
5.1.3 Alternative analyses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
5.1.4 Ambiguities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
CONTENTS 5
5.2 Nämlich and und zwar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226

5.2.1 Specification distinctions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
5.2.1.1 Starting a discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
5.2.1.2 Partial answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
5.2.1.3 Unarticulated constituents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
5.2.1.4 Scalarity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
5.2.2 Explanation and specification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
6 The case of indefinites 241

6.1 The story so far . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
6.1.1 Indefinites are not quantifiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
6.1.1.1 Indefinites are referential . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
6.1.1.2 Indefinites are Skolem functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
6.1.1.3 Indefinites are choice functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
6.1.2 Only apparent wide scope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254
6.1.3 Indefinites are quantifiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
6.1.4 Indefinites are nearly quantifiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
6.1.4.1 Kratzer and Shimoyama . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
6.1.4.2 Indefinites as discourse referents . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
6.1.4.3 Discourse referents and questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264
6.2 The compositional theory of indefiniteness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
6.2.1 Some notational conventions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
6.2.2 Names, properties and pronouns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
6.2.3 The indefinite article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275
6.2.3.1 Relative clauses and the indexer . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
6.2.3.2 Quantification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
6.2.4 The solution of the indefinite scope problem . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
6.2.4.1 An exceptional scope example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
6.2.4.2 The islandhood of islands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
6.2.4.3 The Binder Roof Constraint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
6.2.5 More on the compositional system . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288
6.2.5.1 Negation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
6.2.5.2 The definite article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290
6.2.5.3 Assertion revisited . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
6.3 The derivation of questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
6.3.1 The question-operator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
6.3.2 Functional readings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
6.4 The meaning of indefinite determiners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298
6.4.1 German bestimmt vs.gewiss . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
6.4.2 Russian koe-kakoj and kakoj-nibud’ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
6.5 Conclusion: the function of indefinites in discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
6 CONTENTS
7 Meaning in Discourse 307

7.1 Assignments and Hamblin Semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
7.1.1 The problem of multiple foci . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
7.1.2 An intuitive solution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310
7.1.3 From sets to assignments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
7.2 Integrated formalism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
7.2.1 The semantics of interrogatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
7.2.2 The semantics of focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 318
7.3 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323
8 Back to discourse 325

8.1 Potential questions in realistic discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326
8.1.1 Generation constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
8.1.2 Ordering constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 334
8.1.2.1 The strength rule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335
8.1.2.2 The normality rule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335
8.1.3 Accommodation constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
8.1.3.1 Safe accommodation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338
8.1.3.2 Thematic closure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
8.1.3.3 Optimisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
8.2 Annotation of texts using potential questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
8.2.1 The units of annotation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
8.2.2 Basic tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345
8.2.3 Advanced tagging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348
8.2.3.1 Embedding and modal subordination . . . . . . . . . . 349
8.2.3.2 Conditionals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
8.3 Two annotated examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354
8.3.1 A textbook example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354
8.3.2 The Emperor Nero example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
8.4 Limits of annotation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361
9 Outlook 363
Chapter 0
Introduction
This book is an attempt to introduce a novel notion into linguistic theory: the notion
of potential questions. I claim that potential questions play an important role in the
discourse-grammar interface. This book provides a full answer to the question in (1)
and a partial answer to the question in (2).
(1) What are potential questions?
(2) Why do we need potential questions in linguistic theory?
The answer to (1) is very simple (and even at a higher level of formal precision it will
not get much more complicated): potential questions are questions one can safely ask
in discourse. Since we can ask nearly anything in any discourse, nearly any question
is a potential question. Given this definition, the answer to (2) should appear to be
hopeless. Indeed, we do not need potential questions for the analysis of grammatical
phenomena or for an insightful discussion of discourse phenomena, in any non-tririval
sense.
What we need instead is the notion of potential questions licensed by some utterance
in discourse. Consider a discourse state in which some question α is not safe to ask, for
instance, because it has presuppositions which are not satisfied. In this discourse state,
α is not a potential question. As a next discourse move, some assertion β is performed
such that α is safe to ask in the emerging discourse state. We then say that β licensed
the potential question α in discourse.
I will claim that natural language grammar is highly specialised in handling potential
questions licensed by assertions. I will provide evidence for this claim by discussing
three distinct phenomena. Firstly, I will claim that appositives and non restrictive
relative clauses are a specialised grammatical device to introduce answers to implicit
potential questions licensed by the host utterance. Virtually any kind of potential
questions licensed by the host utterance can be targeted by appositives. Secondly,
7
8 CHAPTER 0. INTRODUCTION
I will claim that specificational constructions are specialised grammatical devices to

introduce answers to a well defined, constrained group of potential questions licensed by
their host utterance: the class of specificational questions. And thirdly, I will claim that
indefinite determiners grammatically encode constraints on the attitude of the speaker
towards an even narrower class of potential questions, so called primary and secondary
potential questions, which are computed in the process of semantic composition. Hence,
one partial answer to the question in (2) is:
(3) We need potential questions because they are part of natural language grammar.
In addition, I will claim that potential questions licensed by utterances also play a
role in the process of discourse interpretation and in the general structure of texts.
This may seem a trivial claim on the first sight. However, given the way linguists
are used to think about discourse, this is not true. I will argue in some detail that
we can analyse several discourse phenomena such as over-answers to overt questions
in a formally precise way by making use of potential questions licensed by assertions.
Moreover, we can annotate entire texts using trees of questions if we systematically use
the notion of licensing potential questions. Some of the problems earlier annotation
systems usually face do not even arise in such a theory. Hence, another partial answer
to the question in (2) is:
(4) We need potential questions because they are part of discourse structure.
This very brief discussion should already suffice to clarify in what sense the notion of
potential questions is to be considered a novel one. For certain, that potential questions
exist, that they can be licensed by utterances, and that they may be activated in
discourse, is not a new claim. The new claim is, really, that we need this notion in
non-trivial ways to understand discourse phenomena and grammatical phenomena and,
hence, it deserves to be part of linguistic terminology.1
Having settled the main topic of this book, in a somewhat secondary way, this book is
also about questions, focus, appositives, specificational constructions and indefinites.
Moreover, the main idea that this book puts forth ends up forcing me to develop a
1
In erotetic logics, cf. most recently Wisniewski (2010), we find that questions are naturally triggered
in various ways by introducing new information into the discourse. Also the particular idea that one
can raise questions by satisfying their presuppositions is incorporated in such systems. Wisniewski,
for instance, calls questions which have satisfied presuppositions sound, and they have natural places
in inquiry strategies, e.g. in so called E-scenarios. Another domain in which this idea has become
prominent is inquisitive semantics and logics, Groenendijk and Roelofsen (2009) and Ciardelli (2009),
where one essential observation is that some utterances e.g. containing disjunction, not only provide
new information but inherently raise new issues in discourse. I do acknowledge the similarity to ideas
from erotetic logics and I will in fact use a version of the framework of inquisitive semantics in this
book. Nevertheless, the perspective taken is entirely different as compared to inquisitive semantics, for
instance, so called hybrids will play no inherent role in the version proposed in this book.
0.1. POTENTIAL QUESTIONS IN DISCOURSE 9
compositional framework (specifically to handle some issues raised by indefinites but at

the same time providing a rich enough interface to discourse structure) which ultimately
can be extended to a semantics of questions and focus as well. This then ultimately
leads to a general perspective on meaning in communication and composition.
In view of this, this book is unusual because it is about very many things. It discusses
many topics which are more or less directly related to the main idea. Thereby, the
main aim is always to show that using the notion of potential questions represents
progress in the respective fields of research. But at the same time, in order to clarify
the problems and in order to solve only indirectly related problems that have been
observed in the analysis of the respective empirical phenomena, this book will quite
often depart from the discussion of potential questions. One of the drawbacks of this
procedure is that some of the phenomena discussed will not be discussed at the level of
detail that they deserve. In the rest of this introduction, I will give some more details
about the phenomena to be discussed and the structure of this book.
0.1 Potential questions in discourse
Consider one of the classic papers in formal pragmatics: Roberts (1996). In her view,
rational discourse is a rigorous question-answering strategy. She assumes that for any
discourse there is a starting question which specifies the information requirement which
the interaction is meant to resolve. This is the reason why the interaction takes place
at all. Any question which addresses a more constrained information requirement is a
licit discourse move, because one can rationally assume that answering ‘smaller’/‘easier’
questions (sub-questions) is a rational strategy for ultimately answering the main start-
ing question. So, for instance, if the starting question is (5-a), one is allowed to raise
the question (5-b) because a full answer to (5-b) contributes to the full answer of the
big question (5-a) and is, at the same time, simpler, i.e. it is a sub-question thereof.
Crucially, once the sub-question is raised, this will become the question which may or
may not license further sub-questions. So, after raising (5-b), the question (5-c) is licit,
because, again, it is a sub-question of (5-b).
(5) a. Who introduced whom to whom at the party?

b. Who introduced John to whom at the party?
c. Who introduced John to Jane at the party?
One essential difference between (5-a) and (5-b) is that as long as (5-b) has not yet been
raised, (6) would be a licit question, but once (5-b) has been raised, (6) is no longer
licit until (5-b) is answered. This is because a full answer to (6) does not contribute to
answering (5-b).
(6) Who introduced Jack to whom at the party?
Under this view, discourse starts with some question which constitutes the aim of the
interaction: people start communicating because they want to achieve agreement on
some issue. Discourse then goes on until the question is answered to the maximal
degree which can be reached by the interlocutors. The moves are all directly justified
from this setup: raising any question means breaking up a larger (and harder) question
into sub-questions, which is repeated until success or failure. Assertions are used to
address whichever question is currently under discussion. If the aim of the interaction
can be achieved, this strategy will potentially lead to success.
There is a question whether a serious theory of strategic inquiry in discourse should be

limited to simply asking sub-questions of some question or whether there should be more
complex strategies of inquiry e.g. including the exploration of various hypotheses about
what could be an answer and dependencies between the answers to various questions,
as partly studied in erotetic logics, e.g. Wisniewski (2010). Conisder the example in
(7). Here, any serious theory of questions in discourse should predict that the next
question is (8). However, (8) is not a sub-question of the starting question.
(7) A: Is Peter coming to the party?

B: If Mary comes, he comes as well.
(8) Is Mary coming to the party?
The conclusion is that sub-questions will be part of a theory of rational discourse,

but they will not suffice to cover the full range of phenomena which would qualify as
‘strategic inquiry’. Let us assume, nevertheless, that the empirical domain of inves-
tigation is limited to the kind of discourse tasks in which we will need nothing more
then sub-questions and answers. Such discourse involves real exchange of information,
i.e. discourse in which the aim is not to find out together something which none of the
interlocutors knew, but rather to share already existing knowledge.
With this restriction, it should be beyond doubt that discourse can be the way required
by the theory sketched above. There is human interaction which is strictly oriented at
resolving a question purely by exchanging information between interlocutors: i.e. the
task is to agree on a commonly acceptable answer to the question. If in such a scenario
there is immense time pressure, we will expect that discourse will be strategic in the
sense of Roberts (1996), i.e. only sub-questions will be asked. So, imagine a business
meeting at the headquarters of a company in which the CEO wants to find out the
answer to the question in (9) under the assumption that the other participants are well
informed, hence the issue is just to communicate the information.
(9) Why did a pipeline explode?

If we assume that there are exactly five minutes in which a complete answer to (9)
must be given, we may guess that the arising dialogue will be (under the assumption
that all interlocutors are fairly cooperative and rational beings) very much in the spirit
of the above. Interlocutors will raise sub-questions, will answer them, they proceed to
the next sub-question etc. until the main question is answered to the full satisfaction
of the CEO. But just imagine the very same meeting with (9) as a main question under
discussion without time pressure. The arising discourse will most likely be different:
each interlocutor will be concerned with impressing the CEO or his colleagues, showing
off, establishing hierarchy and the like. Very often, they will give information that is
totally orthogonal to the topic of discussion, just to show how clever or well-informed
they are. Similarly, they might ask unnecessary questions just in order to make their
interlocutors feel better or more insecure, etc.
Certainly, a theory of discourse may attempt to capture all of the acceptable pieces
of behaviour humans may exhibit in discourse and even come up with some measure
of coherence or rhetorical quality, e.g. Mann and Thompson (1988) or Asher and
Lascarides (2003). But, in this book, I will not be interested in that. I will only
consider one particular way in which we can extend the notion of strategic discourse
sketched above. In real discourse many moves are made which appear to be unexpected
under a purely strategic perspective. These moves can, in part, be handled by saying
that discourse is only loosely strategic in the sense that in the process of interaction
special ‘events’ may occur which trigger reaction fully independent of the strategic
enterprise the interlocutors may be involved in at the given discourse state. Crucially,
the reaction to such events, though non-strategic, is perfectly rational as compared to
other human activities.
Consider an example completely independent of discourse or language. Jenkins, a

veteran soldier, is working as a courier in a small town. He receives the task to bring
a bag full of nails to a industrial production site located a few miles outside the town.
Jenkins finds a sensible strategy: take the bag, go to the industrial production site on
the shortest way through the woods and deliver the bag. On the way, Jenkins sees a
woman harassed by some villains. Jenkins attacks the villains and saves the woman.
However, in the struggle, he loses the bag, which is taken by a fleeing villain. Returning
to the town, Jenkins is celebrated for his bravery even though he failed on his task.
The point of interest in this example is that according to his rational strategic plan,
Jenkins should not have taken any further step, when he noticed the woman and the
villains. So, what Jenkins did, was not strategic. But at the same time, the acting of
Jenkins should not be judged irrational.2
2
We can slightly change the scenario: assume that in the bag, instead of nails, there is some high
risk material of utmost importance. Now, if Jenkins looses this bag, he will most likely be prosecuted
whether or not he has saved the woman. And finally, even assuming that Jenkins does not loose the
bag, he still may be prosecuted if he arrives too late at his destination if there was a very important
time limit.
In this book I propose to think of discourse in a very similar way: the rationale of
discourse moves may either be strategic in the sense that they contribute to finding
the answer to some question which can be seen the momentary discourse goal, or
some reaction to a new situation in discourse which can be thought of in terms of a
temporary question. While for the story above the essential character trait that lead to
non strategic behaviour was bravery, for discourse curiosity will suffice. Put differently,
one can think of discourse as an act of balance between curiosity and strategy. Under
this view, it is precisely because both curiosity and strategy are naturally connected to
questions that discourse is about raising and answering questions.3
With this background, consider (10). This example appears perfectly natural but a
theory like Roberts (1996) has no particularly intuitive take on such examples. This
is because the interlocutors do not seem to act in a particularly strategic way in this
little dialogue: at the start, the question under discussion is raised by interlocutor A:
Who saw Mary in the park? The question is answered at the second discourse turn
by B. However, despite the rational strategy to return to the previous question under
discussion, the discourse participant C starts speaking about John, simply because has
not talked about John for a long time and feels a need for information exchange. The
interlocutors later return to the previous main question under discussion. The whole
discussion about John is totally unrelated to the discourse topic.
(10) A: Who saw Mary in the park?

B: John saw her.
C: Oh, John, I haven’t seen him for ages. Is he alright?
B: Sure, he has a daughter called Jessica. She was born last month.
A: Oh, really, Ann must be so happy.
C: Who is Ann?
A: His wife.
C: Ok, I didn’t know he was even married. But, back to the question, where
Mary has been yesterday. So, she was in the park, but was she also at the
museum?
In this example, C asks a question which is unrelated to the question under discussion.
He failed to act strategically both in relation to the general discourse goal and concern-
ing any other private goals he may have. Finding out something about John may not
have ever before been part of the goals C had. But that does not mean that C acts
irrationally. In most communicative setups, interlocutors will feel comfortable with
a similar development. In fact, we have often no real choice to assuming that texts
3
The importance of the main question and the time limit also play a role: in some discourses,
curiosity is an important principle, in others, strategy seems much more important. We can think
of this as a parameter of some discourse. Some discourse type allow deviation from the main line of
strategic inquiry, others do not.
are following such a pattern: when a new piece of information enters the discourse,
interlocutors may get interested in particular aspects of that piece of information and
they may and answer questions unrelated (or just loosely related) to the previous topic.
Interestingly, in answering such side-questions, they may proceed strategically.
One second example may help strengthen the intuition that such deviation from the
main strategic line of discourse development is not something ad hoc which one should
want to treat as an exception or violation. Imagine reading a novel in which the main
character gets into trouble in an expensive night-club financed by drug dealers. He is
saved by a police officer, who was sitting next to him drinking a whisky. Now, it is a
decent guess that in the next few lines we will find out why the police officer was in
that night-club, even though, potentially, neither the police officer, nor the night-club,
nor the reasons he was there may play any further role in the novel. The explanation
is that the author may assume that the reader is curious whether the police officer was
on a mission or simply having fun that night. In fact, quite generally in narratives, lots
of background information that is ultimately irrelevant is given for precisely the same
reason.
Consider, as a final example the beginning of Chapter 7 of the first part of Tolstoy’s
Anna Karennina:
On arriving in Moscow by a morning train, Levin had put up at the house of

his elder half-brother, Koznishev. After changing his clothes he went down
to his brother’s study, intending to talk to him at once about the object
of his visit, and to ask his advice; but his brother was not alone. With
him there was a well-known professor of philosophy, who had come from
Harkov expressly to clear up a difference that had arisen between them on
a very important philosophical question. The professor was carrying on a
hot crusade against materialists.
... Translated by Constance Garnett
The point of interest in this quote is that from the context (in fact, even from the little
quote) it is totally clear that the ‘real’ question under discussion is what Levin did
and wanted discuss with his half-brother. Nevertheless, once the piece of information
is introduced into the discourse that there was a professor of philosophy in the room,
the narration deviates from the main line and the reader witnesses an entire chapter
about materialism. This is not a peculiar or surprising thing in a narration. Literary
narration seems to be a prototypical example for the sort of text in which there is no
time pressure and the speaker or writer may freely deviate from the main line of inquiry
to discuss whatever topic comes up on the way.
We will capture this general pattern by assuming that whenever a discourse move is
made, regardless of whether this is asking or answering a question, new questions may
arise in discourse, which may or may not be related to the strategy of inquiry in the
discourse. The natural question then is what kind of questions may arise in discourse
given a particular state and what kind of questions cannot arise, or even what kind
of questions are more likely to arise than others. I will only marginally discuss this
question. The reason is that I do not believe that a full theory (pace Asher and
Lascarides 2003 and subsequent work in SDRT) of what can happen in discourse can
be given and even if it could be given it was not one of the central linguistic tasks. It
is not part of the aims of this book to predict what interlocutors will say in discourse.
It is not even part of my aims to develop a theory which can decide whether what
people say is coherent or not. Instead, my aim is to come up with a theory, in which a
valid interpretation of what is said can be formulated. Thereby, a valid interpretation
makes explicit what discourse moves license which discourse moves in what way, hence
providing answer to questions such as: what question y is answered by utterance x,
why is the question y present in the discourse.
I will propose a fairly liberal but content-driven limitation of non-strategic moves in

discourse. In particular: if a piece of new information satisfies the presuppositions of
some question, it turns this question into a potential question. A potential question
licensed by a discourse move is a question that can be raised in discourse as a reaction
to that discourse move – independently of the strategic component. This will not mean
that raising potential questions will always lead to a coherent discourse and it will also
not mean that only potential questions can be raised (in addition to strategically valid
moves).
If we add potential questions to a theory of strategic discourse as suggested in Roberts

(1996), we get a rough discourse model which allows to analyse fairly large amounts
of texts in terms of finding a licensor for each discourse move, i.e. for any question
we can say why it arises and for any assertion we can say which question it answers.
Such an analysis, though it lacks enough constraints to actually measure coherence or
predict anything about discourse, is nevertheless useful in understanding the structure
of texts and discourse in general and allows fairly intuitive annotation, hence turning
question-based models roughly comparable to rhetorical relation based models.
0.2 Potential questions in grammar
From a linguistic perspective, one of the main requirements for a discourse model is
that it should serve as a powerful interface to grammar. This expectation is natural
because one can expect natural language to be highly specialised for use in discourse. A
question-based discourse model as developed in Roberts (1996) provides a natural and
intuitive theory of information structure. The idea is that prosodic focus signals in some
way which question is addressed by a particular utterance. Given that many questions
postulated by the theory are only implicit, the task of indicating what question one is
answering by each utterance, or at least restricting the number of questions one might
be answering by each utterance, seems important enough to explain the omnipresence
0.2. POTENTIAL QUESTIONS IN GRAMMAR 15
of information structural features in grammar. One of the major motivations for adding
potential questions to the discourse model is that potential questions are not only useful
to give an empirically more adequate model for discourse development but also because
grammar of natural language interacts with potential questions. Put differently, if
grammar incorporates an interface to potential questions then one has actually no
choice but integrating them into the discourse model. So even if the model arising is
still incomplete, it qualifies as a useful and necessary step in the research of discourse
structure. I will not claim that in the analysis of the phenomena discussed here this
discourse model is the only option (in fact there does not seem to be any way to prove
such claims); it will suffice to say that it is a reasonable option.
0.2.1 Indefinites and potential questions
Consider example (11). Here, the question in (11-b) appears perfectly natural because
it is a potential question that is somehow triggered by the utterance in (11-a). If
someone informs us that he used to do something, we might ask if he stopped doing it,
partly because this is a typical implicature associated with generic constructions in the
past. This question is predictable by a principle saying: Double check on implicatures!
However, B could have also asked (11-c), which seems just as natural, but does not
seem predictable, at least not as far as formal linguistic theory is concerned.
(11) a. A: I used to cheat on my wife when I was younger.

b. B: Did you stop cheating on your wife?
c. B: Did she ever find out?
As a matter of fact, in most cases, potential questions which are going to be actually
raised in discourse are hard to predict as they arise due to psychological associations,
priming, cultural habits and the like. So, while in one culture, if a speaker A says that
he has killed a bear, his interlocutor might go on asking whether A has been boasting
about that glorious, heroic act of hunting, in some other culture, an interlocutor might
ask whether A was ashamed of his terrible, cruel-hearted act.
Nevertheless, there are some expressions which can be said to trigger potential ques-
tions compositionally. I call such questions that are compositionally triggered by an
expression primary potential questions. In the examples below, the primary potential
question always comes first and it is followed by non-compositionally derivable potential
questions.
(12) Someone came in.

a. Who came in?
b. Why did he come in?
c. How do you know?
(13) Peter or Mary came in.

a. Who came in, Peter or Mary?
b. Did they come in at the same time?
c. Did they use the door or the window?
(14) A man sleeps.

a. Which man sleeps?
b. Why does he sleep?
c. Does he snore?
As shown in the examples, indefinite noun phrases or pronouns and disjunction give
rise to primary potential questions. While I will elaborate on this claim in much
more detail in the book, it may suffice to remember that in many languages indefinite
determiners and disjunction markers are morphologically related to question words or
question morphemes.
One can even go one step further and claim that indefinite determiners conventionally
target these primary potential questions and that their meaning contribution is best
understood in relation to those questions. Consider a further example:
(15) A certain man came in.

a. Which man came in?
b. The answer to question (15-a) is relevant in the discourse.
In the example, the sentence (15) triggers the potential question in (15-a), and one fairly
intuitive way to understand the contribution of a certain is to explicate its meaning as
a comment on this question, roughly paraphrased in (15-b). I will show at some length
that thinking of indefinite determiners along these lines has important advantages as
compared to other approaches.
There is a lot more to indefiniteness than triggering of potential questions and encoding
comments on potential answers to those questions. In this book, I will explore at some
length the relationship between the core function of indefinites, i.e. to introduce new
discourse referents, and the fact that they conventionally give rise to primary poten-
tial questions. I will argue that triggering of potential questions imposes pragmatic
pressure on what may become conventional as a meaning contribution for an indefinite
determiner.
Moreover, I will develop a compositional system in which an analysis along these lines is
feasible on technical grounds. Some of the problems that need to be solved include the
modelling of the scope properties of indefinites and the modelling of non-local relations
between questions and indefinite determiners.
0.2. POTENTIAL QUESTIONS IN GRAMMAR 17
0.2.2 Specification and appositions
The kind of potential questions raised by indefinites are not only targeted by indefinite
determiners themselves, as in (15), but also by specificational constructions (often
headed by the particle namely). Consider (16):
(16) A certain man came in. Namely John.
I argue that in this example namely conventionally attaches to the most salient (often
primary) potential question triggered by some utterance, and gives a term answer to
it. So, the way to think about the example is given in (17).
(17) A certain man came in. Namely John.

a. Q: Which man came in?
A: John.
One fairly strong argument for such an analysis is the fact that the answers to the
specificational questions given in specificational constructions come as term answers.
It is well known, however, that one can give term answers only to explicit questions.
So, if this is still possible in specificational constructions, it follows that these potential
questions are activated in the local environment of specification. Further arguments
supporting the analysis include the observation that there is more to specification than
being a simple complement to indefiniteness. One can specify definites, one can specify
unarticulated constituents, and many other aspects of a sentence, as shown in the
examples below:
(18) a. My best friend came in. Namely Mary.

b. Peter sleeps – in the kitchen.
c. Mary loves John – ever since she met him.
Moreover, in German, the specificational particle nämlich, in many respects equivalent

to English namely, also specifies the answer to How come? -questions. An example is
given in (19):
(19) Peter liebt Maria, sie ist nämlich schön.

Peter loves Mary she is namely pretty
‘Peter loves Mary, for she is pretty.’
a. Q: How come, Peter loves Mary?
A: She is pretty.
I will show that such an explanation-question is also distinguished in a grammatically

reflected way. What is more important, however, is that if it were not for questions,
deriving the common semantic core of explanation and specification would appear very
hard.
In that sense, specificational constructions are not only another example for grammat-
ically relevant primary potential questions, but they also provide direct evidence that
grammar also ‘cares’ for further types of potential questions. Grammaticalisation of
potential questions goes beyond primary potential questions.
0.2.3 Appositives and non-restrictive material
Another phenomenon which is syntactically closely related to the case of specification

is the more general problem of appositives and non-restrictive material. I will suggest
in this book that one very natural way to think about such material is to regard it as
an answer to potential questions raised by the host utterance. Consider, for instance,
(20). In this sentence, one can think of the appositive the idiot as a term answer to
some question that is triggered by the proposition that John saw that Peter had a
pretty girlfriend.
(20) John saw that Peter, the idiot, had a pretty girlfriend.
The main difference to the case of specification is that appositives do not conventionally
encode a specific kind of question to which they convey the answer. While specifica-
tional questions are restricted to wh-questions which specify some missing oder under-
specified aspect of the host utterance, this does not seem to be true for appositives. So,
it would be odd to say that the idiot is in some sense an answer to the question Who
is Peter?.
I will suggest, instead, that appositives and quite generally non-restrictive modification
including non-restrictive relative clauses are a general means by which a speaker can
react to potential questions of all kinds which are triggered by the respective host
utterance. The essential property of such grammatical structures is that they are not
restricted to one particular kind of question, but instead it is by virtue of the context
that the hearer can reconstruct the question they answer.
Moreover, it seems to be part of the communicative advantage of such constructions

that the hearer may not be able to reconstruct the question with certainty. Consider
an example, adapted from Sæbø (2010). Here, there are several ways to interpret
the comment that Mary is a virgin. One is that it answers the question why John is
surprised that Mary is pregnant, and another one is that it answers the question what
do we know about Mary, which may be relevant for the fact that John is surprised that
Mary is pregnant.
0.3. THE STRUCTURE OF THIS BOOK 19
(21) John is surprised, that Mary, a virgin, is pregnant.
Because the hearer may not be able to reconstruct with certainty the precise relation
between the content of the host sentence and the comment encoded in the appositive or
non-restrictive relative clause, it seems that they allow the speaker to introduce material
into the discourse which has an often unclear status. Appositives are an excellent means
to introduce suggestive facts which may explain but may also be fairly independent of
the fact described in the host utterance. The speaker is only committed to the truth
of appositions and to the existence of some general connection between the apposition
and the host utterance.
Moreover, most generally, appositives will contain so called not at issue material. The
peculiarity of such material in the discourse is that it is – on the one hand – independent
of the answer to the question under discussion (which immediately follows from this
analysis), but – on the other hand – it is not meant to raise any further potential
questions. Consider the contrast between (20) and (22). In (22), there is an explicit
marking that the information that Peter is an idiot is independent of the main line of
strategic inquiry.
(22) John saw that Peter had a pretty girlfriend. By the way, Peter is an idiot.
One can analyse the comment as an answer to some potential question triggered by the
first sentence, just like the case of appositions. In the sense that the comment does not
target the question under discussion that would naturally explain why the first sentence
has been used, the comment is not at issue, just like the appositive in (20). The main
difference is, however, that while one can most naturally follow up by asking (23) after
(22), there is an intuition that if one asks (23) after (20), he is in a way acting against
the will of the speaker, i.e. challenging him in a particular way.
(23) Why is Peter an idiot?
0.3 The structure of this book
The primary aim of the book is to provide evidence for the usefulness of potential
questions in linguistic theory. Thereby, I will strongly focus on the discourse-grammar
interface. This leads to the following argumentation structure.
(24) a. Settle what potential questions are in a formally precise way.

b. Show that any potential question licensed by an assertion can be targeted
in a grammaticalised way by appositives.
c. Show that a particular class of potential questions licensed by an assertion,

specificational questions, are conventionally associated with a particular
class of appositives, specificational constructions.
d. Show that for an even more constrained class of potential questions licensed
by an assertion, there are much more local grammatical phenomena which
build on them. This will become obvious in the study of indefinites.
e. Show that, once we use the notion of potential questions, we can make
progress in turning the model proposed in Roberts (1996) into a tool for
the analysis of texts.
This argumentation is only partly reflected in the structure of this book. There are two
main reasons why the book deviates from this argumentation structure in many ways.
Firstly, a lot of background will be needed. While I will be using large amounts of work
in the literature as a background, I will be still forced to spell out the details of many
of those theories, partly because we need slightly different, specific implementations
in order to interface with other theories we will be using, partly because we will need
some modifications to handle inherent problems (mostly known in the literature) which
may be in fact orthogonal to the topic of this book but which might be considered as
potential problems by readers. Secondly, the decisions made in the book will add up
to a more general picture of the consequences on the relationship between meaning
and grammar on the one hand and meaning and discourse on the other hand. I do
not believe that these consequences are necessary, in fact, there may be other ways to
implement the same ideas that I argue for in this book. Therefore the more general
consequences are not the main message of the book. Nevertheless, they are interesting
enough to be worth discussing.
We will start by discussing what questions are and what counts as an answer to a ques-
tion. In particular, we will introduce the general framework of inquisitive semantics, we
will define questions as semantic objects, we will settle what kinds of questions there
are, what counts as an answer to what kind of a question, what kind of answers there
are. But in addition, we will also discuss how we can derive questions from natural
language expressions, i.e. the details of a compositional semantics for questions (and
answers).
In the second chapter, we will turn to the notion of question-answer congruence. In

particular, we will discuss some empirical data motivating the need for a congruence
rule, we will develop a theory of focus and implement the rules of congruence for
questions and foci in a formally precise way, mainly following Rooth (1992).
In these two chapters, not very much is really new on the conceptual side, nevertheless,
there are some serious issues that will be discussed in some detail. So, for instance,
I will argue for a version of inquisitive semantics, in which there is no more recourse
to classical propositions (e.g. as an information state) and which conceptualises the
0.3. THE STRUCTURE OF THIS BOOK 21
role played by hybrids in communication totally differently as compared to the classical

papers; so while in the classical papers on inquisitive semantics it is often claimed that
hybrids answer questions and raise questions at the same time, I will argue that they are
simply no valid discourse moves. Similarly, I will argue that congruence between ques-
tions and answers does not trivially follow from theories such as Alternative Semantics,
once we assume that so called exhaustive questions are a natural class of questions, and
I will propose a solution to this problem. Also, I will argue that a notion of common
ground is essential for question-answer congruence in purely technical terms, an aspect
that has been neglected by virtually all theories of focus and questions.
After having clarified these basic notions, I will turn to potential questions proper. I
will reconstruct and extend parts of the arguments of Craige Roberts that lead to a
notion of strategic discourse. In particular, I will discuss the notion of sub-questions
as discourse moves licensed by already established questions. Then I will give some
arguments showing that we need a looser notion of strategic discourse, which also
allows the activation of potential questions as licit discourse moves. Once a simplistic
but formally precise discourse model is developed, I turn to showing that some of the
puzzles that have turned up already in the discussion of the question-answer congruence
rule can easily be solved once we have a discourse model with potential questions. For
instance, I will show how we can account for unexpected accents like in the case of the
famous Schmerling examples or how we can handle over-answers in this framework.
Then, having the basic notions as a background, the next three chapters discuss three
instances of grammar-discourse interface. First I discuss appositives. I will show how
we can analyse appositives as answers to implicit potential questions and what conse-
quences such an analytical decision has. Second, I discuss specificational constructions.
Being a more constrained class of appositives, the analysis will get much more detailed
here, and we will be able to make much more exact predictions. Finally, I will turn to
indefinites, which will be a long and worrisome journey: I will not only show that using
potential questions helps understand the meaning contribution of indefinite determin-
ers. I will also show that the compositional system which provides a decent interface to
potential questions, can also solve a long standing puzzle about the scope of infinities.
The compositional system developed for indefinites will totally ignore all the assump-
tions we have made about questions and focus in grammar. The reason is that the
new compositional system is different, so whatever we have done in the semantics of
questions and focus in the first chapter and in the second chapter will not be possible
in the same way in the new system. Also, the interface of indefinites to inquisitive
semantics will be held very minimal. Part of the reason for doing this is that the
analysis of indefinites is in many respects independent in formal respect from the other
assumptions of the book and I wished to keep that chapter as autarch as possible such
that readers only interested in what I have to say about indefinites can skip the rest of
the book.
Nevertheless, in the following chapter, I show that the same compositional system will
deliver a focus semantics and a question semantics that is fully compatible with our
assumptions without postulating any additional level of meaning, as generally done
in alternative semantics. Moreover, the arising system can naturally solve a classical
problem of alternative semantics, concerning the empirical issue of over-focusing, but
which I will claim to be conceptually much deeper. I will then consider the general
picture of meaning at the interface between grammar and discourse. While I will
be able to show in what direction such an perspective may lead, I will leave many
open ends in this domain. One particular point of interest in this chapter is that
in translating alternative semantics to the new framework some inherent issues with
alternative semantics will show up which have not been noticed and discussed before.
Finally, I discuss the formal and conceptual tenets of a discourse model which will
allow to analyse a short example of a narrative text using the basic notions developed
before. In particular, I will develop some guidelines for annotating texts using potential
questions as an important tool. In fact, I will conjecture that a question-based theory of
discourse of the kind proposed here is superior to theories based on rhetorical relations
because it is more intuitive, hence it should allow superior and more detailed annotation
by human annotators. On the other hand, the theory – as it stands – is inferior to
theories based on grammatical relations if we consider computational annotation: for
those purposes this theory is entirely inadequate for the moment.
The book ends with some notes on open ends and perspectives for further research.
Chapter 1
Questions and Answers
A theory of discourse based on questions requires some assumptions about questions.

Generally, there are two main aspects of a discussion about questions: what are ques-
tions from a logical perspective and how are questions derived (compositionally) from
a linguistic expression. While there are some papers, most notably Groenendijk and
Stokhof (1984), that focus on both of these aspects, most generally only one of these
perspectives is considered in the literature.
In what follows, we will attempt to provide a discussion of questions that combines both
perspectives. In particular, we will attempt to provide a perspective on questions that
is strongly indebted to inquisitive semantics, cf. Groenendijk and Roelofsen (2009),
Ciardelli (2009). Thereby, will be mainly following Groenendijk (2011), Roelofsen
(2011) and Roelofsen (2013a). My definitions will be, however, in some of the cases,
somewhat different. In fact, the differences are not so big when it comes to the formal
details as they are when it comes to the overall conceptual architecture. So, while
Groenendijk and Roelofsen (2009); Ciardelli et al. (2009) are very much interested
in developing something like an inquisitive pragmatics in which so called hybrids, i.e.
expressions which share features of questions and assertions, play an important role,
I will totally neglect hybrids here. In fact, I will claim that hybrids play no role
whatsoever in discourse. Now, given this huge difference, one may question whether
what I do in the following still qualifies as inquisitive semantics. I will call it that
way, but I do wish to stress right from the start that this may be a controversial
terminological decision.
Then, one may ask, why use inquisitive semantics at all instead of some older, more
established system. The reason for me to choose this path is that inquisitive semantics
(in fact, different versions of it) is a well-studied logical system and, this way, most
of the foundational issues can be avoided. Using inquisitive semantics turns out to be
not only easy and intuitive but also to open new and elegant ways to understand the
relation between semantic objects of different kinds. Moreover, inquisitive semantics
will ultimately deliver a fairly simple notion of discourse context which handles ques-
23
24 CHAPTER 1. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
tions and assertions as receiving states in a uniform way. Apart from that, there is an
interesting architecture of meaning in inquisitive semantics, which I explore in the first
section of this chapter. Finally, there are some issues in which inquisitive semantics
can actually help, i.e. to spell out the meaning of conditional questions, which pose
problems in partition semantics, as argued in Groenendijk (2011). However, in this
book, I will ignore conditionals altogether.
I will limit myself to a basic propositional version of the logical language known as
InqB . This will fully suffice to capture the important intuitions. There are some puzzles
concerning first order cases, cf. Ciardelli (2009), but for discussing such problems, this
book is not the right place.
1.1 The architecture of meanings and terminology
Before starting the discussion, there is an important piece of terminology that needs to
be clarified. We must have a clear distinction between meanings (i.e. semantic objects)
and linguistic expressions (i.e. linguistic objects, strings). For instance, one may rea-
sonably say that the meaning of interrogatives are questions. Hence, a question is not a
linguistic expression; it is rather the meaning of a linguistic expression. In particular, as
objects of thought, questions are independent of their linguistic realisation. Similarly,
we may call the meaning of declaratives classical propositions (sets of possible worlds),
or to make their discourse function more transparent, assertions.
This terminology is certainly not the only possible one. For instance, Stenius (1967)
argues that one must clearly distinguish between semantic objects and communicative
acts. According to this view, also defended in Krifka (2011a), a semantic object like
a proposition must first be processed by some speech act operator in order to actually
become an assertion. Questions, then, are simply ambiguous:
The semantics of questions deals with the interrogative sentence radicals

that occur in root questions or as dependent clauses; the pragmatics of
questions is concerned with the various roles that questions serve in com-
munication.
... (Krifka, 2011a)
I believe that, in essence, I agree with Krifka. However, I will use the term semantic
object in a somewhat different way. In my view, the notion of a proposition in inquisitive
semantics (which can either be a question or an assertion) is exactly what we should
call a speech act. The pure denotation of interrogatives or declaratives will also be
a semantic object, but it will be a different kind of semantic object, crucially, no
proposition at all. One may think of speech act operators as the kind of thing which
creates a proposition out of some radical, non-proposition-type semantic object.
What really matters is that speech acts are the sort of thing that modify the discourse.
1.1. THE ARCHITECTURE OF MEANINGS AND TERMINOLOGY 25
In the inquisitive semantics style perspective taken in this book, assertions and ques-
tions are the kind of thing that modify the discourse. In fact, both are propositions.
Then, speech acts are propositions. Since propositions are (and should be) semantic
objects, speech acts can be viewed as semantic objects.
One could say that speech acts are fundamentally different as compared to proposi-
tions. But I believe that the only thing we gain by doing so, are fuzzy objects in the
theory, because if speech acts are not propositions, they will be something else. Our
understanding of those different kinds of objects is worse than our understanding of
propositions.1 Inquisitive semantics has the particular advantage to clearly distinguish
between propositions and classical propositions: arguably, the classical propositions are
something Stenius (1967) would call semantic objects, the new notion of a proposition is
something which enables us to have a logical perspective on discourse. We will discuss
these notions in what follows.
The conclusion that questions and assertions are semantic objects should be kept. How-
ever, it is not entirely correct that interrogatives and declaratives denote questions and
assertions respectively. They denote something which may be turned into a question
or an assertion easily. This leads to the architecture sketched in Figure 1.12
Semantic objects
Ling. expression Denotations Propositions
interpretation
‘Peter sleeps” {λw.sleep P w} ℘({w|sleep P w})
Figure 1.1: Semantic Objects and Linguistic Objects
In the next part of this chapter, we we will not be concerned with linguistic objects at
all. While I will give several natural language examples which illustrate some intuitions,
1
I do not claim that a theory of discourse entirely based on speech acts, as e.g. attempted in Krifka
(2011b) is not possible. I do claim, however, that for the moment inquisitive semantics is a more natural
choice because the objects it operates with are more intuitive and more familiar. Notice, however,
that I will conclude in chapter 7 that for the compositional analysis of the meaning of interrogatives,
Structured Meanings may be superior to alternative semantics, a framework, inherently related to
inquisitive semantics. This is, however, no contradiction.
2
The formulae will be introduced later.
the next part of this chapter is mainly about logico-semantics, i.e. we are interested
here in the relation between questions and assertions. In the final part of this chapter
we will turn to the linguistic realisation of these semantic objects. Then, I will discuss
how we can derive questions from interrogatives in a compositional way.
When discussing about semantic objects, I will – as customary in inquisitive semantics –

adopt a formal language, in which propositions are expressed by propositional variables.
Now, questions and assertions will be the formal expressions of this language. These
expressions have meanings which will generally be given in terms of set theory and
possible worlds. I will not endeavour to set up a semantic framework which translates
the meaning of natural language expressions into the formal language LInq of some
version of inquisitive semantics. Instead, I will adopt a one-dimensional framework
in which we explicate the meaning of natural language expressions in the same way
in which we talk about the meaning of formal expressions. So, we will say that an
interrogative has a question as its meaning if its denotation is the same as the denotation
of a question in the formal language we use. Loosely speaking, we may also say that
an expression of natural language which is interpreted as a question is a question.
Nevertheless, this is just loose talk, and should not lead to confusions.
1.2 Questions in inquisitive semantics
In the classical view, we equate the meaning of declaratives with their truth conditions;
meanings are propositions. One way to model propositions is in terms of possible worlds.
We then say that the meaning of a declarative is a function from possible worlds to truth
values, such that for worlds in which the declarative holds true this function returns the
truth value true and for worlds in which the declarative is false the function returns the
truth value false. Such a function is the characteristic function of the set of worlds in
which the declarative holds true, therefore we can equate the meaning of a declarative
with that set of worlds. Under such a perspective, (1) is an example of a proposition:
(1) JAlbert is Swiss chocolate designer.K {w1 , w2 , w17 , w112 }
This notion of meaning turns out to be useful to model the function of language in com-
munication. Assume that if two individuals communicate, there is a common ground
knowledge over which they have mutually agreed (Stalnaker 2002). We can model this
knowledge as an information state, called the context set, such that all the propositions
both interlocutors are committed to in the discourse hold true in each world of the con-
text set. Simply: the context set is the set theoretic intersection of all propositions in
the common ground. This is exemplified in (2), in which there are two propositions
in the common ground and the context set is the union of these propositions. In this
example, all the other possible worlds, have been excluded, hence the interlocutors do
1.2. QUESTIONS IN INQUISITIVE SEMANTICS 27
not know whether the actual world is w1 or w112 .
(2) Common ground: {{w1 , w2 , w17 , w112 }, {w1 , w112 , w319 }}

Context set: {w1 , w112 }
Now, if a declarative is asserted, the proposition it denotes can be added to the common
ground yielding a new context set, which is gained by the set theoretic intersection of the
old context set with this new proposition. So, generally, we can think of communication
as narrowing of a set of possible worlds which are still compatible with the information
interlocutors have agreed upon. This is schematically exemplified in figure 1.2.
old context set new context set asserted proposition
Figure 1.2: Context set and assertions
But what is the meaning of interrogatives? Certainly, what ultimately makes them play
a role in discourse are questions, which are reasonably assumed to be the denotations of
interrogatives (modulo some speech act operator as discussed in the previous section).
But under this perspective, it is not trivial to say, what questions should be, and how
they should be modelled. While there are several ways to implement this idea techni-
cally, which have been explored in a number of various frameworks such as Structured
Meanings (von Stechow and Zimmermann 1984, Ginzburg 1992 Krifka 2001), alterna-
tive semantics (Hamblin 1973,Karttunen 1977), partition semantics (Groenendijk and
Stokhof, 1984) or dynamic interrogation (Groenendijk, 1999), the basic intuition seems
to be the same: a question if a function from its potential answers to a truth value.3
The following quote is one very clear way of making the same point:
This time the conclusion ought to be that one knows the meaning of an
interrogative sentence if one knows, given the circumstances, what counts
as a true answer to that question. Since, however, this ought to be perfectly
general, that is, since one should be supposed to know what would be a
true answer in all possible circumstances, this means that the meaning of
3
Arguably, in Structured Meanings approaches, this is a little bit different as compared to alternative
semantics: alternative semantics can be seen as a characteristic function of all answers, whereas in
Structured Meanings the possible answers are the entire domain of a question-function.
questions really resides in its answerhood conditions. (Dekker et al., 2007)
One essential debate concerns the nature of answers to questions, i.e. given some
question, what counts as an answer to it? For example, if one accepts term answers
to wh-questions as valid full-fledged answers, it is reasonable to assume that questions
are incomplete propositions, and if one assumes that answers to questions are complete
propositions, it is reasonable to assume that questions are characteristic functions of sets
of answers (or simply sets of answers or even true answers, as is the case in Karttunen’s
system). Questions are a different type of semantic entity as compared to assertions
(or propositions), in each of these frameworks.
If we adopt an inquisitive perspective of meaning, we can unify the semantic type

of questions and assertions. What we need is to think of any kind of speech act as
a suggestion to update the common ground in some specific way. An assertion is a
suggestion to update with a proposition. A question, then, can be seen as a suggestion
to choose a proposition by which one can update the common ground, from the set
of possible answers to that question. Under this very small change of perspective, it
becomes obvious that an assertion is just a special case in which we can choose from
a set containing exactly one proposition, whereas a question provides several choices.
This is exemplified in 1.3
suggested update 2
new context set 2
old context set new context set 1 suggested update 1
new context set 3
suggested update 3
Figure 1.3: Context set and an invitation to choose an update from a set
We do not want to say that assertions are a special case of questions, because that
would be non-intuitive. Instead, we can re-define the notion of a proposition such that
both questions and assertions are just special cases of what a proposition is. Under
the view that questions are sets of classical propositions, i.e. sets of sets of worlds, we
can achieve this unification of types by lifting the types of assertions, formerly classical
propositions, to sets of classical propositions.
So, in the new inquisitive talk, a proposition is generally defined as a set of sets of worlds,
whereby questions and assertions will be differentiated by more meaningful notions but
not by type. So, in a classical setting we could say that p is a proposition if p is a set of
worlds. In an inquisitive setting, we could say that p is a proposition if p is a set of sets
of worlds. This is exemplified in figure 1.4. Notice, how, in inquisitive semantics, for
singletons (i.e. sets containing only one world) the only difference is a matter of type:
(a) and (b), but for non-singletons, there is no possibility of representation in terms of
classical propositions, as in (c).4
From now on, we use the term proposition to refer to the notion of propositions in
inquisitive semantics. Whenever we wish to speak of classical propositions, we make
that explicit. A proposition is a set of classical propositions.
w1 w2
w1 w2
w3 w4
w3 w4
(a) classical prop.: (b) classical prop.:
{w1 , w3 } 1 1 1 {w1 , w2 } 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 proposition: 1 1 1 1 1 proposition:
{{w1 , w3 }} {{w1 , w2 }}
w1 w2
w3 w4
(c) proposition:
{{w1 , w2 }, {w1 , w3 }}
Figure 1.4: Propositions and classical propositions
With this background, we can now turn to a more principled discussion, of what propo-
sitions are in this framework. I will start by introducing a fairly standard version of
inquisitive semantics based on the notion of support. While I will keep the intuitions
captured in this version, I will immediately switch to another, algebraic, version of
inquisitive semantics, which will turn out to be more useful for practical purposes.
4
Observe that one could come up with the following translation: {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 , w3 }}
{w1 , w2 , w3 }. Of course, there is something intuitively correct in this translation. But we loose informa-
tion, because we have many sets which would translate to {w1 , w2 , w3 }. Consider: {{w1 , w2 }, {w3 }}
{w1 , w2 , w3 } or {{w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }} {w1 , w2 , w3 }. A translation should be bijective.
1.2.1 Support based basic inquisitive semantics
A support-based definition of inquisitive semantics can be given following Groenendijk

(2011)5 :
(3) Support based Inquisitive Semantics

Let InqB be a propositional language with P the set of propositional letters and
ϕ, ψ ∈ InqB .
a. The set of suitable worlds for InqB , W is ℘(P)6
b. The set of suitable states for InqB , S is ℘(W)
c. s |= p iff p ∈ P, s ∈ S and ∀w ∈ s : p ∈ w
d. s |=⊥ iff s = ∅
e. s |= ϕ ∧ ψ iff s |= ϕ and s |= ψ
f. s |= ϕ ∨ ψ iff s |= ϕ or s |= ψ
g. s |= ϕ → ψ iff ∀s0 ⊆ s : if s0 |= ϕ then s0 |= ψ
h. s |= ¬ϕ iff s |= ϕ →⊥ negation
i. s |=!ϕ iff s |= ¬¬ϕ non-inquisitive closure
j. s |=?ϕ iff s |= ϕ ∨ ¬ϕ non-informative closure
Now, in order to define some useful notions, in inquisitive semantics, it is customary to

define the notion of informative content of a proposition as a classical proposition as
in (4):
(4) Informative content (classical version):

The informative content of ϕ, info(ϕ) = {v|v ∈ W and {v} |= ϕ}
I will, however, not use this notion in the upcoming definitions. The reason for this
is that this notion is extrinsic to inquisitive semantics. It suggests that in order to
explicate the function of a proposition in terms of information and update we need
some kind of recourse to classical propositions. Ultimately, I will rather suggest to
entirely give up the notion of classical propositions in the model of communication (as
a matter of theoretical parsimony) and entirely stick with propositions (in the sense of
inquisitive semantics). Ultimately, I will, therefore give up the idea that the context set
is a classical proposition (and for that matter I will also give up the notion of support).
For now, we keep, however, the notion of support, but define each notion in terms
which are theory internal, hence, without using info(ϕ).
5
It is customary to define the last three notions as short-cuts externally (and so it is done in the
original paper), but I have kept these notions together here to give a better overview.
6
The reader should not be confused by the definition of worlds of sets of propositions, because indeed
we can think of possible worlds as labels for the set of true propositions in them.
In what follows, when we speak of the informative content of a proposition ϕ, we will

refer to !ϕ. In the next section, I will give more explanations on !, the non-inquisitive
closure operator.
(5) Informative content (new version):

The informative content of ϕ is !ϕ.
Then, still mainly following Groenendijk (2011) we define informativeness and inquis-
itiveness relative to a state s. The definition in (6) is intended to be fully equivalent
to the definition of Groenendijk, only the notation being different, not using the no-
tion info.7 The idea is that iff a state does not model the non-inquisitive closure of
some proposition, then that proposition will be informative relative to that state. A
proposition is inquisitive relative to a state s iff we can find a state which extends s
(i.e. it contains more information) such that it supports its non-inquisitive closure but
not the proposition itself. Notice that the only way this can happen is that there is a
set containing at least two possible worlds {w1 , w2 } which supports the non-inquisitive
closure but which does not support the proposition itself.
(6) Informativeness and Inquisitiveness
a. ϕ is informative relative to s iff s 6|=!ϕ

b. ϕ is inquisitive relative to s iff ∃s0 .s0 ⊆ s ∧ s0 |=!ϕ ∧ s0 6|= ϕ
In this language the only source of inquisitiveness is disjunction. To see this, we com-
pute the non-inquisitive closure of a simple disjunction in which the disjuncts are not
identical: !(p ∨ q) = ((p ∨ q) →⊥) →⊥. Now, (p ∨ q) →⊥ is supported by states which
have no sub-set which support p or q except the empty set. An additional negation will
create the complement of this set, i.e. the non-inquisitive closure will be supported by
all states s such that for any sub-set of s, there will be a non-empty sub-set supporting
p or q. This means that the states which are in the set theoretic union of the states
which support p and the states which support q, will support the non-inquisitive clo-
sure. Then, the set of states supporting the non-inquisitive closure of the disjunction is
a proper super-set of the set of states supporting the disjunction itself. This is exactly
what the definition of inquisitiveness above requires.
7
The classical definition of informativeness is that ϕ is informative in a state s iff info(ϕ) ∩ s 6= s.
The definition above is equivalent, since it requires that s is not a subset of the informative content
of ϕ. For inquisitiveness, Groenendijk requests that s ∩ info(ϕ) 6|= ϕ. Our definition seems weaker,
for it would suffice that we find a subset of s ∩ info(ϕ) which does not support ϕ to claim that ϕ is
inquisitive. But since we know that we never loose support by making states smaller, the definitions
end up fully equivalent.
Groenendijk (2011) is only interested in notions of questionhood and assertion sim-

pliciter. He defines questions as non-informative propositions and assertions as non-
inquisitive propositions. Therefore, it will suffice to say that a question equals its
non-informative closure, while an assertion equals its non-inquisitive closure.8
(7) Assertions and Questions (context free)

a. ϕ is an assertion iff ϕ ≡!ϕ
b. ϕ is a question iff ϕ ≡?ϕ
Nevertheless, for practical purposes, we can also require that questions are inquisitive
and that assertions are informative. Neither of these additional requirements follow
from (7). For instance, a tautology like ¬ ⊥ is non-inquisitive and non-informative at
the same time: so it would qualify as an assertion without being informative, but it
would also qualify as a question without being inquisitive. While Groenendijk (2011)
solves this problem by requiring that questions are not tautologies or absurd, we can
more generally amend the definition as in (8). This is in fact a line of attack adopted
in earlier papers on inquisitive semantics, e.g. Groenendijk and Roelofsen (2009).9
(8) Assertions and Questions (relative to a context)

a. ϕ is an assertion relativ to s iff ϕ is not inquisitive relative to s and ϕ is
informative relative to s
b. ϕ is a question relativ to s iff ϕ is not informative relative to s and ϕ is
inquisitive relative to s
This step has the big advantage that the notions of questions and assertions are now
defined relative to states, i.e. they are, in a sense, discourse-oriented notions, which
captures the intuition we aim at that questions and assertions are essentially speech
acts.
Since the only source of inquisitiveness in this language is disjunction, we will say any
question is a disjunction over n > 1 propositions. In addition, it is required that for the
state under discussion, this disjunction is not informative. Notice that in this theory
we have not made any assumptions about what counts as an answer to a question,
however, as a first intuition, one may consider that a question is a request to choose
one of the disjuncts as an answer.
8
There are also hybrids which are inquisitive and informative. We will ignore them, however. While
they may be part of an inquisitive logic per se, I see no use for hybrids in whatever this book is
concerned with. Certainly, from the above does not follow that only questions and assertions can be
propositions. Whatever is a proposition and neither a question nor an assertion will simply be of no
further interest. However, consider the next footnote as well.
9
Hybrids, now, can become questions relative to certain contexts. For this reason, ignoring hybrids
does not mean that there is any proposition, which is simply ignored in this theory.
When speaking about questions, I will occasionally omit the use of the state s relative
to which the expression is a question. This is for convenience only. In such cases it is
assumed that the state s is the same on both sides of the relevant definition.
1.2.2 Algebraic inquisitive semantics
Before discussing answerhood and sub-questions, we should note that we can postulate
(9) (following Roelofsen (2011, 2013a)). The first part of this axiom of closure under
sub-sets makes sure that all states which support a proposition will be elements of that
proposition and the second part makes sure that if a state supports a proposition, all
sub-sets of that state will also support that proposition.
(9) Closure under sub-sets

a. For any ϕ ∈ InqB and any s ∈ S it holds that s ∈ JϕK iff s |= ϕ
b. For any ϕ ∈ InqB and any s ∈ S it holds that if s |= ϕ than any s0 such
that s0 ⊆ s |= ϕ
This gives a plain denotational semantics in terms of sets of sets of worlds which allows
to define classical connectives in terms of algebraic operations which are all identical
to the notions defined in terms of support above. This is done in (10).
(10) Logical connectives

a. J¬ϕK = JϕK?
b. Jϕ ∧ ψK = JϕK ∩ JψK
c. Jϕ ∨ ψK = JϕK ∪ JψK
d. Jϕ → ψK = JϕK ⇒ JψK
Thereby for any set A, A? = {a|a ∩

S
A = ∅} reads as the pseudo complement of A
and for any set A and B, A ⇒ B = {a| for any b ⊆ a, if b ∈ A then b ∈ B} and reads
as the pseudo-complement of A relative to B.
In a setup with four worlds, this leads to the following denotations, which I present in
the standard way introduced by Floris Roelofsen, where each rectangle symbolises one
set.
In general, I will use a more economic notation, simply enumerating the denotations
as sets of worlds:
(11) a. JϕK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅}

b. JψK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
c. Jϕ ∧ ψK = {{w2 }, ∅}
d. Jϕ ∨ ψK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
11 10
11 10
01 00
01 00
(a) ϕ (b) ψ
Figure 1.5: Atomic propositions
11 10 11 10
11 10
01 00 01 00
01 00
(a) ϕ ∨ ψ (b) ψ → ϕ (c) ϕ ∧ ψ
Figure 1.6: Connectives
e. Jψ → ϕK = {{w1 , w2 , w4 }, {w4 , w2 }, {w2 , w1 }, {w1 , w4 }, {w4 }, {w2 }, {w1 }, ∅}
While the notion of non-inquisitive closure is still a shortcut for double negation, we
can explicate this notion in a much more direct way for everyday use in (12):
(12) Non-inquisitive closure

For any proposition ϕ it holds that J!ϕK = ℘({w|{w} ∈ JϕK}
According to (12), we first find every world, which is in the denotation of ϕ, i.e. every
world, which supports ϕ, and then we calculate the power set of the set of such worlds.
For all examples above, we can calculate the non-inquisitive closure:
(13) a. J!ϕK = ℘({w1 , w2 }) = JϕK

b. J!ψK = ℘({w2 , w3 } = JψK
c. J!(ϕ ∧ ψ)K = ℘({w2 }) = J(ϕ ∧ ψ)K
d. J!(ϕ ∨ ψ)K = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) 6= J(ϕ ∨ ψ)K
e. J!(ψ → ϕ)K = ℘({w1 , w2 , w4 }) = Jψ → ϕK
In (13), all logical connectives are transparent with respect to the non-inquisitive closure
except for the case of disjunction. This is the simplest illustration of the claim in
the previous section that in inquisitive semantics, the only source of inquisitiveness is
disjunction.
This also illustrates, why we can think of the non-inquisitive closure as the informative
content of a proposition. Because the non inquisitive closure of any proposition is
the smallest non-inquisitive proposition which is supported by the same singletons on
worlds.
To see this, observe that Jϕ ∨ ψK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅} is sup-
ported by the singletons {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }. The non-inquisitive closure, ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 })
is obviously supported by the same set of worlds. Moreover, any proposition only sup-
ported by these singletons which is not ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) is going to be inquisitive, as
the reader can easily check.
We can now define a notion of entailment between propositions, which applies both for
questions and for assertions:10
(14) Entailment
We say that ϕ entails ψ, written as ϕ |= ψ iff JϕK ⊆ JψK
Given this denotational version and given that any state in the current system is roughly
the same as a classical proposition, we can make explicit the relation between denota-
tion (and support) and the classical intuition about meaning. Consider a declarative
sentence like the one in (15) with the given classical denotation. The denotation of this
sentence in an inquisitive setting, at least in the algebraic version, could be the one in
(16), i.e. the power-set of the classical denotation.
(15) JJohn laughed.KCL = λw.laugh(J, w) ≡ {w|laugh(J, w)}
(16) JJohn laughed.K = ℘({w|laugh(J, w)})
The denotation in (16) is, as a matter of fact, the set of the denotations of all stronger
classical propositions as suggested by (17). In this sense, we can think of an inquisitive
10
The sign |= is generally used both for support and for entailment. However, we will attempt to
switch to entailment entirely in this book.
Notice that this does not mean that we should end up without a notion of truth. A notion of truth
will need to recur to the notion of support in some usual way. But the notion of support used in
inquisitive semantics is not a relation between a world and proposition or a model and world and a
proposition, rather it is a relation between a classical proposition (which is called a possibility or a
state, but that is only nomenclature) and a proposition. This is as if we would explicate meanings
within a logic in terms of another one. It seems to me that while such a terminological decision may
have the advantage of convincing the reader that the new logic is similar to the old one, still it should
remain theory external in any possible way.
Notice, however, that in the classical papers of inquisitive semantics, the move from truth to support,
i.e. from w |= p to {w} |= p is understood as an essential step, because it introduces the intuition that
an inquisitive proposition is about “possibilities”. In my view, the notion of a possibility is not needed.
It is neither essential for the notion of truth nor for the notion of entailment. Clearly: {w} |= p iff
p ∈ w is just another way of saying w |= p if p ∈ w, even in the Groenendijk (2011) support-based
version. In the algebraic setup, the situation is even simpler: w |= p if {w} ∈ p.
denotation as an enumeration of all possible information states (i.e. context sets) to

which we still can arrive once we accept this proposition. In other words, an assertion
can be thought of as an invitation to continue the discourse, to find out more informa-
tion. Any assertion, even those which will be supported by only singleton states, can be
thought this way. Observe that the observation in (17) also applies for contradictions.
(17) JJohn laughed.K = {JJohn laughed and xKCL | where x is an expression with
propositional meaning.}
It is worth noting that there is a deep connection to an intuition we find in continuation

semantics, (Barker, 2002; Barker and Shan, 2008), in which propositions are generally
functions of possible continuation-propositions.11 In a sense, in continuation semantics
John laughed could be said to mean something like John laughed and what now?, i.e.
accept the proposition and continue the discourse. Under this perspective an inquisitive
meaning is just about the same: a proposition can be seen as an invitation to add more
information.
(18) JαK = λp.λw.α is true in w and p is true in w
As for questions, precisely the same intuition seems to hold. The essential difference
is just that, given a context set, a question will not rule out any states. Moreover, a
question is required to be inquisitive, which means that given state s, s will support
the non-inquisitive closure of a question but not the question itself.
(19) Questions (in the algebraic setting)

a. ϕ is a question in s iff s |=!ϕ and s 6|= ϕ
b. ϕ is a question in s iff s ∈ J!ϕK and s 6∈ JϕK
The main similarity between an assertion (which is informative per definition) and a
question (which is not informative per definition) is, then, that both are not supported
by the starting information state s. If they were, they would be superfluous discourse
moves. However, the difference is that an assertion will come with a minimal method of
extending that state such that support is established: take that state which is minimally
informative and supports the assertion. A question, however, will offer different minimal
methods to establish support; there will not be one minimally informative state which
supports it. Instead, there will be at least two incomparable minimal states. To make
this more explicit, we will just have to assume that states are ordered by the sub-set
11
This is not meant to suggest that continuation semantics can be reduced to this observation.
Continuation semantics is a very powerful compositional tool which is not mainly about this intuition.
In fact, it is not clear whether continuation semantics is about any intuition at all, being one of the
most abstract programming techniques known for the time being.
relation and a state s1 is more informative than s2 if s1 ⊆ s2 .
In what follows, we will use this algebraic version of inquisitive semantics. Even though,
for certain operators, this will lead to slight technical complications, it appears that the
conceptual advantage of algebraic inquisitive semantics is worth the effort. One of the
first natural consequences is that we can get rid of the notion of support and thereby
move entirely from classical propositions to propositions, even when we represent in-
formation states and thereby the context set.
1.2.3 The notion of context
Classically, discourse states are sets of classical propositions called the common ground,
or their set theoretic intersection in terms of possible worlds called the context set as
in Stalnaker (2002). It is certainly no trivial question whether we need more than that
to represent discourse. For instance, it has been argued by Kamp (1981), Kamp and
Reyle (1993) and many others in the subsequent literature that we need information
about so called discourse referents to capture essential properties of discourse states,
though Stalnaker (1996) has argued that conclusion may not be driven by necessity.
Similarly, Roberts (1996) or Ginzburg (1992) and many others have argued that we
also need questions, or in fact entire strategies of questions, to represent discourse in a
way suitable for the grammar-discourse interface.
For now, we will not consider strategies of questions, but we observe that integrating
questions into the representation of discourse-context is trivial, once we adopt an in-
quisitive perspective. A set of possible worlds is, for Stalnaker, a classical proposition.
Then, a context is a classical proposition which conjoins the entire mutual knowledge.
Now that we have changed the perspective on what propositions are from a classical to
an inquisitive perspective it is a natural consequence to adopt the same perspective for
discourse states as well. While it is certainly possible to keep a notion of information
states for contexts and otherwise work with propositions in the sense of inquisitive
semantics, as is done in most papers on inquisitive semantics, it seems much more
natural to go all the way and assume that discourse states are fully characterised by
propositions, i.e. sets of sets of worlds.
This decision has some problems, since the idea that inquisitive propositions are choices
between different types of discourse updates, becomes obsolete this way. This was
one of the most interesting selling points of the major ideas of inquisitive semantics
in Groenendijk and Roelofsen (2009). However, I have said above that, in fact, the
essential aspect of any discourse update can be spelled out in terms of lacking support12
which must be re-established. So, a proposition is a valid discourse move if it is not
supported by the original discourse state. The actual contribution of that proposition
12
Understood as before, as a relation between sets of worlds and sets of sets of worlds.
will be to re-establish a state in which the proposition is supported. Inquisitiveness and

informativeness are, then, different types of reasons why support is lacking and come
with different methods to re-establish it.
Now, the notion of support has been essential to spell out the relation between a
classical discourse state and an inquisitive proposition. But we know that if we switch
to discourse states as propositions in the sense of algebraic inquisitive semantics, we
can use a notion of entailment between a discourse state and a proposition. Hence, we
can say that a discourse state σ entails a proposition ϕ, i.e.σ |= ϕ, if that JσK ⊆ JϕK.
So, in fact, we do not need to change anything in the notion.
Moreover, this choice allows to define discourse update as set theoretic intersection,
without using the classical informative projection info. We will, however, need to add
a small twist to this operation, as shown in the following.
(20) Discourse update (with denotations)

If σ is a discourse state and ϕ is a licit update proposal, the update will result
in a new discourse state: (J!σK) ∩ JϕK.
(21) Discourse update (with expressions)

If σ is a discourse state and ϕ is a licit update proposal, the update will result
in a new discourse state: (!σ) ∧ ϕ.
One may ask, why we first calculate the non-inquisitive closure of the discourse state
and only then do the set theoretic intersection of the propositions. The reason for this
decision will become obvious once we consider different notions of answers to questions
in the next section. However, there is a more principled motivation as well:
Intuitively, having pure conjunction, i.e. set theoretic intersection without non-inquisitive
closure, would seem superior on conceptual grounds at first sight. But this is only if we
consider that the classical rule for discourse update was plain set theoretic intersection.
But set theoretic intersection is commutative. One really should be surprised of this
assumption. After all, discourse update seems not to be commutative in nature. It
is not the same in which order one asserts propositions. In dynamic semantics, this
intuition has been accounted for by making the dynamic conjunction non-commutative.
Hence, having a non-commutative update rule is, in fact, a welcome development. Put
differently, even if storing discourse referents is not one of our concerns here, we still
may want a non-commutative discourse update rule.
Moreover, one can think of the rule in (21) as a way to spell out the following intuition:
suppose, the discourse state is a question. That question should determine admissi-
ble responses, but should not actually determine how responses are interpreted (pace
Roberts). There might be some pragmatic aspects of interpretation in which knowing
what question some utterance answers licenses some additional inference, but that is a
1.3. ANSWERHOOD IN INQUISITIVE SEMANTICS 39
matter of pragmatics and is most certainly not a matter of clear mutual commitment
of the interlocutors, at least not unless this has been subject to negotiation, e.g. in the
sense of Ginzburg (2012). By using the non-inquisitive closure of the original discourse
state in the discourse update, this is exactly what we warrant: if the discourse state is
a question, it will only restrain, not determine the future updates.
This allows us to translate the notions of assertion and question to the new dialect.
Thereby, the notion of being a question in a discourse state, naturally translates to (22)
and the notion of assertion to (23).
(22) Definition of questions (final version)

ϕ is a question in σ iff !σ |=!ϕ and !σ 6|= ϕ.
(23) Definition of assertions (final version)

ϕ is an assertion in σ iff ϕ ≡!ϕ and !σ 6|= ϕ.
The relation to the previous definitions is very transparent.13
Finally, a notational convention: I will use the Greek letter σ for discourse states while
for assertions and questions I will generally use the propositional variables like ψ,ϕ etc.
Also, I will use different equivalent notations interchangeably, like JψK ∩ JϕK ⊆ J%K or
ψ ∧ ϕ |= %, mainly using the one which seems more intuitive in the given situation: if
we are focused more on sets, we may rather use the first one, if not, we may use the
second one.
1.3 Answerhood in inquisitive semantics
Neither saying that a question is in some sense a function of classical propositions which
qualify as an answer, nor saying, in a classical inquisitive setting, that a question is
just a proposition which suggests to choose between potential updates of the common
ground is going to be very useful unless we can say more about the nature of the
answer or the potential update respectively. Put differently, we really do not know
much about questions unless we know what kind of answer they request: even if we
know exactly what set of sets of worlds a question denotes, we this will only amount
to a clear intuitive notion of a question once we know how these sets of worlds relate
to possible answers.
This is one of the major sources of divergence in the literature because intuitions seem
to vary. One view is that questions generally request exhaustive, complete answers. So,
for instance for a question like (24), what is the information requested? Is the question
13
Observe, for the sake of completeness, that ∅ is not a question in any discourse states, and ∅ is an
assertion in any discourse state except ∅.
a request for a complete list of individuals who have laughed or is the question a request
for just some individual who laughed or is the question a request for a contextually
determined sub-set of the individuals who laughed? Considering an answer like (25)
does not seem to really clarify intuitions. On the one hand, there is an intuition that
the answer is interpreted as suggesting that nobody else laughed. This, in turn, might
suggest that the question (24) really requested an exhaustive answer. But on the
other hand, one may continue as in (26). This would be contradictory if (25) actually
entailed that nobody else than John laughed. So, we could say that the exhaustiveness
inference is just an implicature. Then, one could assume that the question (24) did not
actually request for exhaustive answers. This leads to the second view that questions
only request some weaker kind of an answer and exhaustiveness is just some additional
discourse inference. One recent discussion of this topic is to be found in Zimmermann
(2012), including a large discussion of the relevant literature.
(24) Who laughed?
(25) John laughed.
(26) John laughed. And Peter laughed too.
Whatever conclusion one should attempt to reach, there are many assumptions that
are left implicit. The relation between an empirically acceptable answer to a question
and a question itself really depends on a great number of theoretical decisions: the
definition of questions, the definition of assertions, the definition of answerhood, the
rules for discourse update etc. For precisely this reason I do not believe that a conclusive
argument as to whether interrogatives request exhaustive answers can be given. While
to analyse some phenomena such as embedded and concealed questions (Groenendijk
and Stokhof 1984, Heim 1979, Romero 2005) it may seem more reasonable to handle
questions as requesting exhaustive answers, for other phenomena such as some German
quantified wh-constructions constructions (wer alles) discussed in Zimmermann (2012),
the opposite assumption seems more suitable.
For precisely this reason, we will assume that exhaustive questions, call them mention-
all questions, are just one sub-set of the questions which can be asked, and non-
exhaustive questions, call them mention-some questions, are another sub-set of the set
of questions.14 So, questions can request exhaustive answers but they need not. There
is nothing in the notion of a question which will enforce the need for an exhaustive
answer, but there is also nothing which blocks exhaustive questions.
With this background we now turn to develop some useful notions of answerhood.
14
In fact, after the definitions put forth above, we really had no alternative left, so we may rather
say: it is good news that the empirical situation favours our predictions.
1.3.1 Valid discourse moves and valid responses
We consider a classical Stalnakerian discourse model, in which discourse is fully char-

acterised by the context set, which is an information state, a proposition. We define
what is a valid discourse move relative to that information state and what counts as a
valid response to a discourse move, given a proposition.
(27) Valid discourse move

Given a discourse state σ, ϕ is a valid discourse move iff ϕ is a question or an
assertion relative to σ.
Observe that this notion of a valid discourse move is the final justification to ignore
the notion of hybrids. A hybrid was originally defined as a proposition which is both
inquisitive and informative. Hybrids were defined in isolation. Some propositions
may be hybrids even relative to some discourse state σ. That means that they are
informative relative to σ and they are inquisitive relative to σ. But since assertions
must not be inquisitive and since questions must not be informative and, finally, since
only questions and assertions are valid discourse move in σ, it follows that hybrids
are not valid discourse moves in any discourse state σ. In fact, there may be many
expressions which are hybrids in one discourse state and which become questions in a
later discourse state. But for a theory of discourse they only become relevant once the
current discourse state is such that they qualify as questions.
(28) Valid response (preliminary)

Given a discourse state σ and the last discourse move ϕ, ψ is a valid response
to ϕ iff ψ is a valid discourse move relative to σ and ψ |= ϕ and ϕ 6|= ψ
According to (28), a valid discourse move relative to an assertion will be any stronger
assertion and a valid discourse move relative to a question will be a question which has
exactly the same informative content but is more specific or an assertion which entails
that question. Consider, for example (29).
(29) JσK = J!σK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 })

JϕK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
a. JψK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅} valid response
b. JφK = {{w1 }, {w2 }, ∅} no valid response
c. JρK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅} valid response
ϕ is a question and its informative content is exactly the same as σ: !σ |=!ϕ but
!σ 6|= ϕ. Now, ψ qualifies as valid response because it is a valid assertion relative to
σ, since !σ 6|=!ψ. Moreover, ψ |= ϕ. φ, in turn, is not a valid response. Even though
φ |= ϕ, φ is neither a valid assertion (for it is inquisitive relative to σ) nor a valid

question (for it is informative relative to σ) relative to σ. So, even if φ |= ψ, i.e. φ is a
stronger than ψ, φ is not a valid response while ψ is. The intuition is that one should
have first made the discourse move ψ. Only afterwards does it make sense to raise a
question like φ. ρ is a valid response. ρ is a question relative to σ, since !σ 6|= ρ but
!σ |=!ρ. Moreover, ρ |= ϕ. ρ is simply a more specific question.
The notion of a valid response captures an interesting intuition about what information
exchange is supposed to be and is dictated by the very notions developed above: the
intuition is that every discourse move should lead to gain of information. However,
information in the current setup does not only boil down to ruling out worlds, but,
more generally, to ruling out sets of worlds. If we rule out sets of worlds without ruling
out any world from the denotation of a proposition, the only way to maintain a valid
discourse move will be to create a more specific question.
The notion of a valid response is an important notion in this setup and should be
maintained because it naturally characterises the properties of an information state
under the current perspective. But at the same time, a valid response will not generally
qualify as a reasonable notion of answerhood to a question.
This is not terribly surprising, since we want to define answerhood relative to questions
and not relative to propositions in general. But even apart from that, a valid response
is both too strong and too weak. It is too strong for two reasons and too weak for
one reason. I discuss one reason why the notion of valid response is too strong in this
section. That will lead to an immediate revision of the definition above. The second
reason why the notion of valid response is too strong will be discussed in the next
section just like the reason why it is too weak.
The first reason why the notion of valid response is too strong is an intrinsic error of
the definition itself, which can be resolved easily.15 The problem is that it excludes a
response like π, where JπK = {{w1 , w2 , w4 }, {w1 , w2 }, {w1 , w4 }, {w2 , w4 }, {w1 }, {w2 },
{w4 }, ∅}. The problem with π is that π 6|= ϕ. But intuitively, π may help us further
maximising information.To see this, consider, what happens if we update σ with π:
J!σK ∩ JπK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅}. This exactly the same as ψ above.
More generally, the problem is that a discourse update from a discourse σ1 to σ2

creates an equivalence class U over propositions such that for any α ∈ U it holds that
J!σ1 K ∩ JαK = Jσ2 K. For many purposes which concern discourse update we should treat
all of these utterances alike, but not for all purposes. There is one notable, and well
known exception in inquisitive semantics: inquisitiveness of some proposition may only
become obvious given a certain amount of worlds. In the same equivalence class defined
15
The definition was in fact introduced to show that this problem could occur. Without realising
this issue, one may tend to ignore the problem in later definitions, however the problem is important
in many respects,as it will turn out later.
by two discourse states, we will find both inquisitive and non-inquisitive propositions
(the only exception being if the starting discourse state is maximally ignorant and
maximally inquisitive,i.e. only the upper bound is missing from its denotation.)
This leads to a revision of the definition of a valid response:
(30) Valid response (revised)

Given a discourse state σ and the last discourse move ϕ, ψ is a valid response
to ϕ iff ψ is a valid discourse move relative to σ and JψK ∩ J!σK ⊆ JϕK ∩ J!σK
and JϕK ∩ J!σK 6⊆ JψK ∩ J!σK
Since JϕK ∩ J!σK will invariable equal JσK since we know that σ is the discourse state
after the update with ϕ, i.e. J!σ0 K ∩ JϕK = JσK, this further simplifies to (31), which is
the exact spell-out of the idea that a valid response in discourse is gain in information.
(31) Valid response (final)

Given a discourse state σ, ψ is a valid response iff ψ is a valid discourse move
relative to σ and JψK ∩ J!σK ⊆ JσK and JσK 6⊆ JψK ∩ J!σK
But this leads to a certain terminological problem: the notion of a valid response
would require something like a question or an assertion as an argument, however, in
the definition above we have just shown that we can get rid of the actual question or
assertion one responds to, since whether or not a proposition comes out as a response
or not will only depend on the resulting discourse state.
Therefore we shall say that a discourse state itself acts as a receiving information state,
i.e. something that requires an answer:
(32) Open and closed states

a. If a discourse state σ is not inquisitive relative to !σ we say that σ is a
closed state.
b. If a discourse state σ is inquisitive relative to !σ we say that σ is an open
state.
When we are interested in the notion of an answer to a question, we will generally

consider answers to open states for simplicity, since it is trivial that an open state is
a question relative to its own non-inquisitive closure. Moreover, there will not be any
question, which could be answered, such that it is not, at the same time, an open
state, for only a question that is actually asked can be answered. A question asked in
any discourse state will create an open state as a resulting discourse state. Answering
that open state is as close as we can get to actually answering a question. Of course,
we can always generalise and consider an open state which a question creates when
asked given the totally ignorant state ℘(W), since we know that for any proposition ϕ,
JϕK ∩ ℘(W) = JϕK.
(33) Terminology
We will, loosely speaking, call open states questions (simpliciter).
The remaining two problems with the preliminary definition of a valid response are not
intrinsic issues of the notion of a valid response. Instead, they will lead to working out
the notion of an answer in several steps. The first problem is that the notion of valid
response is too weak, the second is that it is still too strong. Discussing these reasons
will lead us to several notions of answerhood to questions.
1.3.2 Answers and direct answers
The definition of valid responses is too weak because it includes way too strong propo-
sitions. So, for instance, α, such that JαK = {{w1 }, ∅} is a valid response, but we would
not want to have α as an answer to ϕ in (29), for ϕ intuitively did not ask for that
much information.
We can fix the problem by requiring that an answer to a question is a minimally infor-
mative valid response. This rules out too informative answers, under the assumption
that every question has maximal alternatives in its denotation.16 We call this a direct
answer, as standardly defined in inquisitive semantics, e.g. Ciardelli (2009).
(34) Direct answer

Given an open state σ, ψ is a direct answer to σ iff ψ is an assertion in σ and
JψK ∩ J!σK ⊆ JσK and there is no distinct % such that J!σK ∩ JψK ⊆ J!%K ⊆ JσK.
For the following examples all direct answers are given respectively:
(35) JσK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. Jψ1 K = {{w1 }, ∅}
b. Jψ2 K = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
c. In addition, any assertion gained by adding additional worlds which will
be ruled out in the update is a direct answer:
(i) {{w1 , w4 }, {w4 }, {w1 }, ∅} ψ1
(ii) {{w1 , w4 , w5 }, {w1 , w4 }, {w1 , w5 }, {w4 , w5 }, {w5 }{w4 }, {w1 }, ∅} ψ1
(iii) {{w2 , w3 , w4 }, {w2 , w4 }, {w3 , w4 }, {w4 }, {w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅} ψ2
16
Actually, in a first order setting without witnesses, this assumption turns out to be false, see
Ciardelli (2010), Ciardelli and Roelofsen (2011).It seems, however, that once we introduce witnesses or
discourse referents into the semantic representation the problem can be solved.
(iv) ...
(36) JσK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. Jψ1 K = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅}
b. Jψ2 K = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
c. Any assertion gained by adding additional worlds which will be ruled out
in the update
(37) JσK = {{w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. Jψ1 K = {{w1 }, ∅}
b. Jψ2 K = {{w2 }, ∅}
c. Jψ3 K = {{w3 }, ∅}
d. Any assertion gained by adding additional worlds which will be ruled out
in the update
Notice that generally, when giving examples I will ignore propositions which contain
worlds which will be ruled out in the update process, since there is an infinity of the
them anyhow.
The definition of valid responses is too weak because it rules out informative answers we
gain from the disjunction of some (but not all) alternatives even if this answer is non-
inquisitively closed. So, for instance, if we have the question in (37), we would actually
want to allow the answer ψ, where JψK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}. This answer seems
natural enough, its only problem being that it is partial, it does not supply as much
information as needed.
We solve this problem by defining another notion of answerhood, which is more liberal
than the definition above. To keep these notions apart, we call the new notion simply
answer to a question. We then will observe that direct answers to a question are a
subset of answers to a question.
(38) Answer (simpliciter)

Given an open discourse state σ, ψ is an answer to σ iff ψ is an assertion
relative σ and
a. ψ is a direct answer to σ or
b. if there are two propositions ϕ and γ which are both answers to σ such
that ψ =!(ϕ ∨ γ)
For the following examples all answers (which do not involve worlds which will be
eliminated on update anyhow) are given respectively:
(39) JσK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. Jψ1 K = {{w1 }, ∅}
b. Jψ2 K = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
(40) JσK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. Jψ1 K = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅}
b. Jψ2 K = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
(41) JσK = {{w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. Jψ1 K = {{w1 }, ∅}
b. Jψ2 K = {{w2 }, ∅}
c. Jψ3 K = {{w3 }, ∅}
d. Jψ4 K = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅}
e. Jψ5 K = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
f. Jψ6 K = {{w1 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w3 }, ∅}
Observe that for instance for the first example we cannot consider the proposition
℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) an answer to σ because this proposition does not qualify as an assertion
in σ, since it is not informative.
Assume the classical proposition p is true at world w1 and w2 . Assume that the classical
proposition q is true at world w2 and w3 . Then, (40) is a question asking which of p
and q is true. In fact it is just the expected denotation of p0 ∨ q 0 , where 0 stands for the
inquisitive version of the same classical proposition.17 At the same time, (41), is the
same question in an exhaustive version, i.e. it is a partition, an (trivial) equivalence
class over worlds with regard to this question: (p0 ∧ q 0 ) ∨ (p0 ∧ ¬q 0 ) ∨ (¬p0 ∧ q 0 ). We
could also write: (41) = Exh((40)), where Exh is a function that will be defined in the
next section. Now, one can easily see that the exhaustive, mention-all question allows
far more answers than does the mention-some question. This appears to be a natural
consequence of the idea that actually a partition will require more information. But at
the same time, there is an intuition, that this is actually just the same question and
there should be a sense in which they have the same answers. We will explore this in
the next section.
1.3.3 Extended answers and complete answers
In this section, we will develop two further notions of answerhood: extended answers
and complete answers. We start by observing two related problems. We shall soon see
that one natural solution to the second second problem also solves the first one.
Firstly, consider (42). In a sense, ψ should intuitively count as an answer, since it helps
17 0
The sign stands for a postfix function from sets of worlds to sets of sets of worlds defined as
0
= λx.℘(x).
in answering the question which creates the respective open state. It rules out the state
{w3 }. Nevertheless, it comes out as no answer, because ψ 6|= σ, since the first state in
the denotation of ψ is not an element of σ.
(42) JσK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w1 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. JψK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅} no answer
So, what is, conceptually, wrong with this answer? The problem seems to be that the
open state, the question σ, was a bit too specific. In fact, given the information state
the interlocutors really do not know whether ψ is true or not, so ψ should actually be
considered a good assertion. But σ simply did not allow this option. The question, in a
way, suggested that the only likely cases are that either we move to ℘({w2 , w3 }), or to
℘({w1 , w3 }). For precisely this reason, ψ is not only no answer to σ but actually also
no valid response. In a sense, it is against the spirit of σ to go for ψ as an answer. As
far as the amount of information actually requested is concerned, one could say that in
some sense ψ should count as an answer.
Secondly, there is an intuition, coming from the observation of natural language inter-
rogatives that, actually, one cannot really distinguish grammatically between exhaus-
tive and non-exhaustive questions. So, for instance, a very clear example for an ex-
haustive question should be (43), meanwhile a very clear example for a non-exhaustive
question should be (44). So, if I am the president of some country and consider starting
a world-war, I would really want my head of intelligence state department to deliver a
complete, exhaustive answer to (43). Otherwise, I may totally miscalculate my odds.
On the other hand, if I ask someone the question in (44) in Berlin, and he intends
to give me an exhaustive answer, he will go on talking for a few days, since there are
thousands of places where I can buy cigarettes in Berlin.
(43) Where do they have a nuclear bomb?
(44) Where can I buy cigarettes in this city?
Grammatically, however, there is no significant difference between the questions in (43)

and (44).
Moreover, I may be annoyed if the head of intelligence state department gives me a

partial answer to (43), but I may not say they did not answer my question. That they
did, they just failed to give a total answer. Similarly, for (43), if the person I asked
gives me all places where I can buy cigarettes in Berlin, I may not complain that he did
not answer my question. He did. Not in the way I wanted, but he certainly did answer.
So, there is an intuition, that exhaustive and non-exhaustive questions are not only
indistinguishable from a grammatical point of view, but also, in a sense, they really do
admit the same answers.
One way to capture this idea is to see that the exhaustive question actually entails the
non-exhaustive question, hence it is a valid response to it. If I ask a non-exhaustive
question, the exhaustive version of the same question, is valid discourse continuation.
Put differently, exhaustification will always be one valid response to a question. So,
we could say that any answer to an exhaustive question will be acceptable for a non-
exhaustive question precisely because the exhaustive question is a valid response to a
non-exhaustive question.
A major problem remains, however. If we consider the set of questions which are valid
responses to some question α, there will be many elements of this set of questions,
which go beyond exhaustification. That is to say, they are more specific than the
exhaustive version of α. We may, therefore, not want to say that all questions which
are valid responses to α may be answered instead of α. For illustration, just assume
the following scenario:
(45) JσK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w4 }) ∪ ℘({w2 , w3 })

a JαK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w4 })
a JβK = ℘({w2 , w3 })
a σ =α∨β
a. JψK = {{w1 , w4 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, {w4 }, ∅}
b. JχK = {{w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, {w4 }, ∅}
For (45), w1 and w4 should belong to the same partition, for they will not distinguish
between α and β, in both worlds, α is true and β is false. Therefore, in the example
Exh(ϕ) = ψ. ψ is, indeed a valid response to σ in the given state. However, there is an
even more specific question which is also a valid response to σ, χ. χ would, in addition
to ψ also require a distinction between w1 and w4 . But answering with γ where for
instance JγK = ℘({w1 , w3 }) really does not seem to be acceptable.
Intuitively, we can think of exhaustification as a natural limit of valid responses to ques-

tions in terms of more specific questions. Then, we could say that for every question,
we should not only accept the genuine answers defined above but also the answers to
every valid response question up to the limit constituted by exhaustification. Since we
only gain and do not loose answers this way up until the full exhaustification, we can
say that any question should accept any answer to its exhaustified version. But this is
a special kind of answerhood, and certainly it must be distinguished from the notion
of direct answers. We call these extended answers. This means that a partition defines
a range of questions as an equivalence class over questions respective to their extended
answers. In this equivalence class entailment is a partial order.
(46) Extended Answer

Given a discourse state σ, ψ is an extended answer to σ iff ψ is an assertion
relative to σ and
a. ψ∧!σ |= Exh(σ) and there is no distinct % such that ψ∧!σ |=!% |= Exh(σ)
or
b. if there are two propositions ϕ and γ which are both answers to σ such
that ψ =!(ϕ ∨ γ)
This definition only makes sense, if we have a decent definition of the operator Exh. We
can use the basic technique of Groenendijk and Stokhof (1984): we create a partition
for a question. To achieve this, we say that all worlds in which the same minimally
informative elements of a question are true will belong into the same set of worlds. One
definition of this operator is given in (47): 18
(47) The exhaustification operator (for questions)

Exh(ϕ) = ψ1 ∨ ...ψn
where ϕ is a question and ψi |= ϕ and for any χ such that χ |= ϕ and there is
no distinct % such that χ |= % |= ϕ it holds that ψi |= χ or ψi |= ¬χ
Three examples, illustrate, how exhaustification works:
(48) a. JϕK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

b. JExh(ϕ)K = {{w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
(49) a. JϕK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w2 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

b. JExh(ϕ)K = {{w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
(50) a. JϕK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w4 }) ∪ ℘({w2 , w3 })

b. JExh(ϕ)K = {{w1 , w4 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, {w4 }, ∅}
It should be obvious that exhaustification will have no effect on partitions . So for

any question ϕ, Exh(ϕ) = Exh(Exh(ϕ)). This shows that Exh does not have an
inverse function. However, there is a function which determines the set of all questions
who’s partition a given partition is. These trivial facts will be important later when
discussing congruence. Finally, this rule will not only allow some more informative
answers which the previous version did not. It will also allow some extended answers
which initially we might not have even thought of. For instance, for a question p or q,
the new rule will allow an extended answer saying: either p and not q or q and not p.
Indeed, intuitively, this should count as an answer indeed.
18
It is a well-known fact that this kind of exhaustification will lead to weird results for conditional
questions (Isaacs and Rawlins, 2008). However, conditionals will not play a role in this book and there
is no reason to assume that → is in any sense a translation of the English if.
Let us return to the original example repeated here:
(51) JσK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w1 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. JψK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅} no answer
It is easy to see that:
(52) JσK = {{w2 , w3 }, {w1 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

a. JExh(σ)K = {{w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
b. JψK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅} extended answer!
This is exactly as desired.
A final notion of answerhood is the notion of a complete answer. A complete answer is

one which gives the maximal amount of information that could have conceivably been
requested by that question. The definition is:
(53) Complete answer

ψ is a complete answer to a question ϕ iff ψ is a direct answer to Exh(ϕ).
A few facts about questions and answers can be kept in mind, given these definitions:
(54) Fact 1:
For any question, a direct answer is an answer and an answer is an extended
answer.
Fact 1 is easy to prove. The first part says that any direct answer is an answer (sim-
pliciter). This must be so because if some proposition is a direct answer, it will, per
definitionem, also be an answer, cf. (38-a). The second part is a bit more involved: an
extended answer to ϕ is just the same as an answer to Exh ϕ. What remains to be
shown is that given a set of maximal alternatives in a partition Exh ϕ, we can find a
group of maximal alternatives such that the non-inquisitive closure of their disjunction
will equal some maximal alternative in φ. I will not give a formal proof to this extent,
but I illustrate the procedure for a question with three maximal alternatives, i.e. a
question gained from the disjunction of three assertions, given in (55).
(55) ϕ=%∨ψ∨ξ
In Figure 1.7 we find the natural partition arising from the disjunction. Every disjunct
now can be written as the non-inquisitive closure of exactly four cells in the partition,
noted as bold letters:
f e
% a g d
b c
Figure 1.7: Partition
(56) a. ψ =g∨d∨e∨f
b. %=g∨b∨a∨f
c. ξ =g∨d∨b∨c
Hence, every direct answer to ϕ is an answer to Exh ϕ. Since, any answer of ϕ is

further derived from the direct answers of ϕ, they will also be extended answer ϕ.
(57) Fact 2:
For partitions, all direct answers are complete answers.
Fact 2 fact follows trivially from the definition of a partition, for illustration, one can
simply consider Figure 1.7.
(58) Fact 3:
If for a question a complete answer is not a direct answer, it is an extended
answer.
Fact 3 has been implicitly shown in the discussion of Fact 1.
(59) Fact 4:
Exhaustification of a question will not change the set of its complete answers.
Fact 4 follows from the fact a complete answer to ϕ is a direct answer to Exh ϕ and
Fact 2.
(60) Fact 5:
Not for all questions it holds that each complete answer is an answer.
While fact 5 may seem a contradiction, it is easy to prove by taking as an example

the question ϕ and the illustration in Figure 1.7. Here, one complete answer to ϕ is a.
Now, a is not a direct answer to ϕ because there is no maximal alternative (out of %, ξ
and ψ) such that a equals one of them. But if by the pairwise disjunction of %, ξ and
ψ, we also cannot derive a. So, this means that a is not an answer to ϕ.
Finally, it should also be observed that valid responses which are stronger than a
complete answer never qualify as an answer to a question in any sense. These will
be called over-answers and constitute a general problem that will be solved only once
we have the notion of potential questions in the theory. At the end of chapter 3, an
extensive discussion of over-answers will be given.
This concludes the logico-semantic discussion of questions and answers. The notion
of questions and answers above have been spelled out in great detail. The next step
is to show how we can arrive at such question and answer denotations starting from
linguistic expressions. As discussed in the first section of this chapter, we will want
to keep an architecture of meaning, in which we separate linguistic expressions and
semantic objects. One kind of semantic objects will be propositions. That kind, has
been discussed in this section. Another kind will be very similar to propositions, the
compositional denotation of interrogatives and declaratives. They will also be semantic
objects, however, they will require a speech act operator to turn them into regular
propositions. In the next chapter, I will show exactly, how these two steps can be
performed.
1.4 The compositional semantics of interrogatives
Traditionally, there are two main techniques for the compositional semantics of inter-
rogatives: alternative semantics and Structured Meanings. In this section, I will first
briefly compare them; however, given the decisions made in the previous section, there
is not much of a choice left. We will go for alternative semantics. Hence, in the second
and third part I will show how simple wh-questions and polar questions can be derived
and in the fourth part I will discuss some more complex cases.
1.4. THE COMPOSITIONAL SEMANTICS OF INTERROGATIVES 53
1.4.1 Alternative semantics or Structured Meanings
The aim of a compositional semantics of interrogatives is to derive a denotation which

qualifies as a question according to what has been said above from a linguistic structure
which corresponds to interrogatives.
There are, quite generally, two main lines of attack in the literature. The one is what
I call Alternative Semantics, which says that questions denote sets of classical propo-
sitions (Hamblin 1973, Karttunen 1977, Groenendijk and Stokhof 1984 or recently
Eckardt (2007), Haida (2007), Beaver and Clark (2008)). The other one is the Struc-
tured Meanings approach, where questions are said to denote incomplete/unsaturated
structured classical propositions, as argued by Hausser and Zaefferer (1979), von Ste-
chow and Zimmermann (1984), Ginzburg (1992), Reich (2001, 2002), Krifka (2001,
2004) and many others.
The central idea in alternative semantics, is very similar to the version of inquisitive
semantics introduced in the previous chapter. This takes little surprise, given that both
conceptually and historically inquisitive semantics is a more general version of original
work on question semantics in terms of alternatives, as pointed out by Krifka (2011a).
In the original setup, questions are sets of classical propositions. Thereby, there is an
analytical decision to make: are only true answers (Karttunen 1977), only exhaustive
answers (Groenendijk and Stokhof, 1984) or also non-exhaustive answers (Hamblin,
1973) in that set. The answers are generally thought of as compositionally derived in the
very same way in which the meaning of assertions is derived, the main difference being
that the corresponding question word or operator will introduce alternative arguments,
hence splitting the classical proposition into a whole set of alternatives. This is the idea
in the original version of Hamblin (1973). Then, some additional technological twist is
needed to create a partition, as in Groenendijk and Stokhof (1984) or Haida (2007), or
to reduce the set of answers to the true ones relative to a world of evaluation.
At this point, I just give a general scheme for illustration in (61). The abbreviation
DW H stands for all entities in the universe of discourse (the model) which are of the
same type as the denotation of the wh-expression, so, e.g. for who we would get the
set of all humans, for what kind of we would get the set of all properties, etc.
t |
(61) {α(a), |a ∈ DW H }
WH λσ.α(σ)
In Structured Meanings the resulting meaning of a question is not a set of classi-

cal propositions, but an incomplete classical proposition, i.e. a function which yields
propositions depending on the arguments, which are restricted to the domain of the
wh-word, as roughly shown in (62)
t |
(62) λσ ∈ DW H .α(σ)
WH λσ.α(σ)
Both approaches are very similar, as can be seen in the schematic representations in
(61) and (62). In fact, the correspondence is fairly simple to formulate. One can always
derive the result of the alternative approach from the result of the structured meaning
approach, by the functional rule A given in (63), but vice versa, this is impossible. In
other words, we lose information once we proceed to the alternative representation, and
therefore the structured meaning approach is, in a sense, more powerful.19
(63) Convert Structured Questions into Alternative Questions:

A: domain of structured questions → sets
A(S) = {S(a)|a is in the domain of S}
where S is some structured question denotation.
Therefore, the entire discussion between proponents of these two approaches has been
structured around the following two possible arguments: proponents of Structured
Meanings have attempted to show that alternative meanings cannot capture some facts
about questions, i.e. alternative semantics is too restrictive, whereas proponents of
alternative meanings have tried to show that Structured Meanings over-generate, i.e.
Structured Meanings is too little restrictive. Beaver and Clark (2008) come to conclude
that the frameworks are roughly equivalent. I follow them in this assumption, but it is
worth noting that both approaches are not free of problems. Some of the problems of
alternative semantics we will encounter in this section, in the following chapter and in
chapter 7.
1.4.2 Alternative semantics for simple wh-questions
Once the decision is made as to whether alternative semantics or Structured Meanings

should be used as a general formal framework to model questions, the next question
is whether one should use an unconstrained Hamblin (1973)–Rooth (1992)–Beaver and
Clark (2008) semantics for questions or a constrained Groenendijk and Stokhof (1984)–
Haida (2007) partition semantics. I have argued in the previous case, however, that
we actually need both: questions may denote partitions but not necessarily. In par-
ticular, I will assume a fairly standard Hamblin-semantics for interrogatives and use
the Exh operator20 introduced in the previous chapter to create partitions, whenever
19
This was known for a long time in the literature, cf. Rooth (1992), Krifka (2006a), Beaver and
Clark (2008). Actually showing, however, that the expressive power of structured meaning approaches
is higher is more complicated, especially because Structured Meanings will require many formal twists
like abstractions over tuples and a whole range of compositional rules, in order to cover all phenomena.
20
In fact, a slightly modified version of the operator
necessary.21
First, I develop a compositional system widely following Hamblin (1973), Kratzer and
Shimoyama (2002) and mainly Eckardt (2007), but with a few modifications. The
system is limited to simple examples and supports no predicate abstraction, quantifier
movement etc. but it will suffice for illustration. Later, on I will return to some of
these problems.
I assume a simple intensional model M hD, W, J Ki. Where J K is an interpretation

function, D is the domain of individuals and W is the domain of worlds. The model
itself will be left implicit for the most part.
First, I will need type theory, because working with sets of alternatives will alterate
somewhat the type-system, as proposed in Eckardt (2007). In particular, I assume the
following recursive definition:
(64) Type theory for alternatives:

a. e, s, t and τ are types.
b. if a and b are types, ha, bi is a type.
c. Nothing else is a type.
Note the addition of τ to the type system. The reason for this is that in this framework
sets and characteristic functions of them cannot any longer be simply equated. he, ti
is a function containing tuples of individuals and truth values, whereas he, τ i is a set
containing individuals-s.22 Some examples in a simple typed model:
(65) a. De = {M, J, A}23

b. Dt = {1, 0}
c. Ds = {w1 , w2 , w3 }
d. Dhe,ti = {{hM, 1i, hJ, 0i, hA, 0i}, {hM, 1i, hJ, 1i, hA, 1i}...}
e. Dhs,ti = {{hw1 , 1i, hw2 , 1i, hw3 , 0i}, {hw1 , 1i, hw2 , 0i, hw3 , 1i}...}
f. Dτ = ∅
g. Dhe,τ i = {{M, J}, {M}, {J, A}...} i.e. Dhe,τ i ⊆ ℘(De )
h. Dhhe,ti,τ i = {{{hM, 1i, hJ, 0i, hA, 0i}, {hM, 1i, hJ, 1i, hA, 1i}}, ...}
i.e. Dhhe,ti,τ i ⊆ ℘(Dhe,ti )
21
Remember, however, that questions need not generally require to denote a partition in order to
accept exhaustive answers. This is because any question will determine its own partition, and will
accept any answer to its partition as an extended answer. This also includes complete answers.
22
Many scholars seem to overlook the problem because one can actually give compositional rules in
various versions of Alternative Semantics using purely standard types. However, this is only possible
because the compositional rules are formulated such that they implicitly handle sets. Then, meanings
with some type will simply appear in a set. But then we have lots of types in our model, we use these
types, but actually, no single linguistic expression will ever have a denotation of any of those types.
23
I use bold characters for constants, so also for individuals. Also I use bracket less notation for
functions argument sequences wherever possible.
Furthermore, I assume the following general constraints on the lexicon, first given using
just classical types, and repeated in the newly given type theory, in (67):
(66) a. If α is a name, JαKM ∈ {{a}|a ∈ De }

b. If α is a noun or an intransitive verb, JαKM ∈ {{a}|a ∈ Dhe,sti }24
c. If α is a transitive verb, JαKM ∈ {{a}|a ∈ Dhe,he,stii }
d. ...
e. If α is a wh-word, JαKM ⊆ De
(67) a. If α is a name, JαKM ∈ Dhe,τ i and |JαKM | = 1

b. If α is a noun or an intransitive verb, JαKM ∈ Dhhe,sti,τ i and |JαKM | = 1
c. If α is a transitive verb, JαKM ∈ Dhhe,he,stii,τ i and |JαKM | = 1
d. ...
e. If α is a wh-word, JαKM ∈ Dhσ,τ i
Meanings have types in (67), but lack types in (66). This is the core advantage of our
type theory. In addition, there is one functional application rule, which is given in a
first approximation (68) in an intuitive way.
(68) Functional Application (unofficial version)

M M
If α is a tree with two daughters β γ then JαK = {a b|a ∈ JβK and
b ∈ JγKM }
iff for all a ∈ JβKM and for all b ∈ JγKM it holds that b is the domain of a.
The official version is given in (69) in a more direct way, making use of the type theory
developed:
(69) Functional Application (official version)

If α is a tree with two daughters β γ then JαKM is defined iff there is a σ
and ψ such that JβKM ∈ Dhhσ,ψi,τ i and JγKM ∈ Dhσ,τ i
iff defined, the result will be of type hψ, τ i and is computed as:
JαKM = {a b|a ∈ JβKM and b ∈ JγKM }
I illustrate the general idea of the approach on a few simple examples using a rudimen-
tary fragment of English, involving the lexical items given in (70) and a model M. I
use a λ-notation for functions.
(70) Lex: {P eter, M ary, loves, sleeps, John, Anna, who}
24
I occasionally abbreviate hs, ti as st
a. JP eterKM = {P}
b. JM aryKM = {M}
c. JJohnKM = {J}
d. JAnnaKM = {A}
e. JsleepsKM = {λx.λw.sleep x w}
f. JlovesKM = {λx.λy.λw.love y x w}
g. JwhoKM = {P, M, J, A}
First, we consider two simple cases, which yield a singleton set of classical propositions.
(71) Peter sleeps.

u }
w
w
S
w
w
w
v ~
Peter sleeps
= {a b|a ∈ JsleepsKand b ∈ JP eterK}
= {a b|a ∈ {λx.λw.sleep x w} and b ∈ {P}}
= {λx.λw.sleep x w P}
= {λw.sleep P w}
(72) Anna
u loves Peter. }
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
w S

w
w
w
wAnna VP
w
v ~
loves Peter
u }
w
w
= {a b|a ∈ w VP and b ∈ JAnnaK}
w
w
v ~
loves Peter
= {a b|a ∈ {a0 b0 |a0 ∈ JlovesKand b0 ∈ JP eterK} and b ∈ JAnnaK}
= {a b|a ∈ {a0 b0 |a0 ∈ {λx.λy.λw.love y x w} and b0 ∈ {P}} and b ∈ {A}}
= {a b|a ∈ {λx.λy.λw.love y x w P} and b ∈ {A}}
= {a b|a ∈ {λy.λw.love y P w} and b ∈ {A}}
= {λy.λw.love y P w A}
= {λw.love A P w}
Unfortunately, the result of (71) and (72) is not quite what we would call a proposition
according to the definitions in the previous chapter. What we have, is exactly what
is generally regarded a Hamblin-denotation, but this is not sufficient. We will assume,
therefore, that there is an assertion operator, which will turn a denotation as above
into a algebraic inquisitive-semantics style proposition.25
(73) The assertion operator

S
Ass α = ℘( {a|there is b ∈ α such that the characteristic set of b is a})
I define various versions of such operators in a simpler notation. Of course, we can

also use the standard notations: Ass is a function of type hhst, τ i, hs, τ ii such that
S
Ass = λα.℘( {a|there is b ∈ α such that the characteristic set of b is a}), but I find
this harder to read.
To see how Ass works, consider two examples. While we have not derived it composi-
tionally, we might assume that we would get (75) for Peter or Anna sleeps.26 Even for
(75) we do not get an inquisitive denotation.
(74) Ass {λw.sleep P w} = ℘({w|sleep P w})
(75) Ass {λw.sleep P w, λw.sleep A w} = ℘({w|sleep P w} ∪ {w|sleep A w})
Now, we consider a case in which one wh-word occurs. This yields a set of alternative
classical propositions:
(76) Who
u sleeps? }
w
w
S
w
w
w
v ~
Who sleeps
= {a b|a ∈ JsleepsK and b ∈ JwhoK}
= {a b|a ∈ {λx.λw.sleep x w} and b ∈ {P, M, J, A}}
= {λx.λw.sleepx w P, λx.λw.sleep x w M, λx.λw.sleep x w J,
λx.λw.sleep x w A}
= {λw.sleep P w, λw.sleep M w, λw.sleep A w, λw.sleep J w}
Again, the result is no proposition, just a set of classical propositions, because it is not
25
One may note that there are more direct ways to derive propositions from natural language, but
my aim here is to stick to traditional Hamblin-semantics as far as possible.
26
It is assumed in inquisitive semantics that disjunction introduces alternatives, however it is by no
means clear that this also applies to natural language words which generally seem related to logical
disjunction. I will not actually commit to the assumption that English or introduces alternatives, this
example is rather meant to show how the operator works.
downward closed under sub-sets. Moreover, if we were to use the Ass operator, we
would not get a question as a result. This is because the Ass operator actually incor-
porates a non-inquisitive closure operator. Hence, we now define a question operator
analogously: Q.
(77) The question operator

S
Q α = {℘(a)|there is b ∈ α such that the characteristic set of b is a}
Consider, now, two examples. Firstly, observe that in (78), we apply the Q operator
instead of Ass operator on the same disjunctive example as before. We now get a
proposition which will be a question in many discourse states (though, simpliciter it is
a hybrid, i.e. no valid discourse move to start a discourse). Secondly, we can also apply
Q to the result derived in (76), which gives the desired denotation, which, again, will
be a question in any context in which we know that someone sleeps.
(78) Q {λw.sleep P w, λw.sleep A w} = ℘({w|sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep A w})
(79) Q {λw.sleep P w, λw.sleep M w, λw.sleep A w, λw.sleep J w} =

= ℘({w|sleep P w})∪℘({w|sleep A w})∪℘({w|sleep M w})∪℘({w|sleep J w})
If we want to exhaustify this question, we will simply use the Exh operator defined
above and repeated here for convenience as (80). However, notice that Exh has been
defined on expressions and not on denotations, so, it is reasonable to give a purely set
theoretic definition. Moreover, since Exh in (80) makes use of maximal alternatives,
and in fact, before applying Q, this is exactly what we had, it seems more reasonable
to re-define Exh to rather take the denotation of interrogatives before the application
of Q as an argument. Then, we get a new operator which performs both jobs of Q and
Exh, whence called QExh. This operator is given in (81) for everyday use.27
(80) Exh(ϕ) = ψ1 ∨ ...ψn

where ϕ is a question and ψi |= ϕ and for any χ such that χ |= ϕ and there is
no distinct % such that χ |=!% |= ϕ it holds that ψi |= χ or ψi |= ¬χ
(81) The exhaustive question operator

QExh α = {a| there is some b ∈ α0 such that a ⊆ b and for all b ∈ α0 it
holds that a ⊆ b or a ∩ b = ∅} where α0 = {a|there is b ∈ α such that the
characteristic set of b is a}
Let us now consider the virtues of QExh, since it does exhibit a small difference as
27
Needless to say that this will also take care of closure under sub-sets.
compared to Exh. In the version of inquisitive semantics that we have used above, we
could not ask questions in which one alternative was a sub-set of another. This is a
trivial consequence of the downward closure: just any subset will be represented, hence,
we cannot give a special status to any sub-set. But the case can occur that there will
be two alternative classical propositions in the denotation of some interrogative such
that one is a sub-set of another. Say, for our example above, that it is a fact about
the model that Peter only sleeps if Jane sleeps. However, Jane could also sleep if Peter
does not. Hence, in terms of sets of worlds, {w|sleep P w} ⊂ {w|sleep J w}. If we
were to use Exh in some way, we would observe that the alternative {w|sleep P w}
will simply be ignored since it is not maximal. Crucially, QExh will do a better job
here, since it will include a partition in which both Peter and Jane sleep and a partition
in which Jane sleeps and Peter does not, including all of their respective sub-sets. So,
the result is given in (82) for the general case:
(82) QExh {λw.sleep P w, λw.sleep M w, λw.sleep A w, λw.sleep J w} =

= ℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep A w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep J w})∪
℘({w|sleep P w} \ ({w|sleep A w} ∪ {w|sleep M w} ∪ {w|sleep J w}))∪
℘({w|sleep A w} \ ({w|sleep P w} ∪ {w|sleep M w} ∪ {w|sleep J w}))∪
℘({w|sleep M w} \ ({w|sleep A w} ∪ {w|sleep P w} ∪ {w|sleep J w}))∪
℘({w|sleep J w} \ ({w|sleep A w} ∪ {w|sleep M w} ∪ {w|sleep P w}))∪
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep A w} \ ({w|sleep M w} ∪ {w|sleep J w}))∪
℘({w|sleep J w} ∩ {w|sleep A w} \ ({w|sleep M w} ∪ {w|sleep P w}))∪
℘({w|sleep J w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} \ ({w|sleep A w} ∪ {w|sleep P w}))∪
℘({w|sleep J w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} \ ({w|sleep A w} ∪ {w|sleep P w}))∪
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} \ ({w|sleep A w} ∪ {w|sleep J w}))∪
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep A w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} \ {w|sleep J w})∪
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep A w} ∩ {w|sleep J w} \ {w|sleep M w})∪
℘({w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep A w} ∩ {w|sleep J w} \ {w|sleep P w})∪
℘({w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep J w} \ {w|sleep A w})
Given these assumptions, we should say that interrogatives may be interpreted either
using Q or using QExh, depending on whatever pragmatic intentions the interlocutors
pursue. However, it is worth mentioning that whenever one alternative composition-
ally derived from the meaning of interrogatives strictly entails another, in our particular
inquisitive semantics setting, we will need to use QExh in some way or another be-
cause otherwise the same problem we had with Exh will re-emerge. In particular,
the stronger alternative will not qualify as an answer if we use Q (and QExh is not
available at all), even though we know as a matter of empirical fact that the stronger
alternative, generally, is an acceptable answer. The only way the stronger alternative
can be an acceptable answer is either as an extended answer to the question arising
if the interrogative is asked using Q (but we need exhaustification for that) or as an
answer simpliciter to the question arising if the interrogative is exhaustified directly,

but again, we need exhaustification for that.
The theoretical consequence of this discussion is that we have to make a decision: either
we take algebraic inquisitive semantics and the QExh operator, or we take neither of
them.
Notice, further, that there is no guarantee in this setup that the arising proposition
after applying Q or its exhaustive analogon will be a question. It could just as well
be a hybrid. But, empirically, we should want to be able to ask a question, meanwhile
hybrids are useless, since they are no valid discourse moves. We should, therefore,
assume that one further job performed by Q is the so called presuppositional closure,
i.e. there will be a presupposition that the emerging proposition will be a question
in the context.28 Similarly, there will be a presupposition on the side of the assertion
operator that the arising proposition will actually qualify as an assertion, i.e. it will be
informative.
(83) The question operator (with presupposition)

Qσ α = {℘(a)|there is b ∈ α such that the characteristic set of b is a}
S
and it is presupposed that this denotation is a question in σ.
(84) The exhaustive question operator (with presupposition)

QExhσ α = {a| there is some b ∈ α0 such that a ⊆ b and for all b ∈ α0 it holds
that a ⊆ b or a ∩ b = ∅}
where α0 = {a|there is b ∈ α such that the characteristic set of b is a}
and it is presupposed that this denotation is a question in σ
(85) The assertion operator (with presupposition)

Assσ α = ℘( {a|there is b ∈ α such that the characteristic set of b is a})
S
and it is presupposed that this denotation is an assertion in σ.
Before concluding this section, I wish to point out two facts:
Firstly, in the sketch of a theory of questions given above focus plays no role what-
soever. As opposed to many papers, e.g. Haida (2007), Klinedinst and Rothschild
(2011), who use focus semantics in deriving the meaning of questions, I follow Eckardt
(2007) in assuming that the alternative generating devices in focus and in questions are
fundamentally different, even though at the technical level, the system provided here
does differ in some ways from Eckardt (2007), e.g. in that all denotations are calculated
in sets here, like Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) and others. The main motivation for
not using any kind of focus semantics in the denotation of questions is that focus and
28
This presupposition, for questions, is actually an existential presupposition for wh-questions and
the requirement that the discourse state is not too informative, i.e. the question is not yet answered.
questions do not seem to share directionality: I see focus as an anaphoric/backwards

looking device, while questions are cataphoric/forward-looking.Hereby, again, I follow
Eckardt (2007). Focus, however, will be discussed only in the next chapter.
Secondly, in the above, I have not assumed that interrogatives (or declaratives) denote
propositions directly. Instead, I have assumed that there is a special assertion or ques-
tion operator which will derive a proposition from the denotation of interrogatives or
declaratives. There is a question as to whether such a theoretical decision is actually
parsimonious or not. Certainly, on the one hand, there is the advantage that we can
use already well known technology this way, and in addition, we capture a meaning
architecture which neatly corresponds to the view advocated by Krifka (2011a), as
argued in the first section of this chapter. On the other hand, there is the negative
impression that in this system natural language meanings do not seem to be inherently
be connected to an inquisitive logic, at least not in the algebraic version which we use
here. Some readers may consider the analogy between continuation semantics and in-
quisitive semantics in the algebraic notation important enough to opt for a continuation
style theory of compositional semantics for interrogatives and declaratives. While, to
my knowledge, this has not yet been implemented, I see no evident serious problems
with such an attempt. For the purposes of this book, I consider that keeping propo-
sitions (which we only get after applying the assertion or question operator) distinct
from the denotation of declaratives and interrogatives, is in fact a good thing. This
allows to cleanly distinguish between logico-semantic objects and linguistico-semantic
objects and thereby making the distinction between questions and interrogatives and
assertions and declaratives more transparent. The meaning of interrogatives is some-
thing that can be turned into a question once it is actually asked, whereas the meaning
of a declarative is something that can be turned into an assertion once it is actually
asserted. But of course, to a certain extent, such decisions may be a matter of taste in
the end, as they will not come with any visible empirical consequences.
In what follows, I will first give a trivial extension of this compositional theory to polar
questions. Then, I turn to complex wh-questions, in particular to which-questions. In
the discussion of which-question we will also consider domain restriction.
1.4.3 Extension to polar questions
Turning to polar questions, the main problem is how one should derive a set of alter-
natives from a polar interrogative which can be fed as an input for Q or QExh. The
denotation of polar questions has been subject to intensive research recently. Some
prominent papers include: Farkas and Roelofsen (2012), Biezma and Rawlins (2012),
Han and Romero (2004) etc. Typically, it is assumed in the literature that polar ques-
tions denote a set containing two classical propositions: the classical proposition ex-
plicitly denoted by the linguistic expression and its negation. Thereby, double negation
is typically assumed to be eliminated by turning the proposition into an unnegated,
positive one. That means that for negative and positive polar interrogatives we get
exactly the same alternatives:
(86) a. JDoes Peter sleep?K = {Peter sleeps., Peter does not sleep.}
b. JDoesn’t Peter sleep?K = {Peter sleeps., Peter does not sleep.}
One particularly simple way to calculate such a semantic value is to assume a wh-
expression ranging over polarity. This leads to a tree like (88).
(87) Jwh+,− K = {λp.p, λp.¬p}
(88) CP {λw.sleep P w, λw.¬sleep P w}
wh+,− TP
Peter sleeps
(89) CP = {λw.sleep P w, λw.¬sleep P w}
wh+,− TP
Peter does not sleeps
Given the arising denotations, both Q and QExh will give the same results:
(90) QExh([wh+,− [ Peter sleeps ] ] ) = ℘({w|sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|¬sleep P w})

it is presupposed that this denotation is a question in σ
In (90), I have included a presupposition. Generally, one may assume that a polar
question has no presupposition, since this is a total partition over W and thereby it
cannot be informative. However, we also require that questions are inquisitive. Now, σ
could be the power set of a set of worlds in all of which Peter sleeps. In this discourse
state the emerging proposition is neither an assertion nor a question: it is a tautology.
We generally assume that tautologies are no valid discourse moves.29
Finally, one may wonder whether we can also handle rising declaratives and disjunctive
questions correctly in this framework:
(91) a. Peter sleeps. assertion

b. Peter sleeps? question
29
Of course this does not mean that tautologies cannot be interpreted in a discourse.
c. Does Peter sleep? question

d. Does Peter sleep or John? question
e. Does Peter or John sleep? question
f. .. etc.
The compositional analysis of such questions goes beyond the scope of this book. It
is worth noting, however, that a) the compositional analysis of such questions has
turned out to be difficult in any framework and b) in cf. Roelofsen (2013b) some
straightforward suggestions have been made on how to handle such cases. Notice,
however, that care must be taken of the alternatives which arise and spread if we assume
that disjunction in natural language actually compositionally gives rise to alternatives,
also, one has to take care of the correct scope for disjunction and the role of intonation
and word order in such cases.
I wish to make explicit that in this book there is no commitment as to whether disjunc-
tion actually does introduce alternatives into the composition or not. There are some
reasons to make this assumption (Alonso-Ovalle, 2006) but the actual consequences
of this decision for the semantics of questions and focus are – in my view – not yet
sufficiently understood to actually make such a theoretical decision. Put differently, in
inquisitive semantics, we have a very clear view on what ∨ and → do. But whether
natural language expressions such as the English or or if correspond to these operators
directly or in some more indirect way is an entirely different question.
1.4.4 which-questions
We have only analysed questions with simple wh-words leaving even domain restriction
implicit. Even though one really ought to expect that the account naturally extends
to complex wh-expressions, this remains to be shown. The crucial problem of which-
questions is the handling of the world variable. Readers familiar with the literature on
questions are aware of the fact that it is not customary to use intensions in deriving
questions the way I have done that above. In particular, a number of compositional sys-
tems, from Karttunen (1977) to Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) are not compositional,
since they give the denotation of which NP phrases syncategorematically30 , whereas
most work in partition semantics uses versions of Ty2 or Ty3 in which the world variable
is handled first and not last, see Haida (2007) for an insightful discussion.
In what follows, I will attempt to give a principled discussion of the emerging problems,
starting with a general consideration. We has settled above that a question (as a seman-
tic object) is a set of sets of worlds, such that downward closure is granted, but there
30
This is problematic because there is no obvious reason to assume that which NP cannot be com-
posed using regular rules from the meaning of which and NP. After all these seem to be totally regular
natural language expressions.
is no upper bound. Some of the alternatives sets of worlds will be considered maximal
because they are not subsets of any other set contained in the question. We will nat-
urally expect that the maximal alternatives correspond to the compositionally derived
denotation of some interrogative before applying the question operator, at least for
non-exhaustive questions which are derived directly from wh-questions. Hence, given a
model with three individuals, and respective denotations for three atomic propositions,
we can expect the corresponding who-question to have the denotation given in (92),
and, indeed, this is exactly what the theory proposed above would derive.
(92) a. Ass JPeter sleepsK = ℘({w|sleep P w}) = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 , w4 , w5 })

b. Ass JJohn sleepsK = ℘({w|sleep J w}) = ℘({w1 , w2 , w6 , w7 , w5 })
c. Ass JMax sleepsK = ℘({w|sleep M w}) = ℘({w1 , w7 , w3 , w8 , w5 })
d. QJWho sleepsK =
℘({w|sleep M w}) ∨ ℘({w|sleep J w}) ∨ ℘({w|sleep P w}) =
℘({w1 , w2 , w3 , w4 , w5 }) ∪ ℘({w1 , w2 , w6 , w7 , w5 }) ∪ ℘({w1 , w7 , w3 , w8 , w5 })
Given such a question, we can get a new question either by adding or removing a
maximal alternative. We call this domain narrowing/extension. For instance, we can
assume that the individual Peter is not salient in the context, hence, the question is
only about John and Max. This leads to the entirely different question given in (93):
(93) QC JWho sleepsK = ℘({w|sleep M w}) ∨ ℘({w|sleep J w}) =

℘({w1 , w2 , w6 , w7 , w5 }) ∪ ℘({w1 , w7 , w3 , w8 , w5 })
Another way to get a new question is by extending or restricting some maximal al-
ternative by some world. We will need to apply downward closure in these cases but
the resulting semantic objects behave as expected. Call this method informative ex-
tension/restriction. Consider for example an additional proposition like (94). We can
modify the wh-question by restricting the size of each alternative, e.g. by assuming
that it is already known in the context that it is raining. Since in w1 it is obviously
not raining, we will need to eliminate that world from each alternative, hence getting
the question in (95) by informative extension:
(94) Ass JIt is rainingK = ℘({w2 , w3 , w4 , w5 , w6 , w7 , w8 })
(95) ℘({w2 , w3 , w4 , w5 , w6 , w7 , w8 }) ∩ QJWho sleepsK =

℘({w2 , w3 , w4 , w5 }) ∪ ℘({w2 , w6 , w7 , w5 }) ∪ ℘({w7 , w3 , w8 , w5 })
We can also eliminate one alternative altogether by using informative extension instead
of domain narrowing. Consider a common ground context in which it is known that
Peter does not sleep. In this case, we get, by analogy, the question in (96):
(96) ℘({w6 , w7 , w8 }) ∩ QJWho sleepsK = ℘({w6 , w7 }) ∪ ℘({w7 , w8 , })
Why was this technical distinction useful? To see this, consider an example of a very
simple which-question:
(97) Which man sleeps?
As compared to the question Who sleeps? the main difference seems to be that (97) is
only about men, hence, intuitively, we would want to narrow down the alternatives. As
argued above, there are two general types of approaches to the problem. Either we only
want to generate alternative individuals who are men as a denotation to which man,
this would amount to domain narrowing as compared to the respective who-question,
or we want to eliminate all the alternatives in which the respective individual is not a
man by virtue of informative extension, i.e. because it is part of the common ground
that some individuals are not men.
Observe the two possible strategies for (97) given in (98). It is important to see that
there is no lambda binding option from the left hand side of the set declaration into
the right hand side, so we cannot use the w variable on the right hand side.
(98) a. {λw.sleep x w|man x v and x ∈ De } domain narrowing (de re)

where v is the world of evaluation.
b. {λw.sleep x w and man x w|x ∈ De } informative extension (de dicto)
It is often argued that these two representations correspond to a so called de re - de

dicto ambiguity which arises with embedded questions, cf. Belnap (1963), Karttunen
(1977), Groenendijk and Stokhof (1984), Beck and Rullman (1999) etc. The general
argument goes like this:
(99) a. Assume: Peter knows who sleeps.

b. Does it follow that: Peter knows which man sleeps?
If we assume that for Peter to know who sleeps means that he has an answer to the
question whether x sleeps for any individual x, then whether the argument in (99) is
valid or not depends on how we interpret the embedded question which man sleeps. If
we assume a de dicto interpretation the argument does not go through, since it may be
the case that Peter knows that Mel sleeps but he does not know whether Mel is a man
or a woman. However, if we assume a de re interpretation the argument comes out as
valid since Peter only has to know for each individual which independently qualifies as a
man whether he sleeps or not, and that, of course, he must know, since the individuals
who qualify as men are a subset of the set of individuals who qualify as humans.
For non-embedded questions, however, there is no such ambiguity. Therefore, I will

show that we can actually use both strategies to derive correct readings for which-
questions, however, it will turn out that only the second kind of strategy can be pursued
fully compositionally in an easy way. First I will discuss some problems the first strategy
runs into, then, I will turn to the second strategy and show how it ends up being superior
in several ways.
1.4.4.1 The domain narrowing (de re style) approach
The intuition behind this strategy for our example which-question is given in (100).
(100) a. When we ask Which man sleeps? we already know who the men are, so,
we should only have alternatives in the denotation of the interrogative
about those individuals.
b. The natural denotation: {λw.sleep x w|man x v and x ∈ De }
Under a naive attempt, (100) runs into a very obvious problem: The problem is that,
now, the sets of worlds under discussion do no longer require that the individual of
whom it is required to sleep actually is a man in the respective world. So assume that
Peter is a man in the world of evaluation but Peter is not a man in world w177 , he
could be a child in w177 for instance. In w177 , however, Peter sleeps. So, {w177 } will
be an element of the question denotation after we apply Q. But of course, we do not
want that, because in w177 Peter fails to be a man.
One solution to this problem is the formula in (101). (101) circumvents this problem,
because worlds in which Peter is not a man are now ruled out just as in the de dicto
reading, but there seems to be some redundancy here, which should ultimately be
eliminated on grounds of parsimony. Moreover, once we add such an information into
the declaration of the alternatives, we loose the very essence of de re readings; we have
a more constrained de dicto reading instead.
(101) {λw.sleep x w and man x w|man x v and x ∈ De } where v is the world of

evaluation.
The second problem is, again, fairly obvious. We do not want to say that there is a
world of evaluation for a question. After all, there is no point in asking a question if
we know which world we are in: a world fully determines the truth or falsity of all
propositions thereby answering any question. What is rather intended is (102):
(102) {λw.sleep x w and man x w| for all v ∈ W such that {v} |= σ it holds that
man x v and x ∈ De } where σ is the common ground information state.
Given that we have assumed that we already know who the men are, we have implicitly
assumed that the entire common ground is within one partition determined by the
question Which individuals are men. Hence, we will have the same extension for the
predicate man in all worlds in the common ground. We do need to stipulate this
as a presupposition and assume that the question operator Q will simply inherit this
presupposition, though we will ignore the technical details here:
(103) {λw.sleep x w and man x w| for all v ∈ W such that {v} |= σ it holds that
man x v and x ∈ De } where σ is the common ground information state.
it is presupposed that for any x and any v, w such that {v}, {w} |= σ it holds
that man x v ↔ man x w
Once we have this presupposition, we can actually eliminate the first occurrence of the
predicate man, because on update, for any x which is a man in the common ground
worlds, worlds in which x is a not a man will be eliminated. Hence, we can settle for
the final version in (104). This is the natural argument for the Q (or QExh) operator.
(104) {λw.sleep x w| for all v ∈ W such that {v} |= σ it holds that man x v and
x ∈ De }
it is presupposed that for any x and any v, w such that {v}, {w} |= σ it holds
that man x v ↔ man x w
Unfortunately, deriving this compositionally is troublesome because in this notation

the NP will now appear on the right hand side of the set declaration. This cannot be
achieved using the compositional rules above, since no lexical item will ever be able
to access the right hand side of a set declaration31 . The generally adopted solution
then is to give syncategorematic rules for which NP phrases. Doing that has a long
and respectable tradition going back to Karttunen (1977). Nevertheless, it would seem
little surprising if it turns out that the technical difficulty that is circumvented this way
is actually deeper.
So, Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) give a denotation like (105), which we can adapt
for the above as in (106):
(105) Jwhich manKw = {a|a is a man in w} Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002)
(106) Jwhich manK = {x| for all v ∈ W such that {v} |= σ it holds that man x v
and x ∈ De }
presuppose that for any x and any v, w such that {v}, {w} |= σ it holds that
31
Except if we raise the types even higher, hence, having sets containing sets containing sets, but we
will not want to do that.
man x v ↔ man x w
Unfortunately, the problems will not stop here. Since lexical items cannot access the
right hand side of the set declaration for binding either, we will also run into trouble
when we attempt to bind into the restrictor of some which-NP. This applies to sentences
like (107). The issue has been pointed out in Shan (2004) and also discussed in Novel
and Romero (2010).
(107) Whichi man sold which of hisi paintings?
The discussion is a bit more complicated, because Kratzer and Shimoyama have adopted
an apparent workaround solution proposed in Hagstrom (1998) for binding which un-
restrictedly quantifies over a set of functions.
s {M,g,w
(108) λi β = {f∈Dhe,σi |∀x.f (x) ∈ JβKM,g[i7→x],w } where JβKM,g,w ⊆ Dσ
However, once we do that, we get undesired readings, as shown by Shan (2004). The
problem is deep and there is no actual solution to it, even though actually showing this
is a bit more complicated and goes beyond the scope of this book.32 Notice, however,
that we do not need to actually do a lot of computation to understand the nature of the
problem: once we formulate rules that place some meaning into a place which is not
accessible for ordinary lambda binding, we generally defy recursion. For this reason,
putting any meaning of some natural language expression into the right hand side of a
set declaration, while rules of composition are such that they do not allow interaction
32
I will only outline the with this approach here. The problem is that we get way too many func-
tions. If we had two alternatives {a, b} to start with we would have expected that after the predicate
abstraction we will have two functions as a denotation. However, we will have all the right functions,
but also all other possible pairings. Consider the example:
(109) Ji who loves iKg
Here, we have at least the alternative functions in (110), as shown in more detail in Shan (2004).
(110) a. f : x → loves(a, x)
b. f : x → loves(b,
x)
loves(a, a) if x = a
c. f :x→
loves(b, b) if x = b

loves(b, a) if x = a
d. f :x→
loves(a, b) if x = b
This gives wrong prediction, for e.g. in answers to questions, now we will have all kinds of pair-list
readings that are non-existent. The problem is exemplified with the following exmple by Shan (2004),
where unwanted pair-lists are predicted:
(111) A: Who saw nobody?

B: #Peter didn’t see Jack, Max didn’t see Michael...
between right and left side, is not acceptable.
I will show later, as part of a more principled discussion of indefinites, that there is a
natural solution to this problem: thereby, however, we do not put meanings into the
right hand side but rather conditions on meanings in terms of definedness conditions
for assignments.
For now, we will conclude that there is no reason to take this path (at least as long as
we do not discuss embedded questions). Moreover, I will show that the basic intuition
will be reproduced in the second kind of strategy, the de dicto strategy, which makes
use of informative extension instead of domain narrowing for alternatives.
1.4.4.2 The informative extension (de dicto style) approach
We now consider the de dicto style approach, which will use the technique of informative
extension to get rid of unwanted alternatives. The intuition, going back to the de
dicto reading is that we can analyse a question like (112) if we do not know which
of the individuals are men. In what follows, I will argue that actually, this intuition
is misleading, even though (112) turns out to be a correct representation for which-
questions anyway.
(112) {λw.sleep x w and man x w|x ∈ De } informative extension (de dicto)
In order to derive such a reading, we need a fairly plain lexical semantics and totally
standard trees:
(113) a. JmanK = {λx.λw.man x w}

b. JwhichK = {λP.λQ.λw.P x w and Q x w|x ∈ De }
(114)
sleeps
which man
The result is then the one in (115), which is exactly the reading we wanted. Applying
the question operator Q leads to the result in (116), again, as expected.
u }
w
(115) = {λw.man x w and sleep x w|x ∈ De }
w
w
sleeps
v ~
which man
(116) ℘({w|man J w and sleep J w}) ∪ ℘({w|man P w and sleep P w}) ∪

℘({w|man A w and sleep A w}) ∪ ...
In the following purely technical argument, I will show that this question either presup-
poses that we know the extension of the predicate man or it will admit non-intuitive
answers.
Let us consider what comes out as an answer to this question. One may expect that
a declarative like (117) should invariably count as an answer, especially, since one can
see that Peter is one of the alternatives in the question.
(117) Peter sleeps. ℘({w|sleep P w})
However, it turns out that this is not true. The problem is that the set of worlds
in which Peter sleeps is a proper super-set of the set of worlds in which Peter sleeps
and Peter is a man. Put differently Ass(JPeter sleepsK) 6|= Q(JWhich man sleepsK),
so Peter sleeps cannot possibly qualify as an answer. But on closer inspection this is
a perfectly reasonable prediction, for indeed, if the question is which man sleeps the
assertion that Peter sleeps should only qualify as an answer if we know that Peter is a
man. If, for instance, Peter is a parrot or a child or an animated character, for certain,
Peter sleeps should not count as an answer.
Let us, then, consider what happens if we actually know, i.e. it is common ground
knowledge, that Peter is a man. Let us assume that this is the only proposition in the
common ground. That means that the question will be raised relative to this discourse
state and the update rule will be pure set theoretic intersection. Observe in (118) that
the only alternative which is actually not affected is the one directly concerning Peter.
However, now each alternative will entail that Peter is a man.
(118) (℘({w|man J w and sleep J w}) ∪ ℘({w|man P w and sleep P w}) ∪

℘({w|man A w and sleep A w}) ∪ ...) ∩ ℘({w|man P w}) →
℘({w|man J w and sleep J w and man P w}) ∪ ℘({w|man P w and
sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|man A w and sleep A w and man P w}) ∪ ...
Crucially, however, the condition for direct answerhood requires that the assertion set
theoretically intersected with the non-inquisitive closure of the question will entail the
question.33 This time, this intersection will give the result in (119), because each world
in the question will support that Peter is a man.
(119) ℘({v|{v} ∈ (℘({w|man J w and sleep J w and man P w}) ∪ ℘({w|man P w

and sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|man A w and sleep A w and man P w}) ∪ ...)}) ∩
℘({w|sleep P w}) =
33
We only consider the direct answerhood condition, because all the other answer types are derived
from it.
℘({w|sleep P w and man P w})
This time the condition of answerhood is satisfied, since this is now one of the alterna-
tives of the question given in (119) and therefore Peter sleeps qualifies as an answer,
precisely as desired. In other words, Peter sleeps only qualifies as an answer to Which
man sleeps if we know that Peter is a man.
This seems to be a reasonable result. But we are not quite through yet, for the very
same argument can be repeated for any answer of the kind x sleeps where x is some
name for an individual: there are exactly three possibilities.
• We know that x is not a man. In this case on update the alternative that x
is a man will be eliminated (together with all of its non-empty sub-sets) from
the question, hence, the assertion x sleeps will not qualify as an answer to the
question (for obvious reasons).
• We know that x is a man. In this case x sleeps will qualify as an answer.
• We do not know whether x is a man. In this case, x sleeps will simply not qualify
as an answer as shown above for Peter sleeps.
If this is correct, we will need a decision: either we allow only the first two cases or
we allow the third case as well. If we generally allow the third case as well, then the
answer in (120) should be judged as acceptable.
(120) Bruno is a man and he sleeps.
I claim that it is not. Even if it seems intuitively acceptable in some contexts, what
actually happens here is that the interlocutors play around with the common ground.
The question suggests that there is an agreement in the common ground about the
question who the men are, but the answer actually suggests that such an agreement
is not the case. Similarly, if the proposed answer is simply Peter sleeps the hearer
will accommodate that Peter is a man, as part of the common ground, which again,
suggests that there was actually a presupposition that we know who the men are, it
just so happened, that we did not spell out the list of men.
There are two additional reasons why there is no actual alternative to this theoretical
decision.
Firstly, unless we assume that it is presupposed that we know the complete answer
to the question which individuals are men there will not be any way to achieve focus-
congruence in the sense of Rooth (1992). The problem is, again, that the focus alter-
natives like Michael sleeps, John sleeps etc. will not match the question alternatives,
unless there is already common ground agreement as to whether these individuals are
men or not. I will show in the next chapter how we can achieve focus agreement under
the assumption that which-questions presuppose the knowledge of the extension of the
complement NP of which. I will not show how such an agreement can be achieved
without this assumption partly because I believe it is impossible.
Secondly, there is a well-known problem with the representation given above, namely
that the predicate man and the predicate sleeps are treated symmetrically, hence, the
question appears to be equivalent to Which of the individuals who sleep is a man?, cf.
Krifka (2011a) for some recent discussion. This has some undesired consequences. For
instance, one is expected to be able to ask this question in a situation in which we
know who sleeps but we do not know who is a man. But of course, this is incorrect.
However, if we assume that which man-questions presuppose that we know who the
men are, this undesired symmetry immediately disappears.
I believe that these three arguments are conclusive enough to show that it is reasonable
to assume that which-questions generally have the presupposition that the extension of
the argument NP of which is part of the common ground knowledge. I assume that it
is not generally the case that in order for a which-question to be felicitous, interlocutors
should be able to enumerate all individuals in that extension. However, there should
be a sufficient agreement on being in a particular cell of a partition regarding that
extension. In other words: he interlocutors should not consider it a question what the
extension of that NP predicate is.
Once this assumption is made, it is obvious that the de-re strategy and the de dicto
strategy have delivered exactly the same result. However, the method was different.
On the one hand we have used a domain narrowing technique, which turned out to
be conceptually and technically problematic. On the other hand, we have used an
informative extension technique, which seems superior on all grounds, once we have
the same presupposition.
The remaining question is whether we can make this idea that on the de dicto reading
there is a presupposition of knowing the extension of the which-NP formally respectable.
Actually, doing so is easy. Consider the following lexical entry for which:
(121) JwhichK = {λP.[ in the common ground context σ, QExh({λw.P x w |x ∈

De }) is not a question ].λQ.λw.P x w and Q x w|x ∈ De }
One will need a mechanism to relativize the common ground context σ to the modal
base of attitude holders in embedded contexts. But embedded questions are no concern
of this book.
The conclusion is then that once we assume that it is required by which-questions

that in the common ground information state the extension of the complement NP
is constant, we can use the de dicto style question denotation all the way, as it will
give precisely the same result as the de re style representation. In addition, it has the
advantage that it can be easily derived compositionally.
1.4.4.3 Domain restriction
There are also cases, however, in which we need contextual domain restriction proper.
It is obvious that for some wh-questions the domain of individuals under question is
not maximal, but rather limited to just some individuals. Probably, the most obvious
cases are examples involving the enumeration of the alternatives like (122):
(122) a. Which man sleeps, John, Michael or Peter?

b. Who of John, Michael and Peter sleeps?
The easiest way to derive questions with contextual domain restriction in this frame-
work is using a structure like (123), with the respective contextual variable attached to
the noun phrase, cf. Heim and Kratzer (1998).
u }
w
w
w
(123) =
w
w
w
w
v sleeps
~
which
man C
{λw.man x w and sleep x w and x ∈ C|x ∈ De }
Observe that in this case it must be assumed as a part of the common ground that
interlocutors know which individuals are in C. Hence, the very same mechanism that
we have used above will handle these cases as well. So, if John, Michael and Peter are
the only men known to be in C, including this information into the common ground
will turn all other alternatives into the empty set on update.
Alternatively, we can also propose a more sophisticated version in which the C variable
indeed constrains the number of individuals directly. However, we cannot achieve
that compositionally. Instead, we have to stipulate that wh-words inherently, lexically,
involve a contextual variable:
(124) JwhichK = {λP.λQ.λw.P x w and Q x w|x ∈ De ∩ C}
Given this analysis, we can assume that who, simplified in the previous sections, actually
has a more complex structure, which makes it eligible for de re de dicto ambiguities as
discussed above.
(125) JwhoK = {λQ.λw.human x w and Q x w|x ∈ De ∩ C}

1.5. CONCLUSION 75
Notice that there is a fundamental difference between reducing the domain of alterna-
tives generated by some wh-expression as in (124) or (125) as compared to including
a predicate which depends on a world variable into the right hand side of a set decla-
ration. The main difference is that the set of contextually salient individuals does not
depend on any further possible worlds (or linguistic expressions). This is the reason
why such a lexical denotation is possible and not problematic.
1.5 Conclusion
In this chapter, we have opted for a theory of questions and answers in the general
framework of algebraic inquisitive semantics. I will summarise the main findings in the
following:
• We have adopted an inquisitive view on meaning. Questions and assertions are

distinguished not by semantic type but on more contentfull grounds.
– A question is inquisitive and not informative in some context, whereas an

assertion is informative in some context and non-inquisitive.
• Any proposition is a set of sets of worlds with closure under sub-sets.
• There are various notions of answers to questions.
– The notion of a direct answer is the most basic one: a direct answer to a
question is one which equals one of the maximal question alternatives.
– Answers simpliciter include direct answers precise but partial answer, i.e.
we get them by creating a non-inquisitive disjunction over direct answers.
– Questions may be exhaustified. The direct answer to the exhaustified version

of a question is called a complete answer.
– Answers simpliciter to the exhaustified version of a question are called ex-

tended answers.
• To decide whether an assertion counts as an answer to a question we need to

consider the arising update and not the answer itself.
• We have proposed a compositional semantics for interrogatives in which interrog-

atives denote sets of sets of worlds, as standard in alternative semantics.
• A question operator applies closure under sub-sets, an exhaustive question oper-

ator additionally exhaustifies, hence creating propositions out of the denotation
of interrogatives.
• We have discussed compositional problems in the denotation of interrogatives

with complex wh-expressions, like which man, and settled for a theory in which
domain narrowing and informative extension have a clear division of labour:
– we use domain narrowing for restricting the maximal alternatives on con-

textual grounds
– we use informative extension to restrict the maximal alternatives on compo-

sitional grounds.
With this conceptual and compositional/technical background we can turn to the phe-
nomenon of question-answer congruence in the next chapter.
Chapter 2
The question-answer congruence

and the semantics of focus
This chapters provides the second important piece of background needed to develop the
main ideas of this book: the notion of question-answer congruence and a semantics for
focus, thereby providing the most important aspects of the grammar-discourse interface.
In the previous chapter, we have provided a theory of what questions are and what
counts as an answer to a question on grounds of content. But any assertion can be
considered an answer to an infinity of different questions. Consider, for instance (1):
(1) ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) is an answer to:

a. ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) ∪ ℘({w3 , w4 })
b. ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) ∪ ℘({w3 , w4 , w5 })
c. ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) ∪ ℘({w4 , w5 })
d. ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) ∪ ℘({w4 , w5 }) ∪ ℘({w3 , w6 })
e. etc.
If we consider questions that can be naturally expressed by interrogatives, the situation

is not much different. Consider, (2):
(2) John loves Mary. is an answer to:

a. Who loves Mary?
b. Whom does John love?
c. What does John feel?
d. What is the case?
e. What relations are there between individuals?
f. etc.
77
78 CHAPTER 2. QUESTION-ANSWER CONGRUENCE
Question-answer congruence, especially in terms of focus congruence will turn out to

radically reduce the range of indeterminacy observed in this domain. Even though the
range of questions some assertion may answer will still be large, those questions will be
systematically related. Partly, they will form equivalence classes on update.
In this chapter, I will first discuss a number of empirical data motivating the question-
answer congruence rule, then I will develop a compositional theory of focus and show
how it can capture important facts about congruence. I will widely follow Rooth
(1992) in the compositional theory of focus, however, there will be some important
differences partly due to the fact that the interface we need are questions (which are
now defined in algebraic inquisitive semantics), partly due to the fact that some choices
of implementation are different. In the last part of this chapter, I give a brief discussion
of so called intervention effects, which a theory of questions and focus should be able
to correctly predict.
Finally a note on the notion of congruence. Congruence, in particular the role of focus
herein is viewed by most semanticists as a semantic property. Scholars have arrived at
this conclusion after a long discussion of focus sensitivity. This discussion is summarised
in most detail in von Heusinger (1999). Recent additional developments are discussed
in Beaver and Clark (2008). I will not present that line of discussion in this book.
But even apart from that, congruence will be treated entirely as a match between a
particular meaning component of some utterance and some question. When we speak
of congruence between a declarative and an interrogative, we mean the congruence
between their meanings.
A certain confusion may arise because we have defined an assertion as a set of sets of
worlds in a particular way in the previous chapter. In this chapter we will use the same
notion of assertion, but we will also speak of another dimension of meaning, the focus
semantic value. This will force us to re-define the notion of assertion as a semantic
object which unites an ordinary assertion and some focus semantic value. But mostly,
when we use the term assertion, we will only mean the ordinary meaning.
2.1 The question-answer congruence informally
In this section, I will informally discuss the relation between a question and its answer at
the level of grammatical realisation, building on the insights developed in the previous
chapter on the content level, i.e. the issue what counts as an answer to a question
independently of its grammatical realisation. Congruence should be first understood
as an abstract relation:
(3) Congruence: α ∼
=q
The expression α is congruent to the question q.
2.1. THE QUESTION-ANSWER CONGRUENCE INFORMALLY 79
The congruence between questions and answers is relevant for at least two notions of
information structure: topic and focus. I will say that an expression is congruent to a
question if its topic structure is congruent and if its focus structure is congruent. I first
define the relations ∼=F in (4-a) and ∼=T in (4-b), which together define the ∼ = relation.
(4) a. α ∼
=F q iff the focus of α corresponds to the focus requirement of the
question q
b. α∼=T q iff the topic of α corresponds to the topic requirement of the question
q
c. α∼
= q iff α ∼
=F q and α ∼
=T q
Both the notions topic and focus have been extensively discussed in recent literature
as phenonema in their own right but also in relation to questions, both systematically
and from a historical perspective: see the monographs Winkler (1997), von Heusinger
(1999), Büring (2007), Beaver and Clark (2008) and the overview articles Krifka (2007),
Repp (2010), Roberts (2011b), Zimmermann and Onea (2011) or Hinterwimmer (2012).
For this reason I will not attempt to give a complete, adequate overview of the discussion
as it developed over the past hundred years.
Moreover, I will limit the discussion of congruence entirely to the notion of focus. It is
obvious, that topic plays a role as well, and it is obvious that we need some notion of
topic. Grammar employs various marking strategies that seem related to some notion
of topicality. Consider, for instance, German, which has different strategies to front
topical expressions, but may also mark topics in the so called Mittelfeld, cf. Frey (2000).
In all examples in (5), the topic is Peter.
(5) a. Den Peter habe ich gesehen.

The.ACC Peter have I seen
‘As for Peter, I have seen him.’ Vorfeld
b. Der Peter, den habe ich gesehen.
The.NOm Peter him have I seen
‘As for Peter, I have seen him.’ Hanging topic
c. Den Peter, den habe ich gesehen.
The.ACC Peter him have I seen
‘As for Peter, I have seen him.’ Left dislocation
d. Ich habe den Peter wahrscheinlich gesehen.
I have the.AC Peter probably seen
‘I have probably seen Peter’ Mittelfeld topic
But unfortunately, the literature does not seem to converge on a clear enough notion
of topicality. The original intuition comes from the distinction between psychological
subject and psychological predicate (as opposed to grammatical subject and predicate)
by von der Gabelentz (1869), who thought of the topic as what the speaker is making
some assertion about, and the predicate being accordingly what the speaker is saying
about the topic. This assumption has been influential in the semantic literature ever
since, cf. Reinhart (1981) up to Krifka (2007). Some of the topic notions in the
literature roughly fall into this tradition, other do not. At least the following notions of
topic are known: frame-setting topic (Jacobs, 2001), aboutness topic, (Reinhart, 1981),
contrastive topic (Büring, 1997; Büring, 2003), shifting topic (Givón, 1983), (discourse)
link (Vallduvı́, 1992; Vallduvı́ and Engdahl, 1996), theme (Daneš, 1970; Halliday, 1985),
see (Roberts, 2011b) for a recent discussion. I do not see the conceptual connection
between such notions clear enough to be able to say anything about topics. Moreover,
there seem to be so many reasons for grammatical fronting of constituents which is
often called topicalisation or at least related to it on the surface in language after
language (including animacy, salience, definiteness, event-related properties of the verb,
properties of quantifiers, scope etc.) that I am sceptical as to whether the notion of
topicality is actually a useful one.
Still, one must acknowledge that some aspects of what has been discussed under the
label of topicality play a role in question-answer congruence. For instance, (6) is just
not acceptable as a direct answer to the question under any intonation.
(6) (Who did you see?)

a. Der Peter, den habe ich gesehen.
The.NOm Peter him have I seen
‘As for Peter, I have seen him.’ Hanging topic
I conclude, therefore, that there is some sense in which topic congruence exists and to
the extent that topics are one (or more) valid notion (or notions) of linguistic theory,
chances are that topic congruence between assertions and questions will one day be
explicated. For what follows, however, we will only consider focus, because on the one
hand the data are much clearer and there is a vast and clear semantic literature on the
subject matter.
I first discuss the correspondence between wh-expressions and focus. I show that a
simple notion of prosodic focus will not suffice to handle the correspondence, and that
a more abstract notion of focus as a category of information structure is necessary.
I finally elaborate on the congruence conditions between focus and polar questions
(yes-no questions).
2.1.1 Focus as an abstract category
One very direct way to think about focus is this: a focus (or a focused constituent) is a
constituent of a sentence which carries the (or a) main prosodic accent. Occasionally,
the notion prosodic focus is used in this way. In this book, a more abstract notion
of focus is used, but I start with some examples involving the direct relation between
prosodic accent and wh-questions. I then move on to a motivation for this more abstract
understanding of focus.
For a starting illustration, consider (7). While the answer (7-a) seems, intuitively,
appropriate, (7-b) and (7-c) seem, in a way, inacceptable. Similarly, for (8), only the
answer (8-b) is acceptable. It appears that once a question is explicitly asked, there
are some rules according to which the prosody of the answer must correspond to the
question. In particular, the element of the answer which corresponds to the wh-element
in the question needs to bear the main accent. The main accent is marked with capitals
in the examples.
(7) Who did John kiss?

a. John kissed MAry.
b. #John KISSed Mary.
c. #JOHN kissed Mary.
(8) What did John do to Mary?

a. #John kissed MAry.
b. John KISSed Mary.
This is not to suggest that the alternative answers are not acceptable at all, it is just
that they require some special context to become more acceptable. Consider the context
in (9). Here, the answer (7-c) seems acceptable.
(9) B is returning from a party, at which there was a special game such that people
had to kiss each other according to some dice outcome. At this party, there is
one prominent female participant, the supermodel Mary. A knows that Mary
participated at the party and so did the mutual friend of A and B John.
a. A: Who did John kiss (at the party)?
b. B: JOHN kissed Mary.
But even though the answer seems acceptable, in such a case, one might feel that the
answer is indirect to a certain extent. What B seems to suggest when uttering (9-b) is
that the question (9-a) is not really the right one. Instead, A should have asked (10),
which is much more natural to ask, given that Mary is the most prominent guest at
the party. Indeed, it seems that (9-b) is the most natural answer to (10), and (7-a) and
(7-b) are less acceptable as an answer to (10).
(10) Who kissed Mary?

Example (9) is instructive, because it shows that it is not only the case, that once a
question is asked, there are constraints on the prosodic realisation of the answer, but
also the prosody itself seems to impose constraints on the question that the utterance
answers. Hence, the placement of the main prosodic accent is not only a reflex of
the question-answer paradigm, but can be actively used to signal what question the
utterance is answering.
In fact, prosodic highlighting may mainly be used to signal what question the utterance
directly targets. This is because in most cases in which a wh-question is asked, the
answer is elliptic, as in (11). Such short, elliptic answers seem to be the most natural
and economic way in which natural language answers wh-questions. Prosodic accent in
non-elliptic sentences is more frequent when there is no overt question.1

a. JOHN.
Nevertheless, there are at least two ways in which the situation is complicated. Firstly,
the very same prosodic pattern may correspond to different questions. For instance,
(12) may answer the questions (12-a)–(12-c) directly, but not (12-d)–(12-f).
(12) John kissed MAry.

a. Who did John kiss?
b. What did John do?
c. What happened?
d. #Who kissed Mary?
e. #What did John do to Mary?
f. #What happened to Mary?
As opposed to this, it seems that a sentence like (13) imposes much stronger constraints
on what questions it may answer. In particular, it is only compatible with (13-d).
(13) JOHN kissed Mary.

a. #Who did John kiss?
1
I have said that these short answers are generally elliptic. Hence, e.g. (11-a) should have a more
complex syntactic representation like JOHN kissed Mary. But this is not the only possible analysis for
short answers. In fact, there is an insightful discussion as to whether we really should analyse short
answers as elliptic or rather as isolated terms, so called radical orphans in the sense of Haegeman (1988).
Cf. Merchant (2004, 2008), Jacobson (2008) for reference. No clear-cut argument in favour of the one
or the other analysis is known to me in the literature. As noted in the previous chapter, this seems
to be a purely theoretical decision, but is important to keep in mind that it will have repercussions
on the issue how we want to represent questions. Under the perspective adopted in the last chapter,
analysing term answers as radical orphans would lead to serious complications at the interface.
b. #What did John do?

c. #What happened?
d. Who kissed Mary?
e. #What did John do to Mary?
f. #What happened to Mary?
Given the contrast between (12) and (13), there cannot be a direct relation between
the prosodic accent in an assertion and the question it may answer, since syntactic
structure (or at least the word order) seems to play a role as well.
Secondly, there are various cases in which a prosodic accent is used without any obvious
connection to questions, as discussed e.g. in Rooth (1992) and Zimmermann and Onea
(2011). Consider (14). Here, B uses a strong prosodic accent to correct the assertion
of A.
(14) A: John kissed MAry.

B: No, he KILLed Mary.
Similarly, in (15), the use of prosodic highlighting on words denoting nations seems to
be justified by some perceived contrast, and not necessarily by the question asked. One
could answer a question like What happened? with less prosodic highlighting as well.
(15) could also be an answer to the question in (16).
(15) A GERman tourist drank FRENCH wine in Italy.
(16) What kind of wine did what kind of a tourist drink?
However, the main point of the example is that we need not assume that the question
was the one in (16). As opposed to this, if instead of French we had a non-nation
stressed attribute of wine, precisely that would be required, whence the contrast in
(17) and (18):
(17) a. What happened?

(i) A GERman tourist drank FRENCH wine in Italy.
b. What kind of wine did what kind of a tourist drink?
(i) A GERman tourist drank FRENCH wine in Italy.
(18) a. What happened?

(i) ?A GERman tourist drank RED wine in Italy.
b. What kind of wine did what kind of a tourist drink?
(i) A GERman tourist drank RED wine in Italy.
Therefore, it seems safe to conclude that examples such as (14) and (15) show that the
relation between prosody and questions is not one to one.
In the literature, the abstract notion of information structure called focus has turned
out useful to handle such examples and similar ones. It has to be noted, however,
that this is not a matter of consensus. In fact, there are many approaches to accent
placement which do not use the notion focus at all. For instance, Schwarzschild (1999),
spells out a theory of accent placement entirely based on the category of givenness and f-
marking instead of the category of focus. Some similar ideas are also present in Selkirk
(1984, 1995, 2008), Kratzer and Selkirk (2007), Rooth (2010). Nevertheless, there
are various reasons why the notion of focus is justified (or even necessary, cf. Krifka
(2006b)). For one thing, it is a semantic notion which leads to a more natural form-
meaning correspondence, and secondly, it appears in various ways in many languages,
particularly, also in examples that cannot be explained with the givenness principle of
Schwarzschild (1999), e.g. in languages with focus movement, as e.g. in Hungarian
(Brody, 1990; É. Kiss, 1998; Kiss, 2002; Onea and Beaver, 2009).
Assume that focus is an information structural category with some function. We say
that a constituent α is focused if at the level of grammar it has a feature F oc,2 which we
note as αF oc . We say that a focused constituent has the function to invoke alternatives
to the denotation of α. These alternatives will play some role in the interpretation of
the host sentence, i.e. the sentence in which α occurs.
This basic definition mainly follows Krifka (2007), but is widely compatible with most
formal semantic literature on focus. Saying that the alternatives play some role in
the interpretation of the host sentence is fairly vague, but we stick to this for the
moment. For detailed discussion cf. Zimmermann and Onea (2011), who propose a
cognitive interface for the use of alternatives in terms of a limited search space in the
set of possible worlds, widely building on the notion of focus supposition introduced in
Büring (2004).
The advantage is that this idea intuitively captures both the question-answer paradigm
and the examples of correction and contrast discussed above. This is because, a wh-
question Q of the form wh-β suggests that, as far as the knowledge of the speaker is
concerned, there could be several alternatives which replace wh forming a true propo-
sition (though, as we have discussed above, things are a bit more complicated at the
technical level). For example in (19-a), it may be compatible with the knowledge of the
hearer that Peter dances and that Paul dances. The question expresses that the hearer
wishes to know which of these alternatives is correct. Focus then invokes precisely the
same kind of alternatives in the answer.
2
We use F oc instead of F following the convention in Beaver and Clark (2008) that F oc is the
maximal focus projection.
(19) a. Who dances?

Propositions compatible with the knowledge of the speaker:
(i) Peter dances.
(ii) John dances.
(iii) ...
b. JOHNF oc dances.
Alternatives:
(i) Peter
(ii) John
(iii) Max
(iv) ...
Nevertheless, spelling exactly how focus alternatives will match questions, will be the
topic of a formal exercise in the next two sections of this chapter. For now, the first
important task is to establish the relation between the abstract category focus and its
prosodic realisation. We have seen above that a sentence like (12), repeated as (20-b), is
compatible with a question like (12-b), repeated as (20-a). Crucially, the question may
not in any sense invoke alternatives to the denotation of Mary. Instead, the alternatives
may involve for instance cooking dinner, watching a movie and sleeping.
(20) a. What did John do?

b. John kissed MAry.
If, however, we analyse (20-b) as suggested in (21-b) instead of (21-a), we could say that
the alternatives invoked by focus are alternative actions John could have performed,
hence matching the alternatives the question refers to. The problem is, however, that
under the intonation suggested in (20-b) the prosodic highlighting is limited to the
direct object.
(21) a. John kissed [Mary]F oc

b. John [kissed Mary]F oc
At least since Chomsky (1972), scholars scholars have been dealing with the phe-
nomenon shown in (12) and (13) under the label focus projection. Roughly, and ig-
noring lots of the historical debate that lead to this view, the idea of focus projection
is this: a focus, i.e. a constituent marked with F oc, will necessarily contain the carrier
of the main accent, however, there are language-specific rules (see e.g. Selkirk 1995,
Gussenhoven 1999, Féry and Ishihara 2010) of stress assignment such that different foci
can end up with the same intonation pattern. Probably the most adequate interface
system for the moment is Truckenbrodt (1999), see also Büring (2006), but I will not
discuss any details, for they are orthogonal to the aims of this book. I will merely
retain the generalisations of Jackendoff (1972), stated a bit differently in (22):
(22) Prosody-focus interface:

a. A phrase can be a focus if the focus marking occurs in its constituent
which carries the main accent in the default case.
b. The most prominent accent in a sentence is a focus-marker.
Of course, such a generalisation is just as good as a theory of the intonation in the

default case, but for the purposes of this section, I will simply assume that the reader
knows the default intonation.3
Put this way, in (20-b), while Mary carries the main accent, the focus of the utterance
may vary. Since the direct object is a constituent on its own, according to this idea,
it may be a focus. However, since the verbal phrase is a constituent as well and the
main accent is inside this constituent, the whole VP may also be a focus. Moreover,
the entire sentence could be a focus. But this is only true because in the default case,
in English, the main accent of the VP is on the direct object and the main stress of a
sentence is also on the direct object. This correctly predicts that for a sentence such as
(13), repeated as (23), the focus may only be the subject: the direct object and the VP
do not qualify because they do not contain the main accent; the sentence as a whole
does contain the main accent, but at the same time, the default accent of the sentence
would be on the direct object and not on the subject. The only remaining candidate
is the subject itself, which does contain the main accent and, since it is a one-word
constituent, it also carries it by default.
(23) JOHN kissed Mary.
One virtue of such a perspective on focus is that the relation between intonation and
questions is indirect. There is a relation between questions and the abstract notion of
focus and there is another relation between the abstract notion of focus and intonation.
The latter is a problem for a theory of focus marking while the former is a problem for
a theory of focus interpretation. The delimitation of these issues is discussed at large
in Zimmermann and Onea (2011).
The problem of focus marking is not limited to intonation. It turns out that languages
come with a rich variety of ways to mark focus not all of which involve intonational
signals. Some languages, like Hungarian, (Szabolcsi 1981, É. Kiss 1998, Hunyadi 2002,
3
My claim is not meant to imply that it is possible to give a fully predictive theory of default
intonation at all. In fact, it may well be the case that only a context dependent theory of intonation is
possible. If so, it may turn out to be impossible to have a theory of default intonation, which does not
already incorporate notions which are functionally related to focus like givenness, inferability, salience
etc.. If so, the theory of focus marking could, ultimately have a very limited predictive power, however
at least for out of the blue utterances, it still may prove good enough.
Wedgwood 2005) and many others such as Mongolian, Finnish etc. (Onea and Guntset-
seg 2011, Vallduvı́ and Vilkuna 1998) mark focus (on the standard analysis4 ) by move-
ment of the focused constituent to an immediately pre-verbal position, as shown in
(24). Still, in addition, the focused constituent is also prosodically marked with the
main accent. This is particularly important if we want to distinguish between foci
within a moved constituent as shown in (25). In (25), we observe that in the first case,
the main accent is on the quantified determiner and in the second case the main accent
is on the restrictor NP, while both of them are moved to a pre-verbal position. If focus
marking in Hungarian would be only possible through movement, we would predict
that there is no semantic difference between these two examples. However, as a matter
of fact, the intuition is that they may answer different questions.
(24) a. Who sees John?

(i) PÉTer látja Jancsit.
Peter sees John.ACC
‘PETer sees John.’
b. Who does Peter see?
(i) Péter JANcsit látja.
Peter John.ACC sees
‘Peter sees JOHN.’
(25) a. Who sees John?

How Many people see John?
(i) MINDEN ember látja Jancsit.
every man sees John.ACC
‘EVeryone sees John.’
b. Who sees John?
Every what sees John?
Of which group of individual is it the case that everyone sees John?
(i) Minden EMBER látja Jancsit.
every man sees John.ACC
‘Every HUMAN sees John.’
More generally, word order effects due to focus have been often analysed directly as a
device of syntactic focus marking, most prominently by Rizzi (1997) and É. Kiss (1997);
É. Kiss (1998). There is an entire family of approaches to word order effects triggered
by focus which do not assume focus movement, however. They rather assume that the
non-canonical word order triggered by focus is due to PF movements aiming to satisfy
accent placement requirements of focus. Such approaches prominently include: Rein-
hart (1995), Ladd (1996), Neeleman and Reinhart (1998). Given the fact that prosody
is not the only relevant factor in focus marking, approaches which too strictly attempt
4
Cf. Horváth (2005, 2006) for an alternative syntactic analysis
to map word order effects on prosodic interfaces may seem to be in a conceptually fairly
bad situation, however. Consider to this end, for instance that other languages, such
as Wolof (West Atlantic, Robert 1986, Kihm (1999)) and Gùrùntùm (West Chadic),
use morphological focus markers. The example below for Gùrùntùm is adapted from
Hartmann and Zimmermann (2009):
(26) a. WHO is chewing the colanut?

(i) Á fúrmáyò bà wúm kwálı́ngálá.
FOC fulani PROG chew colanut
‘THE FULANI is chewing colanut.’
b. WHAT is he chewing?
(i) Tı́ bà wúm-á kwálı́ngálá.
3SG PROG chew-FOC colanut
‘He is chewing COLANUT.’
Now, most probably, there will not be inherent morphological interfaces analogous to
prosody interfaces. Therefore the idea that various formal features of language are
direct related to focus in terms of strategies of focus marking seems more promising.
Another virtue of this conception of focus is that one even has the theoretical option
to say that not all instances of prosodic highlighting are instances of focus. For in-
stance, Beaver and Clark (2008) and Beaver and Velleman (2011) argue for (slightly
different) two-factorial theories of prosodic accenting in English whereby focus plays
one important but not the only role. Similar views are defended in Selkirk (2008) and
Beaver et al. (2006). Under this perspective, the relation between focus and questions
may become very strong, precisely because instances of prosodic highlighting which are
empirically indistinguishable from instances of focus but have no obvious relation to
questions are motivated in an independent way.
The view that I adopt for the purposes of this book is that there is a requirement
for congruence between focus and questions, moreover, focus limits the number of
questions some utterance can answer. I will not address the relation between focus
and focus marking in individual languages. In the following, I turn to the formulation
of focus-congruence for wh-questions and polar questions by discussing examples for
which the question whether some constituent is focused or not is widely uncontroversial
in the literature.
2.1.2 The notion of focus congruence
In this section, I discuss some of the important phenomena for focus-question congru-
ence for different types of questions and answers.
2.1.2.1 wh-questions
The general rule for the focus-question for wh-questions congruence is given in (27).
The rule will be made formally explicit in the next main section.
(27) Focus congruence rule for wh-questions

The wh-expression in a question must correspond to the focus of the answer.
Consider a wh-question like (28). The question admits two kinds of direct answers: the
elliptic answer (28-a) and the full answer (28-b).

a. JOHN.
b. JOHN kissed Mary.
The simplest case is if the elliptic answer is a one-word constituent as in (28-a). In that
case, it is clear that the non-focused part of the answer is elided. Similarly, if a part
of the answer is identical to a part of the question and the other part of the answer is
identical to the wh-part of the question, as in (28-b), the situation is just as simple. In
these cases, the interface between focus marking and focus as an abstract category is
widely irrelevant, since it is obvious what the focus is.
The first complication arises if the constituent corresponding to the wh-expression in

the answer is complex. Here, internal rules for focus marking apply. So, consider the
contrast between (29-a) and (29-b). Here, the complex DP the mother of John comes
in two intonational patterns. It is only (28-b) which qualifies as a direct answer to
(28), since in this case, according to the interface rule the DP may be focused, since
the default accent of the DP is on the possessor. Nevertheless, in addition to (28), the
sentence in (29-b) may also qualify as an answer to (30-b) and the answer in (29-a)
may answer (30-a).
(29) a. The MOTHER of John kissed Mary.

b. The mother of JOHN kissed Mary.
(30) a. What relative of John’s kissed Mary?

b. Who’s mother kissed Mary?
On the one hand, this is little surprising given what we have said. It is worth noting,
however, that this shows a discrepancy between elliptic answers and long answers.
Consider the contrast in (31). Crucially, under the interpretation we are interested in,
i.e. as an answer to (30-a) or (30-b), the elliptic answers do not only contain the focus
proper but an entire constituent only part of which is focused. From this, it follows,
that it is not generally the case that an elliptic answer is a focused constituent. It may
just as well be a constituent which contains a focus.
(31) a. The MOTHER of John.

His MOTHER
*MOTHER.
b. The mother of JOHN.
JOHN’s mother
*JOHN
Another complication is that the answer to a question may not syntactically match
the structure of the question entirely, or - for that matter - not at all. Consider some
natural answers to (28):
(32) a. It was JOHN, who kissed her.

b. It was JOHN.
c. It was JOHN, I guess.
d. JOHN did it.
e. ...
The requirement is that there is a correspondence between the focused constituent of

the answer and the wh-word in the question, but the syntactic structure of the answer
may be radically different as compared to the question.
Another important observation, which is partly already evident in (32-c), is that it

is not always the focus of the entire sentence that is to be considered. For (32-c),
the afterthought I guess is completely irrelevant for the question-focus congruence
rule. More generally, one can assume that the question-focus congruence rule is always
limited to the part of the sentence which is at issue in the sense of Simons et al. (2010),
i.e. which is meant to address the question. In (32-c), the addition that the speaker is
not sure about the answer is not part of the proposed answer and, therefore, even if it
does contain an additional focus that will not count for the question-answer congruence
rule. Similar examples involve e.g. conditionals or relative clauses:

a. I don’t know, but if JOHN kissed Mary, he will get into SErious trouble.
b. If she is HAppy, then it was JOHN who kissed her.
c. Mary, that stupid little BITCH, JOHN kissed her.
In all three examples above, there are several foci in the sentence but only one part of
the sentence content-wise addresses the question. On the one hand, these example show
that there are examples of focus which do not stand in any congruence relationship with
the question the host sentence addresses.
On the other hand, the example in (33-a) (but also (32-c)) shows that the focus-question
congruence rule does not directly require that the question is in any sense answered
by the sentence, it suffices that the question is targeted. In other words: (33-a) does
not answer to question (33). In fact, the speaker makes it explicitly totally obvious
that he doesn’t know the answer, hence he is in no position to answer. Moreover, the
clause containing the focus on John is contained in a conditional, hence the sentence
as a whole doesn’t even entail that John kissed Mary. So, here, there is absolutely
no assertion of what could count as an answer. Yet, the focus-question rule seems to
apply. Nevertheless, in this book we will limit our attention to cases in which the host
of the focus qualifies as an answer on the conceptual grounds discussed above.
There are also instances of double focus as shown in (34). These often signal that
the assertion is an answer to a double wh-question. Double foci and multiple foci
are discussed e.g. in Krifka (1991), see Beck and Vasishth (2009) for a more recent
perspective.
(34) a. Who kissed whom?

b. JOHNF oc kissed MARYF oc .
Also, there are some puzzling examples. Famous are, for instance, the so called Schmer-
ling examples and related surprise-effect foci. Above, I have stated that for answering
a What happened? style question, typically, one will require a default prosodic accent,
in order to get the abstract focus-projection to the entire sentence. But it turns out
that answers to What happened? can be fairly natural even if the focus is different, as
shown in the examples from Schmerling (1976).
(35) What happened?

a. JOHNSON died.
b. Trueman DIED.
Here, the example (35-b) is predicted, however the example in (35-a) does not only
seem natural as well, but it is actually reported by Schmerling as a naturally occurring
television report, even though the focus is only the subject and not the entire clause, as
one would expect. The background of these examples contributes to the puzzle: There
is Trueman and there is Johnson, two politicians. At the time of the respective reports
Trueman is seriously sick, hence people could expect him to die. Johnson, however, is
not known to be sick. The most recent proposal that could account for this kind of
examples is Gillingham (2013) who suggests a surprise operator for focus. In the next
chapter, we will be able to explain these examples in a more principled way, however.
2.1.2.2 Polar questions and verum focus
For polar questions like (36), (27) cannot apply, since polar question lack a wh-element.
Nevertheless, there are some constraints on focusing in answers to polar questions as
well.
One complication is the distribution, meaning contribution and cross linguistic variation
of answer particles, which may appear alone as in (36-a), together with an elliptic (36-b)
or a non elliptic (36-c) answer, or not appear at all, as in (36-d) and (36-e). However,
in this book, I will not discuss answer particles at all. The reader is referred to the
insightful work Farkas and Roelofsen (2012) which covers a wide range of variation on
semantic grounds. Further insightful work worth mentioning: Ginzburg (2012), Biezma
and Rawlins (2012), Kramer and Rawlins (2011), Krifka (2013).
(36) Is Peter happy?

a. Yes / No
b. Yes, he is.
c. Yes, he / Peter is happy.
d. He is.
e. Peter is happy.
What is important for the current purposes is that in a direct answer to a polar question
there is a very limited use of focus. Any prosodic stress on a constituent from which
focus cannot project to the entire CP is unacceptable in a direct answer, as shown in
(37).
(37) a. Is Peter happy?

b. #Yes, PEter is happy.
Of course, an example like (37) can have a natural interpretation. However, in such
a case, it seems as though the direct answer is limited to the answer particle and the
following sentence adds additional information, e.g. the implicature that someone else
is not happy or that potentially Peter is the only one who is happy.
One way to think about this constraint is to assume that an answer is congruent to
a polar question if it has a CP-level focus. Unfortunately, the problem with such an
approach is that, in most cases, the answer to a polar question will only contain lexical
material which already appears in the question itself and therefore it will typically be
de-accented based on phonological rules discussed e.g. in Schwarzschild (1999). For
this very reason, a default CP-level focus accent does not seem acceptable as a direct
answer to a polar question. Nevertheless, the acceptability of (37) is significantly lower
than the acceptability of (38-b).
(38) a. Is Peter in love with Jane?

b. #Yes, he is in love with JAne.
One natural way to answer polar questions involves prosodic stress on the inflected
verb, as e.g. in (39). Such patterns have received a fair amount of attention since
Gussenhoven (1984), and it has been found that they emphasise the truth value of the
sentence. This phenomenon is often called verum focus following Höhle (1992).
(39) Yes, he IS in love with Jane.
This intonational pattern we find in many languages:
(40) Did Peter kiss Mary?

a. Ja, Peter HAT Maria geküsst. German
Yes Peter has Mary kissed
‘Yes, Peter DID kiss Mary.’
b. Igen, Péter MEGcsókolta Marit. Hungarian
Yes Peter PRF-kissed Mary.ACC
‘Yes, Peter DID kiss Mary’
In the analysis of such examples, I will follow an idea explored in Zimmermann and
Hole (2008), who argue that phenomena such as verum focus are part of a more gen-
eral pattern of focusing functional categories. In particular, they observe that given
particular kinds of alternatives, one can focus the verb or VP (41), the tense operator
(42), the mood operator (43), and (for the case of verum focus) the polarity operator
(44).5 The German examples are from Zimmermann and Hole (2008), glosses added.
(41) a. What’s Peter doing to the car?

b. Er repaRIERT es (gerade).
He repairs it (right now)
‘He’s FIXING it.’
(42) a. Has Peter (already) fixed the car?

b. (Nein), er repaRIERT es (gerade).
No he repairs it (right now)
‘(No), he’s rePAIRing it (right NOW).’
(43) Peter würde eine Runde ausgeben, wenn er gewonnen HÄTTE, aber er
Peter would a round give if he won had but he
5
Such operators are assumed to be parts of the syntactic representation of sentences in a layered
LF approach.
HAT nicht gewonnen.

has not won
‘HAD he won, Peter would shout a round, but he DIDN’T win.’
(44) a. I wonder if Peter is (indeed) repairing the car (as he should be).
b. (Ja), er repaRIERT es.
(yes) he repairs it
‘Yes, he IS fixing it’
Zimmermann and Hole argue that while in German all of these types of focus are
realised in exactly the same way, in some cases, there are clear arguments that they both
structurally and semantically differ. One of the arguments is that different languages
use different strategies to express them, and there is a clear correlation between verb
movement to higher functional layers and the realisation of different types of foci.
So, even in German the verum focus is not actually realised on the verb but on the
C projection where presumably one can assume a polarity operator. This becomes
obvious in examples in which it is the inflected auxiliary that moves to C (45) or in
which C is occupied by a complementiser (46) (which is known to block verb movement
to C, van Besten (1983) and many others). Crucially, only (46) is unambiguously a
verum focus.
(45) Peter HAT das Auto repariert.

Peter has the car repaired
‘Peter HAS fixed the car’
(46) DASS Peter das Auto repariert.

That Peter the car fixed
‘...that Peter has fixed the car’
Instances of tense, aspect or mood focus should be analysed as answers to wh-questions,

although the respective wh-expression may not actually be grammaticalised:
(47) a. Did Peter kiss Mary already?

b. No, he is kissing her right NOW.
As opposed to this, verum focus is a genuine answer to a polar question.
While many scholars have claimed, most explicitly Höhle (1992), that verum focus in
some sense emphasises the truth or falsity of the respective proposition on semantic
grounds, I do not see what it means to emphasise the truth of some proposition, as
Höhle observes himself. After all, any assertion is an assertion of truth, if one desires,
an emphasis that the proposition is true (a proposition can be true even if it is not
asserted). Certainly, this is not to suggest that the propositions in (48) are exactly the
same. There are differences, for sure, even if not in truth conditions. But crucially,
if one claims that (49-b) is the same as (48-a), then he should come up with a story
about what (49-a) means. If anything, that would mean adding one more layer of It is
true that. However, this does not seem plausible at all. In fact, I would assume that
in (48-a) and in (49-a) the proposition that Johnson is a man is used as an indirect
quotation. Verum focus, however, does not seem to have anything to do with quotation.
(48) a. It is true that Johnson is a man.

b. Johnson is a man.
(49) a. It IS true that Johnson is a man.

b. Johnson IS as a man.
I will settle for a much weaker claim here: verum focus marks a genuine congruent
answer to yes-no questions, in fact, the only possible marked answer which shows
that the question addressed must be polar.6 For any other realisation of focus in an
assertion, an analysis of the assertion as an answer to a wh-question is at least possible
(often unavoidable). So, while a CP level focus counts as a congruent answer to a polar
question, it is also a congruent answer to the question What happened? As opposed
to this, verum focus is only congruent to polar questions. The impression that verum
focus emphasises the polarity of the proposition might arise pragmatically because
verum focus is the only marked answer to a polar question. Using the marked answer
instead of the unmarked one results in a certain pragmatic load, which gets exploited
pragmatically in some way or another.
A bit more technically, we can think of the CP level focus, realised with default clause
intonation, as generating propositional alternatives of all kinds. Now, the alternatives
polar questions give rise to are compatible with such a huge set of propositional alter-
natives. But default intonation resulting in a CP level focus is compatible with any
question, even if it is often interpreted as marked.7 . As opposed to this, verum focus
generates exactly two alternatives, the proposition with a positive and a negative polar-
ity. This is why this focus is only compatible with a polar question. There are several
ways to implement this compositionally, but in virtually all proposals in the literature
there is some operator high at LF, typically in a C position, which will serve this pur-
6
In fact, this is quite exactly what Gutzmann (2012) derives compositionally using a verum operator
which is an identity function over propositions, but generates opposite focus alternatives.
7
It is worth noting that there is an apparent contradiction here: I have said above that in an answer
to a subject wh-question a stress on the direct object in the answer is not acceptable. Saying now that a
default accent, which allows an interpretation as a CP focus, is compatible with any question is exactly
the opposite, since we know that in English at last the default focus is on the direct object. However
the contradiction is only apparent, because the mapping between accent and focus is not one to one.
In a subject wh-question the direct object is already explicitly mentioned which leads to de-accenting
(Schwarzschild, 1999). Therefore it is no longer the case that the default accent is on the object. On
the contrary, one may say that the default accent is on the subject in this case, so we could analyse a
clear subject-accent as a CP level focus as well.
pose either directly or indirectly, mediated by general focus interpretation devices, cf.
Gutzmann (2012) for several technical implementations. Since, presumably, such an
operator will be at the level of the complementiser but the focus will not project to the
entire CP, we call this C level focus.
This leads to the congruence rule for polar questions in (50):
(50) Focus congruence rule for wh-questions

A C focus or CP focus are congruent to a polar question.
Having said this, we can generalise that whenever an overt question is asked the focus
of the answer must be congruent. Moreover, whenever we have an assertion and no
overt question, we can assume that the range of implicit questions the assertion could
answer is limited by the focus of the assertion. In particular, a C focus signals a polar
question, any other term or constituent focus signals a wh-question. Only a sentence
with a CP level focus (also known as all-new) which exhibits default intonation is totally
uninformative as far as the range of possible questions to be answered by the assertion
is concerned.
2.2 Alternative Semantics for focus
Turning to the semantics of focus, exactly the same discussion could be repeated as
for questions. Alternative Semantics is mainly developed in Rooth (1985, 1992, 1996),
and the structured meaning approach is developed in a number of papers, Cresswell
and von Stechow (1982), Jacobs (1983), von Stechow (1982, 1990, 1991) and Krifka
(1991, 1995, 2001). Again, I will use Alternative Semantics. In what follows, I will first
develop a system originally proposed in Rooth (1992) with some minor modifications,
in part also following Beaver and Clark (2008).
Rooth (1985, 1992) assumes two levels of semantic representation, i.e. two interpreta-
tion functions, the ordinary semantic value and the focus semantic value. While Rooth
uses the superscript O for ordinary semantic value, I will ignore that according to the
translation rule:
(51) J KO = J K
Given the general assumptions above, I will need to make a slight modification to
Rooths system right from the start: for ordinary semantic value, Rooth uses standard
meanings, as given in (52).
(52) a. JP eterK = P
b. JP eter sleepsK = sleep P
2.2. ALTERNATIVE SEMANTICS FOR FOCUS 97
As opposed to this, in the previous chapter, I have assumed that ordinary meanings
are always sets. Since I do not believe that in questions natural language expressions
have different meanings than in assertions, I will stick to the claim that every meaning
is included in a set. Hence, the ordinary semantic value of simple sentences will be as
discussed before, and we will end up with a proposition after applying Ass or one of
the question operators Q or QExh. Whether we end up with a question or not, will
depend on the operator we chose, the denotation of the expression we evaluate (e.g.
the question operators will not create alternatives out of thin air as opposed to the
non-informative closure operator) and on the context (since many propositions fail to
be questions in some contexts).
In addition, Rooth (1992) introduces a second interpretation function, which is called

the focus semantic value, and noted as J KF . The focus semantic value will be identical
to the ordinary semantic value for all expressions unless they are focused, so:

a. JP eterKF = JP eterK = {P}
b. JM aryKF = JM aryK = {M}
c. JJohnKF = JJohnK = {J}
d. JAnnaKF = JAnnaK = {A}
e. JsleepsKF = JsleepsK = {λx.λw.sleep x w}
f. JlovesKF = JlovesK = {λx.λy.λw.love y x w}
g. JwhoKF = JwhoK = {P, M, J, A}
Once an expression is focused, it is assumed that its focus semantic value will denote
all alternatives to the expression, i.e. all entities of the same semantic type. In order to
capture intuitions about the ‘right’ focus alternatives, one may want to consider a richer
type theory such as Asher (2011) or at least distinguish gender features as in Onea and
von Heusinger (2009). Note that in the example the focus alternative values for the
two verbs are singletons just because there are no alternatives in our mini-language.8
Note also that the focus alternatives induced by a wh-word are only apparent, since
they are identical to the ordinary semantic value.

a. JP eterF oc KF = JM aryF oc KF = JJohnF oc KF = JAnnaF oc KF = {P, M, J, A}
b. JsleepsF oc KF = {λx.λw.sleep x w}
c. JlovesF oc KF = {λx.λy.λw.love y x w}
d. JwhoF oc KF = {P, M, J, A}
8
In fact, in chapter 7 I will show that there is a problem hiding here, but we will ignore that issue
until then.
The rules of composition are the same as for the ordinary meaning, except that they
target the focus sematic value. (69) is modified to (55):
(55) Rule for composition

If α is a tree with two daughters β γ then JαKF,M is defined iff there is a σ
and ψ such that JβKF,M ∈ Dhhσ,ψi,τ i and JγKF,M ∈ Dhσ,τ i
iff defined, the result will be of type hψ, τ i and is computed as:
JαKF,M = {a b|a ∈ JβKF,M and b ∈ JγKF,M }
This allows to compute a simple example:
u }
w
w
(56) S = {λw.sleep P w}
w
w
w
v ~
PeterF oc sleeps
u }F
w
w
(57) S = {a b|a ∈ JsleepsKF and b ∈ JP eterF oc KF }
w
w
w
v ~
PeterF oc sleeps
= {a b|a ∈ {λx.λw.sleep x w} and b ∈ {P, M, J, A}}
= {λx.λw.sleepx w P, λx.λw.sleep x w M,
λx.λw.sleep x w J, λx.λw.sleep x w A}
= {λw.sleep P w, λw.sleep M w, λw.sleep A w, λw.sleep J w}
Again, wh-words behave - at an intuitive level - unexpectedly, since their focus semantic
value is identical to their ordinary value even if they are focused. Actually, this is not
surprising once a general rule for calculating the focus semantic value is formally given:
(58) Focus semantic values

a. JαK = JαKF for any expression α if α is not focused.
b. JαF oc KF = Dσ iff Type(JαK) = hσ, τ i
Consider that John denotes an individual, i.e. it is of type he, τ i. Now, according to
the definition, the focus semantic value of a JohnF oc is De . Similarly, who denotes a
set of individuals, i.e. it is of type he, τ i, which yields exactly the same result. This is
because the type he, τ i is defined in a way that includes both individuals and sets of
individuals in the domain. In fact, the way in which he, τ i contains individuals is in
terms of singletons containing individuals.
This has two important implications: first, focusing a wh-word does not make any
semantic difference. This has one positive consequence, namely that I can remain totally
agnostic on the discussion of whether wh-words are inherently focused or not, because
this will simply make no difference whatsoever in the semantics. Second, alternatives
induced by focus at the level of focus semantic value mix with alternatives induced by
wh-words, but only at the level of focus semantic value. This means that we can clearly
distinguish between alternatives which come from the wh-word and alternatives which
come from focus: we see focus alternatives only at the level of focus semantic value,
whereas we see the wh-alternatives at both levels of meaning.
Consider the sentence (59):
(59) Who loves PeterF oc ?

a. JWho loves PeterF oc ?K =
{λw.love J P w, λw.love A P w, λw.love M P w, λw.love P P w, }
b. JWho loves PeterF oc ?KF =
{λw.love J P w, λw.love A P w, λw.love M P w, λw.love P P w,
λw.love J A w, λw.love A A w, λw.love M A w, λw.love P A w,
λw.love J J w, λw.love A J w, λw.love M J w, λw.love P J w,
λw.love J M w, λw.love A M w, λw.love M M w, λw.love P M w, }
Once the focus semantic value of expressions is computed, the alternatives can be used
in various ways. Rooth (1992), for instance, argues that the alternatives are used for
at least four aims:
1. As an interface to questions, i.e. to model the question-answer congruence.
2. As non-local ressources in the computation of the semantic value of focus sensitive

particles.
3. As a way to model formal contrast.
4. As a means to model scalar implicatures (in question-answer paradigms).
The particular way in which Rooth uses the alternatives is to introduce the so called
squiggle operator ∼. This operator is assumed to be part of the LF to be interpreted.
This operator catches the alternatives of its sister node and presupposes that the context
in some sense contains these alternatives or at least a sub-set of them.
For example, the squiggle operator may appear attached to a CP which would require
that the context provides propositional alternatives as shown in (60). This is generally
the kind of LF that we use when we require question-answer congruence. Certain
theories of association with focus will use such alternatives to derive exhaustification
with only as well. But it can also appear deeply embedded, e.g. above an NP. In this
case, ‘smaller’ alternatives are called for as in (61), where we will either have alternative
individuals or quantifiers, depending on the determiner.
(60)
CP ∼
...
(61) CP
XP
YP
DP ∼
...
...
...
One particularly interesting case is the following: assume a complex sentence in which
an entire CP is embedded. Here, the squiggle operator may disambiguate different
kinds of questions the sentence may target. Consider the examples in (62) and (63).
The idea is that the maximal focus projection in both examples is the embedded CP.
Crucially, however, in the first case we are interested in alternatives to the embedded
CP as an argument of the matrix clause, i.e. we will get alternative propositions stating
that John has different beliefs. In the second case, we are only interested in alternatives
to the embedded CP; we ignore the matrix clause when checking whether the context
satisfies the presupposition triggered by ∼.
(62) What does John believe?
a.
∼
John
believes CPF oc
Peter sleeps
b. {John believes that Peter sleeps, John believes that Max sleeps,
John believes that Anton sleeps, John believes that it is raining,...}
(63) What happens?

a.
John
believes
CPF oc ∼
Peter sleeps
b. {Peter sleeps, Max sleeps, Anton sleeps, Peter sleeps, It is raining, ...}
Moreover, there can be several ∼ operators in the same sentence, each of them having its
very own function. In particular, Rooth (2010) uses ∼ (though in a different notation)
very often in an attempt to predict the intonation pattern of the sentence in a model
which combines focus and givenness mainly building on the technology introduced in
Schwarzschild (1999). He uses ∼ not only to presuppose focus alternatives, but also
to mark when a non-focused constituent is discourse given. Note that this is possible,
because the ∼ operator will presuppose that a (non-emtpy) sub-set of the focus semantic
value will be present in discourse. Now, if the focus semantic value is a singleton, this
will mean precisely that the ordinary denotation of the ∼ marked constituent is present
in the discourse, i.e. it is ‘given’.
For our purposes, the only relevant aspect is that in the discussion of congruence we will
never need the actual focus semantic value of some sentence. Instead, we only consider
those alternatives which are ‘captured’ by ∼. Making this work compositionally turns
out to be not quite as simple as one would like. This does not hinge particularly on our
inquisitive setting but on the very nature of the problem. In fact, there are three issues
here: Firstly, if ∼ is supposed to somehow see the focus semantic value of it’s sister
node, it must somehow trigger an own compositional rule. Secondly, if ∼ is supposed
to generate a presupposition, we will need to represent it. If we want to allow several ∼
operators in the same tree, we will need to represent the presuppositions of ∼ in a set,
to which one can add something, i.e. we end up with many presuppositions instead of
one. Finally, if we want to assume that ∼ somehow gets rid of the focus alternatives in
the process of the composition, we will need to specify that as well. And we do actually
need to assume that ∼ can kill focus alternatives because we will need this to model
focus sensitive operators.9
One sketch of a technical implementation is given in Rooth (2010), though it has some
disadvantages: it is incomplete as a discourse interface, it uses way too many operators,
which are invisible represented in non-standard trees and it is way too opaque for
9
There is a theory of focus sensitivity as in Beaver and Clark (2008) which does not use the ∼
operator, however that theory tends to get problems with deep embedding and will need to posit
locally accommodated questions. While this is a valid theoretical decision, I will not assume that here.
Generally, for cases without embedding, all I will say is compatible with Beaver and Clark (2008), as
far as the inventory of tools is concerned that they need to generate the meaning of focus sensitive
particles.
manual use, also it did not become obvious to me whether Rooth can actually handle
several presuppositions at a time and match them within the same sentence is he ought
to. I will not give examples here, since introducing his formalism would require quite
a bit of space.
Another, much simpler solution seems to be this: assume that ordinary semantic values,
in this version indexed with a + sign, are tuples. The first element of those tuples is a
set of presuppositions. Each presupposition is a set of focus-alternatives. The second
element of the tuple is the standard ordinary meaning. Focus semantic values are as
before:
(64) Ordinary denotation

JαK+ = hP, Ai
As a technical side-note, it is worth contemplating the types10 : the type of A thereby

is going to be hσ, τ i, if α is a sentence, σ will be hs, ti. However, the set P is a bit
problematic, from the point of view of types, since it is a set containing sets of entities.
The problem is, however, that those entities may have different types. So, we will end
up with a set P of sets Qi...n , such that the type of Qi may differ from the type of Qj .
We will not have a type for such sets and this is a fairly big difficulty if one intends
to implement this theory in a functional programming language using typed functions
which is still subject to research in functional programming. To see how the problem
can arise, consider what P should be for a tree like (65): the elements of P are a set
of individuals (i.e. focus alternatives to a name, which we get from focused DPs with
an attached squiggle as shown in (65)) and a set of propositions, which we get from a
squiggle attached to an entire CP.
(65)
∼
DPF oc
transVerb
DPF oc ∼
There are various, fairly complex ways to handle this problem, none of them being
particularly easy or intuitive. For this reason, we will assume that JαK+ = hP, Ai is
just an informal way to describe a fully deterministic procedure and I will not provide
a full type theoretic implementation. Notice, however, that we encounter this problem
really only because we are in search of a general solution. We do not know anyway how
to check for alternatives in discourse which are not propositions. So, we can just as
10
One can define a type for a tuple or just treat it as a set of sets using the type τ . This is not part
of the actual problem.
well ignore them. If we ignore any non-propositional alternatives, the entire type issue
automatically disappears.
Every time, a ∼ operator is encountered in the tree, it will add the focus semantic
value, e.g. a set of classical propositions, to the set P. P will then contain sets of
classical propositions. At the same time, there will be a rule that Jβ ∼KF = Jβ ∼K,
hence resetting focus alternatives. Furthermore ∼ will be interpreted as a polymorphic
identity function in J K. Finally, as a matter of notation, I access the elements of the
tuple by index. Hence JαK+ +
1 is the set of focus presuppositions, whereas JαK2 is the
ordinary meaning proper.
The rule of composition is now given in (66):
(66) Rules of composition for J K+

If α is a tree with two daughters β γ then JαK+,M is defined iff there is a σ
and ψ such that JβKM ∈ Dhhσ,ψi,τ i and JγKM ∈ Dhσ,τ i or iff γ =∼.
iff defined and γ 6=∼, the result will be a tuple hP, Ai where A will be of
type hψ, τ i and A will be a set. The resulting tuple is computed as: hJβK+
1 ∪
+,M
JγK+
1 , {a b|a ∈ JβK2 and b ∈ JγK+,M
2 }i.
iff defined and γ =∼, the result will be a tuple hP, Ai and is computed as:
+,M
hJβK+ F
1 ∪ {JβK }, JβK2 i.
Meanings will be, accordingly defined as in (67). Notice that focus does not change
anything, hence will be ignored.

a. JP eterK+,M = h∅, {P}i
b. JM aryK+,M = h∅, {M}i
c. JJohnK+,M = h∅, {J}i
d. JAnnaK+,M = h∅, {A}i
e. JsleepsK+,M = h∅, {λx.λw.sleep x w}i
f. JlovesK+,M = h∅, {λx.λy.λw.love y x w}i
g. JwhoK+,M = h∅, {P, M, J, A}i
Focus semantic values are unchanged as compared to (53), however the semantic rule
for focus semantic value composition is changed:
(68) Rules of composition for J KF

If α is a tree with two daughters β γ then JαKF,M is defined iff there is a σ
and ψ such that JβKF,M ∈ Dhhσ,ψi,τ i and JγKF,M ∈ Dhσ,τ i or γ =∼
iff defined and γ 6=∼, the result will be of type hψ, τ i and is computed as:
JαKF,M = {a b|a ∈ JβKF,M and b ∈ JγKF,M }
iff defined and γ =∼, the result is computed as: JβK+,M

2
To show, how the current system works, we calculate the example in (69). Notice that
this is a purely analytical exercise, given that the compositional rules are fairly difficult.
It is of no relevance, whether this tree could ever actually appear in natural language
syntax. Typically, we use several ∼ operators in more involved examples. We proceed
step by step:
u }+
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
(69) w
w

w
w
w ∼
w
w
wPeter
w F oc
∼
v ~
loves AnnaF oc
Since in (69) the right node is ∼, we move to (70):
(70) hJ[PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]]K+ F

1 ∪ {J[PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]]K },
J [PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]] K2+,M i
We now calculate, J [PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]]K+,M and we shall return to (70) to
fill in the results. To calculate this, we first notice that the right node is not ∼, we
transform to:
(71) hJPeterF oc K+ +
1 ∪ J[[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]K1 ,
{a b|a ∈ J PeterF oc K+,M
2 and b ∈ J [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]K2+,M }i
Having reached a first terminal, we can simplify the formula as in (72). Notice that we
thereby used the fact that the set theoretic union with the empty set does not change
the result.
+,M
(72) hJ[[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]K+
1 , {a b|a ∈ {P} and b ∈ J [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]K2 }i
Now, we calculate J [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]K+,M and we fill feed in the results into (72).
Since again the right node is ∼, we move to (73):
+,M
(73) hJ [loves AnnaF oc ]K+ F
1 ∪ {J [loves AnnaF oc ]K }, J [loves AnnaF oc ]K2 i.
Now, we can directly compute J [loves AnnaF oc ]K+ which we can write as:
+,M
hJ loves K+ +
1 ∪ JAnnaF oc K1 , {a b|a ∈ JlovesK2 and b ∈ JAnnaF oc K+,M
2 }i.
Since all are terminals, we can push in the lexical entires, hence getting after the trivial
replacements: h∅, {λy.λw.love y A w}i. Moreover, we can calculate J [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]KF
which has not changed, according to the rules, hence yielding:
{λy.λw.love y A w, λy.λw.love y J w, λy.λw.love y M w, λy.λw.love y P w}. To
keep the formula simple, we will use a placeholder for this set: f ocV P . We now can
return to (73), replacing the results which leads us to (74), which is the result for:
J [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]K+,M .
(74) h{f ocV P }, {λy.λw.love y A w}i
Now we can replace the result in (72) as shown in (75), which simplifies to (76).
(75) h{f ocV P }, {a b|a ∈ {P} and b ∈ {λy.λw.love y A w}}i
(76) h{f ocV P }, {λw.love P A w}i
Remember that (76) is the result for J [PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]]K+,M , which we
will need to replace into (70) as shown in (77).
(77) h{f ocV P } ∪ {J[PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]]KF }, {λw.love P A w}i
What remains to compute is J[PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]]KF which shows the last
twist of the system. According to the rules, we get: {a b|a ∈ {P, J, M, A, } and
b ∈ J[[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]KF,M }. We now need to compute:J[[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]KF,M but
since this time the right node is ∼, the rule for compute focus semantic values requires
to take: J[loves AnnaF oc ]K+,M
2 , which we calculated already: {λy.λw.love y A w}. By
replacing the results, we then get:
J[PeterF oc [[loves AnnaF oc ] ∼]]KF =
{λw.love P A w, λw.love J A w, λw.love A A w, λw.love M A w}.
We can abbreviate this entire set as f ocCP , which leads to the final result.
(78) h{f ocV P }∪{f ocCP }, {λw.love P A w}i = h{f ocV P, f ocCP }, {λw.love P A w}i
The result is exactly as desired. We get two distinct sets of focus alternatives in the
presupposition, each respectively triggered by the ∼ operator. Now, one may want to
observe that the ∼ operator does not per se require that anything in its sister tree is
focused. So, we can also imagine a configuration as in (79). The reader may easily
check that the result will be as follows:
u }+
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
(79) w
w

w
w
w ∼
w
w
w
wPeter ∼
v ∼ ~
loves AnnaF oc
h{{P}, f ocV P, {λw.love P A w}}, {λw.love P A w}i
We can use, just as in Rooth (2010) the ∼ operator, to signal given constituents. For
instance in the example in (79), Peter is marked as given, similarly, the entire sentence
is marked as given. This gives us a great deal of flexibility to capture facts about
intonation, even though I will here only hint at the purely technical side, not going into
the details here.
The general idea is this: the squiggle operator (∼) will generate presuppositions. We
say that a sentence is acceptable, if all the presuppositions generated by ∼ are satisfied.
There are two ways to satisfy them. One way is sentence internal and the other one is
at the level of discourse. There are some examples in the literature, the most famous
one being the case of the American and Canadian farmer, given in (80), which require
sentence internal justification, i.e. the accent on Canadian is justified by the presence
of American in the sentence. Discourse justification boils down to discourse givenness,
contrast and, what will be our topic in the next section: congruence to questions.
(80) An AmERican farmer met a CaNAdian farmer.
Let us assume that each presupposition in the presupposition set of some sentence will
be removed once it is justified. Now, a very simple modification of our system will help
modelling sentence internal justification within the compositional system: We switch
to multi-sets when gathering presuppositions and assume that once the composition
is finished, we eliminate all elements which appear more then once, or, which contain
each other. Then, the remaining presuppositions in the presupposition set must in
some sense or another match elements in the discourse.
For the example in (80), this means the tree representation in (81). Here, both adjec-
tives will generate alternatives of the same type. In a multi-set representation, they
will hence appear twice. For precisely this reason they will be deleted at the end of
the computation, which correctly predicts that both foci are justified without imposing
any further requirements onto the context.
2.3. THE QUESTION-FOCUS CONGRUENCE 107
(81)
met
An
farmer a
AmERicanF oc ∼ farmer
CaNAdianF oc ∼
I will not spell out the details of such a modification, for that would go beyond the
scope of this book. For our current purposes, we will only need one way in which focus
presuppositions can be satisfied, and that is congruence to questions. It is important
to see, however, that the proposed system comes with inherent advantages which go
beyond the immediate aims we follow here.
2.3 The question-focus congruence
The essential job that remains to be done is to formulate the rules of question-answer
congruence in terms of focus semantics. The traditional view, which will not quite be
suited for our purposes is more or less (82):
(82) Congruence rule (preliminary version):

The focus semantic value of a congruent utterance is a super-set of the deno-
tation of the question it directly targets.
The reason why in (82) it is requested that a question is a sub-set of the focus semantic
value instead of being identical with it is mainly that questions may have explicit or
implicit domain restriction, such as in (83). Generally, in this context the two versions
of the question will be interpreted in the same way. One standard way to handle this is
to assume that the meaning of who involves contextual restriction, which is standardly
modelled by assuming a contextual variable C, as a set of salient individuals, as shown
in (84)
(83) Peter speaks with John about their mutual friends Anna, Maria and Jane.
a. Peter: Who is the most beautiful?
b. Peter: Who of Anna, Maria and Jane is the most beautiful?
c. Peter: Which friend of mine is the most beautiful?
(84) JwhoK = De ∩ C
Now, if the answer is (85), one can assume that the set of focus alternatives is not
constrained by the context. In that case the number of question alternatives will be
lower than the number of focus alternatives, hence the sub-set relation seems exactly
what we need.
(85) John: ANna is the most beautiful.
But why not assume that the focus alternatives are also constrained by the context?
The main conceptual argument is that the focus alternatives are part of the meaning of
some expression and the meaning of an answer should not depend on the question that
expression is supposed to answer. But one could ignore this kind of conceptual reasoning
and assume that if the context variable is able to restrain the question alternatives, then
it will certainly be able to do so for focus alternatives as well. After all, if the question
is the context of the answer, the answer may inherit the context variable as well.
Nevertheless, this would be a hopeless attempt. Consider (86). In order to make an
identity based congruence rule work, one would have to make sure that the alternatives
to Anna are all managers and the alternatives to Mary are all secretaries. However, if
salience is supposed to do this, salience should ‘know about’ grammatical roles at least.
This is too much to ask from a set of individuals.
(86) a. Because of which secretary has Peter broken up with which manager?
b. Peter has broken up with ANNA because of MARY.
Having established the congruence rule in (82), we still face a problem. The focus alter-
natives we have derived above are sets of classical propositions. However, questions are
downward closed sets of sets of worlds, not just any set of alternative classical proposi-
tions. Therefore questions will generally not be sub-sets of the set of focus alternatives,
because focus alternatives will lack downward closure (under sub-sets). Hence, we will
need to first apply downward closure to the focus alternatives. Fortunately, this is not
problematic. From the perspective of types, the focus alternatives are just the same
kind of denotation that we have already sighted when discussing questions. Hence, we
can use the operators Q or QExh for achieving downward closure.
Consider a simple example, in which we do not assume domain restriction for the ques-
tion, hence we expect that the focus alternatives will equal the question alternatives.
We first calculate the question interpretation.
(87) a. Who sleeps?

b. PeterF oc sleeps.
(88) QJWho sleeps?K =

℘({w|sleep P w})∪℘({w|sleep A w})∪℘({w|sleep M w})∪℘({w|sleep J w})
(89) AssJPeterF oc sleepsK = ℘({w|sleep P w})
(90) QJPeterF oc sleepsKF =

℘({w|sleep P w})∪℘({w|sleep A w})∪℘({w|sleep M w})∪℘({w|sleep J w})
As is obvious, QJWho sleeps?K = QJPeterF oc sleepsKF . Using QExh on both sides in-
stead would also lead to equality, hence congruence is correctly predicted, since equality
happens to be an instance of the sub-set relation: ⊆.
Nevertheless, it seems unnatural to assume that we have a special operator which only
operates on the level of focus alternatives. Moreover, we already have established above
that we should not directly handle the focus semantic value of some sentence, because
the focus alternatives are actually interpreted by ∼. If there is only one ∼ in a sentence
and it is attached to the CP, the difference is not important, but we do not need to
make this assumption. We develop the following operators using the official version in
which focus is “seen” only be the squiggle.
We start with the simple assertion operator. We assume that the assertion operator
takes an expression as an argument. Again, we access the first element of a tuple with
the subscript α1 and the second element with the subscript α2 . As a final prerequisite,
we assume a function which takes a set of sets of alternatives as an argument, and picks
out the characteristic sets of all alternatives which are classical propositions and deletes
everything else meanwhile preserving structure. For simplest notation this function will
be noted as 0 .
(91) The function 0
α0 = {a| exists b ∈ α and fbijective : b → a such that for all x ∈ b it holds that
f (x) = {w|x w}}
We now define the assertion operator in (92). Notice that we have kept the presup-
position that the result should be an assertion in the context. Put differently, focus
presuppositions are entirely different, as compared to plain presuppositions. I believe
that this is, indeed, empirically correct.
(92) The assertion operator

0
Ass α = h{ {℘(a)|a ∈ b}|b ∈ JαK+ +
S S
1 }, ℘( {{w|aw}|a ∈ JαK2 })i
There is a presupposition that (Assα)2 is an assertion in the context σ
Observe that (Ass α)1 will be a set of propositions and (Ass α)2 will be a proposition.
Since the bracketed notation is somewhat tedious, we will generally underline Ass α if
we mean (Ass α)1 . If we mean (Ass α)2 we write Ass α, but only in cases in which
misunderstandings are not likely. Whenever possible misunderstandings are suspected,
we will use the standard bracketed notation.
Now we can write a very first rule for congruence:
(93) Congruence rule (intermediate version)

α is congruent to β if there is an γ ∈ Ass α such that β ⊆ γ.
Consider some examples. In all examples the question is (94). Also, we assume that
for all assertions the ∼ operator is attached to the CP, for we have seen that any other
attachment will not result in propositional alternatives.
(94) A: Who sleeps?
Hence, we are interested in whether the answers are going to be congruent to Q(94),
i.e. ℘({w|sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep A w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep M w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep J w})
Consider now the first candidate, given in (95). Ass([ [ PeterF oc sleeps? ] ∼ ]) =
h{℘({w|sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep A w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep M w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep J w})},
℘({w|sleep P w})i. Now, the congruence rule requires that there is an element of
Ass([ [ PeterF oc sleeps? ] ∼ ]) such that the question is a sub-set thereof. Obvious,
the only element of the focus-presupposition is identical with the question, hence (95)
is a congruent answer to (94).
(95) B: PETER sleeps.
The very same way we can show that (96) is not congruent, for the focus presupposition
will be entirely different.
(96) B: Peter SLEEPS.
For (97), if the focus is assume dot project to the entire CP and the ∼ operator is also
attached to the CP, the only element of the focus presupposition will be ℘(W). Now,
the question will be a sub-set thereof. This predicts that this is a congruent answer.
However, we will also require that an answer to a question qualifies as an answer on
the definitions of the previous chapter as well. (97) does not qualify as any kind of
answer.11
(97) B: Peter loves MAry.
11
Rooth (1992) required that the assertion itself should be one of the question alternatives. We do
not require this, because we will want to allow extended answers simpliciter and extended answers as
well. In those cases, this requirement would predict wrong results.
Notice that this congruence rule has the virtue that it will allow embedded clauses
with a ∼ attached to their respective CPs to match a question even if the entire matrix
clause is not congruent. So, the answer to a question may well be embedded. While
this is not new, and in fact, already allowed by Rooth (1992), to my knowledge, this is
the first fully explicit spell-out of this idea.
Still, there are two main reasons, why this rule is actually useless. Firstly, once we are
in an algebraic inquisitive setting, for a proposition being sub-set of another is actually
something different than for a set of classical alternatives to be a sub-set of another.
The main difference is that a sub-set relation is entailment in this general setup. Now,
the congruence rule requests that the question under discussion entails the question we
would get from focus alternatives. This is not a relation between maximal alternatives.
Consider one abstract example which would satisfy the requirement:
(98) a. Question:℘({w1 , w2 , w3 })∪℘{w2 , w3 , w4 }∪℘({w1 , w2 , w5 })∪℘{w2 , w3 , w6 }

b. Focu alternatives:℘({w1 , w2 , w3 , w4 , w5 , w6 }) ∪ ℘{w7 }
In (98), there all of the question alternatives are “in” the question derived from the
focus denotation, however all of them are sub-sets of the same alternatives. This is not
what we wanted.
Secondly, even if there was a way to rule out this problem, this rule will only hold for
mention-some questions. We still need to spell out congruence to mention-all questions,
i.e. partitions.
Now, there may be an argument to the following extent: we do not need a rule for
congruence between assertions and mention all questions because, contrary to what we
have said in the first chapter, wh-questions actually denote plain Hamblin-Alternatives.
Exhaustification is, instead, pragmatic. So, if we wish to spell-out a rule for congruence
for exhaustive question we are just wasting our time.
Let us assume, for the sake of the argument, that this is correct. Still, nobody will
doubt that even if the plain denotation of Who sleeps? is non-exhaustive, there will be
partitions as denotations of some questions. For instance, Zimmermann (2012) argues
that German quantifying questions like (99) are exhaustive even if in his view generally
wh-questions are not exhaustive.
(99) Wer hat alles Maria geküsst

Who has all Mary kissed
‘Who-Exh has kissed Mary?’
More generally, the point is that it is beyond doubt that under any logical definition
of what a question is, a partition will be a question. Now, anyone who claims that we
need no focus congruence rule for a partitions, implicitly also claims that a sentence
like (100) is not going to be a valid answer to any wh-interrogative. I do not know of
any scholar ever having explicitly claimed this.
(100) Only MARY sleeps.
The conclusion ought to be that even those who generally doubt that we need a parti-
tion semantics as the denotation of all wh-interrogatives (including myself in previous
research) should admit that we need a rule of focus congruence with regard to those
questions which are partitions. So, the following discussion is necessary and there is no
safe way to avoid it, at least not in the framework of Alternative Semantics or, more
specifically, in inquisitive semantics.
Mention-all question denote partitions. Partitions are opaque as for the alternatives
that generated them, hence if we want e.g. PETER sleeps. to be congruent to the ques-
tion QExh(Who sleeps?), we will need to create a partition out of the focus alternatives
of the assertion as well.
But this leads to another problem: we have assumed above that focus alternatives are
not contextually restricted, however question alternatives may be. Unfortunately, the
number of alternatives is decisive for the partition we get. To see the problem, just
consider the nature of exhaustification. If we have two overlapping sets A and B the
partition arising by exhaustification will be: {A \ B, B \ A, A ∩ B}. But if we add one
more set C, which overlaps with both, the new partition will be :{A \ B \ C, B \ A \
C, A ∩ B \ C, A ∩ C \ B, B ∩ C \ A, C \ A \ B, A ∩ B ∩ C}. Crucially, the first partition
is not a sub-set of the second partition. Precisely the same applies to sets of worlds if
they are question denotations.
Technically, there are several possible solutions to the problem. The most straightfor-
ward one is this: Partition all subsets of the focus alternatives one by one and require
that the question partition equals one of them. For the above abstract example, if we
want to partition {A, B, C}, we will find the sub-set {A, B} which will trivially deliver
exactly the first partition. But since we required sub-set relationship instead of equality
in the congruence rule before, there will be a mismatch in the rule: equality in parti-
tions and sub-sethood with respect to non-partitioned alternatives. This is, however,
no problem, since we can apply the same technique to non partitioned alternatives as
well, hence requiring equality in both cases. In fact, this also trivially solves also the
problem we have shown above that sub-set relations in inquisitive semantics behave
differently as compared to classical Hamblin semantics.
This leads to the assertion operator in (101) and the congruence rule in (102).12
12
It is also possible to define an exhaustive assertion operator in this framework, however I assume
that exhaustification actually takes place more locally, and therefore I do not pursue this line any
further:
(101) Assertion operator (final version):

S
Ass α = h{( {℘(a)|a ∈ b}), {c| there is some d ∈ b such that c ⊆ d and for
0
all d ∈ b it holds that c ⊆ d or c ∩ d = ∅}| there is an e ∈ JαK+
1 such that
S +
b ⊆ e}, ℘( {{w|aw}|a ∈ JαK2 })i
(102) Congruence rule (final but incomplete version)

α is congruent to β if there is an γ ∈ Ass α such that β = γ.
Now, (101) is a powerful operator, since it performs the following job: for each set of
focus alternatives derived from α by using ∼, it will downward close and partition all
of its subsets. Non-surprisingly, then Ass α is the set of all questions α is congruent
with plus the set of propositions to which the focus could mark contrast. This turns
out to be a maximal benefit. Let us consider the simplest of examples: PETER sleeps,
but for simplicity, we reduce the set of individuals to Peter, Mary and Jane.
(103) Ass PETER sleeps =

h{
℘({w|sleep P w}),
℘({w|sleep M w}),
℘({w|sleep J w}),
℘({w|sleep M w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep J w}),
℘({w|sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep J w}),
℘({w|sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep M w}),
℘({w|sleep P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep M w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep J w}),
℘({w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep J w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|¬sleep J w}) ∪
℘({w|¬sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep J w}),
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep J w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|¬sleep J w}) ∪
℘({w|¬sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep J w}),
℘({w|sleep M w}∩{w|sleep P w})∪℘({w|sleep M w}∩{w|¬sleep P w})∪
℘({w|¬sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep P w}),
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|¬sleep M w} ∩ {w|¬sleep J w})∪
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|¬sleep J w})∪
℘({w|¬sleep P w} ∩ {w|¬sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep J w})∪
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep J w})∪
℘({w|¬sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep J w})∪
℘({w|sleep P w} ∩ {w|¬sleep M w} ∩ {w|sleep J w})∪
℘({w|¬sleep P w} ∩ {w|sleep M w} ∩ {w|¬sleep J w})},
AssExh α = hAss α, {a|a ∈ M and for all b ∈ (A \ C ? ) it holds that a ∩ b = ∅}i

where A is the characteristic set of a maximal set of focus alternatives, C is the characteristic set of
ordinary denotation and B ? is defined as {a|there is a b ∈ B such that b ⊆ a and b is of the same type
as a} and M is the maximal partitions in Ass α which has been derived using the ordinary denotation
as one alternative.
℘({w|sleepPw})i
I wish to conclude this section by an important remark: We have said in the last chapter
that the decision how to model question alternatives for which-questions depends on
focus congruence. Since at that time we did not have a theory of focus, this was simply
a claim. Now, it is time to show that. The decision to make was whether we will accept
which-questions which have alternatives of the kind as in (104) after the update which
are not fully equivalent (105).
(104) Which man sleeps ℘({w|sleeps P w and man P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleeps J w

and man J w})...
(105) Which man sleeps ℘({w|sleeps P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleeps J w})...
The idea is that we compositionally get alternatives like in (104), however, we assume
that in the common ground it is already known who is a man and who is not a man.
Now, all propositions about alternatives of whom it is known that they are not men
will be reduced to the empty set of worlds, because the classical proposition that x
is a man will be false for those alternatives. Crucially, for all individuals for which
it is already known that they are men, the additional condition that x is a man is
superfluous under this assumption. Of course, if we do not assume that in the common
ground we know who are men and who are not, we will end up with alternatives like in
(104) which do not reduce to (105). The claim is now, that we cannot generally have a
focus congruence rule for questions like (104), but we trivially have one for (105). The
second part of the claim is obvious and needs no further discussion. The first part is a
bit more involved, however.
Firstly, observe that if we stick to classical propositions, as in the original system of

Rooth (1992), indeed, we will not be able to establish congruence. To see this, compare
the focus alternatives with the question alternatives in a classical setting:
(106) a. Which man sleeps CL {{w|sleeps P w and man P w}, {w|sleeps J w

and man J w}, ...}
b. PETERF oc sleeps CLf ocusalternatives
{{w|sleeps P w}, {w|sleeps J w}, ...}
The set of question alternatives is now not a sub-set of the set of focus alternatives.
Notice that if we were to require that each question alternative entails some focus
alternative instead of the classical sub-set requirement, we would firstly, allow over-
answers and secondly, we would have a hard time making sure that they do not actually
entail the same focus alternative, which would ruin the entire enterprise.
2.4. INTERVENTION EFFECTS 115
In the inquisitive setting, the situation is by no means better. If we go back to the sub-
set requirement, we will get congruence for free, as shown in (107), since each classical
proposition generating the question is stronger then the respective one in the focus
presupposition, hence under downward closure we get that the question is a sub-set of
the focus presupposition. However, I have argued above that the sub-set requirement
for congruence in algebraic inquisitive semantics is nonsensical, since being a sub-set of
another propositions means entailment in this framework and has nothing to do with
congruence.
(107) a. Question: ℘({w|sleeps P w and man P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleeps J w and

man J w})...
b. Focus presupposition: ℘({w|sleeps P w}) ∪ ℘({w|sleeps J w})...
Once we require equality between the question and a sub-set of the focus presupposition,
we run exactly into the same problem as in the case of classical propositions: the focus
presupposition will include a set containing the world wn in which Peter sleeps but Peter
is not a man whereas such a world may not be included into the question denotation.
This complements the argument made in the previous chapter, that we can only guar-
antee focus-question congruence if we assume that questions are intersected with a
common ground information state which already settles the extension of the which-
NP.13
2.4 Intervention effects
While, intuitively, the above system is more or less exactly what we would expect, in
the last decade a phenomenon has become prominent in the literature on the syntax-
semantics interface of wh-expressions and focus which arguably shows that the system
above is blatantly wrong: the so called intervention effects studied among others in
Beck (1996); Beck and Kim (1997, 2006); Beck (2006). Some Korean examples are
given in (108) from Beck (2006).
(108) a. *Minsu-man nuku-lûl po-ass-ni?

Minsu-only who-Acc see-Past-Q
‘Who did only Minsu see?’
b. Minsu-nun nuku-lûl po-ass-ni?
Minsu-Top who-Acc see-Past-Q
‘Who did Minsu see?’
13
Finally, if the starting alternative differ, it also can be easily seen that we will not be able to match
partitions either, as the reader can easily verify.
c. nuku-lûl Minsu-man po-ass-ni?

who-Acc Minsu-only see-Past-Q
‘Who did only Minsu see?’
The examples license the generalization in (110) from Beck (2006). Call the focused
element associated with the focus sensitive particle only an intervener. The problem
with the a. example is then that an intervener c-commands the wh-element which
remains in situ. Some additional examples from German in (109), also quoted from Beck
(1996) show that interveners may not only be focused expressions but also quantifiers.
(109) a. *Wen hat niemand wo gesehen?

whom has nobody where seen
‘Where did nobody see whom?’
b. Wen hat Luise wo gesehen?
whom has Luise where seen
‘Where did Luise see whom?’
c. Wen hat wo niemand gesehen?
whom has where nobody seen
‘Where did nobody see whom?’
The generalization emerging and defended in much detail in the literature is then
given in (110), cf. also Kim (2002). Thereby intervene means that the intervener is
c-commanded by the complementizer but c-commands the wh-word.
(110) Generalization
An intervention between a wh-phrase and its licensing complementizer is for-
bidden.
The most influential analysis of this phenomenon is given in Beck (2006). Beck sum-
marizes her proposal in such a clear and compact version that I decided to quote the
respective paragraphs entirely:
I follow Rooth in attributing a twofold semantic contribution to focused

phrases: their ordinary semantic value on the one hand, and a set of al-
ternatives of the same type on the other. A wh-phrase shares with focus
the second role. Unlike focus, the wh-phrase makes no ordinary semantic
contribution. I propose that the ordinary semantics of the wh-phrase is in
fact undefined. Since wh-phrases occur in expressions that have a perfectly
well-defined ordinary semantic value, something must rescue the structure
as a whole from undefinedness. This is the role of the question operator.
Thus I propose that the LF of (33) is (33’), and that the semantics of Q
lets it ignore the ordinary semantic value of its sister, and elevate its focus
semantic value to the ordinary semantics.
(33’) [Q [ who left]]

2.4. INTERVENTION EFFECTS 117
Things go wrong when there is in addition a focus in the question whose

contribution is evaluated within the question, i.e. within the scope of the
Q operator. This situation is schematized in (35).
(35) [Q ... [Op [φ ... XPF ... wh ...]]]
For the focus on XP to be evaluated within the scope of the Q operator

means that there is a focus sensitive operator, here: Op, which uses the
semantic contribution of the focus. Op could be ’only’ or ’even’ or the like,
or, in Rooth’s (1992) more indirect framework for association with focus,
it could be the operator. We know that when focus is evaluated at the
level of a phrase φ, focus semantic values enter into ordinary semantics. For
example, in order to derive the semantics of ”only John left”, we need to
consider both the proposition that John left, and alternative propositions
’that x left’ for alternatives x to John. This means that with all focus sen-
sitive operators (other than the question operator), we use the ordinary as
well as the focus semantic value of φ. Moreover, the effect of focus is neu-
tralised, i.e. for external purposes the expression φ behaves as if all foci had
been reset to their ordinary semantics. The problem that arises in (35) is
that the wh-phrase has no ordinary semantics. Thus the ordinary semantics
of φ is undefined. This undefinedness is inherited by the larger structure.
But since the focus semantic value has been reset to the ordinary semantic
value, the sister of the Q operator has neither a well-defined ordinary nor
a well defined focus semantic value. Not even the Q operator can save the
structure from undefinedness. This, I claim, is why structures like (35) are
unacceptable.
Certainly, the claim that wh-questions have no ordinary semantic value comes with
a particularly elegant solution for intervention effects. However, it turns out that in
the system presented above, intervention effects can be captured by a very simple
stipulations as well. In fact we only need one stipulation:14
(111) Intervention blocking

If in a language L an expression α is an intervener JαβK is only defined if
|JβK| = 1
To understand the virtue of (111), one just needs to remember that no expressions
except for wh-expressions may have an ordinary semantic value that has a cardinal-
ity higher then one. Hence, unless an intervener c-commands a wh-word, (111) has
absolutely no effect. Also, (111) has no effect concerning the focus semantic value in
whatsoever way. What remains to be explained is why for embedded questions it is
no longer a problem if an intervener c-commands the wh-words from outside the em-
bedded CP. One possible explanation for this is that embedding verbs that can embed
questions will manipulate directly denotations with a higher cardinality and turn them
14
For simplicity, I have given the rule using plain denotations. We can translate this rule to J K+
denotations without any difficulty. Conceptually, there is no difference.
into a propositional variable having a cardinality of 1. For instance, this can be done
by assuming that question embedding verbs are quantifiers over the set of alternatives
in their complement; such a line of attack is standardly chosen for verbs like to know,
to remember, anyway.
There is a question as to whether there are advantages on the analysis presented in

Beck (2006) as compared to the one suggested here, especially concerning the overall
parsimony of the theory. Saying that wh-words have no ordinary semantic value seems
like a deeper insight than postulating that interveners require a cardinality of 1 from
their sister nodes at LF. However since we can write these postulates into the lexical
entry for interveners (i.e. we need no extra rule) the theoretical parsimony argument
doesn’t seem to take us very far. The advantage of the current proposal is that we
get a possibility to interpret focus in questions as well and we do not need to assume
that wh-words are focused. This seems to be a serious empirical advantage, since it
seems to be simpliciter true that questions exhibit information structure. It is thus
the null-hypothesis that information structure in questions is somehow relevant to the
discourse-semantics interface.
2.5 Conclusion
In this chapter, we have first reviewed a number of empirical data concerning question-
answer congruence. We have accounted for these data by assuming that focus is an
abstract category of information structure. Thereby, a distinction is made between
a theory of focus interpretation and focus marking. We have only concentrated on a
theory of focus interpretation in this chapter.
We have assumed that focus generates alternatives, as generally assumed in Alternative

Semantics. We have assumed that in order to get question-answer congruence, the
focus-alternatives will need to match the question alternatives. This is the point at
which the three main innovations of this chapter comes into the picture:
• Firstly, we have adapted Alternative Semantics for focus to match questions which
denote propositions in terms of algebraic inquisitive semantics. In order to achieve
this, we needed to apply closure under sub-sets for focus alternatives, in a way,
generating questions out of them, which can match the questions which are the
respective common ground information state. We have assumed that this job is
performed by the assertion operator.
• Secondly, we have given a compositional analysis of the ∼ operator used in Rooth

(1992) which is very similar to Rooth (2010). Nevertheless, we have used more
standard trees and less operators to achieve that.
• Finally, we have implemented the idea that mention some questions and their
exhaustified counterparts will admit exactly the same answers. The problem
2.5. CONCLUSION 119
hereby was, that exhaustified questions denote partitions, and focus alternatives
have no clear connection to partitions. To achieve a match between partitions
and focus alternatives, we have used a technique of partitioning over all sub-sets
of the focus-alternatives.
The chapter ended with a very brief discussion of so called intervention effects. The
main point of this discussion was not an in depth analysis of intervention effects as
such but rather to show that the general line of attack pursued in this chapter is
not compromised by the data that motivated totally different assumptions about the
ordinary semantic value of wh-words.
There are some natural extensions of the theory, which I did not spell out in this
chapter: For instance, given that questions have standard ordinary values and focus
alternatives at the same time, we can also establish congruence rules between questions
and questions. Also, I did not spell out how congruence works for polar questions (since
polar questions are just a special subclass of wh-questions under this theory) and I did
not spell out, how verum focus generates alternatives. These phenomena should follow
naturally from what has been said above.
Nevertheless, some problems remain. For instance, there is a well-known issue with
over-focusing, discussed in Krifka (2001) and I will discuss some additional problems
of Alternative Semantics which arise once we focus properties/verbs in Chapter 7.
Generally, Alternative Semantics seems to be a very powerful and useful theory as long
as we focus referential expression. However, once we focus properties, problems tend to
arise. While in Chapter 7, it will be more important to consider the limits of the theory,
for now, it is more important to see the virtues of Alternative Semantics: it allows us
to spell out in a perfectly clear way what we mean by question answer congruence.
This, on its turn, allows us to develop a model for discourse in which questions and
question-answer congruence play one essential role.
Chapter 3
Potential questions in discourse
The main aim of this chapter is to introduce the notion of potential questions as part of
a simple discourse model which will serve as a powerful interface to grammar. In order
to achieve this, we will need three main ingredients: a) we need a clear formal definition
of potential questions as part of a set of discourse rules, b) we need a clear motivation
for the general setup of the discourse model and c) we need a clear motivation for why
one would want potential questions as part of the discourse moves to start with.
In this chapter, I will first outline a general view on discourse as a strategic, cooperative
enterprise, widely following Roberts (1996, 2012b). I will conclude this discussion
with clear definitions of strategic components, in particular, of sub-questions and their
role both in the overall discourse setup and in information structure. Second, I will
argue that a purely strategic discourse misses important facts about the rationale of
discourse moves. Following this, I will spell out the definition of potential questions
and their structural role in the discourse model. And thirdly, I will show how adding
potential questions to the model immediately helps analyse two important phenomena:
unexpected focus accents and over-answers.
3.1 Strategic discourse and sub-questions
The aim of this section is to give a general conceptual analysis of what it means for
discourse to be strategic. In particular, I will argue that discourse can be analysed
as an attempt to agree on the answer to a question. Moreover, I will argue that a
notion of strategic discourse cannot really be avoided once the assumption is made
that discourse is about answering questions. I will argue, however, that the notion
of strategic discourse will only come with any useful predictions if overt questions are
present or the grammar-discourse interface is powerful enough to strongly constrain
possible questions under discussion at any time. Finally, I will give some definitions
which will be useful for the following discussion.
121
122 CHAPTER 3. POTENTIAL QUESTIONS IN DISCOURSE
3.1.1 Discourse is about answering a question
Since Grice (1967) linguists generally think of linguistic communication as a cooperative

enterprise. One way to understand this is that there is an abstract level at which
communication is a joint activity with the same goal for all interlocutors. This does
not mean that the interlocutors do not have particular individual goals when they start
communicating. However, the assumption is that, communication being a joint activity,
there is some (stable or dynamically evolving) goal that interlocutors share once they
get involved in communication. Grice formulates this in a particularly cautious manner
as follows:
The following may provide a first approximation to a general principle.

Our talk exchanges do not normally consist of a succession of disconnected
remarks, and would not be rational if they did. They are characteristically,
to some degree at least, cooperative efforts; and each participant recognizes
in them, to some extent, a common purpose or set of purposes, or at least
a mutually accepted direction. This purpose or direction may be fixed from
the start (e.g., by an initial proposal of a question for discussion), or it
may evolve during the exchange; it may be fairly definite, or it may be so
indefinite as to leave very considerable latitude to the participants (as in
a casual conversation). But at each stage, SOME possible conversational
moves would be excluded as conversationally unsuitable. We might then
formulate a rough general principle which participants will be expected
(ceteris paribus) to observe [...].
... (Grice 1975 p. 45)
It is not obvious what the common goal ought to be. We need some kind of goal
which can justify the cooperativity principle (in whatever way we may formulate it, i.e.
whether strictly following Grice or not). I will assume, following an idea very directly
defended in Roberts (1996), that such a common goal is answering a question. The
motivation for this idea will be somewhat different as compared to Roberts (1996),
however.
In particular, Roberts sees cooperative discourse as a way to follow common goals, as

suggested by Grice. Based on this view, she postulates a cooperativity principle like the
one in (1), from which, as a special case, she claims that it follows that if individuals
agree on a question that needs to be resolved, answering that question will become the
common goal of both individuals.
(1) Rational Cooperation in a Discourse D:

Make your utterance one which promotes your current intentions in D.
... (Roberts 2012a p. 8)
The first main argument in this section is against this idea of Roberts: I believe that
we should not assume that questions are a special case of following goals/intentions in
3.1. STRATEGIC DISCOURSE AND SUB-QUESTIONS 123
discourse. Instead, I will argue in what follows that discourse ought to be analysed
more directly as an enterprise to answer questions. To make this argument, I will first
attempt to show the problems I see with assuming that discourse is about following
more general goals. I will then provide some arguments as to why questions should
rather be treated as primitives.
Let us first reconstruct the argument of Roberts:
The conventional meaning of linguistic expressions does not fit the meaning intended to
be conveyed by the speaker. One may call this underspecification of speaker meaning
by conventional meaning. Nevertheless, interlocutors are successful in communication
and therefore one should assume that there are devices and principles that facilitate the
retrieval of speaker meaning for the hearer. One hypothesis is that discourse structure
is one essential factor in this enterprise. So far, there is a certain level of consensus in
the literature, however, the particular spell out of how discourse may help in retrieving
speaker meaning can differ. Some theories of discourse assume that discourse enhances
communicative success by principles of rhetoric relations, as argued e.g. in Asher and
Lascarides (2003). Other theories such as Centering Theory (Walker et al., 1998) resolve
some aspects of anaphoric underspecification using salience and attention in discourse.
Roberts (1996), Roberts (2011a), Roberts (2012a) argues that retrieving speaker mean-
ing amounts to recognising the intentions of the speaker. This is then mainly facilitated
in a general discourse setup which is structured around goals and intentions of the in-
dividual interlocutors:
My hypothesis is that the structure of a discourse interaction is de-

signed to help satisfy Retrievability, to make it be reasonable to intend
that one’s audience will recognize that one intends them to both grasp the
proposition one intends to express and recognize that one proposes that this
proposition is true (or not, in the case of ironic statements).
... (Roberts 2012a p. 5.)
Roberts (1996) emphasises the role of the so called question under discussion (QUD) in
retrieving speaker meaning. Assume that for a given state of discourse development the
hearer of some utterance knows what question the speaker intends to address by some
utterance he makes. In this case, the hearer has an edge in attempting to reconstruct
the intentions of the speaker, given that the intentions of the speaker will be directly
related to the question under discussion. Probably the simplest conceivable example is
the case of elliptic-/term-answers to wh-questions. Consider the example in (2). Here,
if we do not know what question the assertion addresses, we may have a hard time
understanding what the speaker means. But once the question is known, the answer is
easy to interpret as expressing a full proposition.1
1
The idea the QUDs may help in anaphoric disambiguation has recently been pushed in Keshet
(2013), who argues for an entire theory of binding outside the c-command domain using focus alterna-
(2) a. Who killed the sheriff?

b. The barber did it.
Roberts (2012a) argues that the ways in which discourse structure facilitates meaning
retrieval goes beyond the role of questions under discussion. Discourse structure is
viewed as a structure of common (and individual) goals, and questions are - in a sense
- a special case thereof:
we can characterize the relevant goals in a discourse as the intentional

structure of the interlocutors’ exchange [...] Informally, the idea is that,
in keeping with Grice, meaning recognition is intention recognition. So in-
terlocutors who want to track each others’ meanings must track each others’
evident intentions. Thus, in a full model of the conversational scoreboard
for a discourse, in addition to the elements from the InfoStr of the earlier
paper,we expand the tuple of kinds of information to include a set of in-
terlocutors and, for each interlocutor, their evident goals at that point in
the discourse. At any given point in discourse, the set of sets of individual
interlocutor goals for all the interlocutors, G, also includes their common
goals at that point, Gcom. G is closely related to the QUD: Each accepted
question corresponds to a common goal of the interlocutors, and hence is
also reflected in the personal goals for each. Since the sincere adoption of
a goal involves the intention to achieve that goal (and in a rational agent,
the assumption that it is reasonable to attempt to do so), the resulting
structure over the interlocutors’ goals is intentional in character. This [...]
is intended to make it clear that goals and the corresponding mutually evi-
dent intentions of the interlocutors form the central structure of a discourse
interaction. Just as intentions generally are constrained by beliefs and drive
action, so the intentions in G and QUD, constrained by CG, both drive and
constrain interpretation.
... (Roberts 2012a p. 7-8)
Two question arise at this point, given in (3):
(3) a. Why can we assume that relevant common goals of interlocutors exist?
b. Is there any evidence that goals apart from questions do play a role in the
grammar/pragmatics interface?
(3-a) appears to be most important. Definitely, if two individuals are involved in

communication, one may reasonably assume that they do have a common goal, namely
to communicate (about some topic). This may involve that each interlocutor has the
aim that he understands the other and that the other understands him. The goal to
communicate is so abstract, however, that it does not seem to facilitate the retrieval
of speaker meaning in any interesting way. But apart from this, it is not obvious why
tives and questions as the essential tool. While that theory is still not fully worked out, it does support
the general intuition of Roberts.
we would assume that further common goals exist. This is especially problematic for
goals which would in some sense license something like active cooperation.
Consider an example: A may want to communicate with B with the individual aim to
convince B to clean up the bedroom. B on the other hand, may enter the very same
discourse with the individual aim to convince A to clean up the bedroom himself. It is
possible to say that, abstractly, A and B share the goal to agree on the answer to the
question (4):
(4) Who should clean up the bedroom?
But this is only an abstraction, for A’s goal is that they agree upon a specific answer
to (4) and B’s goal is that they agree upon a totally different answer to (4). A mere
reaching of agreement is certainly uninteresting for both A and B. So active cooperativ-
ity may or may not be expected. Moreover, if the common goal is only an abstraction
it is not so clear how it could play any role in any real process, e.g. in the retrieval
of meaning. It is very important to see that unless A and B do somehow start to
cooperate in discourse they will fail to communicate. So my argument is not against
the idea that discourse is cooperative. The point is merely that from the individual
aims A and B have it is not obvious how a common aim can be derived, which would
lead to cooperation.
The second problem, (3-b), is both empirical and practical: while there has been a
great amount of research showing that questions in discourse do have repercussions
on the grammar of natural language (in fact interrogatives are a major grammatical
phenomenon to start with, and we have discussed to a large extent the rules for question-
answer congruence in the previous chapter), I do not know of any grammatical effect
of individual or common goals beyond the effect of questions.
Roberts gives some suggestive evidence that goals play a role in discourse as exemplified
in the following quote:
The more general intentional structure of discourse outlined above also sug-
gests a generalization of the notion of Relevance to other goals and inten-
tions, as well as to the QUD. Consider this exchange:
Nurse: Don’t eat on the morning before your test.
Patient: May I drink water?
One might say that the patient’s question is Relevant to the goal proposed
by the nurse’s suggestion (here, an order) because it requests clarifica-
tion about the nature of the proposed goal, hence facilitating its successful
achievement. This suggests that it might be interesting to explore a more
general definition of Relevance, wherein behavior is Relevant to a goal to
the extent that it potentially contributes to achieving that goal:
A move m is Relevant at a given point in a collaborative, task-oriented
interaction iff it promotes the achievement of an accepted goal of the inter-

locutors.
... (Roberts, 2012a)
Nevertheless, there are two problems with this argument: either the role of the goals
of interaction can easily be reduced to a question, namely What is the patient allowed
to eat or drink in the morning? or, if that should not be the case, the question of the
patient is licensed by general world knowledge, free association, frame-knowlegde etc.
But that such factors play a role in discourse is just as obvious as that they play a role
in everyday acting and life in general.
The upshot of these two problems is that it may certainly be true that individuals
enter any communicative setting with individual goals, some of which may be common.
Doubtlessly, they will be attempting to achieve their goals in a rational manner. And
whenever these goals are common, they will be forced to be cooperative by reason.
Moreover, it is most probably true that knowing the goals some interlocutor has in
discourse helps retrieving the meaning of his utterances. However, the connection
between individual goals and the attempt to agree upon answers to questions as a
common goal is not clear enough and the connection between the goals and grammar
is not clear enough either. If anything, it seems that there is a connection between
grammar and questions, as suggested by the entire range of question-answer congruence
data.
In what follows, I will show that we can generally assume that discourse is about
answering a question if we make some (as it seems) fairly natural assumptions:
Some of the goals an individual has are such that he may believe that no other individ-
ual would share those goals even if confronted with the same factual knowledge2 that
the individual under discussion has. Such goals could (potentially) include the extermi-
nation of mankind or the total destruction of the universe. Call these goals irrational.
Naming goals irrational has no ethical component here, it stands for the idea that one
cannot consider something rational meanwhile believing that no rational being can be
convinced of it. Notice that I do by no means claim that the se of irrational goals some
individual may have must be non-empty. Whether or not individuals have irrational
goals, is of no concern here.
Some other goals may be such that the individual believes that any rational being
would share them if confronted with the same factual knowledge the individual has.
Such goals may include contributing to save the environment, promoting politic ideas
one is convinced of, helping people in need etc. Call these goals rational goals. These
goals are rational because the individual believes that anyone who is a rational being
2
I will have a loose usage of the term knowledge in this book. I will say that an individual knows
that p if he has a justified belief that p. Whether p is actually true or false does not play a role. Put
differently, I will use to know as a shorthand for to believe to know.
can be convinced to share them by sharing information about facts. Again, individuals
may have such goals or not. It will play no role whatsoever if it turns out that some
(or in fact all) individuals fail to have rational goals in this sense.
Crucially, there are goals individuals may have which are neither simpliciter rational
nor irrational. Individuals may believe that there are people who can be convinced to
share those goals by communicating information, and others who cannot. Call these
goals rational relative to a set of individuals. Common sense says that most of the
goals a normal human has are of this kind, but again, it will not be required that any
of the goals an individual has fall into this category. However, it follows logically, that
if an individual is opinionated about whether he can convince others of his goals, any
goal will fall in one of these categories.
With this little background, we can define3 :
(5) Rational goals

a. A goal G an individual A has is rational relative to a set of individuals S,
if it holds that A believes that for any B such that B ∈ S it holds that if
B knows everything that A knows than B will also have G.
b. A goal G an individual A has is irrational relative to a set of individuals S,
if it holds that A believes that for any B such that B ∈ S it holds that if
B knows everything that A knows than B will not have G.
c. A goal G an individual A has is rational simpliciter, if it is rational relative
to the set of individuals S 0 containing all individuals.
d. A goal G an individual A has is irrational simpliciter, if it is irrational
relative to the set of individuals S 0 containing all individuals.
Assume that whenever an individual enters a communicative situation with some indi-
viduals having a particular goal (or set of goals) on his mind, he should want to achieve
these goals in some way by virtue of (truthful) communication. Now we can consider
whether a natural common goal for interlocutors will arise in any communicative set-
ting.
For simplicity, consider a communicative situation involving A and B as interlocutors.

A has goal G1 and he believes that if B shares G1 , this will be helpful for achieving G1 .
Now, there are exactly three possibilities:
1. G1 is rational relative to the set of individuals containing B (and nobody else),

or
3
There may be goals which are neither rational nor irrational relative to any set. Such goals may
not be known to the individual who has them. Also, there may be goals some individual has, such that
this individual has no idea as to whether others would share it or not.
2. G1 is irrational relative to the set of individuals containing B and nobody else, or
3. neither of these is true.
In the second case, if G1 is irrational relative to the set of individuals containing B and
nobody else, it follows that A will believe that there is no way by virtue of which he can
convince B to share G1 only by sharing truthful information. We will follow a multitude
of philosophers here in saying that we cannot consider lying as a structurally relevant
phenomenon for the study of discourse. Therefore, it follows, that communicating with
B in order to convince him to share G1 is is a waste of time. 4
In the third case, it is not clear, whether it is rational for A to communicate with B in
an attempt to convince him of G1 by uttering only true information. This may be a
classical game theoretic situation in which the payoff and the cost should be correctly
considered. But if A decides to communicate, he will at least hope that he can convince
B to share the aim G1 . This is the same as the first case.
Therefore, we really only need to consider the first case, i.e. the case in which G1 is
rational relative to the set of individuals containing B and nobody else. That means
that A believes that by sharing information, i.e. by sharing his knowledge, he can
convince B to share G1 . Hence, sharing information can be reasonably called a goal
A has whenever communicating, because A believes that sharing information will help
him in achieving G1 . Call sharing information therefore G0 and state that A has the
goal G0 .
Let us further assume that B has some goal G2 which licenses his decision to enter a
communicative setting with A. Everything we have said about the goal G1 from the
perspective of A, will apply mutatis mutandis to G2 and B. Therefore, we can infer that
if G2 is rational relative to some set containing the individual A, B will automatically
have the goal G0 . Since G0 is a goal A and B have, we can call it a common goal. This
is exactly what we wanted to show.
(6) Principle of communication (a):

For any rational discourse sharing information can be considered the common
goal of all interlocutors involved.
Since we can model any exchange of information as the the attempt to agree on the
answer to some question, we can reformulate (6) in a question-based terminology as
shown in (7). So (6) and (7) should be equivalent.
4
Of course, this does not mean that communication could not be useful in achieving irrational goals
by being useful in achieving some rational goal that would contribute to the achieving of the irrational
goal. But this already falls into the first case, for the immediate goal communication helps achieve
qualifies as rational.
(7) Principle of communication (b):

For any rational discourse, attempting to agree on the answer to a question can
be considered the common goal of all interlocutors involved.
One possible concern with regard to the equivalence between (6) and (7) is that while,
abstractly, sharing information may be a common goal of the interlocutors, this will
not reasonably lead to the idea that the common goal of any communication can be
understood as answering one question. The problem is that if A follows G1 , he will
rationally attempt to communicate the information which he believes B should have
in order to accept G1 . Call this information p1 . B on the other hand follows G2 and
he will attempt to communicate to A all the information he believes A should have
in order to accept G2 . Call this information p2 . Crucially, there may not be even
one bit of information-overlap between p1 and p2 . So even if there is communication
between A and B and each of them is successful in achieving his respective goal, it
could be that at no point any of them was really interested in what the other had to
say and therefore the communication was more like a tradeoff (I listen to you and you
listen to me) than about answering questions, let alone questions whose answer can
be considered a common goal. Put differently, the worry is that (7) is in fact stronger
than (6) and therefore may be wrong in some cases in which (6) is true.
Let us assume that the information that A ought to communicate to B in order to

achieve his aims, call it IA→B , is independent from the information B ought to com-
municate to A in order to achieve his aim, call it IB→A . Put differently, the set of
propositions that A should utter is disjoint from the set of propositions B should utter.
Let us assume that A and B do not have incompatible knowledge. Assuming that
IA→B and IB→A are modelled as sets of possible worlds, i.e. the intersection of the
propositions uttered respectively, we can say that: IA→B ∩ IB→A 6= ∅. IA→B ∩ IB→A
can be understood as the information that needs to be communicated. Let us then
formulate the question q which is completely answered by precisely IA→B ∩ IB→A . Let
us formulate a question qA which is completely answered by the information IA→B and
a question qB which is completely answered by IB→A . It is easy to see then then if both
qA and qB is answered, q is also answered. We then can say that A and B will commu-
nicate rationally if and only if they will agree to answer q because this is the smallest
question which fulfills the communicative goals of both A and B. If q is answered, both
A and B will presumably have achieved their goals.
If q equals qA and qB the common goal is trivially given. If not, communication will
occur if A and B will agree on q (for whatever reasons). Certainly, for many cases this is
nothing but a formal trick, but it does show that (6) and (7) are equivalent. Moreover,
it shows that agreeing on a common question as a main common goal of communication
may be driven by rational necessity (i.e. if q = qA = qB ) or it may be the result of a
trade: I listen to you and you listen to me. Certainly, the less related qA and qB will be,
the more likely the discourse is to split into two parts: one coherent discourse about qA
and one about qB . Crucially however, now we can see qA as a common goal for both A
and B because B will know that after qA is answered, qB will be discussed. Therefore,
B should cooperate as well as he can in finding a common answer to qA , since this will
take him nearer to the point when qB is discussed.
If the above is on the right track, then the emerging general picture is this: if two
individuals start communicating, they may have very different individual goals. If they
believe that these goals are rational relative to one another, they will want to convince
the other to share these goals by sharing parts of their knowledge. Since the goals they
have may be totally unrelated, there may be need to clarify whether or not they can
find a range of information which is of interest to both. Call this the question under
discussion. If they find a common question under discussion, they will communicate
and they will attempt to agree on an answer to it in a joint, cooperative effort, precisely
because answering this question is their common goal.
This does not mean that they have to explicitly settle for a question. Very often the
question under discussion will be self-understood. In other cases, some default question
is assumed, like What happened?, What is the way things are? etc.
This overall understanding of communication as driven by a common question imme-

diately explains why communication is cooperative, as postulated by Grice (1975) and
Roberts (1996). Moreover, it also explains in an intuitive way why questions are so use-
ful. Asking a question is in fact proposing a common goal for communication. Finding
out whether communication is a sensible thing to do or not amounts exactly to agree on
a question to discuss. If such a question interlocutors can agree upon is found, rational
cooperative discourse can start. In this setup, individual goals no longer play a role,
even though the resulting architecture is compatible with the QUD-theory of Roberts
(1996).
Notice that from the point of view of communication it is totally uninteresting what
goals A and B have. What matters is solely that a) they believe that communicating
will help them in achieving these goals, and b) they believe that they will not have to
lie in order to achieve their goals. If that is the case, they will have a communicative
goal which is common: share information in the domain of some QUD they agree upon.
If not, communication does not seem rational (or at least not interesting as an example
for a general theory of discourse).
Before concluding this section, I wish to address one less linguistic but nevertheless
important aspect: Under the assumptions above interlocutors adhere to rationality.
That means that if an individual pursues a goal which he considers rational, he will
only pursue this goal with the proviso that he has the right reasons to do so. Therefore,
he is willing to give up that goal if convinced that he had the wrong reasons to pursue
it. Attempting to convince someone of the rationality of my goals by exchange of
information is - according to this reasoning - a valid choice even if, ultimately, it leads
to an outcome such that I will give up my goal myself. To put it differently, if I have a
goal G1 and attempt to convince my interlocutor to share G1 by informing him about

my knowledge, in one case it may turn out that I can actually deliver information that
will convince him of G1 . Crucially, however, it may also be the case that there will be
a conflict between my knowledge and his. Then, he may convince me that something I
thought I knew is actually wrong. In this case, it may follow that I have to give up G1 .
The question is then whether the communication was a rational thing to do. After all,
I did not reach my goal, instead I have given it up, because it did not stand up to the
requirements of rationality.
Technically, I will assume that discarding goals on rational grounds is one way to
accomplish them. In this sense, for any goal that I consider rational, discourse is always
a rational choice. Any goal I have which I would not give up even if my assumptions
on which it is based are wrong, are such that it is not rational to discuss them. Such
goals should be then considered irrational. Again, there is no ethical component in this
labelling.
This gives us an easy explanation of what happens in the example above in which A
and B communicate to find out who should clean up the bedroom. A believes that B
should do it, otherwise there would be no need for communication from A’s point of
view, since A could simply clean the bedroom himself, if he believes that it is his turn.
B, on the other hand, believes that A should do it. But if they actually start to discuss
the topic, they believe that they can agree on an answer to the question who should
clean up the bedroom. One of them will accomplish his goal, the other one will have to
give up his goal. But as long as they have a rational attitude to their goals, they both
will have been successful, since both goals are in a sense dealt with. If, however, any of
them would not be ready to ‘loose’ the dispute, they should avoid communication and
attempt to convince the other one by other means, e.g. by beating him up.5 But the
argumentum ad baculum is of no further relevance to this book.
3.1.2 Strategic discourse
Having said above that (at least in one essential aspect) discourse is about agreeing
to answer questions which can be regarded as mutual communicative goals of the in-
terlocutors, it does not follow, that discourse needs to be strategic in doing so. For
sure, one may need many sentences to answer some fairly ‘big’ question, e.g. What
happened on the 10th of July 1990 in Berlin? But it is not obvious why we would need
5
Threatening someone may well count as a communicative act, since the rational assumption behind
threatening seems to be that once the interlocutor knows what consequences it would have if he acts
in some way, he will come to the rational conclusion that it is a better idea not to act in that way. But
there is much to say about this kind of communication, since in such cases, generally, there is not much
of an agreement about what question is to be answered. One who threatens me really decides what
the question is and knowing what he has to say about the consequences of my acting should (ideally)
bring me to the conclusion that the question he addresses is the right one. Otherwise threatening will
simply fail.
anything more then just utter a minimal set of true sentences which exhaust the topic
in order to answer the question. Intuitively, we would expect that those sentences will
be organised in some way (be it just for cognitive purposes), but for what reason would
we want to actually speak of a strategy?
In this section, I will discuss this question, in some detail, especially attempting to
convince the reader that indeed, the notion of strategic discourse is conceptually well
motivated. At the same time, I will show that if we make the assumptions above saying
that discourse is strategic is actually saying very little. In other words: whatever people
say, one will be able to analyse that as strategic. The strategic nature of discourse really
only becomes interesting if it is overtly signalled which strategy is followed.
First, I will explicate a notion of strategy based on non-linguistic considerations. I will

then discuss some very important differences between general action and planning and
discourse. Finally, I will spell out some consequences for the analysis of discourse.
3.1.2.1 The notion of strategy and planning
In order to get started, consider a simple example. Assume, I want to have a pizza for
dinner at home. Having that pizza for dinner is my goal. Assuming, further, that I do
not have a pizza in the fridge, I may form the following plan to get a pizza.
(8) Main goal: Have a pizza.

a. Take money
b. Take jacket.
c. Put shoes on.
d. Go to the garage.
e. Open garage.
f. Drive out of the garage.
g. Close garage.
h. Drive to the pizzeria.
i. Walk into the pizzeria.
j. Order the pizza.
k. Pay pizza.
l. Take pizza.
m. Walk to the car.
n. Drive home.
o. Open garage.
p. Drive into the garage.
q. Close garage.
r. Walk into the house.
s. Take off jacket.
t. Take off shoes.

u. Eat pizza.
One could characterised a plan as a list of actions such that if they are all performed
the goal under discussion is accomplished. While, intuitively, a plan like in (8) seems
reasonable, it is based on a number of non-trivial assumptions. So, for example, it
is assumed that when I go to the garage I will find the car there. Furthermore, it is
assumed that, e.g. the car has enough fuel to actually get to the pizzeria and back.
Moreover, it is assumed that the pizzeria is open, that my money will suffice to pay for
the pizza, that I do not get lost in the city while driving. If we want to handle some
level of uncertainty about the facts in the world and about the outcome of individual
actions, we may consider a more complex plan, involving some conditional instructions.
For instance, we could say that if the car has no fuel, I should first drive to the gas
station and then to the pizzeria. Since in this book I will generally ignore all kinds of
ignorance phenomena in discourse, we can safely do the same here as well. We assume,
therefore, that if I develop the plan in (8), I have all the relevant knowledge about the
world.
Then, we can safely assume that if my goal can be accomplished given the state of the
world, there will exist a plan which leads to it. Thereby, a plan will be a set of actions
ordered by the time at which the actions need to be performed in order to accomplish
the goal. Notice that the complexity of the plan plays no role hereby. A plan will
always be a flat structure of temporally ordered actions such that performing the last
action means accomplishing the goal. There is an issue about granularity, however. So
the question is, what counts as an action. For instance one could say that playing a
game of chess with Jane is one action if we consider it as an element of a larger plan
of courting Jane, who happens to love chess. But at the same time, one could say that
playing a game of chess is not really an action but rather a shortcut for lots of actions:
each individual move. Also, for our example above, we could say that driving to the
pizzeria is not actually one action but a shortcut for an entire plan involving starting
the engine, releasing the breaks, fastening the seatbelt etc. But we shall ignore this
problem altogether here. We assume that there is some natural level of granularity for
each plan.
The main problem with a plan is finding it. For sure, if the goal is as simple as the one
in (8), finding it is trivial, but very often, finding a plan is a fairly complicated task.
So, for instance, if my goal is to win the elections to become the mayor of Göttingen,
finding a plan which leads to success will be very difficult even if I had all the relevant
knowledge, i.e. I would not need to worry about handling different potential outcomes
of my actions or potential assumptions about the facts in the world. This is the place
at which strategic planning becomes important.
While there are very different ways to think about strategies, widely explored in the AI
and even more in economics and management literature, I shall suggest a very simple
view here. Think of strategies as shift from actions to goals. A plan is a list of actions
which leads to the accomplishment of my goal. A strategy is a list of goals such that if
each of them is accomplished, my main goal is also accomplished.
I will not discuss here, how exactly strategic reasoning should be modelled, but the
general idea should be fairly obvious: suppose I want to accomplish goal G. I may
realise that if I accomplish goals G1 and G2 and G3 , I have implicitly accomplished
G. If, now, these three goals are simpler than G my next task is to find a plan to
achieve G1 , G2 and G3 . Again, I may start with a strategic reasoning. Suppose, I if
I accomplish G4 and G5 , G1 is also accomplished. I then can continue, until the new
goals are so simple that I can easily find a plan, i.e. a list of actions, which lead to their
respective accomplishment. Strategic reasoning, then, is one way to get from a goal to
a plan by breaking up the goal into simpler goals recursively until each of the goals is
broken down to a list of actions. Putting all these actions together will conclude in a
large plan which leads to my main goal.
Even for simple cases, we can make use of intermediate goals to structure the plan, as
shown in (9) for the plan in (8).

a. Goal: Get pizza.
(i) Action: Take money
(ii) Goal: Get to the pizzeria.
Goal: Prepare for going out.
Action: Take jacket.
Action: Put shoes on.
Goal: Get car ready.
Action: Go to the garage.
Action: Open garage.
Action: Drive out of the garage.
Action: Close garage.
Action: Drive to the pizzeria.
Action: Walk into the pizzeria.
(iii) Goal: Buy pizza.
Action: Order the pizza.
Action: Pay pizza.
Action: Take pizza.
b. Goal: Eat pizza.
(i) Goal: Get home.
Action: Walk to the car.
Action: Drive home.

Goal: Park car
Action: Open garage.
Action: Drive into the garage.
Action: Close garage.
Action: Walk into the house.
(ii) Goal: Prepare to eat.
Action: Take off jacket.
Action: Take off shoes.
(iii) Action: Eat pizza.
It seems, though, that something is wrong with (9). In particular, we have said that
we use intermediate goals to find a plan. But actually, in (9), for some of the goals
intermediate goals and actions are mixed, which seems to lead to problems once we
intend to design a logic for strategic planning (even if we do not actually do that in this
book), because goals and actions are just not the same kind of entities. One solution
to this problem is to introduce the notion of terminal goals as follows.
(10) Actions
An action is a function from some state of the world (a proposition) to some
other state of the world. a, b are actions.
(11) Goals
A goal is a description of a state of the world (a proposition). G, G0 are goals.
(12) Accomplished goals

We say that a goal is accomplished in a state s if s ` G, i.e. the description
holds true in s.
(13) Terminal goals

G is a terminal goal in s, if there is an action a such that a(s) ` G
This allows us to replace any action in a strategy with a minimal terminal goal which
is achieved by that action. Since we know that for any terminal goal there is an action
which leads to its accomplishment, we can always transform a strategy into a plan if
we replace each terminal goal in a strategy with a respective action which leads to its
accomplishment. This can be done iff a strategy is closed, i.e. each goal will have its
own strategy such that finally all goals are terminal. For our example, we can just use
the same descriptions for terminal goals and actions, since the goals are actually the
states which are the result of the relevant action.

a. Goal: Get pizza.

(i) Terminal Goal: Take money
(ii) Goal: Get to the pizzeria.
Terminal Goal: Take jacket.
Terminal Goal: Put shoes on.
Terminal Goal: Go to the garage.
Terminal Goal: Open garage.
Terminal Goal: Drive out of the garage.
Terminal Goal: Close garage.
Terminal Goal: Drive to the pizzeria.
Terminal Goal: Walk into the pizzeria.
(iii) Goal: Buy pizza.
Terminal Goal: Order the pizza.
Terminal Goal: Pay pizza.
Terminal Goal: Take pizza.
b. Goal: Eat pizza.
(i) Goal: Get home.
Terminal Goal: Walk to the car.
Terminal Goal: Drive home.
Goal: Park car
Terminal Goal: Drive into the garage.
Terminal Goal: Walk into the house.
(ii) Goal: Prepare to eat.
Terminal Goal: Take off jacket.
Terminal Goal: Take off shoes.
(iii) Terminal Goal: Eat pizza.
There are two important observations to be made about the definition above.
Firstly, it is allowed that a terminal goal is nevertheless strategically addressed by

breaking it up into further terminal (or even non-terminal) goals. So, for example,
assume that my goal is to get a cup of tea from the kitchen to the living room, me
being in the kitchen. This goal can be qualified as terminal. But nevertheless, I may
also develop a strategy involving first calling John on the phone, convincing him to
come to my place, to take the cup of tea from the kitchen to be living room, e.g. for
a significant amount money. So, there is no requirement that a goal which is terminal
according to the definition will actually not be strategically addressed. However, if, as
part of a strategy, this does not happen, the strategy will be automatically translated
into a plan which only involves direct actions to accomplish each terminal goal. So,
given a closed strategy, we can determine at least one plan, such that for each terminal
goal in the strategy there will be exactly one action in the plan.
Secondly, whether a goal is terminal or not, depends on a state at which we are eval-
uating it. Consider the example in (14), I have said that walking into the house is a
terminal goal. However, this is only true if all the goals before are actually accom-
plished. Assuming I am still in the pizzeria, walking into the house is by no means
a terminal goal. Moreover, what I have roughly called Walk into the house actually
should mean Walk into the house with the pizza, for assuming that the pizza is left
in the car, walking into the house will not be particularly useful. But in this case, we
could also say that walking into the house with the pizza is a non-terminal goal and e.g.
getting a pizza is a sub-goal thereof. Hence, it turns out that we could have constructed
a totally different strategy which would have lead to exactly the same plan:

a. Goal: Walk into the house with a pizza.
(i) Goal: Get pizza.
Terminal Goal: Take money
Goal: Get to the pizzeria.
Terminal Goal: Take jacket.
Terminal Goal: Put shoes on.
Terminal Goal: Go to the garage.
Terminal Goal: Drive out of the garage.
Terminal Goal: Drive to the pizzeria.
Terminal Goal: Walk into the pizzeria.
Goal: Buy pizza.
Terminal Goal: Order the pizza.
Terminal Goal: Pay pizza.
Terminal Goal: Take pizza.
(ii) Goal: Get near the house.
Terminal Goal: Walk to the car.
Terminal Goal: Drive home.
Goal: Park car
Terminal Goal: Drive into the garage.
(iii) Terminal Goal: Walk into the house.
b. Goal: Prepare to eat.

(i) Terminal Goal: Take off jacket.
(ii) Terminal Goal: Take off shoes.
c. Terminal Goal: Eat pizza.
Importantly, the strategy proposed in (15) is just as valid as the one in (14). In fact,
if we think of goals as descriptions of states, and we assume that the temporal order
of goals means that the description of each goal incorporates the description of the
goals already achieved (which is reasonable), it will take no surprise that virtually any
grouping of a valid plan into groups of actions which can be described as a whole will
qualify as a strategy.
This property of strategies is not a problem, however. In fact, it is a natural consequence

of the fact that strategies are best thought of as ways to get to a plan. Given a plan,
there are many ways one can find that plan. So it is no surprise that there are many
ways in which we can group the action of a plan which would yield a valid strategy.
Crucially, however, if we need strategies at all, we need them to find a plan and not
to analyse a plan. The only sense in which it makes sense to say that a strategy is
an analysis of a plan is that it is a reconstruction of one plausible way in which an
individual could have arrived at that plan. The strategy in (15) is not particularly
sensible, and, most probably, it would not be very helpful for individuals in finding a
plan. A plausible strategy is one which appears to be more helpful. The parameters of
plausibility are of no further relevance here.
Observe that Eat pizza appears twice in (14). Once as a big goal and once as a terminal
goal. First, notice that the two goals are not really identical: The first occurrence is a
shorthand for Eat pizza, given that the pizza is in my possession. The second occurrence
is as a shorthand for Eat pizza, given that I am at home with a pizza and my shoes and
jacket or off. Nevertheless, we could have said that once we have reached the state in
which the second occurrence enters the strategy the two goals are actually identical,
since in that particular state, the former mention is actually a terminal as well (at
least if we assume that the descriptions handle temporal order of events properly). So,
instead of having a terminal goal in the strategy, we could have just assumed that the
overarching goal of eating the pizza is at this point terminal and determines an action
on its own. Now, for one thing, as far as the plan is concerned, there is no difference.
However, it seems more parsimonious to assume that a valid strategy will always involve
as many sub-goals for any goals until by accomplishing each sub-goal the main goal is
also implicitly accomplished. This way we can say that no goal can have sub-goals and
be a terminal in the same strategy, even if, as a matter of fact, this involves repeating
the goal as its last sub-goal in the end of the strategy.
One way to represent a strategy is using an ordered set. Moreover, since at all times,
when using a strategy we only care about the last element (since the order is tem-
poral), and we can eliminate the last element whenever it is accomplished, we can
use a more efficient representation called stack. Roberts (1996) uses such stack-based
representations. A more intuitive notation in terms of trees is also possible, however.
In a tree notation, we firstly require that any node is accomplished if all of its daughters
are accomplished. And then we secondly require that no node may dominate any node
which could be omitted without violating the first requirement. So, for instance for
(16), in order to accomplish G1 , one would need to accomplish G2 and G5 . In order to
accomplish G2 , however, he will need to accomplish G4 and G5 .
(16) G1
G2 G5
G3 G4
In a tree notation, we do not actually see how many of the goals have already been
accomplished. So, if we are interested to know, at which stage of a strategy we are,
e.g. if we really want to put it into practice, we may mark the current goal with a
box. Moreover, in order to make transparent that there may be a temporal order
requirement among sister nodes, we require that the leaf to the left must always be
first accomplished as compared to its sisters to the right. So, for instance in (17), we
are handling G5 and G3 , G4 and G2 have been handled before (since they are to the
left). In (18) we are handling G3 which means that no other goals are accomplished
yet.
(17) G1
G2 G5
G3 G4
(18) G1
G2 G5
G3 G4
For the pizza example, we can give a tree notation as well:

(19) Have a pizza.
Get a pizza Eat pizza
Get home Park Prepare Eat
Take money Go to pizzeria. Buy ... ... Jacket Shoes
Order Pay Take

Prepare self prepare car Drive Walk
Shoes Jacket
Goto garage Open Drive Close
A strategic tree is transformed into a plan by translating each terminal node into a
corresponding action, just in the same way as we linearise syntactic trees in linguistics.
We can always check whether a leaf is terminal if we consider that all goals it dominates
and all goals to its left in the tree are already accomplished.
3.1.2.2 Application to discourse
Having established that strategies may be useful to find plans for achieving goals, the
question still remains whether the same applies for discourse.
Intuitively, there is a very natural way in which we can speak about strategic discourse.
Assume I wish to convince John that he should clean up the bedroom. I may now
create a strategy on how to do that in terms of a discourse. I should first, explain
what advantages he has if he cleans up the bedroom, then I should point out what
disadvantages he has, if he does not clean up the bedroom, and finally, I should compare
the advantages and disadvantages of other alternative actions he might perform to the
advantages and disadvantages of cleaning up the bedroom. But this really does not
seem to be a strategy that is more helpful then any other strategy in actually answering
the question:
(20) Why should John clean up the bedroom?
If there is a sensible point in such a strategy, it really concerns cognitive processing,

aesthetics, rhetorical principles, etc. To see this, assume, first, that goals in the dis-
cussion above correspond to questions (as argued above), and by analogy, we shall say
that assertions correspond to actions. The point, now, is that we will not need any
intermediate questions in order to find a valid plan to answer some question q. Any
simple list of assertions or even one single (big) assertion will suffice.
Consider, for instance the question answer sequence in (21). Let us assume that in this
sequence a complete answer to the question is given.
(21) a. What happened yesterday?

b. The chancellor of Germany had breakfast with the prime minister of Italy
and Olimpique Marseille won against Paris Saint-Germain and the presi-
dent of the United States of America said that he is optimistic about the
future and the German parliament discussed a law project against smok-
ing and Bayern Munich lost against Borussia Dortmund and the president
of France visited Nigeria and the Boston Red Sox won against Tampa Bay
Rays.
We could group the atomic propositions in the answer as in (22), such that each of the
questions addressed in (22) are actually sub-question of the question under discussion.
Sub-questions should be questions that we only want to answer in order to get nearer
to the answer of the question under discussion.6 If we have a complete answer to the
question, what happened yesterday, we will have a complete answer to the question
what happened in German governmental politics and in French sports, so the question
qualifies as a sub-question of the main question. The same reasoning applies to the rest
of the questions as well. Moreover, we can further split the questions as in (23) until
we end up with atomic propositions answering one question each. We could now say
that (22) is a strategic discourse.

(i) What happened in German government politics and French sports?
The chancellor of Germany had breakfast with the prime min-
ister of Italy and Olimpique Marseille won against Paris Saint-
Germain.
(ii) What happened in american politics and in the German parliament?
The president of the United States of America said that he is
optimistic about the future and the German parliament dis-
cussed a law project against smoking.
(iii) What happened in German sports, in French politics and in US
sports?
Bayern Munich lost against Borussia Dortmund and the pres-
ident of France visited Nigeria and the Boston Red Sox won
against Tampa Bay Rays.
6
The definition follows in the next main section.
(i) What happened in German government politics and French sports?

What happened in German government politics?
The chancellor of Germany had breakfast with the prime
minister of Italy.
What happened in French sports?
Olimpique Marseille won against Paris Saint-Germain.
....
Consider, now, the version of the answer in (24), which seems, intuitively, much better
structured. (24) seems to correspond to the strategy in (25) such that each of the
sentences answer exactly one terminal question in the strategy.
(24) The chancellor of Germany had breakfast with the prime minister of Italy
and the German parliament discussed a law project against smoking. Bayern
Munich lost against Borusia Dortmund. The president of the United States of
America said that he is optimistic about the future. The Boston Red Sox won
against Tampa Bay Rays. The president of France visited Nigeria. Olimpique
Marseille won against Paris Saint-Germain.
(25) What happened yesterday?

a. What happened in Germany?
(i) What happened in politics in Germany?
(ii) What happened in sports in Germany?
(iii) ...
b. What happened in the USA?
(i) What happened in politics in the USA?
(ii) What happened in sports in the USA?
(iii) ...
c. What happened in France?
(i) What happened in politics in France?
(ii) What happened in sports in France?
(iii) ...
d. ...
The crucial observation is that both strategies suggested are valid, as they split the
question under discussion into sub-questions and the sub-questions are further split
into sub-questions. So the fact that the answer in (24) seems much more natural does
not seem to depend upon the question whether there is a valid strategy or not in the
background. Instead, it seems that the acceptability of the answer really rather depends
on the internal structure of the strategy, i.e. whether it is or it is not natural in some
sense.
So, claiming that a discourse is strategic per se will not come with any interesting
predictions about the naturalness or coherence of that discourse. Nevertheless, it is a
natural question, whether every discourse qualifies as strategic? Put differently, is it
the case that for any sequence of assertions we can find questions which they answer
such that ultimately we arrive at only one main question?
The answer to this question is: yes. Take a question which is completely answered
by the first assertion and take a question which is completely answered by the second
assertion. Now, create the conjunction of these two questions. Naturally, the first two
questions are sub-questions of this question. We can repeat this recursively, until we
reach one single main question. We can then say that we have reconstructed a strategy
by virtue of which this sequence of assertions has accomplished the aim of answering
that question.
But this is pretty much the same as saying that any chain of actions is such that there
is a strategy that could have derived it. Or, put differently, whatever one does, we
should be able to interpret that chain of actions as rational relative to some (potentially
irrational) goal.
But, this is not the point. What we are really interested in is the question whether
discourse is generally strategic once we decided what the question under discussion is.
Especially, if there are overt questions in the discourse, being strategic comes with an
immediate prediction:
(26) Strategic discourse

Given a question q which is established in discourse, there will be no informa-
tion in the discourse which does not contribute to answer q until q is completely
answered or given up for some reason or another.
It is easy to show that if (26) holds, we will be able to find a strategy whose main goal
is agreeing on an answer to q such that all the relevant assertions of that discourse are
answers to terminal questions which qualify as sub-question to q. Whether, however
(26) holds is an interesting empirical question. Ultimately, I do not believe that (26)
is correct, but I do believe that there certain examples of natural discourse for which
(26) holds. These are interesting enough to be worth investigating in their own right.
Let us, however, for the sake of the argument, assume that (26) holds.
Observe that (26) not only holds for the main question. If we assume that there is a
sub-question of q which is established in discourse, we ought to assume that (26) also
holds for that question, and that will come with additional constraints on discourse
development.
But, again, care must be taken here: unless there is empirical evidence that the question
under discussion is a particular one, speaking of strategic discourse, even in this fully
recursive spell-out, will be empty talk, as argued above. So, a theory of strategic
discourse would highly profit of lots of empirical help for finding out which is the
question under discussion at any point in discourse development.
Unfortunately, in most cases, interlocutors will not overtly agree on some sub-question.
Even in the simplest of cases, such as (27), it seems odd to actually ask a polar sub-
question of a wh-question.7 Here the question raised by B does not seem particularly
natural, partly because it appears to be superfluous.
(27) a. A: Who kissed Jane?

b. B: ?Did Max kiss her?
But overtly raising questions is not the only way in which interlocutors may signal the
strategy they pursue in answering some question. Roberts (1996) suggests that gram-
mar forces interlocutors to accommodate questions all of the time. In particular, she
assumes that the focus of any assertion must be congruent to the question it answers, as
we have observed in the previous chapter. If there is no overt question that is congruent
to the information structure of the answer, interlocutors will need to accommodate an
appropriate question. Consider a brief example for illustration.
(28) Who did John kiss?

a. John kissed MAry.
b. #John KISSed Mary.
(29) What did John do to Mary?

a. #John kissed MAry.
b. John KISSed Mary.
If someone utters (29-b), the hearer will know that he is not addressing the question
(28) because (29-b) is not compatible with that question. This way, information struc-
ture helps figuring out what strategy the speaker is pursuing. Büring (2003) argued,
in addition, that contrastive topics not only show the immediate question under dis-
cussion, but actually also a large piece of strategy involving a super-question of the
immediate question under discussion. Consider:
(30) JOHN/ kissed MAry.

a. Who kissed whom?
7
I am grateful to Jeroen Groenendijk (p.c.) for making this clear to me.
b. valid strategy: Whom did John kiss?

c. invalid strategy: Who kissed Mary?
Nevertheless, it is easy to show that information structure cannot determine a strategy

on its own. This is especially true for longer texts with several utterances. Information
structure can only be used as a general hint that may help, together with further
principles about what counts as a natural strategy, to reconstruct the strategy actually
pursued by the speaker.
The final conclusion of this section is that when we say that discourse is a strategic
enterprise to answer a question which constitutes the communicative goal we mean that
to the extent that this is justified by overt marking (be it via information structure
or via overt questions) questions which constitute sub-questions of the question under
discussion may be accepted as intermediary communicative goals hence becoming tem-
porarily the question under discussion themselves. This can be repeated recursively.
Since every sentence will have a focus, every utterance will contribute to reconstructing
the strategy pursued in answering the question under discussion. Nevertheless, it is by
no means necessary that the overt marking fully determine one single strategy.
3.1.3 Sub-questions in discourse
In this section, we build on the notion of strategic discourse in some more technical
detail. We will firstly give a definition of sub-questions.8 We then provide some informal
discourse rules (which will be formalised in the main section) on how sub-questions
should be handled in discourse.
3.1.3.1 The notion of sub-questions
The intuition that we want to capture by the notion of sub-questions is this: assume
there is a question ϕ in a context σ. Then, ψ will be a sub-question of ϕ iff ψ is a
question in σ which is easier to answer than ψ while answering ψ contributes to answer
ϕ without delivering additional information. This is the justification for assuming that
sub-question can be used as parts of a strategy to answer some question, i.e. we want
to answer ψ really only because we ultimately want to answer ϕ, there is absolutely no
other reason to discuss ψ.
8
Roberts has a definition of sub-questions, however, she does not distinguish between mention some
and mention all questions the way we have done here, hence, her definition cannot be applied in
a principled way. Also I wish to note that Jeroen Groenendijk has significantly helped clarifying my
ideas on sub-questionhood by criticising earlier versions of this argument. While the particular spell-out
is different as the one discussed with him, he must be credited at least for pointing out that mention-
some questions do not have yes-no questions as sub-questions and that mention some questions are
sub-questions of mention all questions. Also my definition of sub-questionhood is ultimately equivalent
with his suggestion even if it is implemented very differently.
In order to make this idea explicit, we will need to clarify what it means for a question
to be easier to answer. That could mean some relation between the set of some type of
answers of the sub-question (e.g. complete answers) and the set of answers of the same
type of the super-question. Being easier to give thereby should mean easier to find,
which in turn means being less informative. So we could say that a sub-question will
admit at least one answer of a certain type which is less informative than any answer
of the same type given to the super-question but at the same time, this answer should
help answering the super-question without contributing any unnecessary information
or raising any new issues.
From all types of answers that we have discussed in Chapter 1, the most natural is
the notion of a direct answer, because this is really the kind of answer the question
requests most specifically. After all the difference between answers and direct answers
is just that answers can be less informative and extended answers also allow answers
to some other questions hence being, sometimes indirect. Again, complete answers are
defined such that a set of complete answers does not determine one question but rather
a whole equivalence class of questions. So, we should use the notion of a direct answer
to define the notion of sub-questions.
The intuition is that a sub-question has direct answers which the super-question has not,
but these direct answers of the sub-question are actually disjunctions of direct answers
of the super-question. Put differently, some direct answers of the sub-questions are
merely answers (simpliciter) of the super-question. In order to make this explicit, we
first define sets of answers:
(31) Set of direct answers

For a question ϕ let ↓ ϕ be the set of direct answers of ϕ.
(32) Set of answers

For a question ϕ let ↑ ϕ be the set of answers of ϕ.
Then it holds that for some σ, any ϕ which is a question in σ, ↓ ϕ ⊆↑ ϕ.
With these notions there are two ways to define sub-questions. First, we can give a
recursive definition in (33):9
(33) Sub-Questions (recursive definition)
a. Given two question ϕ, ψ, we say that ψ is an immediate sub-question of ϕ

iff there is α, β ∈↓ ϕ such that JψK \ JϕK = J!(α ∨ β)K \ Jα ∨ βK
9
In these definitions we keep the state relative to which the respective utterances qualify as questions
implicit. One can just as well take the ignorant state.
b. Non-immediate sub-questionhood is the transitive closure of immediate

sub-questionhood.
c. If β and γ are (potentially identical) non-immediate sub-questions of ϕ
then β ∨ γ is a sub-question of ϕ.
An equivalent, but potentially more intuitive definition is given in (34):
(34) Sub-Questions (direct definition)

A question ψ is a sub-question of ϕ iff ↑ ψ ⊂↑ ϕ and ϕ |= ψ.
Notice that in (34) we assume that the set of answers of a sub-question is a sub-set of
the set of answers of a super-question. In fact, given this definition, every question will
be a sub-question of its own exhaustification. This is because, given a question ϕ, the
set of answers of ϕ, ↑ ϕ will be a sub-set of the set of extended answers of ϕ as shown in
chapter 1. However, the set of extended answers is the set of of answers of Exh ϕ, i.e.
↑ Exh ϕ. Finally, in all cases it holds that Exh ϕ ⊆ ϕ (due to closure under sub-sets).
It is easy to show that sub-questionhood is a transitive relation, in fact, sub-questionhood

is a partial order over questions such that sub-questions are always asking for less in-
formation than the super-questions. If we think of sub-questionhood this way, it may
occur to us that sub-questions are a very fundamental notion of a theory of questions
because the amount of information requested by a question really defines that question;
i.e. questions really are about requesting information. If so, the idea that sub-questions
are used in discourse structuring in some way or another is a natural prediction of a
theory of questions: hence, we could say that it is not due to the theory of strategic
discourse that we develop the notion of sub-questionhood, but it is because we have
the notion of sub-questionhood that we can actually think of a strategic discourse in
the first place. Under such a perspective it takes little surprise that sub-questions play
a role in virtually any version of erotetic logics.
A sub-question may have the same exhaustification as a super-question, but this is not
always so. Take any partition and add the set theoretic union of two elements thereof
to the result. We then have a new partition. Moreover, the new partition will be a
sub-question of the old partition. In the example below ψ is a sub-question of ϕ, since
ϕ |= ψ and ↑ ψ ⊂↑ ϕ. Moreover, both ψ and ϕ are partitions, i.e. they exhaustify to
themselves.
(35) a. JϕK = {{w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}

b. JψK = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
c. J%1 K = {{w1 }, ∅}
d. J%2 K = {{w2 }, ∅}
e. J%3 K = {{w3 }, ∅}
f. J%4 K = {{w1 , w2 }, {w1 }, {w2 }, ∅}

g. J%5 K = {{w2 , w3 }, {w2 }, {w3 }, ∅}
h. J%6 K = {{w1 , w3 }, {w1 }, {w3 }, ∅}
i. ↑ ϕ = {%1 , %2 , %3 , %4 , %5 , %6 }
j. ↑ ψ = {%3 , %4 }
Let us call those sub-questions of a question which are in the same equivalence class
defined by their exhaustification sister questions.
(36) Sister Questions

If γ1 is a sub-question of γ2 and Exh γ2 = Exh γ1 then γ1 and γ2 are sister
questions.
As a special case it follows the fact described in (37). This is because Exh γ =
Exh (Exh γ) as has been shown in chapter 1.
(37) Fact
γ and Exh γ are sister questions, for any γ, a question.
I conjecture that in natural language there will not be a grammatical distinction be-
tween sister-questions, i.e. generally they can be realised using exactly the same string,
or at least: the same string can be interpreted either way.
(38) The sister questions conjecture

Grammar does not distinguish between sister questions.
The reasoning behind this conjecture is that actually, sister-questions really request the
same information. Now, if moving towards exhaustification is allowed by the notion of
valid response and moving towards the sub-question is allowed by strategy, basically
having both in grammar is useless in discourse.
If this conjecture is true, this is an important fact about natural language which has
not been noticed so far, hence proving that the notions provided here (basically the
notions dictated by inquisitive semantics) are fundamentally on the right track. I
leave proving or falsifying this conjecture to further research. I note, however, that
quantified German wh-phrases discussed in Zimmermann (2012) are not, as it may
seem, natural counterexamples to this conjecture, because quantified wh-phrases have
additional features e.g. regarding plurality requirements.
I wish to mention that while mention-all questions have the same range of extended
answers as the respective mention-some questions, the range of sub-questions is not
the same. In particular, mention-all questions are super-questions of mention-some
questions, but not the other way around.
Also, it is worth noting, that there will be many sub-questions of some question, which
do not appear intuitive, and which are hard to express in natural language. To see this,
consider some question with 100 alternatives. One sub-question of this, will have two
alternatives: the first one and the power set of the union of all the rest.
There are two typical examples of natural language interrogatives, which would count
as sub-questions, given in (39). In particular, it is often argued that (39-a) is a sub-
question of (39) and (39-a-i) is a sub-question of (39-a), which, by transitivity would
also make it a sub-question of (39). Let us now consider, whether they come out as
sub-questions according to this system.
(39) Who loves whom?

a. Who loves Jane?
(i) Does John love Jane?
As a matter of notation, we write Sub a b means that a is a sub-question of b. In order

to check whether a question is a sub-question of another, we will, therefore, try to
derive the denotation of one of them by creating disjunctions of maximal alternatives.
Generally, since spelling out the full denotations in a given model gets lengthy, we give
informal proofs. We now turn to the first case:
(40) a. Who loves whom?

b. Who loves Jane?
We first consider Sub QExh (40-b) QExh (40-a). We start with the second argument:
QExh(40-a) will be a partition such that in each cell of the partition we find worlds in
which exactly the same persons love exactly the same persons. Some of the partitions
are given in (41):
(41) a. worlds in which only John loves only Jane

b. worlds in which only John loves only Dianne
c. worlds in which only John loves only Anna
d. worlds in which only Max and John loves only Jane
e. worlds in which only John loves only Jane and Anna
f. worlds in which only Max and John loves only Jane and Anna
g. ...
Now, by keeping fixed the first argument, we create the union of all partitions which
have Jane as a second argument, as suggested in (42).
(42) a. worlds in which only John loves only Jane or only Jane and Anna
b. worlds in which only John loves only Dianne
c. worlds in which only John loves only Anna
d. worlds in which only Max and John loves only Jane or only Jane and Anna
e. ...
Since worlds in which only John loves only Jane or worlds in which only John loves
only Jane and Anna or worlds in which only John loves only Jane and Mary or worlds
in which only John loves only Jane and Anna and Mary etc. is just another way of
saying worlds in which only John loves Jane, we get the result in (43). It is easy to
see that the first part of this list is precisely the partition to which QExh (40-b) leads.
However, there are many additional cells. We can merge into the last element of the
list in (43), which will not be part of QExh (40-b).
(43) a. worlds in which only John loves Jane

b. worlds in which only Max and John loves Jane
c. ...
d. worlds in which nobody loves Jane
Hence, we reach the answer: Sub QExh (40-b) QExh (40-a) = False, i.e. in the
exhaustive reading, these will not stand in the sub-question relation.
But in contexts in which it is already common knowledge that Jane has been kissed
the two questions stand in a sub-question relation with each other.
If we want to consider the non-exhaustive version, we check: Sub Q (40-b) Q (40-a).

Now, the question Q (40-a) will result in maximal alternatives of the following kind:
(44) a. worlds in which John loves Jane

b. worlds in which Max loves Jane
c. ...
d. worlds in which Max loves Anna
e. worlds in which John loves Anna
f. ...
In this case, we do not even have to worry about unifying partitions, as the sub-question
candidate shows up entirely at the beginning of this list. But again, the candidate super-
question allows many answers which will not be part of the sub-question candidate.
But sub-questions need to be larger than super-questions, hence, it is obvious that
Sub Q (40-b) Q (40-a) = False. But this time, in order to find a context in which
Sub Q (40-b) Q (40-a) comes out as true, we would actually need a much stronger
context than before: only if we know that nobody else than Jane has been kissed, will
the sub-question relation hold. But then it holds trivially, since the two questions are
contextually identical. This is not surprising, for we know that mention-some questions
generally do not require sub-questions for strategic reasons.
We found that, according to our definitions, it is not generally true that by replacing
a wh-argument in an interrogative we get a sub-question thereof. If, however, the
existential presupposition of the simple wh-question is satisfied (i.e. it is a question to
start with), the sub-question relation holds in the exhaustive version but only in the
exhaustive version.
Consider the remaining pairs. We now turn to (45):
(45) a. Who loves Jane?

b. Does John love Jane?
We first consider Sub QExh (45-b) QExh (45-a). This time, QExh (45-b) = Q (45-b)
and is given in the partition in (46). The question QExh (45-a) determines another
partition, sketched in (47):

b. worlds in which John does not love Jane
(47) a. worlds in which only John loves Jane

b. worlds in which only Max and John loves Jane
c. worlds in which only Max and Michael and John loves Jane
d. ...
e. worlds in which only Max loves Jane
f. worlds in which only Max and Michael loves Jane
g. ...
If we unite all cells of the partition in (47) in which John appears in the description
we get the first cell of the partition in (46), and if we unite all the rest of the cells in
(47), we get the second cell of the partition in (46), but only under the assumption that
it is contextually clear that someone loves Jane. We know that unless this condition
is satisfied, (45-a) will not even qualify as a question, hence this condition should
be taken for granted. Crucially, there is a difference to the previous case: if we did
not know that someone loves Jane we could not have asked Who loves Jane? to
start with. But if Who loves Jane? is the current question, i.e. the state σ, we
obviously must have asked that question. So, we have to assume that someone loves
Jane anyway. In the previous case, however, the presupposition concerns the alleged
sub-question, and that question may not yet be the current discourse state. This
proves that: Sub QExh (45-b) QExh (45-a) = True, hence the respective polar
questions about the alternatives are sub-questions of wh-questions, if the wh-question
is interpreted exhaustively.
If we want to consider the non-exhaustive version, we check: Sub Q (45-b) Q (45-a).

Now, the question Q (45-a) will result in maximal alternatives of the following kind:

b. worlds in which Max loves Jane
c. worlds in which Michael loves Jane
d. ...
While the first set of worlds is identical with the first cell in (46), there is no way
to determine the second cell by using set theoretic union on the rest of the maximal
alternatives. Therefore Sub Q (45-b) Q (45-a) = False. Again, this is not very
surprising, since intuitively, the candidate sub-question is harder to answer instead of
being easier to answer than the candidate super-question.
Finally, we briefly observe that using exactly the same strategy, it can be shown that
the third pair of questions behaves exactly like the second, i.e. we can create the ques-
tion (49-a) from (49) in the mention-all but not in the mention-some interpretation.
Again, there is a contextual requirement, namely that the interrogative (49) is inter-
preted as presupposing that each alternative individual is loved and does love someone.
This is certainly a natural context in which (49) can be asked, but not the only one.
Alternatively, the same requirement can be satisfied accidentally in the context.

a. Does John love Jane?
In fact, it can be shown analogously that (50) is also a sequence of sub-questions,

but only in the exhaustive interpretation. This time there is no additional contextual
requirement not already presupposed by the first interrogative.

a. Does anyone love Jane?
Finally, we may consider two different prosodic realisations of a sub-question. We find

that as part of an inquiry, only one of the two realisations seems acceptable.10
10
Jeroen Groenendijk (p.c.) pointed out to me that as part of a dialogue, raising the polar question
as an immediate reply to the wh-question is not acceptable under any intonation. Nevertheless, there
are contexts in which the intuitions about congruence still play the same role. Consider the minimal
pair:
(51) a. We want to find out today who kissed Jane. Ok. Let’s start. Did JOHN kiss Jane?
b. ?We want to find out today who kissed Jane. Ok. Let’s start. Did John kiss JANE?
(52) a. Who love JANE?

(i) Does PETER love Jane?
(ii) #Does Peter love JANE?
While I will not spell-out the technical side of this idea, one can account for this con-
trast by requiring that sub-questions which are overtly asked are congruent to the QUD.
Congruence for sub-question-question sequences is exactly the same as congruence be-
tween assertions and questions: the focus presupposition of the sub-questions will need
to match the super-question. Crucially, such a theory of congruence is impossible if we
assume that in questions focus acts entirely differently as compared to assertions. The
compositional theory of focus and questions proposed in the previous two chapters has
the virtue to allow such congruence, very much in the spirit of Eckardt (2007), who
implicitly predicts such a congruence as well.
3.1.3.2 Discourse rules
I finish the discussion of sub-questions by pointing out some informal discourse rules in
which sub-questions play a role. In particular, I will motivate one theoretical decision
which will ultimately turn out useful in the analysis of real texts:
(53) Main discourse rule

No question may have more than one answer.
In the model of Roberts (1996), the requirement is much weaker. In her theory, a
discourse state is characterised by a stack of questions such that each element on the
stack is a sub-question of the lower element in the stack. We use the notation for stacks
in (54). We can access the head of a stack, which is the top-most element at all times
in the standard way by using the head function and the rest of the stack is the tail. A
S is a valid stack of questions if it recursively holds that Sub (head S) (head (tail S)).
(54) S = q1 : q2 : q3 : []
a. head(S) = q1
b. tail(S) = q2 : q3 : []
c. [] is the empty stack.
Here, the second sequence marked with one question mark is acceptable, but only with a special
interpretation. In particular, the interpretation is that the speaker really does not remember who John
kissed, and he is wondering whether Jane was among those persons. If so, a partial answer would
follow. Crucially, in the first sequence such an indirect interpretation is not needed. The polar question
is interpreted as directly tackling the issue under discussion.
With this background, her requirement for discourse moves is that any discourse move
ψ is either an answer to head S or a sub-question of head S. A sub-question will be
added to the stack, while an answer will update the common ground. A question will
be removed from the stack if it is completely answered or agreed not to be answerable.
(55) Disocurse rules after Roberts (1996)

Given S and the common ground G and a discourse move ψ:
a. If Sub ψ (head S) then the new state will be: ψ : S.
b. If ψ is an answer to head S then the new common ground will be G ∪ ψ,
and if head S is completely answered by G ∪ ψ, then the new state will
be: tail S
Crucially, this makes the prediction, that a question can be answered as many times
as one desires, as long as only partial answers are given. In fact, even the following
example is conceivable, in which q1 receives two different partial answers meanwhile
sub-questions are raised and answered.
(56) a. S0 = q1 : q2 : q3 : [], C0
b. S0 = q1 : q2 : q3 : [], C0 ∪ ψ ψ answers q1
c. S1 = q4 : q1 : q2 : q3 : [], C0 ∪ ψ q4 is a sub-question of q1
d. S1 = q1 : q2 : q3 : [], C0 ∪ ψ ∪ ϕ ϕ completely answers q4
e. S1 = q1 : q2 : q3 : [], C0 ∪ ψ ∪ ϕ ∪ % % answers q1
f. S2 = q5 : q1 : q2 : q3 : [], C0 ∪ ψ ∪ ϕ ∪ % q5 is a sub-question of q1
There are two essential problems with this approach.
The first one is that we have already discussed in the previous chapters that we will not
be able to actually spell out a decent theory of question-answer congruence unless we
assume that question alternatives are at all times intersected with the common ground
knowledge. Tte argument made was entirely based on a notion of questions developed in
algebraic inquisitive semantics, however, one can easily check that precisely the same
argument will go through with plain Hamblin-Semantics as well. From this follows
that ψ and % answer different questions, since the common ground did change. Put
differently, % does not answer q1 but rather some question we gain by updating q1 such
that its alternatives reflect the new common ground knowledge.
Secondly, this leads to spurious ambiguities, which can be easily avoided if we assume
(53). Consider the case in which q1 is an exhaustive question and q4 is a sister-sub-
question thereof, i.e. a question which would generate exactly that partition if it were
exhaustified (Exh q4 = q1 ). We have assumed that there is no grammatical difference
between an exhaustive question and a non-exhaustive sister of it, even if the non-
exhaustive question is a sub-question of the exhaustive question. Crucially, any answer
to q4 will also be an answer to q1 . So, now, there will be no way for the interlocutors to
know whether q4 is on the stack or q1 . In fact, at any point q1 may appear on the stack
after q4 appeared on the stack and nobody will know. This is especially problematic,
since completely answering one of them, also completely answers the other one. Put
differently, there is an unnecessary level of indeterminacy here without any relevant
differences in predictions.
Following the assumptions made in Chapter 1 a discourse state is a proposition σ. Now,

σ may be a question or not. We can say that whenever σ is a question and an assertion
is uttered, the discourse state changes to a non-question proposition. Put differently,
once a question has received some answer, the question is gone.
We will use a tree notation for discourse instead of stacks, but that will not make any
significant difference. The point is rather that there is no way to give one question two
answers in this theory. This naturally captures the idea that the specific function of an
answer is to turn an open state into a closed state. In the theory presented in Chapter
1 we did not say how sub-questions are handled, in fact, we did not give any rule as
to when and how one should ask a question at all. We were only concerned with the
question when a proposition is a question and what kinds of answers a proposition may
receive. We now add: given an open discourse state, we can utter or accommodate a
proposition which qualifies as a sub-question of that state. Of course, since answering
that state will lead to a closed state, we need a way to go back to the previous question.
We can do that either by popping a stack, as in the example in Roberts-style or by
moving one node up in a tree, i.e. to a mother node. Nevertheless, we will only be
able to move to nodes which are open states and which have not yet been answered,
i.e. closed down.
The consequence of this decision is that any two assertions will answer two different
questions. This will require more accommodation than in the case of Roberts (1996),
since if there are two answers to the same question, we will need to accommodate
two sub-questions of that question which are answered respectively. But this actually
has some correct predictions. Consider a first example: In (57), we have a double
wh-question and an answer is suggested which is congruent, given the double focus
construction. However, if we continue the discourse with another double focus answer,
this sounds very odd. Nevertheless, according to the model of Roberts (1996) this
should not sound odd at all, after all, if we assume that the first example did not
completely answer the question, the second answer should be fully acceptable.

a. ROBERT loves JANE
b. #MAX loves ANTOINE
Notice that the example gets more acceptable, if we add some particles and connectives:

a. Well, ROBERT loves JANE.
b. And/But of course, MAX loves ANTOINE
c. And also MAX loves ANTOINE
d. And/But MAX loves ANTOINE too.
Now, one may argue that in (58) the reason why the continuation is better is that well
signals that the answer is not exhaustive. However, true as it may be, this remark is
not going to help, since the first continuation is still bad even if we do a lot of work
signalling that the first answer is not exhaustive, as shown in (59).

a. Well, ROBERT loves JANE
b. For example, ROBERT loves JANE
c. #MAX loves ANTOINE
The essential point is that, apparently, we need to signal that in some sense the second
proposition answers the same question as the first one. If, however, Roberts was right
that answering the same question several times is allowed by discourse rules, this should
not be necessary. Moreover, there are good reasons to assume that connectives such as
and and but do not generally signal that two propositions answer the same question,
cf. Jasinskaja and Zeevat (2009). This is shown, e.g. by examples like (60):
(60) a. The car is beautiful and it is expensive

b. The car is beautiful but it is expensive.
Jasinskaja and Zeevat (2009) argue that the two conjuncts in (60) answer different
sub-questions of some question like Why should we and why should we not buy the car?
The first example would answer two sub-question of the kind What is the first reason to
buy the car and What is the second reason to buy the car, whereas the second example
answers two sub-questions like What is the reason to buy the car and What is the reason
not to buy the car, cf. also Jasinskaja (2012)
I will assume that generally, if two assertions seem to answer the same question, they
actually answer different sub-questions of that question, unless they are realised in one
single information structural unit, i.e. they form one utterance.
Moreover, I assume the principle in (61):
(61) Maximize discourse interface

Mark which question your assertion answers as well as possible
3.2. LOOSELY STRATEGIC DISCOURSE AND POTENTIAL QUESTIONS 157
This then naturally predicts that one should use a contrastive topic intonation for the
example under discussion, which, following Büring (2003), signal that there are different
sub-questions under discussion as shown in (62).

a. Who does Robert love?
(i) /ROBERT loves JANE
b. Who does Max love?
(i) /MAX loves ANTOINE
Notice that (61) does only help if we assume (53) as well. This is because if we did
not assume (53), (63) should be fully acceptable, since both propositions signal which
question they answer, i.e. the same one.

a. ROBERT loves JANE
b. #MAX loves ANTOINE
Finally, the question remains whether overtly asking a sub-question of another question
which is also overtly asked is actually a valid move. Given a discourse state in which a
question has been established, asking a sub-question will be acceptable. But whenever
the super-question has been explicitly asked directly in the previous turn, asking a
sub-question seems really odd:
(64) a. A: Who loves Jane?

b. B: ?Does MAX loves Jane?
The oddity of this example may be explained by assuming that there is no reason to
explicitly signal such an obvious strategy. If we assume that every assertion will only
answer one question and every question will only be answered by one assertion, we
will need accommodation all of the time. Focus, topics and lots of particles and other
grammatical devices will be used to signal what kind of accommodation we need each
time (some of these will be discussed later). Crucially, if so much grammaticalisation
is present, there is absolutely no need to signal totally obvious strategies by overtly
asking questions.
3.2 Loosely strategic discourse and potential questions
Assume we were interested in designing what is known in the AI literature as a cognitive

architecture, cf. e.g. Newell (1990) or some more recent architecture such as ICARUS
(Langley and Choi, 2006) that we want to apply in some domain, e.g. for an NPC
character in some computer simulation or game. One component of such a cognitive
architecture should, most likely be a planner module, roughly corresponding to what
has been discussed above. A planner develops a strategy to achieve a goal. While
one way to implement a planner is as a pathfinder among action options, another one,
potentially more general though, would involve a strategy consisting of goals rather
than individual actions. Given some goal, we may assume that our character will act
according to a plan derived from a planner, say by attempting to accomplish each
terminal goal on a stack (or in a tree, according to some linearisation rule like the one
discussed above) one after the other, which ultimately leads him to accomplish the
main goal under discussion.
However, any useful cognitive architecture will also include some reactive component.
The idea is this: the character runs around the virtual world and identifies some
events/situations which he may react to. To consider some really simple example,
a character in a strategy game may be on a path from A to B and suddenly he is being
shot at. Whether or not sticking to the plan ultimately turns out to be a good idea,
a cognitive model for this character does certainly profit if the character can make a
decision about the new fact, namely that he is shot at. The decision could be to stick to
the original plan, to flee or to engage in combat, to mention just a few of the common
action options available in simple games.
Now, there are various ways to integrate such a reactive module into a cognitive archi-
tecture. For instance, we can assume that a reaction to an event may create new goals
for the agent. Of course, it is a difficult and complicated issue to derive a new goal from
an encountered event, but if we think of that as an unknown function f which takes an
existing plan, an event and some further parameters as arguments and returns a new
plan we may ignore the complexities of actually spelling out f. The crucial observation
is that under such a perspective the reactive module will potentially add new goals to a
strategy. Also, we may assume that after achieving the new goal, the agent will return
to the previous plan. For our example this could be (65) (whereby we assume that C
is an intermediate goal on the way from A to B).
(65) a. Old strategy: REACH(B)
REACH(C) REACH(B)
b. New goal: ELIM IN AT E(attacker)
c. Strategy for new goal: ELIM IN AT E(attacker)
REACH(attacker) ST AB(attacker)
d. New strategy:
REACH(B)
REACH(C) REACH(B)
ELIM IN AT E(attacker) RET U RN T O(C)
Crucially, the new strategy is no longer a valid strategy, since ELIM IN AT E(attacker)
is not a sub-goal of REACH(C). In fact, REACH(C) is still terminal. The gener-
ated plan is to first go to C, then go to the attacker, then stab the attacker (thereby
eliminating the attacker) and return to C. Notice that according to the rules of lin-
earising strategy trees in terms of a plan, we would not actually get this plan. Instead,
we would expect that arriving at C is only (implicitly) accomplished after eliminating
the attacker. That means that if we want to incorporate an event handler in a strat-
egy representation we need to have a different kind of attachment to the tree. We can
achieve that by adding actions to the strategy tree. We write actions in bold for clarity.
Actions and goals may have the same label, however.
(66) a. Old strategy: REACH(B)
REACH(C) REACH(B)
GOTO(C) GOTO(B)
b. New goal: ELIM IN AT E(attacker)
c. Strategy for new goal: ELIM IN AT E(attacker)
GOTO(attacker) STAB(attacker)
d. New strategy:
REACH(B)
REACH(C) REACH(B)
GOTO(C) GOTO(B)
ELIM IN AT E(attacker) RET U RN T O(C)
GOTO(C)
GOTO(attacker) STAB(attacker)
Now, linearising a plan amounts to standard linguistic practice, except that whenever
an action (in bold) dominates any node, the dominating action is performed first. This
correctly predicts the plan we desire.
3.2.1 Licensing question by assertions in discourse informally
This discussion over-simplifies in many ways. It is not part of the aims of this book
to develop any cognitive architecture. What we are actually interested in is discourse,
and the small adjustment we have made above will turn out to be sufficient for largely
improving our discourse model. I will now show that such an adjustment is helpful
in analysing run-of-the-mill-examples of linguistic discourse. In what follows, I discuss
the beginning of some arbitrarily picked novel:
Title: Emperor Nero
§1. He was quite simply a megalomaniac from a long line of psychopaths.
§2. His grandfather led the way. Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus had been
savage and cruel. The gladiatorial contests he organised were so bloody and
vicious that the Emperor Augustus had to ask him to tone down things a
little.
§3. His father, Gnaeus, once rode his horse over a small child on the Appian
Way. [...]
from: Evil Psychopaths (True Crime) by Gordon Kerr.
Assume that the first sentence, §1, answers some question. There are various candi-
dates, but one can consider a question like (67). Let us assume that §1 answers this
question fully (for the purposes of the communication).
(67) How was emperor Nero?
The point of interest is the discourse state after processing the first paragraph. At
this point, the text discusses each of the psychopaths in Nero’s family one after the
other. Actually, if one continues reading, more examples of psychopaths in the family
follow. Since, as a reader, we do not know, who the psychopaths are, we may assume
that the question under discussion is Who are the psychopaths in the family?. The way
this question is addressed is strategic. In fact, we get a number of sub-questions like
Was his grandfather a psychopath?, Was his father a psychopath? etc. So we get the
structure in (68). This is perfectly compatible with what has been said so far.
(68) Who were the psychopaths in the family?

a. Was his grandfather a psychopath?
(i) Answered by: §2.
b. Was his father a psychopath?
Notice that not much hinges on the exact spell-out of the strategy, and depending on
intonation and further intuitions one may have or not have, we could also assume some
alternative strategies, including (69) or (70). Notice that both are valid strategies both
under the original model of Roberts (1996).
(69) Who were the psychopaths in the family and in what order?
a. Who was the first psychopath?
b. Who was the second psychopath?
(70) Who were the psychopaths in the family and in what order?
a. Who was the first psychopath?
b. Was his father a psychopath?
The first problem is that (67) does not seem to be a super-questions for the questions
(68) and (69). This means that we do not expect a tree geometry like (71).
§1 Who were the psychopaths?
§2
If we assume, however, that (67) is completely answered by §1, we may assume that the
next paragraph targets the super-question of (67), therefore, we would get the structure
in (72):
(72) Q
How was emperor Nero? Who were the psychopaths?
§1 §2
There is a logical guarantee that we can find suitable super-question for both candidate
sub-questions. One would be: How was emperor Nero and who were the psychopaths
in his family? 11 . Another one is (73).
(73) What is the way things are?
Nevertheless, there is something deeply unsatisfying about the tentative solution in

(72). Intuitively, it seems that the question about the psychopaths is really only possible
because we have found out that there are psychopaths in the family. It seems that there
is an analogy to what we have called event handling above. It is because the information
that there are psychopaths in the family has been given, that the question arises. So,
we would rather expect a structure like (74). To make the analogy even clearer, the
assertions are marked with bold characters.
§1
Who were the psychopaths?
§2
11
Some care is needed, however, to make sure, this actually comes out as a question in the common
ground. But we can always achieve that by adding, the power set of all worlds which are compatible
with the common ground and not in the question denotation, i.e. applying non-informative closure.
Then, of course, the question does not exactly fit the interrogative, but that is of no importance.
We encounter exactly the same problem inside §2 again. Here, we get an answer to the
respective question already in the first line: His granfather led the way. This clarifies
that his grandfather was a psychopath and that, in fact, he was the first psychopath.
So, whichever strategy we choose, the first question is answered. Nevertheless, the para-
graph goes on to discuss details explaining why one would want to call his grandfather
a psychopath. Since, intuitively, it is very clear that the next part of the paragraph
really answers a why question, the problematic structure is the one in (75): Where
should we attach the b. tree?
(75) a. one strategy:

Who were the psychopaths in the family and in what order?
Who was the first psychopath?
His grandfather led the way.

b. where to attach this tree?:
Why should we consider him a psychopath?
Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus had been savage and cruel.
One possible solution is analogous to (72). Here, we assume that the new question is
again attached to the main question Q, hence getting (76):
(76) Q
How was Nero? Psychopaths? Why psychopath?
§1 §2 savage and cruel.
Again, a much more intuitive solution would involve assuming that asking why someone
should be considered a psychopath is a reaction to the information that he is supposed
to be a psychopath. That would lead to a tree like (77).
§1
Grandfather
Why psychopath?
savage and cruel.
Once we consider, by analogy the second and third paragraph we easily see that iff we
are to maintain at least the linearisation rule for strategies discussed above, the first
kind of strategy will lead to an entirely flat structure while the second kind of strategy
will lead to a much more intuitive organisation of the information in the text. This is
shown in (78) vs. (79).12
(78) Q
How was Nero? Psychopaths? Why psychopath? Why cruel?
§1 First psycho? savage and cruel. ...
§2
§1
First psycho? Second psycho?
Grandfather hF atheri
Why psychopath? Why psycho?
savage and cruel. Killed child
Why savage and cruel?
Augustus
12
The information and questions are abbreviated to fit the tree and should be reconstructed by the
reader from the text. Also note that the information that Nero’s father was a psychopath is treated as
accommodated. How and why this should be possible, will be discussed later.
Notice that the kind of representation as in (79) is superior to the representation in

(78) if we really want to conceptualise such a tree as a strategy or plan. The problem
with (78) is that when we ask the question who the psychopaths in the family are, we
already know that there are psychopaths in the family. However, if we assume that
a strategy in answering Q could in principle be used to develop a plan, we are faced
with the problem that when developing the abstract strategy we had absolutely no
way of knowing that there are psychopaths in Nero’s family. So, we could not safely
ask, who the psychopaths were. As opposed to this, the representation in (79) suggests
that actually only the transition from the question Who were the psychopaths? to the
two sub-questions is supposed to be strategic. Every other question is licensed in this
discourse as a reaction to the relevant information which has been given in answer to
previous questions.
Put differently, given the way the text is written, there is a way to analyse the entire
text as a strategy, suggested in (78). However, that strategy is not at all plausible as
a device to develop a plan because some of the questions involved are only safe to ask
once a certain amount of information is already available. So, in a way, this looks like
a totally useless strategy. As opposed to this the analysis suggested in (79), makes
obvious that the text is not really entirely strategic. This seems to correspond much
more to the actual intuition.
Notice that if we eliminate the questions from the structure in (79), we gain a tree as in
(80), which is very much the same with the structure one would derive in a theory such
as SDRT (Asher and Lascarides, 2003). I will not discuss the similarity, however, since
the task of a theory of discourse structure such as SDRT, based on discourse relations,
differs fundamentally from our task, see however Jasinskaja (2011) for such a project.
We do not attempt to predict coherence. We are only interested in reconstructing the
internal logic of discourse moves in a (more or less) strategic discourse.
(80) §1
Augustus
The above shows that we may assume that discourse is partly strategic, partly driven
by reactions to new information introduced by the interlocutors. Interlocutors may get
involved in topics brought up by new information and stick to that topic for a while.
After that, they may return to some strategic line of inquiry. Potentially, the main
motivation behind the phenomenon is curiosity. Since humans are curious by nature,
natural discourse seems to be most naturally described if we take into account curiosity
as one of the factors that licenses discourse moves.
Nevertheless, I do not claim here that if we introduce some notion of triggering questions
by introducing new information into the discourse we automatically gain a discourse
model which could compete with discourse models based on rhetorical relations in
computing discourse coherence. Also, I do not claim that it is per se impossible to
analyse any discourse in terms of strategy alone.In fact I have suggested above a general
method to do precisely that: take a question which large enough as a general goal of the
discourse and then for any utterance there will be a question such that the utterance is
congruent to that question and that question qualifies as a sub-question of the general
main question. What I do suggest, instead, is that we get more natural explanations
of discourse moves if we assume that questions are not only strategically licensed but
also in terms of a reaction to previous discourse moves. In this sense, I suggest that
the model sketched in Roberts (1996) should be extended to include such a type of
licensing of questions.
Some suggestive examples are given in (81) and (82). Firstly, overt questions are
introduced by repeating the information which actually triggered them at an earlier
stage of the discourse. This can be done by using a phrase like You mentioned that....
But similarly, one can also address accommodated implicit questions triggered by some
older information in the same way:
(81) a. You mentioned that you bought a Kindle Touch. Did you go with the 3G
model?
b. You mentioned that you focus specifically on Reformed churches. Why do
you focus on Reformed churches?
c. You mentioned that you live with your dad. I remember not wanting to
talk to my dad about any “girl stuff”...
Some other examples:
(82) a. And coming back to what Craig was saying, I have most Autosports from
2002 to around now but I haven’t got them in ages. Still it’s a huge pile.
b. But there is something about edges being scary, and coming back to what I
was saying, does my being good with boundaries emerge out of my anxiety
around edges more than my professionalism?
These examples suggest that interlocutors do take into account a significant amount of
effort to signal what is the actual licensor of their respective question or utterance. In
the examples above it is always some piece of information that triggered the question. I
take this to be strong evidence for the cognitive reality of licensing of questions through
assertions in discourse.
3.2.2 The notion of potential questions
In this section, I introduce the central notion of this book. Given the great amount
of background we have covered until now, introducing this notion turns out to be very
simple.
Because of the closure under sub-sets required for the denotation of propositions, a
proposition contains every proposition which entails it. In particular, that means that
there are countless questions and assertions hidden in any proposition. For instance,
all direct answers and complete answers are subsets of a question.
More technically speaking, in the algebraic setting (Roelofsen, 2013a), every proposition
is a meet semi-lattice. An assertion is the special case in which the proposition is a
bounded lattice, hence containing an upper bound.
Now, given any assertion and a discourse state determined only by its informative
content, once we eliminate only the upper bound, we get a question. Moreover, if we
keep eliminating joins of sub-lattices while not touching singletons, we can get further
questions. This is because we did not touch any singleton, hence, we did not (factually)
gain any information. So, the arising propositions will not be informative. Moreover,
they will be inquisitive (because lacking an upper bound) and therefore they will be
guaranteed to be questions. The procedure is illustrated in Figure 3.1
w1 , w2 , w3
w1 , w2 w1 , w3 w2 , w3 w1 , w2 w1 , w3 w2 , w3
w1 w2 w3 w1 w2 w3
(a) ψ (b) ψ\ upper bound
w1 , w2 w2 , w3
w1 w2 w3 w1 w2 w3
(c) further question 1 (d) further question 2
Figure 3.1: Questions in an assertion
Let us call such questions that we can create from ψ potential questions triggered by
ψ. It holds that in the discourse state that we reach after updating the totally ignorant
state with an assertion ψ, ψ is no longer informative in that state and all potential
questions triggered by ψ are valid discourse moves, in fact, valid responses to ψ.
However, given some non-trivial state σ and a proposition ψ, the situation is a bit more
complicated.
Firstly, any question relative to JψK ∩ J!σK that is a sub-set of ψ will be a potential
question triggered by ψ but not any potential question triggered by ψ simpliciter will
qualify as a question in JψK ∩ J!σK. Consider, for instance in (83): we observe that both
% and ϕ are potential questions triggered by ψ, however only ϕ qualifies as a question
in JψK ∩ J!σK.
(83) a. JψK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 , w4 })

b. JσK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 , w7 })
c. J%K = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 }) ∪ {w4 } no question in JψK ∩ J!σK
d. JϕK = ℘({w1 , w2 }) ∪ ℘{w3 , w4 }) question in JψK ∩ J!σK
Second, the set of questions in JψK∩J!σK is not generally a sub-set of potential questions
triggered by ψ. To see this, just consider ϕ in (84). ϕ is not a potential question
triggered by ψ since it contains the world w5 , but is is a question in σ, since σ entails
its non-inquisitive closure but not $ itself.
(84) a. JψK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 , w4 })

b. Jψ∧!σK = ℘({w1 , w2 , w3 })
c. JϕK = ℘({w1 , w2 }) ∪ ℘({w3 , w5 })
Crucially, if we assume that triggering potential questions is a grammatical category, we

would expect that triggering questions should be independent of the discourse state. On
the other hand, if we expect triggering potential questions to be a category of discourse,
we would rather expect that this notion is dependent on the relevant discourse state.
This leads to two non-equivalent definitions, given in (85) and (86).
(85) Potential questions triggered simpliciter

ϕ is a potential question triggered by an assertion ψ, iff ϕ is a question ψ.
(86) Potential questions triggered in a context

ϕ is a potential question triggered by an assertion ψ relative to a discourse
state σ, iff ϕ |= ψ and in ϕ is a question in ψ∧!σ.
For any ψ and any σ, the set of potential questions triggered by ψ in σ is a subset of
the set of potential questions triggered by ψ. Moreover, once we have the update rule
defined in Chapter 1 as conjunction, the definition in (86) is equivalent with the one in
(87).
(87) Potential questions triggered in a context (alternative formulation)

ϕ is a potential question triggered by an assertion ψ relative to a discourse
state σ, iff ϕ is a question in ψ∧!σ.
This notion of potential questions, unfortunately, does not seem to be any step forward,
as compared to the notion of valid discourse moves and the notion of valid responses
provided in Chapter 1. In fact, the definitions are pretty much equivalent. Especially,
these notions will not help us in any way capture any interesting fact about discourse,
in fact the only possible empirical claim that one could associate with these notions is:
If you are in the discourse state σ, ask anything that is a question in σ. This extends
the coverage of Roberts (1996), however, in a way which makes the entire discourse
model trivial.
Once we consider a dynamic component, however, the situation becomes much more
interesting. I propose the definition (88), which will turn out to be useful.
(88) Potential questions licensed by a discourse move in a context

ϕ is a potential question licensed by an assertion ψ relative to a discourse state
σ, iff ϕ is a potential question triggered by ψ relative to ψ∧!σ and ϕ is not a
question in the discourse state σ.
This definition is equivalent with the following formulation:
(89) Potential questions licensed by a discourse move in a context (alter-

native formulation)
σ, iff ϕ is a question in ψ∧!σ and ϕ is not a question in the discourse state σ.
The set of potential questions licensed by ψ relative to a discourse state σ is a subset

of the potential questions triggered by ψ relative to the discourse state σ. It should,
furthermore, be clear that the notion of triggering potential questions simpliciter is not
context dependent, whereas the other two are.
Given the definition in (89), we expect that the licensed potential questions by the last
assertion constitute the largest set of possible discourse moves which are non-strategic
in discourse, hence corresponding to the weakest conceivable notion of non-strategic
event handling discussed in the previous section.
I wish to conclude this section by making clear that, intuitively, the notion of potential
questions widely corresponds to the classical notion of sound questions in the erotetic
logics of Wisniewski (2010). In particular, Wisniewski assumes that only questions

which have satisfied presuppositions are safe to ask in a discourse state. So, unless
I know that someone laughs, I cannot safely ask (90), as I otherwise may receive a
negative answer, which is generally conceived as a discourse malfunction.
(90) Who laughs?
In the semantic literature, there is a certain discussion as to whether wh-questions have

presuppositions at all. In particular, it has been observed that it is very natural to
answer with (91) to the question (90). However, following Karttunen (1977), Hintikka
(1978) and most recently Haida (2007) I will assume that such an answer to a wh-
question is really no answer but a rejection of the question as unsuitable for the discourse
state.
(91) Nobody laughs.
One clear argument showing that which I take from Haida (2007) is that one cannot
answer with a pure existential to a wh-question. This would be predicted, however, iff
the question had no existential presupposition:
(92) a. Who laughs?

b. ??Someone laughs.
Another argument to the same extent is that an ignorant answer as in (93) intuitively
suggests that the speaker accepts the presupposition. For precisely this reason it is
not superfluous to add: (94). If there was no existential presupposition, (94) would be
expected to mean the same as (93):
(93) I don’t know who laughs.
(94) I don’t know who laughs, in fact, I don’t know whether anyone laughs at all.
In the current setup I do not speak of presuppositions of questions, rather I say that in a
given discourse setup a proposition is not a question at all, unless it’s “presupposition” is
satisfied. In my view, this step is dictated by the overall setup of inquisitive semantics
(at least in the algebraic setup I follow here). In inquisitive semantics, except for
assertions and questions, also so called hybrids exist, which are both informative and
inquisitive. Consider for instance the utterance of any informative proposition of the
type given in (95) in the ignorant state.
(95) ϕ∨ψ
(95) will not qualify as a question, because it is informative, but it will also not qualify
as an assertion, because it is inquisitive (it lacks a join in its denotation). According
to the definitions adopted in Chapter 1, (95) is not a valid discourse move.
This departs from the original discussion in Groenendijk and Roelofsen (2009), where
it has been claimed that disjunction (both in logics and in natural language) has a
double role: it may be informative, but on the other hand it also requests for further
information. I follow Roelofsen (2013b) in assuming that actually no assertion, marked
e.g. by a sentence final falling accent, will be inquisitive, which can be e.g. implemented
by saying that a declarative accent adds missing joins to the semantic representation
(i.e. they form the non-inquisitive closure), hence turning them into assertions. Another
option that we have adopted in the previous two chapters was to assume that the
assertion operator itself applies non inquisitive closure, hence ruling out the option that
disjunctions in assertions give birth to hybrids. Hybrids remaining are then denotations
of interrogatives and they will become questions in certain discourse states (in which
they are not informative).
The notion of potential questions captures another intuition, spelled out in Ciardelli
et al. (2009), who introduce so called attentive content: In early versions of inquisitive
semantics, generally only maximal states that support some proposition have been
given as its denotation. Now, this has the advantage that one can, occasionally, add
alternative states into the denotation which are not maximal, if determined by formal
or natural language grammar. Such states are called residuals. Now, one may say
that propositions which have residual alternative states, have the function to draw the
attention to those states, e.g. natural language might appears to behave this way.
Similarly, in the light of Roelofsen (2013b) it would be reasonable to assume that
disjunction in declaratives behaves exactly the same way. I.e. one way to represent
disjunction would be the one in 3.2. In the figure, one can actually see that there are
two alternatives which seem not to perform anything, since they are not maximal, but
still have a special status. These are the alternatives to which the attention of the
hearer seems to be drawn.
11 10 11 10
11 10
01 00 01 00
01 00
(a) ϕ (b) ψ (c) !(ϕ ∨ ψ)
Figure 3.2: Disjunction as attentive content
But in Roelofsen (2013b) an algebraic account is adopted in which every conceivable

residual state is present in the representation anyway, hence as shown in Figure 3.3,
the maximal alternatives corresponding to the two disjoints no longer have a special
status.
11 10 11 10
11 10
01 00 01 00
01 00
(a) ϕ (b) ψ (c) !(ϕ ∨ ψ)
Figure 3.3: Disjunction in the algebraic setting
The notion of potential questions now enters the picture as a more principled way to
unify the two intuitions: the idea that disjunction in a natural language declarative
somehow raises the question which of the disjoints is true really is a special case of the
more general notion of triggering potential questions. Given (95), it is easy to see that
the question naturally triggered by the disjunction, i.e. which of the disjoints is true,
is a maximal potential question. But other questions may also arise. This is shown by
the two examples in (96) and (97):
(96) a. Peter either sleeps or he reads a book. He will definitely not come to the
party.
b. Peter sleeps. He will definitely not come to the party.
(97) a. Peter either sleeps or he reads a book. I wonder whether he sleeps or he

reads a book.
b. Peter sleeps. I wonder whether he snores.
The point of interest is the comparison between the a. and b. sub-examples in each
example. Consider the first pair in (96). Here, we compare the disjunction in (96-a)
with the simple atomic assertion in (96-b). I see absolutely no intuitive ground on
which one can say that disjunction raises an issue here. In fact, given the obvious topic
of discussion, the disjunction settles the issue just as well as the assertion. Of course,
the disjunction is less powerful in terms of informativity, and therefore one could say at
least that in some sense, one more issue arises. But this is true in all cases just because
(as Groenendijk and Roelofsen (2009) note themselves) discourse is always ignorant
with regard to many things.
The example in (97) complements the argument. Now, we have a disjunction in (97-a)
and the speaker actually raises the issue that should have been raised by the disjunction.
For one thing, this might seem surprising, but one can always say that re-raising an
issue is possible in some cases. However, we see in (97-b) that one can raise an issue
precisely the same way just by elaborating on an atomic assertion. On an intuitive
ground, I see absolutely no difference between the a and b examples that would in any
way suggest that disjunction in natural language assertions is more inquisitive than
atomic assertions, if inquisitiveness is understood as really raising an issue in discourse.
If, however, we think of potential questions, we have a nice way to handle the examples:
The question whether John sleeps or he reads a book only qualifies as a question in
the given discourse, once we know that John sleeps or he reads a book. Hence, it
is a potential question licensed by the first assertion. Exactly the same holds for
the question whether John snores. Since snoring (under the natural interpretation)
presupposes that John sleeps, the question whether John snores is also a potential
question raised by the respective assertion.
This is not to say that disjunction is not special. One may argue that disjunction,
just as the existential quantifier (which is analysed as a big disjunction in Roelofsen
(2013a)), is special in the sense that it compositionally highlights a particular question
and it makes it also available for other grammatical items. The idea is, then, that while
potential questions are the generic notion, in grammar not all potential questions play
the same role. For instance, if a potential question is at some point activated in the
process of composition, it will be more salient.
I wish to conclude this section with a terminological note: when speaking about gram-
mar, I will often speak about potential questions triggered and licensed by a proposition
interchangeably. This is because triggering can be understood as licensing in a totally
non-informative starting context. For any purposes in which the actual context plays
no role, triggering (simpliciter) and licensing are just the same. Triggering in a con-
text, however, differs from licensing in a context. These notions are then not to be
confounded.
3.2.3 Licensing of discourse moves in a discourse state
With the background on licensed potential questions and the background on sub-
questions, we are now in the position to finally, come up with a theory if discourse
which will be able to model entire texts (at least in cases in which modality and con-
ditionals play no role).
It should be obvious that in order to create a theory of discourse we will need a more
complex representation of discourse as compared to saying that a discourse state is a
proposition σ.
There are at least two reasons for this. Firstly: we need to see previous discourse states
in order to model that some question may have several sub-questions in discourse, i.e.
once a sub-question is answered, we need to go back to the super-question. Secondly,
potential questions licensed in discourse also require to see an old and a new discourse
state.
We therefore use a small fragment of the development history of a discourse to charac-

terise a discourse state. A discourse state is then defined as in (98), which amounts to
saying that there is no loss of information in discourse. Notice that it is a peculiarity of
algebraic inquisitive semantics that this formulation is not just a more pompous way to
speak about entailment; it is something entirely different. This is because sub-questions
do not entail their super-questions.
(98) Discourse states

hσ1 , σ2 i is a discourse state iff σ1 and σ2 are propositions and there is no w
such that {w} |= σ2 but {w} 6|= σ1 .13
Given this notion we can define the notion of licit discourse moves and discourse update:
(99) Licensing in discourse

A discourse state hσ1 , σ2 i licenses a proposition ψ iff
a. ψ∧!σ2 is an extended answer to σ2 or answers
b. ψ is a sub-question of σ2 or sub-questions
c. ψ is a question in σ2 but not a question in σ1 potential questions
(100) Discourse update

If hϕ1 , ϕ2 i licenses the proposition φ, the update will result in a new discourse
state: hϕ2 , !ϕ2 ∧ ψ.
Firstly, notice that when checking answerhood we have checked whether ψ∧!ϕ2 is an
answer, i.e. whether the actual update would qualify as an answer. This will not rule
out any answers and allow less informative utterances as answers, iff in the context
they support an answer. Notice, secondly, that we have used the notion of extended
answer here. This is the most liberal notion of answerhood that has been defined14 . It
may be the case that a stronger notion of answerhood could be argued for as a natural
limit to what counts as an answer to a question, such as the notion of an answer
simpliciter or the notion of a direct answer. However, as far as I can see, this will not
generally hold. It seems that any further constraint on answerhood should be used
either as part of explicating the answerhood-requirements of some particular kinds of
questions or as particular pragmatic rules. For instance, some questions like German
wer-alles? -questions discussed in Zimmermann (2012) seem to really require complete
answers, some other questions like disjunctive questions seem to require direct answers,
but neither of them can be seen as a general case. Similarly, there are pragmatic
13
This is a simplification, we know from the study of interaction, Ginzburg (2012) that there is a
significant amount of negotiation between speaker and hearer going on and that, actually, it is often
the case that proposed content will ultimately will be removed from discourse.
14
However, if we require, additionally, congruence between questions and answers, there will, again,
be some limitation.
situations in which it is obvious that giving a direct answer which is not a complete
answer will suffice, and yet others in which only complete answers are acceptable.
Moreover, one can think of contexts in which answers which are not direct answers are
welcome, i.e. in a query in which the interlocutors have to contribute all knowledge
to find out the complete answer to a question, and others, in which complete answers
are mostly useless, e.g. in the case of mention-some questions, e.g. Where can I buy
cigarettes?. (99) is to be seen as a general, very liberal constraint, which can certainly
accept additional requirements.
Notice that the licensing rule defined above is not yet fully compatible with our require-
ments for at least two reasons. Firstly, it does not yet capture the recursive behaviour
of sub-questions and it does not capture the idea that even potential questions might
be asked which have been triggered at some earlier point. In order to achieve this, we
will finally introduce a representation of discourse as a tree.
3.2.3.1 Discourse as a tree
For the following, I define a discourse state ξ as a tree such that each node in a tree is a
proposition in the sense of inquisitive semantics pi .15 Each node has a binary property
1 or 0 which we write as a superscript. In addition, we have a pointer A which always
points to the so called active node in the tree. Graphically, we signal the active node
as a box. We use the pointer in the intuitive way, i.e. unless the pointer itself stands
alone on the left hand side of := it will not be reset and continue to point to where it
has been set to point. So, the following are discourse states differing only in the active
node. We assume furthermore that each proposition in each node is unique, so we can
identify a node by the proposition it contains.
(101) p11 p11 p11
p12 p04 p15 p12 p14 p15 p12 p14 p15
p03 p16 p07 p03 p16 p07 p03 p16 p07
The property of each node is accessed by Available(pi ). If that equals 1 it means that
the node is an open attachment site, if it equals 0 then the node is no longer an open
attachment site. We then define a function returning the mother node of some node in
the tree and a function returning the lowest available dominating open node, if there
is one.
(102) Useful notions
15
In the tree notation I use latin small letters for inquisitive propositions.
a. Mother(pi ) = pj iff pj is the mother of pi

b. Ancestor(pi ) = pj iff pi ..pn ..pj is the smallest chain such that for any
n : Mother(pn ) = pn+1 and Available(pj ) = 1. If no such node exists,
Ancestor returns a natural end of the discourse.
We write A(ξ) to access the active node of ξ and we write Content(ξ) to calculate
the intersection of the non-inquisitive closure of all propositions in ξ. Then, naturally,
Content(ξ) is most similar to the context set. We also define the informative content
of a section of a tree which is independent of a particular node, we write keeping in
mind that temporal order is from the left to the right: Content(ξ, p) which is defined
as the intersection of the non-inquisitive closures of all propositions of ξ which are not
equal to or dominated by p or sisters or dominated by sisters to right of p in the tree
.16
Consider an example:
(103) ξ= p11
p12 p04 p15
p03 p16 p07

a. Content(ξ) =!p1 ∧!p2 ∧!p3 ∧!p4 ∧!p5 ∧!p6 ∧!p7
b. Content(ξ, p2 ) =!p1
c. Content(ξ, p5 ) =!p1 ∧!p2 ∧!p3 ∧!p4
d. Content(ξ, p1 ) = ℘(W)
We say that ξ is valid if for any two nodes pi and pj such that Mother(pi ) = pj ,
hContent(ξ, pj ), pj i licenses pi . The idea is that each discourse move in the tree must
be licensed by the last discourse state, which is gained by the mother proposition and
the former overall state. Notice that as a pre-requisite to this definition, one may want
to show that if a proposition α is licensed by a discourse state ψ, the proposition α ∧ ψ
is licensed as well. This is easy to show.
Furthermore we stipulate that any question-node in ξ may not have more than one
daughter if any of its daughters are assertions. If we apparently have several individual
non-complete answers, we will need to accommodate relevant sub-questions. This is a
requirement based on considerations developed in the previous chapter.
16
We assume that when content is used with one argument only, the second argument is a tautology
temporarily attached to the topmost node on the right. Such an implicit argument counts as a natural
end of a discourse.
3.2.3.2 Construction rules
Now, we discuss the rules by virtue of which, in this model a text (or a dialogue) can
be interpreted. Notice that at this point we are not interested in finding the best or
any coherent interpretation. We are just interested in finding a valid interpretation.
At the end of this book I will discuss some constraints on how a quality interpretation
can be found. At this point that is entirely irrelevant. We give the rules in terms of a
pseudo-algorithm. The algorithm is fully explicit but not directly implementable in a
programming language without some auxiliary pointers. The algorithm is not closed,
i.e. further constraints can be added. We generally ignore contradictions, as before, for
simplicity.
First, we give a rule for initialising a discourse: for any proposition p, p can be used to
start a discourse. We add p to the empty tree and set A := p and Available(p) := 1.
For any further discourse state ξ, we assume that ξ is not empty. We consider the
candidate p. We now discuss all cases which can occur:
• Case 1: hContent(ξ, A), Ai licenses p.
– Sub-case 1.1: p is a question in A. We introduce p ∧ Content(ξ) as a

node to the right such that Mother(p ∧ Content(ξ)) = A and we reset
the pointer A := p ∧ Content(ξ) and we set Available(A) := 1, i.e. the
licensing mother remains available as an attachment site, but the answer is
also available and in addition it is the new active node.
– Sub-case 1.2: p ∧ Content(ξ) is an answer to A. We do as before, but this

time we set Available(A) := 0 before re-setting the pointer. That means
that the question is now no longer available as an attachment site, but the
answer is.
– Further constraint: If the resulting tree is not valid, skip and go to Case 2.
• Case 2: hContent(ξ, A), Ai does not license p.
– Sub-case 2.1: We find a node pi such that Ancestor(A) = pi such that

hContent(ξ, pi ), pi i licenses p. If so, set Available(A) := 0 and A := pi and
go to case 1. If Ancestor(A) is not suitable, we may continue searching for
Ancestor(Ancestor(A)) etc. while closing all available attachment sites in
the event of final success.
– Sub-case 2.2: We do not find a node pi dominating A such that

hContent(ξ, pi ), pi i licenses p. In this case, we will need to accommodate
a valid tree ψ (consisting of at least two nodes) such that the root of ψ is
some proposition pr and the active node of ψ is (p ∧ Content(ξ), whereby
all nodes pu in ψ pu |= Content(ξ). When accommodating ψ we start by
case 1 attaching the root and all of its daughters, whereby the pointer is set
to the active node in ψ. When accommodating, we start again, at the active

node, but we also try dominating nodes that are available attachment sites.
– Further constraint: Accommodation must be optimised for practical pur-

poses.
A final rule will require that whenever explicit linguistic marking occurs which imposes
particular operations in the tree, e.g. attaching to a node which is actually no longer
accessible, this can happen. In those cases the tree will be locally turned into a simple
directed graph such that we get edges between mother-daughter nodes, which then
behave locally as if they were in the Mother relation. This way we make sure that we
return to the previous state once the excursion to the explicitly targeted node is over.
I will not implement the technical details of such steps, however, as I believe that such
operations should be defined in specific ways for the particular grammatical devices
triggering them.
I wish to conclude this section by pointing out that the notion of licensing potential
questions is a very powerful but very little restrictive resource in discourse. Hence,
unless we take seriously that accommodation must be optimised, we end up predicting
that any informative assertion may follow any assertion, because at all times we will
be able to accommodate a question triggered by the first assertion to which the second
assertion is an extended answer. In fact, this is a mathematical fact. If the second
assertion rules out at least one world (hence being informative) we can always construct
the exhaustive question consisting of a bipartition: on the one hand containing the
worlds ruled out by the second assertion and on the other hand the rest of the worlds.
This question is the completely answered by the second assertion.
Congruence, defined at least for foci in the last chapter, can help to a certain extent.
In particular, we may assume that any overtly made licit discourse move must be
congruent to its mother node, i.e. to the node to which it will be ultimately attached.
(104) Congruence
An overt proposition ϕ can only be attached to a node A iff ϕ ∼
= A.
However, congruence will not apply to accommodation. After all, we do accommodate

content and not linguistic expressions, hence we cannot check for accent and focus. The
consequence is that even if we assume some notion of congruence, there still will be a
guarantee that by virtue of accommodation we can find an attachment for any upcoming
assertion. In fact, again, there is an algorithm to generate an interpretation purely
based on set theoretic considerations, though it may contain a longer sub-tree that will
be accommodated. While I will not discuss this here, the idea of such an algorithm is
to generate sequences in which we move from more constrained congruence patterns
to less constrained congruence patterns in each step until we reach totally unrestricted
patterns. Once we are at that point, we can move on to the bipartition sketched above.
3.3. TWO APPLICATIONS 179
This, however, is not some undesired property of the system. Hence, just as it was
possible to interpret any two propositions as coherent using just sub-questions, the
additional system also allows total freedom. Empirically, this corresponds to the fact
that any two (totally unrelated) propositions can be asserted one after the other and
we, as humans, will attempt to find some kind of reasonable relation between the
two.There is no dadaist poem or text without an interpretation, in fact, the less obvious
the interpretation is, the more interpretations humans tend to come up with. Consider
a simple example:
(105) Peter loves Jane. It is raining. Grass never was greener.
Given the fact that (105) is a constructed example to show that unrelated sentences
can be interpreted, one may have the intuition that there is no connection between
these sentences. However, even then, we really feel inclined to find some connection
between the sentences, and given a long enough time and the trust that it is worths
searching, we will find some interpretation.
So, the above really is not imposing constraints on texts or discourses, but rather on
interpretations. So, while no text or discourse will ever come out as uninterpretable
according to the theory sketched above, many interpretations will come out as bad.
We will see at the end of the book, that once we attempt to actually analyse a real
text, we can use some interesting constraints to optimise the system to rule out more
interpretations and create a partial order over others.
3.3 Two applications
In this final section of this chapter I will show two first applications of the newly
introduced licit discourse move. In particular, I will show how we can naturally analyse
so called over-answers to questions and some unexpected focus accents, in particular
focusing on the Schmerling examples.
3.3.1 Over-answers
When the utterance proposed as an answer to some question gives too much information
we speak of over-answering. According to the definition, over-answers do not qualify
as an answer to respective question, even though in Roberts (1996) they are allowed,
as mentioned above. Nevertheless, some appear to be quite natural. Three natural
examples are given in (106), the first being taken from Zeevat (2007):
(106) a. A: Did any stock rise yesterday?

B: Yes, Alcatel and Telefonos Mexicanos.
b. A: Whom did Mary kiss?

B: She kissed JOHN, who you met yesterday.
c. A: Whom did John introduce to Jane?
B: John, cheerfully, introduced MAX to Jane.
However, some over-answers appear to be less natural, marked with one question mark
in (107), while others seem quite odd, marked with two question marks (though judge-
ments are subtle here):
(107) a. A: Whom did John introduce to Jane?

B: ?John cheerfully introduced MAX to Jane.
b. A: Whom did John introduce to Jane?
B: ?John CHEERfully introduced Max to Jane.
B: ??John introduced MAX to Jane cheerfully.
d. A: Who has a car?
B: ??JOHN has two cars.
e. A: Who has a car?
B: ?John has TWO cars.
The key observation that we will need is that we may paraphrase any over-answer as
a conjunction between an answer and some additional proposition, for example: John
introduced Max to Jane and he did it cheerfully. We may use a terminology recently
advocated in Simons et al. (2010) and subsequent research, especially Tonhauser et al.
(2013), to distinguish these meaning components: the distinction between at issue and
not at issue meaning components. We can define:
(108) Given some assertion p1 and a question p2 such that we can write p1 as a
conjunction of two maximal assertions p3 and p4 such that p3 is an extended
answer to p2 and p4 is not an extended answer to p2 , we say that p3 is at issue
and p4 is not at issue relative to p2 .
The notion of maximality amounts to this: Take the strongest entailed answer and
the weakest entailed non-answer such that they conjunction builds up our candidate
proposition. For our example, this means the following distinction:
(109) Whom did John introduce to Jane?

a. at issue component: John introduced Max to Jane.
b. not at issue component: John introduced Max to Jane cheerfully.
(110) Did any stock rise yesterday?

a. at issue component: Some stock rose yesterday.

b. not at issue component: Alcatel and Telefonos Mexicanos rose yesterday.
With this terminology we assume that an over-answer can only be accepted iff the
at issue content will answer the question (in terms of being an extended answer).
Moreover, once we add the at issue content to the discourse, this will license a new
potential question which will accept the not-at issue content of the candidate assertion
as an extended answer, which needs to be congruent to this potential question.
(111) Did any stock rise yesterday?
Yes, some stocks rose yesterday.
Which stocks rose yesterday?
Alcatel and Telefonos Mexicanos
(112) Whom did John introduce to Jane?
John introduced Max to Jane.
How did he do it?
He did it cheerfully
It is worth noting that the analysis proposed is very similar to what Zeevat had in
mind:
... the answer to the yes-no-question is followed by an answer to the wh-

question Which stock rose yesterday?, a question that was not explicitly
asked, but one which the interpreter obviously thought would be the next
one the speaker would ask.
In fact, this is exactly what we assume here, the main difference being that in this model
the treatment of over-answers follows naturally from the overall architecture and there
is no need for a special devise to generate so called stronger question as postulated by
Zeevat who claims that stronger questions can be obtained by replacing NPs by wh-
elements and by replacing more restricted wh-phrases by less restricted ones. Crucially,
the example in (112) shows that obtaining stronger questions in the sense of Zeevat
is only a special case. This is because we can also ‘replace’ unarticulated constituents
and we can also ask more general questions like in (113). The examples in (113) are
also answers to a triggered why-question.
(113) a. Who kissed Jane?

b. Peter kissed Jane, because he loves her.
The general suggestion is then that an over-answer always involves a two step inter-
pretation procedure: one part of the answer is interpreted as an answer to the overt
question and the other part of the answer is interpreted as an answer to a potential
question licensed by the former part of the answer.
However, this is not the entire story because it does not predict anything about the
different levels of acceptability of the answers.
We will assume that over-answers may come in three versions. In the first case like in
(106-a), the over-answer is a clear conjunction of two distinct sentences, each having
their own prosodic realisation. In the second case, the over-answer is built from two
units, but one of them is not independent, as in (106-b) and (106-c). Finally, in the
third case, the over-answer is one prosodic unit, as in (107-a),(107-b), etc.
Since in the first case we have two distinct prosodic units, it is reasonable to assume
that the over-answer consists of two independent speech acts.
The first of them will be interpreted (as sketched above) as a direct answer to the overt
question. The second speech act will answer a potential question licensed by first speech
act (or some question independently licensed in discourse). This correctly predicts that
we expect that the first speech act is congruent to the overt question and the second
one is congruent to the potential question which is accommodated in the discourse tree.
Moreover, it correctly predicts that such an over-answer cannot be turned around, so it
has to be the first part which is an answer to the overt question.Consider for instance
(114), which is simply bad. Another example is given in (115).
(114) A: Did any stock rise yesterday?

B: ??Alcatel and Telefonos Mexicanos, Yes.
(115) A: Who loves Mary?

a. B: JOHN loves her. She is pretty.
b. B: ?? She is pretty. JOHN loves her.
Notice that if we use connectives, turning the order around seems to be possible, con-
sider (116) and (117), however, intuitively these are no over-answers, rather it seems
that the first sentence is not intended to give more information than necessary; instead,
it makes explicit some piece of information which is required to deliver the answer. In
order to analyse such examples, which build on inference patterns, a more elaborate
theory of strategic queries would be necessary, see e.g. Wisniewski (2010).17 A simple
strategic query built on sub-questions alone will not suffice. The intuition is, however,
that the examples (116) and (117) are not instances of over-answers.
17
In the current theory, conclusions cannot be articulated because they are not informative. If they
follow, the context already supports them.
(116) A: Did any stock rise yesterday?

B: Alcatel and Telefonos Mexicanos, so, obviously, yes.
(117) A: Who loves Mary?

a. B: JOHN loves her. She is pretty.
b. B: She is pretty. Hence, JOHN loves her.
The second type of over-answers seems to be very similar. This time, however, the non-
independent unit, typically a non-restrictive relative clause or some appositive, will be
grammatically marked as such and it will always contain the not at issue inference.
This is, in a way, the standard analysis of appositives, and we will come back to them
in a detailed discussion in the next chapter. For now, it will suffice to observe that we
require that the non-restrictive material will need to answer and therefore be congruent
to some potential question licensed by the main clause, as shown in (118):
(118) A: Whom did Peter kiss?

B: Peter, cheerfully, kissed MAry.
a. Whom did Peter kiss?
Peter kissed MAry.
b. Peter kissed Mary. licenses: How did Peter kiss Mary?
c. How did Peter kiss Mary?
Peter kissed Mary cheerfully.
Crucially, we did assume here that such appositives are in a sense dependent but distinct
speech acts. We think of them as grammatically marked not at issue content as argued
in Simons et al. (2010), a similar idea is discussed in Potts (2005).
We now come to the third case, which is the most interesting of all. All examples
of this type are degraded, but apparently there still are differences in acceptability,
even independently of content. We can account for this by postulating two general
principles. The first is obvious, see e.g. Ginzburg (1992), Rooth (1992), Roberts
(1996), Beaver and Clark (2008), while the second one is a more general version of the
principle Maximise Presupposition originally postulated in Heim (1991), used in vast
amounts of the literature on various grammatical phenomena.
(119) a. Congruence
A speech act answers one questions and a speech act is congruent to the
question it answers.
b. Mark
Not at issue material relative to the overt question must be marked.
Let us now see how these two principles correctly predict the acceptability of the 7
answers discussed above and repeated in (120).
(120) a. A: Whom did John introduce to Jane?

B: ?John cheerfully introduced MAX to Jane.
b. A: Whom did John introduce to Jane?
B: ?John CHEERfully introduced Max to Jane.
B: ??John introduced MAX to Jane cheerfully.
d. A: Who has a car?
B: ??JOHN has two cars.
e. A: Who has a car?
B: ?John has TWO cars.
Observe that all examples in which the accent is on the constituent corresponding to the
wh-word in the overt question, except (120-a) are strongly deteriorated. This is because
none of the proposed answers (120-c), (120-d) qualify as extended answers to the overt
question. Hence, they answer some other question. Crucially, they are congruent to the
overt question, hence, they are not congruent to the question they answer. The first
principle is violated. Moreover, in these examples the second principle is also violated,
for the additional information as compared to the overt question is not marked as not
at issue. Hence, we have a double violation.
As opposed to this, the accent on the not at issue material seems to lead to a less
deteriorated pattern: both (120-b) and (120-e) appear to be much better, but still not
really acceptable. Here, we observe that the utterances do not qualify as extended
answers to the overt questions, and they are not congruent to them. Instead, if we
assume that they answer a potential question licensed by their at issue content, i.e.
How did John introduce Max to Jane? and How many cars does John have? 18 , we
observe that they both qualify as extended answers to these questions and they are
congruent to them. Hence, the congruence principle is not violated. However, in both
cases, the non-restrictive material relative to the overt question is not marked as such,
whence we get a violation of the second principle. Having one violation instead of two
arguably makes the examples more acceptable. We have seen, that once we mark the
not at issue material as an apposition, the example (120-b) becomes more acceptable,
as repeated in (121). The same is shown in (122) for (120-e). For these two examples
an analyses analogous to the previous type can be easily given.
18
There is another interpretation of the example, however, as well, according to which there is a
contrast between a car and two cars, hence B is actually wondering whether John counts as the owner
of a car if he has two cars. However, such an interpretation appears more natural as an answer to a
question like Who has one car?. In this case we have no over-answer.
(121) A: Whom did John introduce to Jane?

B: John, CHEERfully, introduced MAX to Jane.
(122) A: Who has a car?

B: John has a car, in fact TWO.
The example (120-a) is special, because it seems totally different from the rest. In-
tuitively, what happens here is that the speaker suggests that we actually knew that
whoever John introduced to Jane, he introduced him cheerfully. In a way then, it is
suggested that the common ground already supports the information cheerfully.
We have not said anything about presuppositions above, but it will certainly suffice
to observe that there is a clear contrast to (120-c), the latter being less acceptable.
I assume that this is explained by the fact that in (120-a) the adverb is moved to a
topical position, which, if non-focused, can be interpreted as a kind of presupposition
marking. Such a marking may suffice to avoid a violation of the principle Mark!. By
topicalising the not at issue material without focus, a sufficient degree of marking not
at issueness appears to be achieved.
The above is not a complete story of the phenomenon of over-answers. In particular,

the internal rules of accent placement seem to play a role as well. For instance, (123)
seems to be worse than (120-b). But I assume that this has purely prosodic reasons, as
in this case, probably, Max will not receive sufficient accent to mark its discourse new
status. I will not discuss such examples here.
(123) A: Whom did John introduce to Jane?

B: ??John introduced Max to Jane CHEERfully.
3.3.2 Unexpected foci
In the last chapter, I have stated that for answering a What happened? -question, typ-
ically, one will require a default prosodic accent, in order to get the abstract focus-
projection to the entire sentence. But it turned out that answers to What happened?
can be fairly natural even if the focus is different. This has been shown using the
following famous examples from Schmerling (1976).
(124) What happened?

a. JOHNSON died.
b. Trueman DIED.
The example (124-b) is unsurprising, however the example in (124-a) is against all
theoretical expectations and has constituted a long standing puzzle. In this section,
I will propose a simple and intuitive analysis of these examples using the notion of
potential questions. I will then extend the analysis to a range of additional data which
have been claimed to be similar.
Consider first the historical context: Trueman and Johnson are two politicians. At
the time of the respective news report, Trueman was seriously ill whereas Johnson was
supposed to do fine. Therefore, the fact that Johnson died can be considered a surprise,
whereas the fact that Trueman died is less surprising.
Second, we need some assumptions about the general rules of news-reports. In partic-
ular, we assume that in the newsflash, the starting question is What happened?. After
all, people are watching the news to find out what happened that day in the world.
Presumably, a newsflash is well structured and typically people expect that news will be
given according to a strategy of sub-questions. Moreover, we can have pretty much any
sub-questions, once we assume that the main question is interpreted as a mention-all
question, as argued above, since a direct answer to the exhaustification of this question
would single out one possible world. So, such sub-questions could be:
(125) a. What happened in the morning?

b. What happened in the evening?
c. What happened in politics?
d. ...
But notice that the question Who died? is not going to be a sub-question, for it
excludes the possibility that nobody (of importance) died. Instead, the question Did A
die? is a sub-question of the exhaustive question What happened?. So, if, in the news,
the speaker intends to say that a particular person A died, he has two main choices.
Either he introduces his utterance X died as an answer to the polar question (which
is a sub-question) as in (126), or he opts for a more subtle strategy. This goes like in
(127). 19
(126) Direct strategy

a. Q: What happened? accommodated or overt main question
b. Q: Did x die? licit sub-question, accommodated.
c. A: X died. overt utterance
(127) Subtle strategy.

a. Q: What happened? accommodated or overt main question
b. Q: Did anyone die? licit sub-question, accommodated.
19
Notice that we do not want the overt utterance to be interpreted directly as an answer to the main
question, for this would mean that this is the only news (at least, it will not be possible to attach any
more answers to that question).
c. A: Someone died. accommodated answer

d. Q: Who died? licensed potential question
e. A: X died. overt utterance
Given this theoretic and historical background, we can now think about the two an-
swers: which strategy can be used for which of the two Schmerling answers?
Consider first, (124-b). Since we know that Trueman was sick at that time, the direct
strategy in (126), seems very intuitive, after all, probably, it was a very salient question
in those days whether Trueman died or not. Now, crucially, as we have seen in the
last chapter, (124-b) is a perfectly congruent answer to the polar question. But what
about the subtle strategy? If we follow the subtle strategy in (127), the utterance is
not congruent. But instead, we can consider (128-b), for completeness. Under this
intonation, the answer is congruent with the subtle strategy but, nevertheless, strange.
For one thing, since Trueman was the most likely person to die (out of the important
people), building up a strategy according to which it is first insinuated that someone
died, then, the question is insinuated, Who died?, and only then, the answer is given,
seem totally absurd, since there was a much more direct strategy available. So, if one
were to still choose it without any obvious reason, that would give rise to undesired
interpretations, e.g. that the speaker is making fun of Truemans death. In a newsflash,
this must be avoided.

a. Johnson DIED.
b. ??TRUEman died.
Now consider (124-a). Obviously, this utterance is congruent with the subtle strategy
and not congruent with the direct strategy. For (128-a), then, exactly the opposite
holds. Now, consider which of the strategies is actually appropriate? The direct strat-
egy is not very appropriate because nobody would ever come up with the question
whether Johnson died or not. After all Johnson was healthy, hence, his death was
not an issue. Nevertheless, if the speaker had used (128-a), hearers could have recon-
structed the direct strategy. Since this strategy would be usual in a newsflash, hearers
would most probably accept the respective intonation. This predicts that (128-a) is
acceptable.
The subtle strategy, however, is appropriate as well. This is because there is an element
of surprise in the fact that Johnson died and hence, it makes sense to contrast Johnson
with other people who could have died. In the subtle strategy, since the question Who
died? is activated, precisely this happens. So the correct prediction arises, that it is
reasonable to use (124-a) but not (128-b).
At an informal level (though making use of the formal technology developed) this may
count as a satisfying solution for the ever since puzzling examples of Schmerling. The
notion of triggering potential questions played an important role thereby. In fact, I
believe that the lack of this notion in linguistic theory has been one of the reason no
satisfying explanation has yet been given.
The solution is not complete, since we do not have a theory of why a strategy really
should be chosen or not in discourse. We went entirely with intuition here and we
will not have a complete theory of choice in discourse in this book. But this is not
intended. Such a theory should be the topic of interdisciplinary research on salience
and other cognitive phenomena. For the purposes of this book, it suffices that the
conceptual apparatus introduced in the previous chapter can help us find at least one
way to preserve the focus question congruence rule without making too ad hoc decisions
about discourse moves.
At this point, I will attempt to extend the intuitive analysis to some more data by
discussing a recent proposal from the literature. Consider the contrast between (129)
and (130) from Kehler (2005).
(129) John1 pushed Bill2 and

a. he2 FELL.
b. HE1 fell.
(130) Fred1 summoned the bartender2 and then

a. he1 ordered a DRINK .
b. HE2 ordered a drink.
These examples are puzzling, because the accent depends on the indexing of the pro-
noun, even though the linguistic context is the same, i.e. the same elements are contex-
tually given, hence theories of givenness cannot account for the contrast. Moreover, the
general difference between the salience of the subject and the object cannot account for
the contrast either, since in (130) the accented pronoun is the object of the first clause
whereas in the example (129) the accented pronoun is the subject of the first clause.
Similarly, the θ-roles are also not going to help, because there is no agentivity contrast
between (129) and (130).
Kehler argues that in order to correctly predict the accent pattern in such examples
we need to assume that discourse coherence plays an essential role. In particular, he
argued that (129-b) is puzzling because
... the word that represents Given information receives accent whereas
the one that represents New information does not. (Again, this fact is
orthogonal to the decision to pronominalize; accent is still required if we
replace he with John on the relevant Result reading.) A plausible analysis
is that the presupposition of the Givenness of the Existential F-Closure of

the second clause – ∃x.fell x – is being accommodated by virtue of the world
knowledge expressed in (129). That is, example (129-b) reads roughly as
John pushed Bill, and as expected someone fell, but contrary to expectation
it was John and not Bill who did. [...] This analysis therefore suggests that
this use of accent would be infelicitous without an expectation capable of
giving rise to an inferrable antecedent, which appears to be correct:
(32) # John was talking to Bill and HE sat down.
Example (32) leaves the hearer searching for an interpretation because there
is no expectation being violated on either pronoun assignment.
... (Kehler, 2005)20
Kehler argues that while discourse coherence can help explain the accent pattern a
theory of QUDs like Roberts (1996) is not really helpful:
As these are both instances of Result, the QUDs for the second clauses are
presumably the same, along the lines of And what happened as a result?. It
is only world knowledge that tells us what the expected role fillers are, i.e.,
that usually the person who was pushed is the one who falls (thereby not
requiring accent on he in (129-a)) rather than the one who did the pushing
(thereby requiring accent on he in (129-b)). Again, coherence establishment
seems necessary to determine what both the QUD and accent patterns are.
... (Kehler, 2005)21
I wish to suggest that in one sense, Kehler is right. Certainly, if we are to predict
preferences among different intonation patterns, world knowledge is important and for
that matter any theory building on world knowledge, non-monotonic logic, plausibility
and probability. Also, he is correct, that a theory of QUDs alone, i.e. without potential
questions, will not be able to help analyse the data correctly. However, in my view,
there seems to be a certain subtle confusion in what he says.
For sure, there is a real contrast in (129). However, that contrast is about world
knowledge and not about linguistics. Put differently, it is not true that both accent
patterns would not be acceptable with the opposite indexing, as shown in (131). This
is supported by the fact that if we replace the pronouns with the respective names the
patterns are still acceptable, even if they are odd to a certain extent.
(131) John1 pushed Bill2 and

a. he1 FELL.
b. HE2 fell.
(132) John pushed Bill and
20
Formatting and numbering adapted
21
Formatting and numbering adapted
a. John/Bill FELL.
b. JOHN/BILL fell.
Given our world knowledge, some of these patterns sound odd. But if we actually hear
such an intonation pattern, it is not the case that our language module will break down.
Instead, we feel invited to make some assumptions about the world under which the
intonation gets natural. Consider one examples:
(133) Bill is a huge sumo-wrestler and John is a kid. John pushed Bill and
a. BILL fell.
b. ?JOHN fell.
c. John FELL.
d. Bill FELL.
The real contrast is that in such a situation the world knowledge influences the accept-
ability of the examples with narrow focus on the subject of the second clause. However,
world knowledge does not influence the acceptability of the examples with CP focus
(intonation on the verb), which is compatible with a what-happened question. This
is, then, exactly the same pattern as in the Schmerling examples. One very natural
strategy could be:
What happened first? What happened next?
John pushed Bill. John/Bill fell
The difficulty is rather that this simple and straightforward strategy, which is always
available in narration, is violated by the intonation with narrow focus on the subject.
What linguistic theory now needs to do is to explain what kind of interpretation of
these examples is available under the narrow focus intonation and then it is up to
world/situational knowledge to determine in which context this pattern will be accept-
able and in which one it is not. Put differently: a theory of QUDs cannot determine per
se (without a theory of plausibility, world knowledge etc.) which pattern will be more
acceptable and which one will be less acceptable. But that is not the business of this
theory. The real problem is that without a theory of potential questions in discourse a
theory of QUDs cannot explain in an intuitive way what is going on with the narrow
focus accent. But once we have potential questions, an analysis is easy to give:
What happened first? What happened next?
John pushed Bill. Someone fell
Who fell?
JOHN/BILL fell
A theory of discourse under the perspective adopted in this book ought to be able to
decide whether the interpretation in (136) is licit. It is on purely structural (congruence)
and logical grounds. The question, what kind of context, what kind of world knowledge
is needed that makes choosing such a strategy as compared to the one on (135) a decent
choice is an entirely different question. In discussing this question, the intuition of
Kehler is fully correct: unless the one who fell is unexpected, we do not need to choose
such a complicated strategy. But note, again, that this discussion is on a different level.
Now, is the analysis provided here better or worse than the one provided in Kehler
(2005). It is an explanation at a different level. Kehler shows that world knowledge
plays a role in predicting acceptability of accent patterns. But he only has an ad hoc
theory of the technical details. The analysis which comes naturally in the discourse
model provided here has a very clear technical machinery which predicts that (135) is
a valid strategy for narrow focus intonation (either on Bill or on John). But is has only
an ad hoc solution to the question whether world knowledge will actually license such
a strategy.22
22
But there are also other approaches to these data. In particular, Gillingham (2013) proposes a
focus sensitive surprise operator, which I quote in (136) and which says that the surprise operator will
only be defined if there is a focus alternative (in the sense of Rooth (1992), but that can be adapted
to inquisitive semantics as in Chapter 2 of this book) to the prejacent which is more likely than the
prejacent itself.
(136) JOpunlikely K = λChst, ti.λp : ∃qhs,ti [q ∈ C ∧ likely(q) > likely(p)].p
Now, she accounts for the contrast under discussion by saying that in contexts in which it is more likely
that Bill fell than that John fell, it will be acceptable to say that JOHN fell and vice versa. Clearly,
for this example (and actually for a whole range of other examples, this makes correct predictions).
However, there is a problem with this approach. Generally, it is assumed that whenever a focus
alternative is salient in the context, focus on the respective expression is licit. Now, in any case
in which Opunlikely is defined, such an alternative must exist (otherwise, it cannot be more likely).
Hence, whenever Opunlikely predicts that focus on some constituent is licit, any theory of focus without
Opunlikely would make the very same prediction. Of course, Opunlikely is not defined in all contexts in
which focus theories as such would predict an acceptable answer. However, it is not possible to assume
that any sentence with a narrow focus in which Opunlikely is not defined will be illicit. This is totally
obvious, since we can directly answer a wh-question with a narrow focus even if our answer picks the
most likely candidate, as shown in (137):
(137) a. Who won the price?

I wish to conclude this discussion with a telling analogy. Discourse is very much like
everyday human action. Interpreting discourse and finding the rationale behind human
action in general is pretty much the same. If I see John in his garden catching flies,
this certainly is odd. Now, I may decide whether I come up with a rational theory
of why John would start catching flies in his garden, or I may conclude that John is
insane. I could come up with various rational explanations: John could be a biologist
who wants to study flies, John might have lost a bet which forces him to do that, etc.
But if I know that John is not a biologist, I may not actually accept this (otherwise
totally rational) explanation of his action. With discourse, it is just the same: Given
a sentence in a context and given its intonation (and other grammatical properties),
a theory of discourse should come up with (a number of) valid interpretations (if any
interpretations exist). Whether or not such interpretations are actually plausible is a
totally different issue.
So I concluded that Kehler is right in many respects and his theory of coherence can
actually help but at the same time, a technically clear theory of valid interpretations in
discourse in terms of justifying each discourse move by a licensor is necessary as well.
The discussion of these examples shows that we need the notion of potential questions
to develop a proper analysis of such data. At the same time, this discussion also shows
the limits of potential questions: they are not and they are not intended to be useful in
making predictions about the acceptability of any valid strategy. To do that, we need
additional components.
b. Of course, SeBAStian won the price. He is the best.
Hence, we must assume that Opunlikely is optional. This means that we ended up with an operator
which will not be present whenever it is not defined and which will not do anything whenever it is
present. To the extent, than, that this operator can explain any data, it is just because there is an
implicit assumption that whenever a more likely focus alternative exists, it will be salient. But this is,
in essence, the same as Kehlers point.
Chapter 4
Appositives and non-restrictive

relative clauses
In this chapter, I will propose a sketchy analysis for non-restrictive relative clauses, and
more generally, for appositives in terms of answers to potential questions licensed by
the host sentence.
Before starting, I will introduce the terminology that I use. The expression to which
an appositive or non-restrictive relative clause is attached is the anchor and I call the
whole clause/sentence which contains the appositive or non-restrictive relative clause
the host.
(1) Terminology
Michael, a champion, is home.
a. anchor: Michael
b. Appositive: a champion
c. Host: Michael is home.
Non-restrictive relative clauses are those relative clauses which do not restrict the do-
main of some quantifier or determiner.
(2) a. A man who loves Mary is home. restrictive relative clause

b. John, who loves Mary, is home. non-restrictive relative clause
4.1 Background
Supplement expressions, in particular appositives and non-restrictive relative clauses,

have recently been hotly debated, especially since the dissertation of Christopher Potts
(Potts, 2005) often under the label of conventional implicatures. Consider an example:
193
194CHAPTER 4. APPOSITIVES AND NON-RESTRICTIVE RELATIVE CLAUSES
(3) Peter, a friend of mine, sleeps.
A sentence like (3) should be puzzling for anyone doing compositional semantics right
from the very start, for it is unclear what to do with Peter. Certainly, we can combine
Peter with sleeps. Peter can be seen as an entity of type e, sleeps as a function of type
he, ti, so we can combine them and get a proposition (type t). But now, Peter is gone,
and what do we do with a friend of mine? After all, a friend of mine, seems to be
of type he, ti and this cannot be combined with a proposition. Alternatively, we could
combine Peter with a friend of mine, but this also leads to problems: this would yield
something of type t (the proposition that Peter is a friend of mine), and we cannot
further combine this with sleeps. Technically, we could also combine a friend of mine
with sleeps, say via the predicate modification rule in Heim and Kratzer (1998), which
would yield a type he, ti result, namely the property of being a friend of mine and
sleeping. This property can be combined with Peter, yielding a proposition. However,
the result is problematic – not only is it deeply unintuitive – if we add a simple negation.
If indeed (3) were to mean that Peter is a friend of mine and sleeps, the negation could
be true for two reasons: either because Peter is not a friend of mine, or because he does
not sleep. However, (4) still entails that Peter is a friend of mine.
(4) It is not the case that Peter, a friend of mine, sleeps.
This phenomenon is often called projection and initially observed for presuppositions in
Langendoen and Savin (1971) (although at that time it was rather formulated as a task,
namely to derive the presuppositions of a complex sentence from the presuppositions
of their parts). A recent definition comes in Simons et al. (2010):
An implication projects if and only if it survives as an utterance implication

when the expression that triggers the implication occurs under the syntactic
scope of an entailment-cancelling operator.
This identifies two problems (that are of course interrelated) about appositions:
• How can we combine appositives with their anchor?
• How can we derive their projection properties?
4.1.1 Syntax
While for presuppositions the projection problem is not tied to syntax in particularly
interesting ways (at least not in the most important theories), as it is clear that they
are triggered in the syntactic scope of some entailment-cancelling operator, this is
by no means that clear for so called conventional implicatures in the terminology of
Potts (2005), partly because actually getting the semantic composition done such that
4.1. BACKGROUND 195
the conventional implicature, in our case, supplements, stay syntactically in situ is

anything but trivial. In fact, most analyses, like Edmonds (1979), McCawley (1988)
or more recently Del Gobbo (2003) or Schlenker (2010), assume that supplements of
the relevant kind or at least appositions and non-restrictive relative clauses are not
(always) in the scope of entailment-cancelling operators to start with. Let us call such
approaches: high syntax or flexible syntax approaches. Potts (2005) on the other hand
provides a compositional system in which a local application of appositives becomes
possible. Let us call such approaches the low syntax approaches.
Consider, first, the low syntax approach of Potts (2005). Potts (2005) postulates a
special level/dimension of meaning and includes a comma operator into the syntactic
structure, which transfers the meaning arising from the right daughter into the conven-
tional implicature and passes its left daughter on to the computation, as shown in (5).
Then, specific rules apply which conjoin the conventional implicature to the at issue
proposition expressed, yielding the results in (8) for (6).
(5) The comma operator

DP
Comma
DP App
(6) John thinks that Mary, a girl from the neighborhood, is waiting for you.
(7)
John
thinks
that wait M
CommaCI = girl M/ord. = M VP
is waiting for you

Mary Appos=girl
a girl from the neighbourhood
(8) assertion: John thinks that Mary is waiting for you.

conventional implicature: Mary is a girl from the neighbourhood.
One of the immediate consequences of this analysis is that conventional implicatures

are scopeless. Therefore, not being able to take narrow scope under any operator, two
general predictions follow:
• firstly, there is no binding from at issue meaning into conventional implicatures

and,
• secondly, conventional implicatures do not interact with any operators, such as

negation, conditionals, attitude verbs etc.1
Potts (2005) gives a convincing example to the extent that there is no binding into
conventional implicatures. Consider:
(9) No reporter1 believes that, as he1 wrote, Ames is a spy.
However, examples have been given in Amaral et al. (2007) according to which, to a
certain extent, binding seems possible from at issue content into not at issue content,
i.e. the content of supplements:
(10) Several scientistsi , most of themi linguists, arrived late.
The second prediction is that whenever combined with attitude verbs, for instance, the
conventional implicature will not contribute to building the embedded proposition:
(11) Mary believes that Peter, a linguist, is crazy.
In (11) it is not part of the belief reported of Mary that Peter is a linguist. Rather,
this information is interpreted as a kind of speaker-comment. This phenomenon has
also been discussed under the label of speaker orientation.
The high syntax approach assumes a syntactic tree like (12):
(12)
Appos
John
thinks
that shei is girl from the neighbourhood
Maryi VP
is waiting for you
1
For presuppositions no such claims exist (or would be justified).
4.1. BACKGROUND 197
There are different versions of the exact syntactic implementation starting from radical
orphanage until different adjoining sites in the domain of the CP or speech act operator.
We will not go into the syntactic details here. What is important, however, is to see that
such an analysis on the one hand, can predict speaker orientation and scopelessness for
free, without introducing any funky operator or additional dimension of meaning. The
reason is that the appositive is not part of the domain of any operator in the sentence.
On the other hand, there is a locality issue to be solved: Mary does not c-command
and therefore cannot bind the pronominal element which combines with the appositive.
Typically, the technical solution of the locality problem is to assume that she is a so
called E-Type pronoun, cf. Heim (1990), Elbourne (2001, 2005), which is modelled
in the general framework of situation semantics. I do not discuss the technical imple-
mentation here for two reasons: firstly, I do not agree with the conceptual background
of situation semantics in general for reasons that are of no relevance to this book,
and second, because it does not seem to me that the binding problem in such cases
is actually really serious to start with. In fact, we can assume that a proper name
such as M ary is scopeless itself and therefore we can move it up the tree to a position
in which it c-commands the apposition. Alternatively we can say that proper names
are presuppositional in nature and therefore, after accommodation in discourse, they
will be able to dynamically bind a pronoun according to any dynamic semantic theory
e.g. DRT Kamp and Reyle (1993) or DPL Groenendijk and Stokhof (1991). More
generally, it is simply true that only DPs can be modified by appositives which have a
high enough existential scope (in the sense of Szabolcsi (2010)2 )to bind the appositive
even on the highest attachment site. Otherwise predictions such as scopelessness and
speaker orientation would not hold to start with. For readers who are sceptical about
both proposals, there is an additional solution: Onea (2013) proposes a static com-
positional system in which binding without c-command, in fact, even donkey binding,
comes for free. For this reason, I will not worry here about the pronominal binding
outside the c-command domain.
What is a much more serious problem of the high syntax approach is that it is not
clear what the discourse function of appositives should be. Put differently, what is the
difference between:
(13) a. John, a friend of mine, sleeps.

b. John sleeps and he is a friend of mine.
Notice that under the theory of Potts, at least it is clear that conventional implicatures
2
Szabolcsi differentiates for many quantifiers a so called existential scope (which fixes the existence
of a restrictor set) and a distributive scope, which is generally much lower. For pronominimal binding
both are available, but they often coincide. For her, indefinites can escape scope islands because their
existential scope is not limited to islands, but their distributive scope (which is irrelevant if there is
only one element in the restrictor) is in the island.
are special. Under the high syntax analysis, additional stipulations are needed to ex-
plain what makes appositives differ from plainly adjoined conjuncts in root sentences.3
4.1.2 Projection
Appositives and non-restrictive relative clauses seem not to interact with other oper-
ators which appear to syntactically dominate them. A few examples should illustrate
this uncontroversial observation:
(14) Peter believes that Mary, his friend, is sick.

a. 9 Mary is sick.
b. → Mary is Peter’s friend.
(15) It is not the case that Mary, Peters friend, is sick.

a. 9 Mary is sick.
(16) If Mary, Peters friend, is sick, Peter will be sad.

a. 9 Mary is sick.
In this respect, appositives seem similar to presuppositions, which also project above
holes.
(17) Peter believes that Marys children are sick.

a. 9 Marys children are sick.
b. → Mary has children.
(18) It is not the case that Marys children are sick.

(19) If Marys children are sick, Peter will be sad.

But there are essential aspects in which presuppositions and ‘projecting’ appositive in-
formation differ. Firstly, appositives mostly provide new information, whereas presup-
positions are generally assumed to provide information that, in some sense, is already
3
For embedded cases, of course, the difference is obvious because high syntax can predict projection.
4.1. BACKGROUND 199
part of the common ground at the moment of the evaluation of the asserted content
of the corresponding sentence. One meanwhile classical example comes from Beaver
(2001).
(20) Sweden may export synthetic wolf urine – sprayed along roads to keep elk away
– to Kuwait for use against camels.
Moreover, appositions come with what Potts (2005) has called the anti-backgrounding
effect, i.e. if the information they contain is already in the common ground, they
become redundant and hence unacceptable. As opposed to this, presuppositions can
already be part of the common ground. Potts (2005) gives the following example for
illustration:
(21) Lance Armstrong survived cancer.

a. #When reporters interview Lance, a cancer survivor, he often talks about
the disease.
b. And most riders know that Lance Armstrong is a cancer survivor.
Yet another difference involves the observation that presuppositions do not always
project, typically so called plugs block presupposition projection, as argued in Potts
(2005). In the following expressions, the inference in the parenthetical appears to
survive, even though comparable presuppositions do not.
(22) a. Peter said that Mary is crazy, as John reported.

(i) 9 Mary is crazy.
(ii) → John reported that Mary is crazy.
b. Peter said that Mary managed kill John.
(i) 9 Mary killed John.
(ii) 9 Mary tried to kill John.
(23) a. Peter pretended that he, as predicted by Michael, was sick.

(i) 9 Peter was sick.
(ii) → Michael predicted that Peter would be sick.
b. Peter pretended that his children are sick.
(i) 9 Peters children are sick.
(ii) 9 Peter has children.
Therefore, it is generally assumed that projecting information in appositions and non-

restrictive relative clauses are not actually presuppositions, even though this is not
uncontroversial. Cf. Sæbø (2010), who treats them as ordinary presuppositions, and
Schlenker (2010), who analyses projection exactly along the same lines as presupposi-
tion projection, even though he does not explicitly claim that supplement information
is presupposed.
Again, some problematic examples have been provided. Of special interest are ex-
amples discussed in Sæbø (2010), who observes that in downward entailing attitude
contexts, very often conventional implicatures are part of the proposition that is at-
tributed to someone. For instance in (24-a) if the information that Mary is a virgin was
only attributed to the speaker, Mary would have little reason to be astonished about
becoming a child – however, once we assume that she knows that she is a virgin (which
she obviously must know), her astonishment becomes fully legitimate.
(24) a. Mary could not believe that she, a virgin, would have a child.
b. Mary was surprised, that Peter, an atheist, had a Bible under his pillow.
Other types of examples for which at least some kind of shift from speaker to attitude
holder appears to exist, are given in Amaral et al. (2007), the one quoted is, however,
from Harris and Potts (2009):
(25) Joan is crazy. She’s hallucinating that some geniuses in Silicon Valley have
invented a new brain chip that’s been installed in her left temporal lobe and
permits her to speak any of a number of languages she’s never studied. Joan
believes that her chip, which was installed last month, has a twelve year guar-
antee.
The essential aspect of these kinds of examples is that the speaker is not committed
to believe that the chip of Joan has been installed a month before the speech act, but
rather, what is reported is a belief of Joan. Such examples have lead Amaral et al.
(2007), but also Sæbø (2010) and Schlenker (2010) (although Schlenker comes with
additional types of examples), to assume that, after all, conventional implicatures do
take narrow scope in such cases. Otherwise, it would appear difficult to understand how
in (25) the belief that the chip of Joan was installed at a specific time is not attributed
to the speaker but to the hearer.
4.2 Appositives and non-restrictive relative clauses are

answers to potential questions
In this section, I will propose an alternative theory of appositives and non-restrictive

relative clauses. The theory that I propose is in fact extremely simple: they conven-
tionally encode the (short/term) answer to one of the potential questions triggered by
the host utterance. Consider, first, a simple example in (26):
4.2. APPOSITIVES AND POTENTIAL QUESTIONS 201
(26) Peter, a friend of mine, sleeps.

a. Host/At issue meaning: Peter sleeps.
b. Potential question: ψ
c. Answer: A friend of mine.
We did not actually say which question ψ is. Some preliminary suggestions are given
in (27).
(27) a. Who is Peter?

b. Do I know Peter?
c. Which Peter?
d. ..
4.2.1 Grammatical constraints on potential questions
Appositives in general do not impose any content-related restriction on the potential

question they answer except that the appositive must be congruent with (and of course
an answer to) the potential question and the potential questions must be licensed by
the host utterance itself.
That does not mean that there are no additional, grammatical constraints. In fact, one
of the difference between NP appositives and non-restrictive relative clauses is that non-
restrictive relative clauses impose no constraints whatsoever on the potential question
they answer, whereas appositives come with some simple constraints. Consider, for
instance, the following situation:
(28) context: In a Woody Allen film at a family dinner with friends, at some point
one of the guests gets upset and reports that she has seen the family father,
named Peter, with another woman, hoping to upset his wife. Now, in order
to emphasize that she did not mistake Peter with someone else, she can say,
pointing at Peter:
a. Guest: I have seen Peter, him, with another woman.
b. Guest: # I have seen Peter, he, with another woman.
Consider an additional example, given in (29). This time, A reports that Peter sleeps,
B responds bewildered, since he has no idea who is meant. Say, B and A are a couple
who live together, and when B, the wife, comes home, A reports that Peter sleeps. The
astonishment of B is now acceptable. A can answer to this question by supplying some
quick information about Peter.
(29) a. A: Peter sleeps.

b. B: Who???
c. A: A friend of mine.
One could argue that this Who? is actually a short form for Who is Peter?, but
actually if we consider a similar example in German, we will find an interesting contrast.
Consider, (30), which is a very clear contrast in German:
(30) a. Ich habe Peter gesehen.

I have Peter seen
‘I’ve seen Peter’
b. Wen???
Who.ACC
‘Who?’
c. #Wer???
Who.NOM
‘Who?’
Potts has used similar arguments from German to argue for a low syntax approach.
(31) a. Ich habe Peter, einen Freund von mir, gesehen.

I have Peter a.ACC friend of mine seen
‘I’ve seen Peter, a friend of mine’,
b. *Ich habe Peter, ein Freund von mir, gesehen.
I have Peter a.NOM friend of mine seen
‘I’ve seen Peter, a friend of mine’
I do not assume that the data actually give enough evidence for such a claim. Instead,
it seems that the very same constraints which govern the case matching in our English
example above also apply to naturally raised overt questions about the host utterance,
as shown in (30). Hence, we may assume that appositives do not syntactically require
a case match between the appositive NP and the modified NP, rather, they impose
constraints on the potential questions answered directly by the appositive NP.
As opposed to this, the examples below show that there are no similar constraints on
non-restrictive relative clauses:
(32) a. Ich habe Peter, den Maria liebt, gesehen.

I have Peter whom Mary loves seen
‘I’ve seen Peter, whom Mary loves’,
b. Ich habe Peter, der Maria liebt, gesehen.
I have Peter who loves Mary seen
‘I’ve seen Peter, who loves Mary’
Up to now, we have made the claims in (33), which suffices to analyse all the data
above.
(33) Interpretation of appositives

Given a discourse state σ and a linguistic structure ,
CP1 App.CP2
JApp.CP2 K must be interpreted as an extended answer to some question ϕ such
that JCP1 K licenses ϕ as a potential question relative to σ. Moreover:
a. App.CP2 must be congruent to !σ ∧ ϕ and
b. If App.CP2 is an elliptic structure such that the only overt element is an
NP, then ϕ must be derived from an interrogative such that the wh-word
of the interrogative has the same case features as the anchor.
4.2.2 An interesting prediction
This little theory has one important prediction that no other theory of appositives can
make in a formally precise way: a proper name will only trigger potential questions
about the respective individual (without any further connection to the content of the
sentence) on first mention.
The reason for this is that names, just like definite descriptions, are presuppositional, as
standardly assumed in DRT. If they appear in a question, the respective individual must
have been already mentioned before. So, mentioning an individual, will immediately
trigger potential questions about that individual, since no question containing that
name could be asked beforehand. Crucially, however, after the first mention, no more
potential questions about this individual as such will be licensed, because an utterance
only licenses those potential questions which have not been available before.
The prediction regarding appositives is then the following: On first mention of a proper
name (or an indefinite) an appositive can contain any information about that individual.
On second mention, however, we will infer some contentwise connection to the host
clause information. A very clear example should be (34):
(34) Peter, a friend of mine, won a dancing competition.

6 My friendship helped him in some sense winning this competition.
(35) Peter was very happy yesterday. Peter, a friend of mine, won a dancing com-
petition.
My friendship helped him in some sense winning this competition.
I admit that (35) (given the fact that the name is repeated on such a short distance) is
odd. But the crucial thing is that there is a very clear contrast here: if one hears (35),
some inference of the kind mentioned is really easy to get. After all, it seems that the
speaker mentioned that Peter is a friend of his because this is somehow connected to
his success. But in (34), this inference is at least much weaker.
Where does the prediction come from? On first mention, a proper name will trigger any
kind of potential question about the respective individual. However, on second mention,
it will be only the propositional content of the host, which will trigger the potential
questions. Hence, we will end up with questions which presuppose the proposition of
the host. We will therefore attempt to find a closer connection between the proposition
expressed by the appositive and the proposition expressed by the host. This will include
questions of explanation, of elaboration etc.
4.2.3 Not-at-issueness
This analysis still misses one crucial property of appositives and non-restrictive relative
clauses, namely that they represent not at issue content. To see the problem, remember
that any assertion will license potential questions. Crucially, any potential question
licensed by some assertion can, in principle, be answered by the next assertion. But
not any such answer will be an appositive. So, there must be a difference between
appositives and normal assertions which answer a potential question. The difference is
precisely that appositives are not at issue. I first discuss the general intuition behind
this claim in an informal, functional way, and then I go on to give a formally precise
definition of this idea.
Consider, for illustration, the following examples:
(36) a. Peter is happy. He just won a dancing competition.

b. Peter, who just won a dancing competition, is happy.
It is perfectly conceivable that the second sentence in (36-a) answers exactly the same
potential question triggered by the first sentence, as the appositive in (36-b). In fact,
there is a quite obvious candidate question, given in (37):
(37) Why is Peter happy?
However, in (36-a) the information that Peter won a dancing competition is at issue,
in (36-b) it is not at issue. Under the assumption that (38) is a potential question
triggered by the main clause/first sentence, the difference cannot be, as many scholars
claim, that not at issue content does not answer the question under discussion. In
fact, the potential question, once it is activated, is a perfectly legitimate QUD, it may
have its own sub-questions, it may be targeted by contrastive topic constructions etc.
I believe that the essential difference lies elsewhere: not at issue content should not
motivate any non-strategic steps in the discourse. Put differently, not at issue content
will not trigger potential questions. Or, put differently, not at issue content will not be
a reasonable attachment site for any further discourse move.
For our example, this predicts that any potential question directly triggered by the
proposition that Peter won a dancing competition will not be acceptable as a contin-
uation to (36-b) but it will be acceptable as a continuation to (36-a). The prediction
is only limited in power, since the reason that a speaker marks some information as
not at issue will not necessarily stop the hearer to ‘make it’ at issue if he desires. So,
the level of non-acceptability that we predict is not so high. It is, however, higher in a
monological setup. Consider some examples.
(38) Peter is happy. He just won a dancing competition.

a. It took place in Paris.
b. The competition was sponsored by a big IT-corporation.
c. Max also won a dancing competition.
d. A: Where was the competition?
e. A: Did you know there was a dancing competition?
(39) Peter, who just won a dancing competition, is happy.

a. ??It took place in Paris.
b. ?The competition was sponsored by a big IT-corporation.
c. ??Max also won a dancing competition.
d. A: ??Where was the competition?
e. A: ?Did you know there was a dancing competition?
So the idea is that if the speaker uses (36-a) there is a risk that the interlocutor will
venture into discussing the dancing competition. The entire point in using (36-b) is,
accordingly, to block such an undesired discourse adventure. Functionally speaking,
then, appositives and non-restrictive relative clauses are used because they are a gram-
maticalised way to a) answer a potential question triggered by the main clause and b)
they will not trigger potential questions themselves. That is to say, they are grammat-
icalised way to temporarily escape a strategic discourse and, at the same time, block
any further digression.
Indeed, there seems to be a very clear intuition to that extent, consider another example:
(40) a. Peter, a friend of mine, is happy.

b. Peter is happy. He is a friend of mine.
In (40), the intuition seems to be that when the appositive is used, the speaker informs
the hearer in passing, who Peter is, and he does not intend that any further question
about his friendship with Peter will come up. As opposed to this, if a full clause is
chosen, one obvious next topic to continue would be this very friendship.
Appositives trigger no further questions, but at the same time, there is a grammatical
guarantee that appositives answer a potential question about the first sentence. This
leads to a very interesting consequence: the exact spell-out of the potential question
will remain implicit forever. Put differently, this question is implicit, and the speaker
signals that this question and its answer will not become discourse topics. Therefore
the connection between the appositive and the host sentence will generally remain
somewhat vague. This is the reason why very often in real discourse, appositives are
used to suggest some connection between two states of affairs which is either not clear
or which is clear enough to be inferred, however the speaker does not wish to actually
commit to it. Consider an example:
(41) John, who has a migration background, has ended up in jail.
(42) John has ended up in jail. He has a migration background.
I think that there is a very clear intuition that (41) is a very subtle way to suggest
that John ended up in jail (partly) because he has a migration background. However,
the speaker is not actually committed to this causal inference. For (42), however, the
speaker is, again, not clearly committed to a causal inference, but he risks a discussion
about migration background in which he may end up in need to either commit to the
causal inference or to commit to the opposite. Using (41), is a suggestive way to let the
hearer know about the background of John, and then go on to discuss another topic.
While I have not conducted (and I do not know of) any corpus research on this topic,
I strongly suspect that politicians make heavy use of this feature of appositives and
non-restrictive relative clauses, since it allows them to introduce new information into
the discourse with suggestive content to which they are ultimately not committed.
The question remains, how we can express this property of appositives and non-
restrictive relative clauses in a formally precise way. To achieve this, all we need to
say is that when we add appositives to the discourse we do not re-set the pointer A to
point at them. Let us consider, for illustration the simple examples discussed above,
thereby using the variables defined in (43).
(43) a. Peter, a friend of mine, is happy.

b. Peter is happy. He is a friend of mine.
c. ϕ = ℘({w|happy P })
d. ψ = ℘({w|friend P })
e. % = JWhat should the hearer know about Peter?K
We first consider the second example in which no appositive is used. We assume, for
simplicity, that this is the first mention of Peter in the discourse. Moreover, we assume
that the question % will be the potential question answered in both cases. We assume
that the discourse starts with some state σ (which probably is a question) and ϕ is
attached to that sate as a node in the tree.
(44) Starting state:

σ1
(45) Update with first sentence:

σ0
ϕ1
(46) Accommodate potential question-answer sequence:

σ0
ϕ1
%0
ψ1
Notice that at this stage, the pointer A, signalled by the box, is on ψ and that ψ is
indexed with 1, i.e. it is an open attachment site. Hence, we do expect any continuation
with a potential question licensed by ψ in the context. Moreover, we expect also any
continuation with a potential question about ϕ in the context, however, only as a second
choice. Indeed, this corresponds to the intuition.
Let us now consider the example with the appositive:
(47) Starting state:

σ1
(48) Update with first sentence:

σ0
ϕ1
(49) Accommodate potential question-answer sequence:

σ0
ϕ1
%0
ψ1
Observe that in this example the pointer A is not pointing at ψ but rather at ϕ.
Hence, we will never have an option to continue with a potential question licensed by
ψ. However, observe also that ψ is a valid attachment site, since it is indexed with
1 and not with 0. This captures the following intuition: if the hearer now wishes to
make ψ the actual attachment site, he can do that, but he needs to do some explicit
signalling. He needs to break the default rules of update. As opposed to this, if ψ was
indexed with 0, this would mean that there is no more way to address ψ in discourse,
just like fully answered questions.
The prediction is illustrated in the following examples:
(50) Peter, a friend of mine, is happy.

a. ?Why is he your friend?
b. ?Since when (is he your friend)?
c. Oh, I did not know he is your friend. Since when are you friends?
In the last example the hearer does not pick up a potential question licensed by the
apposition (since this is not possible), he rather signals that he makes the not at issue
aspect of the first utterance at issue. Once he repeats it, he can, of course, attach a
question to it.
4.2.4 Potential questions and rhetorical relations
One final interesting consequence of this analysis is that appositives can be used in
situations in which the rhetorical relations between the host and the appositives are
not very clear.
Generally, for a sequence of two sentences that follow each other in discourse such that
the second one answers a potential question licensed by the first sentence, that question
will be such that it can be spelled out fairly easily. There is lots of underspecification,
but nevertheless, if readers are asked what question the second assertion answers, they
will generally converge. Some classical examples:
(51) John fell. Peter pushed him.

Why did John fell?
(52) John pushed Peter. Peter fell.

What happened then/as a result?
Such examples are typically used to exemplify rhetorical relations between discourse
segments.
(53) John fell. Peter pushed him. EXPLANATION
(54) John pushed Peter. Peter fell. RESULT, NARRATION

Indeed, typically such relations can be easily transformed into questions. E.g. an
explanation relation corresponds to a why question, a narration relation corresponds to
a what happened later question etc. Put differently, if we take seriously theories such
as SDRT who claim that in a coherent discourse we always have rhetorical relations
between assertions, we will probably want to be able to spell out those relations not
only abstractly as “RESULT” or “NARRATION” but also more specifically in terms
of questions under discussion.
Crucially, for appositives, we do not need to be able to actually spell out the question
easily, because appositives are not at issue, hence, the speaker may use appositives to
suggest way too complicated or fuzzy relations between the appositive and the host.
If that is correct, the rhetorical relations between appositives and host are generally
unclear, in fact, one can actually posit that appositives are an own kind of rhetorical
relation. While one can observe or stipulate this in any framework, it is worth noting
that I do not know any framework from which this naturally follows.
Conisder the famous example from Beaver (2001) in (55) to exemply:
(55) Sweden may export synthetic wolf urine – sprayed along roads to keep elk away
– to Kuwait for use against camels.
a. At issue: Sweden may export synthetic wolf urine to Kuwait for use against
camels.
b. Potential question: How can synthetic wolf urine help against camels?
c. Answer: Sprayed along the roads to keep them away.
The problem in this example is that the answer is about elks and the question was
about camels. In order to solve the problem, one would need a somewhat more complex
question which would nevertheless be a potential question, as in (56):
(56) In what form is used wolf urine against what in Sweden, that could be analo-
gously made to work in Kuwait against camels?
The point here is that there is no discourse relation for which (56) really counts as a
decent paraphrase. We can do this with appositives precisely because due to the fact
that what we suggest in the apposition is not at issue, chances are, nobody will actually
ask what the connection is. Appositives are therefore perfectly suitable to express vague
or complex relationships which need not be clarified or formulated in context at a higher
level of precision. The advantage is, hence, not only that the speaker need not commit
to the exact relation between the host and the appositive, but also that he can save
time and effort in communication.
4.3 Potential questions and projection
Let us now consider whether the analysis provided above can actually handle the prob-
lems with projection and scope of appositives discussed in the literature. I will only
briefly point out some ideas here, without going into technical details.
I start with the type of binding examples given in Amaral et al. (2007). In example (57),
one has to somehow explain, how them can appear to be bound by several scientists.
(57) Several scientists i , most of themi linguists, arrived late.
The answer is no complicated: any material in a question can bind into the answer,
but not vice versa:
(58) a. Why did several scientists arrive late?

b. Most of them were tired.
(59) a. Why did several scientists arrive late?

b. Most of them were linguists.
(60) a. What played a role in the fact that several scientists arrived late?
b. Most of them were linguists.
There is a valid point in being worried as to how the binding from the question to the
answer can come about. But this is a technical worry. Whatever solves this problem
will apply to my analysis of appositives as well. Moreover, the good news is that there
must be a solution to three examples above because they empirically show that this
kind of binding from question to answer is possible. If it is empirically possible, than
there must be a theory which can predict that. How this theory works, is orthogonal
to my point.
But what about the example of Potts (2005) who claims that such binding is actually
not possible. Consider the example (61).
(61) No reporter1 believes that, as he1 wrote, Ames is a spy.
The example is hard to parse, for Potts wanted to construe an example which may
not involve E-Type pronouns. Arguably, in downward entailing contexts they are not
licensed. Indeed, there is no binding reading in this example. However, this stands in
a clear analogy to questions: it is well known that negative quantifiers fail to bind into
questions as well, as shown in (62):
(62) a. Who did every man kiss? → For every man, who did he kiss?
4.3. POTENTIAL QUESTIONS AND PROJECTION 211
b. Who did no man kiss? 9 For no man, who did he kiss?
This correctly predicts that any quantifier that can actually bind into a question, can
also bind into a conventional implicature:
(63) Every mani believes that, as hei wrote, Ames is a spy.
Put differently, I did not solve any of the problems here. But I have shown that the
problems are no argument against my analysis. In fact the very existence of these
contrasts shows that my analysis must be on the right track, since we find the same
problems for questions as well.
The other type of examples that apparently show that conventional implicatures can
have narrow scope (and thereby scope at all) involve examples such as (64).
(64) Mary was surprised, that Peter, an atheist, had a Bible under his pillow.
In this case, again, a simple answer can be given that does not involve scope. Consider
the kinds of potential questions that a complex sentence containing an embedding
attitude verb may give rise to: some of them will be speaker oriented, some of them
will concern the epistemic world of the attitude holder. For (64), in (65) I give some
examples:
(65) a. Who is Peter?

b. Why is Mary surprised that Peter had a Bible under his pillow?
c. Why could anyone be surprised that Peter had a Bible under his pillow?
d. Would Mary be surprised, if someone else had a Bible under his pillow?
e. What prorperties does a Bible have, such that it makes Mary be surprised
that John has one under his pillow?
f. ..
Now, whether or not the appositive in such an example will be interpreted as speaker
oriented or as part of the reasons why Mary is surprised, depends on the question it
answers. For (64), it is actually hard to formulate such a question that sound acceptable
in natural language, but it could be something like (66). If the speaker intended to
answer this question, he might have wanted to suggest that Mary is not generally
surprised if a man has a Bible under his pillow, but this does not mean that in any
sense the information that Peter is an atheist is part of the actual content of Mary’s
mental state of being surprised, hence having narrow scope. In fact, one can just as
well keep this information scopeless.
(66) Mary is surprised that what kind of man had a Bible under his pillow?
Sæbø (2010) claims that downward entailing attitude verbs such as surprise favour
the narrow scope readings. As opposed to this upwards entailing attitude verbs such
as believe favor speaker oriented readings. It turns out that the current analysis can
easily predict this fact. All we need is to consider the following observation: The most
salient potential questions are often in some sense about causes and explanations. But
the reason of a belief is most often not part of the belief itself, whereas the reason of
a surprise is very often part of that state of mind. This is easily shown by the nearly
equivalent pair in (67). As opposed to this, in (68) we have sentences that are not even
similar in meaning.
(67) a. Mary is surprised that Peter is gay.

b. Mary is surprised because Peter is gay.
(68) a. Mary believes that Peter is gay.

b. Mary believes because Peter is gay.
In particular, if Mary attempted to seduce Peter, who she has often seen in the company
of attractive women, and found out that he is gay, we are entitled to say either sentence
in (67). In any context in which Mary has come to believe that Peter is gay, whether or
not this is true, we can say the first example in (68). However, for the second example
in (68), we really need some phantasy to construct a suitable scenario. One could be
that Mary was so deeply in love with Peter, that when she found out that he is gay,
she went into a monastery where she has become a believer.
If the potential question asked is such an explanation question, which is very likely, we
get the impression (mostly a justified impression, for that matter) that the answer also
involves the state of mind of the attitude holder if we speak about surprise. But for
belief this is not the case. This directly and naturally explains the observation of Sæbø
(2010).
Crucially, however, this observation does not over-generate: Even for surprise and other
downward entailing verbs, it is not generally predicted that appositions are attitude
holder oriented. In fact, whenever the appositive has no explanative flavour, this effect
is not observed, as shown in (69):
(69) a. Mary is surprised that Peter, as reported in the evening news, is gay.
b. Mary is surprised that Peter, who ate so many bananas last time you and
I met him, is gay.
Finally, I discuss an example from Schlenker (2010) given in (70):
(70) Situation: John is in London and he is about to go to California to meet his

girlfriend Ann. He is planning to marry her there but his parents do not know
4.4. CONCLUSION AND PROBLEMS 213
it.
a. John decided yesterday that tomorrow he would tell his parents that he
was in Vegas with Ann, who was about to become his wife.
The point made by Schlenker is very clear and convincing on first sight: he argues that
past tense features only remain uninterpreted if the verb is embedded under a past tense
attitude verb. Now, given that in (70) it is possible to use was in the non-restrictive
relative clause, it follows that the non-restrictive relative clause is embedded, i.e. it
has narrow scope.4 To my knowledge, this is the most powerful argument against the
theory of Potts.
However, using potential questions, again, immediately shows a potential solution:

Consider the question answered by the non-restrictive relative clause. One can fairly
assume that the non-restrictive relative clause could answer a question such as (71-a).
Now, in an answer to this question, we have again, exactly the same pattern:
(71) a. What was it about Ann, that he decided to tell his parents?
b. That she was about to become his wife.
If one uses an ellipsis analysis of short answers to questions, it does actually follows
that in (71-b) the answer is embedded under a past tense attitude verb. However, this
does not mean that it is embedded under the matrix verb of the host. Hence, the
argument of Schlenker does not force to give up the scopelessness assumption. What is
scopeless, is, however the whole answer, and if that happens to be elliptic and contain
some embedding verb, we can get embedding effects at the grammatical level as well.
4.4 Conclusion and problems
In this chapter, I have suggested a theory of appositives and non-restrictive relative

clauses that heavily uses the notion of potential questions. It claims that appositives
and non-restrictive relative clauses are answers to potential questions licensed by the
host utterance. I have shown that this theory is powerful and can explain a lot of data
that were problematic to other theories. However, the theory that I have given does
over-generate in some interesting ways.
Why is it for instance, that one does not get a whole lot of possible short answers
as supplements, for instance as shown in (72). This absurd example is predicted to
be acceptable, if we assume that And did he believe it? is a valid potential question
4
Schlenker does give the missing minimal pairs for making the argument valid, among others showing
that one cannot do the same with two matrix clauses.
triggered by the host. In fact, there is nothing that rules out that potential question
in my theory.
(72) #I told Peter that John, he did not, loves Mary. .
Certainly, it is correct to assume that the respective potential question is a licit one,
since we can actually construct an acceptable example with a non-restrictive relative
clause.
(73) I told Peter that John, who did not believe it, loves Mary.
I do not believe that this problem cannot be solved. Probably it is possible to spell out
more detailed grammatical constraints on the potential questions that can be answered
by appositives. What is important to note, however, is that I did not do that here.
Doing that would require, obviously, a book in its own right. The main point of this
chapter was not to come up with a full fledged theory of appositives but rather to
show that a) analysing them as answers to potential questions is intuitive and helps
solving lots of problems known in the literature and b) there are no obvious technical
impediments to work out this analysis as a fully compositional theory of appositives
and non-restrictive relative clauses.
As we will continue the exploration of the role of potential questions in grammar in

the next two chapters the empirical domain will narrow down more and more. As it
does narrow down, we will be able to construct more detailed, more exact theories.
For appositives, it seems, the empirical domain is too large to attempt for a complete
theory in this book.
Chapter 5
Specificational constructions
One can define specification is the universal discourse task of delivering more specific
information about the state of affairs described by the host expression, which is not at
issue.1
Many languages have specialised specificational particles such as a imenno in Russian,

éspedig and mégpedig in Hungarian, cioè or ovvero in Italian, namelijk in Dutch or
nämlich and und zwar in German or à savoir in French. Many other langauges employ
complex specificational expressions such as mai precis (‘more precisely’) in Romanian.
Generally, the class of specificational markers has been explored in the research tradition
of relevance theory (Sperber and Wilson, 1995), under the labels apposition markers
and reformulation markers (Blakemore, 1996, 1997), and in construction grammar,
e.g. (Günthner and Imo, 2003). In particular, it is claimed that such particles have
a purely procedural (as opposed to propositional) meaning, assisting in the inferential
process “by making explicit reference assignment, disambiguation, further enrichment
and elliptic material in connection with the recovery of the propositional form” (Murillo,
2004).
It is hard to fully understand the notion of procedural meaning. Instead, I will propose
a theory for specification in this book, in which specification is a subclass of appositives,
which comes with some more constrained usage rules. In the view that I will defend
here, specification is a device that targets potential questions triggered by an expression
and it provides a direct elliptic answer to it.
What makes specificational constructions particularly interesting is that they may not
only be used to answer ‘specificational’ potential questions, but also Wieso? (‘How
come?’)-type questions in German, as shown in (1).
1
Parts of this chapter, especially examples and descriptive generalisations are identical to some parts
of Onea and Volodina (2011). The analysis differs, however, in important respects, hence, even readers
who are familiar with that paper should not skip this chapter.
215
216 CHAPTER 5. SPECIFICATIONAL CONSTRUCTIONS
(1) a. Peter liebt Maria. Sie ist nämlich schön.

Peter loves Mary. She is nämlich pretty
‘Peter loves Mary, for she is pretty.’ explanative
b. Peter liebt eine Frau. Nämlich Maria.
Peter loves a woman. nämlich Mary

‘Peter loves a woman, namely Mary.’ specificational
This is important, because it shows that specification is naturally related to potential

questions. If one were to analyse specificational constructions as specifying a discourse
referent directly, i.e. as reference disambiguation, then it should be hard to explain
how an explanative use could ever grammaticalise. However, if one derives the meaning
contribution of specificational constructions from the more general notion of potential
questions, the way to explanation is easy since as a how come? -question is one of the
highly salient potential questions.
The analysis that I will give in the following attempts to achieve a greater level of
empirical precision as compared to the analysis of appositives in the previous chapter.
The main reason is that the domain of investigation is much more constrained. At the
same time, a detailed investigation of the empirical situation will turn out to strongly
support the idea that specification should be analysed in terms of grammaticalised
devices to answer potential questions.
5.1 The common core of specificational particles
Specificational particles across languages typically exhibit subtle differences. So, for
instance, the German und zwar can start a discourse, whereas nämlich cannot. Some
expressions like Romanian mai precis can be used to slightly modify what has been
said, while Hungarian mégpedig cannot. Some expressions such as à savoir in French
can be used to relativise information given in the previous sentence, others, such as
Hungarian tudni illik are restricted to already accessible information. This list could
be continued.
Therefore, it is necessary to give a common core property for specification constructions,

which allows us to distinguish them from other constructions, which achieve similar
effects in some cases.
Before starting, I will first clarify some terminology. I call the expression to be specified
the anchor. I call the argument of the specificational particle/expression the argument
and I call the whole sentence which contains the specification or to which it attaches
the host, just like in the case of appositives and relative clauses.
5.1. THE COMMON CORE OF SPECIFICATIONAL PARTICLES 217
(2) Terminology
A woman sleeps, namely Mary.
a. anchor: a woman
b. Argument: Mary
c. Host: A woman sleeps.
5.1.1 Specification of indefinites
All specificational constructions have a common core and that is that they can specify
the referent of an indefinite description, in other words:
(3) Generalisation
All specificational particles can target indefinite anchors.
Some examples are given below. In cases in which the judgements are not totally clear,
I have used examples from the web for illustration.
(4) German
a. Eine Frau ist glücklich, und zwar Maria.
A woman is happy und zwar Mary
‘ A woman is happy, namely Mary’
b. Eine Frau ist glücklich, nämlich Maria.
A woman is happy nämlich Mary
‘ A woman is happy, namely Mary’
(5) French
a. Le second est celui d’un auteur que l’on ne présente plus,
The second is that of an author which IMPERS not present any more
à savoir Pierre Mollier.
á savoir Pierre Mollier
‘The second is the one of an author which we do not present, namely Pierre
Mollier’2
(6) Hungarian
a. Egy nagyon szép lányról álmodtam, éspedig Mariról.
A very beautiful girl-of dreamed éspedig Mary-of
‘I have dreamed of a very beautiful girl, namely Mary.’
b. Egy nagyon szép lányról álmodtam, mégpedig Mariról.
A very beautiful girl-of dreamed mégpedig Mary-of
‘I have dreamed of a very beautiful girl, namely Mary.’
2
http://www.fm-fr.org/Editoriaux/De-saines-lectures-avant-Noël.html
(7) Romanian
a. Dintre acestia, unul a dobandit functia de prim-vicepresedinte,
Of these one has received the-function of vice-president
mai precis, Petru Rostas.
mai precis Petru Rostas
‘From these, one has become vice-president, namely Petru Rostas.’3
This core requirement disqualifies some expressions which are very similar. So for in-
stance, the French expression c’est-à-dire can specify definite descriptions, and one can
find many examples of this kind, but, apparently, it is not quite acceptable specifying
indefinite expressions, unless in a reading in which one takes back the first formulation
as wrong. So, it is not a specificational construction.
(8) French
a. Comme de coutume, il a lieu le dernier dimanche du mois
As of practice it has place the last Sunday of month
d’octobre, c’est-à-dire le 28 octobre 2012.
October c’est-à-dire the 28 october 2012
‘As usual, it took place on the last Sunday of October, that is the 28th
October 2012’4
Similarly, the chinese erqie can specify a degree but not indefinites.
(9) Chinese
a. Bide xihuan mali, erqie shi hen xihuan.
Peter like Mary, erqie FOCUS very like.
‘Peter likes Mary, in fact he likes her very much.’
This does not mean that specificational particles cannot target definite anchors. In
fact, they do, as I show with examples from German:
(10) German
a. Die schönste Frau ist glücklich, und zwar Maria.
The most beautiful woman is happy und zwar Mary
‘ The most beautiful woman is happy, namely Mary’
b. Die schönste Frau ist glücklich, nämlich Maria.
The most beautiful woman is happy nämlich Mary
‘ The most beautiful woman is happy, namely Mary’
3
http://www.mesagerul.ro/2006/06/27/romii-bistriteni-se-reorganizeaza?quicktabs 1=0
4
http://www.roentgenlauf.de/page8.php?lang=2
However, such specification of definite descriptions is restricted to a subclass of definite

descriptions which pick their referent by uniqueness, not by familiarity cf. Schwarz
(2009) or Heim (2011) for some references on the distinction and its grammatical reflex.
Accordingly, (11) is ungrammatical in most contexts. It is acceptable, however, in a
context in which, out of many women only one will play the role of a woman at a
costume party or in a play.
(11) German
a. #Die Frau ist glücklich, und zwar Maria.
The woman is happy und zwar Mary
‘ The woman is happy, namely Mary’
b. #Die Frau ist glücklich, nämlich Maria.
The woman is happy nämlich Mary
‘ The woman is happy, namely Mary’
This leads to a second generalisation, given in (12):
(12) Generalization:
Specificational particles can also target definite anchors if these definite de-
scriptions are not anaphoric.
Let us now try to account for these two generalisations. The idea is that, as any
appositive, a specificational construction will target a potential question triggered by
the host sentence. However, specificational constructions are (in a first approximation)
limited to specificational questions about the anchor. Specificational questions are a
sub-class of potential questions triggered by an utterance and they can be defined as
in (13).
(13) Specificational questions:

Given a sentence denotation which can be analysed as a P (x) where x is con-
strained by an NP predicate Q, a specificational question will require a more
specific answer to Who x such that P (x) and Q(x)?
For example for a sentence like (14), the specificational question is given in (15):
(14) A man sleeps.
(15) Which man sleeps?

Who sleeps and is a man?
This definition trivially explains the fact that specificational constructions can have
indefinites as anchors. While I will only show in the next chapter how and why we
need to assume this, it is intuitively clear (and customary in inquisitive semantics)

to assume that indefinites act as a kind of disjunction, hence raising a specificational
question. This ‘raising of a question’ in our theory boils down to triggering/licensing a
specificational question. Since indefinites license specificational questions, it naturally
follows that they can be anchors of specificational constructions.
Crucially, if definite expressions are used to depict unique individuals, precisely the
same may apply (even if our current theory cannot capture this, since we would need
some distinction between speaker modal base and hearer modal base): whenever the
hearer uses a definite NP picking out a unique individual, he may presume that the
hearer does not know who that unique individual is. In such cases, a specificational
construction may be used.
(16) The most intelligent chess player sleeps.

Who is the most intelligent chess player?
As opposed to this, in cases in which definites are used to pick familiar entities these
entities must have been previously introduced into the discourse (this is the very idea of
familiar definites in Heim (1982)). Now, typically this happens through indefinites, and
this way, the potential specificational question was already salient in discourse at an
earlier time. Hence, the specificational issue will not be a potential question triggered
by the host any more, since it was triggered already earlier.
Even though, at the first sight, this explanation seems intuitive, sceptical readers may
suspect a deep problem here. The problem seems to be that we are interested in the
question of the type Who x such that P (x) and Q(x)?, however in (16), we have used a
different question, i.e. Who x is such that Q(x)? While the difference may not seem to
be very important for (16), it becomes suddenly very important once we have claimed
that we cannot ask specificational questions about anaphoric definites, because the
respective specificational question would have been triggered already on first mention,
hence it cannot be triggered on the anaphoric mention. The problem is that the first
mention could have had a different predicate, as shown in (17):
(17) #A man walked in. The man, namely John, is happy.
In (17), the indefinite is first introduced by an indefinite. There, one would expect that
the specificational question in (18) would be triggered. Then, in the second sentence
the specificational question in (19) is under discussion. But this is a different question.
(18) Which man walked in?
(19) Which man is happy?

If we think of indefinites as plain existential quantifiers this reasoning is correct. How-

ever, in a discourse model, we need a dynamic perspective on the handling of discourse
referents. Under such a perspective an indefinite, like a man, will introduce a discourse
referent or discourse item, say x. Then, we have to find an interpretation of the ques-
tion (18) such that it is not simply about finding out which man walked in, but more
specifically the question is which man the speaker apparently had in mind such that
he came in. Then, we can also ask about any other properties of that individual and
among those properties on will be captured by the question (19). Hence, it is correctly
predicted that anaphoric definite descriptions will not trigger any new potential ques-
tions of specification. The details of this idea will be (in part) discussed in the next
chapter in the discussion of indefinites.
Specification may also target functional readings of indefinites:
(20) Every man loves a woman. Namely his mother.
Some - but not all - specificational constructions can also specify so called unarticu-
lated constituents: so, for instance, while German nämlich and also English namely
cannot specify unarticulated constituents, und zwar in German can, and also éspedig
in Hungarian.
(21) Peter hat Maria geküsst.

Peter has Mary kissed
‘Peter kissed Mary.’
a. #Nämlich auf die Wange.
nämlich on the cheek
intended: ‘He kissed her on the cheek.’
b. Und zwar auf die Wange.
und zwar on the cheek
‘He kissed her on the cheek.’
5.1.2 Similar constructions
Specificational constructions are similar to specificational sentences, e.g. (22), or

pseudo-cleft constructions, e.g. (23) (den Dikken 2005, Romero 2005, Heller 2005,
Gerbl 2009 etc).
(22) The actress John met is Julia Roberts.
(23) Who John met is Julia Roberts.
The essential difference between these sentence types of specificational constructions is

that specificational constructions are never the main point of the utterance, whereas
for pseudo-clefts and specificational sentences, the identification of the person under
discussion is precisely the main point of the sentence. In other words, in specificational
constructions the specification itself is never at issue, but in specificational sentences
or pseudo-clefts it is. That specificational constructions cannot contribute at issue
content immediately follows from the claim that they are a special case of appositives.
Appositives as an entire class of constructions do not contribute at issue content.
Moreover, one cannot syntactically integrate specifictional sentences and pseudo-clefts

into other sentences, as in (24)
(24) My best friend, namely John, is sick.
Specificational constructions are similar to, in fact a subclass of, apposition markers like
that is, in other words or in short (Blakemore 1996), e.g. (25) or even plain appositions
omitting the specificational particles would often yield an apposition, as shown in (26).
(25) The interpretation sometimes depends on pragmatic, in other words not purely
linguistic, factors.
(26) a. My best friend, namely John, sleeps.

b. My best friend, John, sleeps.
McCawley (1998) observes that one can use a specificational construction but not a
non-restrictive relative clause with an indefinite:
(27) a. A recent winner of the Illinois State Lottery, Albert Swenson, has an-
nounced that he plans to move to Bermuda.
b. #A recent winner of the Illinois State Lottery, who is Albert Swenson, has
announced that he plans to move to Bermuda.
One potential explanation for this observation could be that due to the existence of
the highly specialised specificational constructions in English, using a non-restrictive
relative clause (which is the least specialised kind of appositive) would be ruled out by
pragmatic blocking. This would predict that if in a language there are no specificational
constructions non-restrictive relative clauses can also modify indefinites.
5.1.3 Alternative analyses
Since – as argued above – the common core of specificational constructions is that they
can specify referents introduced by indefinites, one simple way to analyse them is to
say, that they further specify the restrictor of the anchor. So we would have:
(28) A man sleeps, namely Peter.

∃x.man(x) ∧ sleeps(x) ∃x.man(x) ∧ sleeps(x) ∧ x = P eter
Alternatively one can implement the idea very easily in DRT, which would yield (29) or,
more pedantically, in the framework van der Sandt (1992), Kamp et al. (2005) rather
(30), since being Peter is not part of the presupposition:
x
x
x
U man(x)
(29) man(x)
P eter(x) sleeps(x)
sleeps(x)
P eter(x)
x
x
P eter(x)
U x man(x)
(30) man(x)
sleeps(x)
sleeps(x)
person(x) P eter(x)
There is an obvious reason, why this does not quite seem to be the right way: Specifi-
cation always preserves the grammatical case of the target (in our case the indefinite).
This is shown in (31) and (32). This is also true for English, as can be seen if the
argument is a pronoun, as in (33).
(31) German
a. Peter hat einen Mann getroffen. Nämlich den Max.
Peter has a man.ACC met nämlich the.ACC Max
‘Peter met a man, namely Max.’
b. #Peter hat einen Mann getroffen. Nämlich der Max.
Peter has a man.ACC met nämlich the.NOM Max
intended: ‘Peter met a man, namely Max.’
(32) Hungarian
a. Péter látott egy férfit. Éspedig Marcit.
Peter saw a man.ACC nämlich Max.ACC
‘Peter saw a man, namely Max.’
b. #Péter látott egy férfit. Éspedig Marci.
Peter saw a man.ACC nämlich Max.NOM
intended: ‘Peter saw a man, namely Max.’
(33) a. Peter saw a man. Namely me.

b. #Peter saw a man. Namely I.
If there is a purely referential link between the target and the argument, no trivial
explanation for this observation is available. After all, there are many cases of referential
identity without case identity, as in the case of so called hanging topic constructions in
German cf. Frey (2004) or English:
(34) Der Peter, ihn liebt niemand.

The.NOM Peter him loves nobody
‘As for Peter, nobody loves him.’
Since case preservation is known as an important feature of short/elliptic answers to

wh-questions, cf. e.g. Jacobson (2008) or Merchant (2004), as shown on German
examples in (35) and (36), this supports our analysis as compared to the more direct
implementation of identifying a discourse referent.
(35) a. Wen hat Maria gesehen?

Who has Mary seen
‘Who did Mary see?’
b. Den Mann.
the.acc man
‘The man’
(36) a. Wen hat Maria gesehen?

Who has Mary seen
‘Who did Mary see?’
b. #Der Mann.
the.nom man
‘The man’
This supports the hypothesis in (37):
(37) Hypothesis
Specificational particles conventionally encode that their argument is the short
answer to a potential question triggered by some expression in the host sen-
tence.
5.1.4 Ambiguities
Typically, reconstructing the potential question the argument of the specificational

particle or expression answers will be very easy if there is only one indefinite:
(38) A woman sleeps, namely Mary.
However, if there are two indefinites, the syntactic position of the specificational con-
struction will help disambiguate.
(39) a. A teacher met a farmer, namely Mary.

b. A teacher, namely Mary, met a farmer.
Moreover, if one of the indefinites is focused, it will usually be interpreted as the

anchor, as in (40). Moreover, Onea and Volodina (2011) observe that if there is a
focused element accompanied by a focus senstive particle such as only, and there is one
more non-focused indefinite. It is hard to specify the non-focused indefinite, even if no
ambiguity is possible, as shown in (41).
(40) A teacherF oc met a farmer, namely Mary. (Mary is the teacher).
(41) Ein junger Mann hat nur einen großen Wunsch.

A young man has only one big wish
‘A young man has only one big wish’
a. Nämlich seine große Liebe zu finden.
Namely his great love to find
‘Namely to find his great love’
b. ?? Nämlich
Peter.
namely Peter
‘Namely Peter’
In languages with case, the disambiguation is generally much easier. So, in German,
for a sentence like (42), only one interpretation is available.
(42) Ein Lehrer hat einen Bauern getroffen, nämlich mein Vater.
A teacher has a farmer met nämlich my father.NOM
‘A teacher, namely my father, met a farmer.’ (The father is the teacher)
Also general plausibility can help:
(43) (It is known that Johns father is a farmer). A teacher met a farmer, namely
Johns father. (Johns father is the farmer.)
We may assume that potential questions triggered by propositions are ranked in salience.
Consider, for instance (44):
(44) A teacher met a farmer.

a. Which teacher met which farmer?

b. Which teacher met a farmer?
c. Which farmer did a teacher meet?
d. Where did a teacher meet a farmer?
We can assume that focus signals that the focused element already answers the question
under discussion. For (45-b), the question under discussion will (most probably) be
(45-a). (45-c) is a sub-question of (45-a). In other words, (45-b) does not fully answer
the question under discussion, and (45-c), simply continues answering the question
under discussion. (This will not make the specification at issue, for, technically, it is
a different QUD, albeit a sub-question). Under such an assumption, it is easy to see
that among the potential questions (45-b) does trigger (45-c) is the most relevant in
discourse, hence the most salient. For the German example in (41), exactly the same
story can be repeated, while keeping in mind that nur (‘only’) associates with the
question under discussion in an even clearer way (Beaver and Clark, 2008).
(45) a. Who met a farmer?

b. A teacherF oc met a farmer.
c. Which teacher met a farmer?
d. Johns father.
Finally, the position of the specificational construction has a very strong impact on
disambiguation. One can model this in terms of co-indexing. Assume that generally
specificational particles may have an index-variable. If they have such an index variable,
than they will pick the question triggered by the co-indexed expression in the host
sentence. The technical details of this idea will be discussed in the next two chapters.
5.2 Nämlich and und zwar
In this section, I will show differences between the German particles nämlich and
und zwar. In particular, I will demonstrate that nämlich is in many respects much
more constrained than und zwar. This will boil down to saying that nämlich can only
introduce the answer very highly salient potential questions. As opposed to this, und
zwar can mark the answer to virtually any potential question. In a second step, I will
also discuss propositional arguments of nämlich and und zwar, showing that nämlich
not only answers specificational questions but also how come-questions. This is not
possible for und zwar. While explaining why nämlich can answer How come-questions,
is going to be fairly simple, as one can say that How come-questions are particularly
high on salience, it will be more difficult to explain why und zwar cannot answer How
come-questions.
5.2. NÄMLICH AND UND ZWAR 227
5.2.1 Specification distinctions
In this section, I present four observations regarding the difference between und zwar
and nämlich:
1. Und zwar can start a discourse, but nämlich cannot.
2. Und zwar can give partial answers to potential questions, but nämlich can only
give complete answers.
3. Und zwar can specifiy unarticulated constituents, but nämlich cannot.
4. Nämlich is anti-scalar, but Und zwar is not.
For each of these generalisations I will provide an explanation in terms of constraints

on potential questions imposed by nämlich and und zwar.
5.2.1.1 Starting a discourse
If one argues that specificational particles conventionally mark that their argument is
an answer to a potential question triggered by their host sentence, then, one expects
that it is not possible to start a conversation with a specificational particle. While this
is true for nämlich in German and for many other particles such as English namely,
Hungarian mégpedig or Romanian mai precis, for und zwar in German this is false. It
is possible to start a discourse with und zwar in certain situations. One example is
given in (46):
(46) At the doctor’s:

a. Guten Tag! Und zwar ich habe seit einigen Wochen schon seltsame
Good day und zwar i have since some weeks already strange
Rückenschmerzen, aber seit Kurzem wurde es viel schlimmer.
backache but since shortly aux expl much worse
‘Hello, I’ve been having this stange backache for quite a while now, but
lately it has become much worse.’
b. *Guten Tag! Nämlich ich habe seit einigen Wochen schon seltsame
Good day nämlich I have since some weeks already strange
c. #Guten Tag! Ich habe nämlich seit einigen Wochen schon seltsame
Good day I have nämlich since some weeks already strange
Such a start of a discourse with und zwar is restricted, however to contexts in which
one is expected to explain an issue, such as in audience at some officials, at the doctor’s,
or when calling a hotline for support. In such contexts, typically it is assumed that the
speaker has approached his interlocutor with a problem, and therefore the speaker can
address this problem in a most direct way (say, to save time). Since it is so obvious
that the discourse will be about the problem, one can accommodate the existence of
such a problem, as if the discourse was as in (47). Note that in this case nämlich is
also acceptable.
(47) At the doctor’s:

a. Guten Tag! Ich habe ein Problem. Und zwar ich habe seit einigen
Good day I have a problem und zwar i have since some
Wochen schon seltsame Rückenschmerzen, aber seit Kurzem wurde
weeks already strange backache but since shortly aux
es viel schlimmer.
expl much worse
b. Guten Tag! Ich habe ein Problem. nämlich : Ich habe seit einigen
Good day I have a problem nämlich I have since some
Wochen schon seltsame Rückenschmerzen, aber seit Kurzem wurde
weeks already strange backache but since shortly aux
es viel schlimmer.
expl much worse
The difference revealed by this contrast between nämlich and und zwar is then obvious:
und zwar allows to accommodate a piece of information that would trigger the primary
potential question addressed by it. nämlich on the other hand does not allow this.
5.2.1.2 Partial answers
One particularly striking observation is that nämlich , in most cases, cannot appear
with indefinite arguments, while und zwar can.
Consider (48):
(48) a. Vor der Tür steht eine Frau. Und zwar eine Freundin von mir.
In front the door stands a woman und zwar a girlfriend of mine
‘A woman stands in front of the door, more precisely a girlfriend of mine.’
b. #Vor der Tür steht eine Frau. Nämlich eine Freundin von mir.
In front the door stands a woman nämlich a girlfriend of mine
‘A woman stands in front of the door, more precisely a girlfriend of mine.’
As observed in Onea and Volodina (2011), replacing eine Freundin von mir (‘a girlfriend
of mine’) with a proper name would make the example acceptable, as already shown in
many examples above. But, crucially, Onea and Volodina (2011) argue that (49) shows
that the situation is more complex. While the definite meine beste Freundin (‘my best
girlfriend’) only marginally improves the example, deine beste Freundin (‘your best
girlfriend’) makes the example perfectly acceptable.
(49) Vor der Tür steht eine Frau.

In front the door stands a woman
‘A woman stands in front of the door.’
a. ?Nämlich meine beste Freundin .
namely my best girlfriend
‘Namely my best girlfriend.’
b. Nämlich deine beste Freundin .
namely my best girlfriend
‘Namely my best girlfriend.’
What is essential here is, hence, that the argument of nämlich is interpreted as unam-
biguously referential and both hearer and speaker are supposed to be familiar with the
referent. In (49) the hearer may or may not know the best girlfriend of the speaker,
but in a neutral context he is definitely expected to know his own best girlfriend.
In Onea and Volodina (2011) it has been argued that this translates into saying that
nämlich always gives a complete answer relative to the communicative task at hand.
There, the idea was that depending on the communicative aims different answers may
qualify as complete for a question. For some question only an exhaustive answer qual-
ifies, for other questions also example-answers qualify, as in the famous petrol-station
examples:
(50) a. Where is a petrol station?

b. Left around the corner. (Does not implicate that it is the only one).
Nevertheless, this does not seem correct. If nämlich encoded completeness of answers
relative to the tasks of communication, one would expect exceptions to the general-
ization that nämlich does not take indefinite arguments. Such examples do exist, but
it turns out that they are of a different type. Nämlich can occur with indefinites if
and only if they refer to a type, as in (51), once we add a modification that makes a
type-interpretation impossible, the sentence becomes ungrammatical, as shown in (52)
(51) Ich bin mit einem politisch korrekten Fahrzeug gekommen. Mit einem
I am with a politically correct vehicle come with a
Fahrrad nämlich .
bicycle nämlich
‘I came with a politically corret vehicle, namely with a bicycle.’
(52) *Ich bin mit einem politisch korrekten Fahrzeug gekommen. Mit einem
I am with a politically correct vehicle come with a
Fahrrad von dir nämlich .
bicycle of yours nämlich
‘I came with a politically corret vehicle, namely with a bicycle of yours.’
The easiest way to account for this observation is to assume that nämlich gives a
complete answer to the question it answers according to the definition in Chapter 1.
This immediately accounts for the contrast in (49): one can interpret your best girlfriend
as a referential expression, which, if correctly exhaustified is a complete answer, whereas
my best girlfriend does not qualify as a complete answer if the hearer does not know
who the girlfriend of the speaker is.
5.2.1.3 Unarticulated constituents
In Onea and Volodina (2011) I have observed that nämlich cannot be used to specify
discourse referents that are not explicitly present in the previous utterance, as shown
in (53). This is puzzling, since the question When did Peter kiss Mary is a potential
question triggered by the host sentence and Yesterday is an acceptable short answer,
which can be seen as picking one the alternatives. Once, however we make it explicit
that it happened on a particular day, nämlich becomes acceptable.
(53) a. Peter hat Maria an einem bestimmten Tag geküsst. Nämlich

Peter has Mary on a particular day kissed nämlich
vorgestern.
yesterday.
‘Peter kissed Mary on a particular day, namely yesterday.’
b. ??Peter hat Maria geküsst. Nämlich gestern.
Peter has Mary kissed namely yesterday
‘Peter has kissed Mary, namely yesterday.’
As opposed to this, und zwar has no restrictions of this kind whatsoever, witness (54):
(54) a. Peter hat Maria an einem bestimmten Tag geküsst. und zwar gestern.
Peter has Mary on a particular day kissed und zwar yesterday
‘Peter kissed Mary on a particular day, namely yesterday.’

b. Peter hat Maria geküsst. und zwar gestern.
Peter has Mary kissed und zwar yesterday
‘Peter has kissed Mary, namely yesterday.’
Onea and Volodina (2011) argue that this difference can be accounted for by the dis-
tinction between presupposition triggers and context markers in the sense of Zeevat
(2003). Context markers are said not be accommodate, while presupposition triggers
can accommodate. Nevertheless, while this seems true, as argued above, it does not
really explain the puzzle, for whether or not an indefinite is present, the respective
question is a potential question triggered by the host sentence, and there is no need to
accommodate anything special here. One could argue that it is wrong to assume that
nämlich associates with potential questions.
Instead of giving it up, I rather suggest yet another revision of our earlier theory of
nämlich: instead of accommodation, what is needed is the ranking in salience for po-
tential questions. We can assume that any potential question which has indefinites as
anchors is relatively high on this ranking, whereas potential questions which has unar-
ticulated constituents as anchors are relatively low on this ranking. This is intuitive,
for if the speaker considered the issue important, he would have used an expression to
make the question more salient. Now, one can state that nämlich associates with ques-
tions high on the salience ranking. For und zwar , on the other hand, such a salience
ranking is not so important, und zwar can associate with questions that are relatively
low on salience.
5.2.1.4 Scalarity
Another interesting property of nämlich observed in Onea and Volodina (2011) is that
it cancels all kinds of scalar evaluative effects. So, consider for instance, (55):
(55) ?Vor der Tür steht ein Mann. Nämlich George Clooney.
In front of the door stands a man nämlich George Clooney.
‘There is a man in front of the door: George Clooney.’
The example is hardly acceptable in German, and to the extent that it is acceptable,
it comes with a very clear interpretation that having George Clooney in front of your
door is nothing special. Such a sentence can be uttered by a good friend of George
Clooney, but not a dedicated fan, for whom this would be a dream that has just come
true. As opposed to this, one can use und zwar in such a context. In this case, the
message does not come with such an anti-scalar interpretation.
(56) Vor der Tür steht ein Mann. Und zwar George Clooney.
In front of the door stands a man nämlich George Clooney.
‘There is a man in front of the door: George Clooney.’
Note that I call the effect anti-scalar, for nämlich cancels all scalarity, it does not
reverse a scale or signal that George Clooney is low on a scale of important people.
If indeed one makes explicit in the host that we are talking about a very important
person, the sentence becomes acceptable.
(57) Vor der Tür steht ein sehr wichtiger Mann. Nämlich George
In front of the door stands a very important man nämlich George
Clooney.
Clooney.
‘There is a very important man in front of the door: George Clooney.’
We have a similar effect in Hungarian. In Hungarian, the particle éspedig and its
counterpart mégpedig behave similarly. If there is some scalar item and some positive
or negative expectation of the hearer (or some general expectability) about the further
specification of some articulated or unarticulated constituent and the specification the
speaker is about to give exceeds the given expectation on the scale, éspedig is not
licensed. This is shown in (58).
(58) Péter megverte Jancsit.

Peter up-beat John
‘Peter has beaten up John.’
a. Éspedig egy kalapáccsal.
Namely a hammer-with
‘Namely with a hammer (which is normal.).’
b. Mégpedig egy kalapáccsal.
Namely a hammer-with
‘Namely with a hammer. ’
The way I propose to think about this effect is that éspedig in Hungarian and nämlich
in German presuppose that the alternatives in the question they answer are not ordered
in any relevant way. As opposed to this, the ‘scalar’ effects for mégpedig and und zwar
come from the content, not from the particle itself.
One interesting prediction of this assumption is that nämlich and éspedig cannot have
inherently scalar arguments, such as an NP modified by only or even (unless in cases
in which already in the host the anchor is modified by such a scalar element), whereas
mégpedig and und zwar can. The judgements here appear to be somewhat subtle, so
empirical evidence seems necessary to confirm the prediction.
I give a corpus search result which supports this prediction in a very clear way for
German. In particular, I have searched the German Reference Corpus from the Institut
für Deutsche Sprache in Mannheim5 for occurrences of nämlich with nur (‘only’) and
und zwar with nur (‘only’). In order to keep the results as clean as possible, I have only
included sentence initial occurrences starting with a capital letter, whence the relatively
low numbers (if one includes cases without capitals, we get plenty of explanative nämlich
usages, which I discuss later on). The results are summarised in Table 5.1.
5
http://www.ids-mannheim.de/cosmas2/
- nämlich und zwar

total 8.127 29.823
[+ nur] 44 109
Table 5.1: Corpus results for specification with only in German
At first sight, it might appear that the prediction is falsified. After all, the ratio in
the two columns is more or less exactly the same: 0.005 for nämlich , and 0.003 for
und zwar , hence if anything, nämlich occurs more often with nur (‘only’). However, a
close inspection of the actual results shows that in all 44 occurrences of nämlich + nur
it is already specified in the host that the answer to the specificational question must
be low on the scale. Consider some corpus examples:
(59) Die Lions hätten gut gespielt, sagte Kroll, aber wie meistens etwas wenig Tore
geschossen. Nämlich nur eines.
‘The Lions have played well, Kroll said, but as ever they have shot few goals.
Namely only one.’
(60) Die Statistik-Behörde des Landes ermittelte auch, dass nur wenige Untertanen
von Beatrix in diesem Alter noch einer bezahlten Arbeit nachgehen. Nämlich
nur rund 2000.
‘The statistics office of the land observed that only few of the people of Beatrix
do still work for money at that age, namely only around 2000.’
(61) Die Liberalen würden eine SPÖ-Minderheitsregierung nach der Nationalratswahl

”nur als ultima ratio” (also als letzten Ausweg) unterstützen. Nämlich nur für
den Fall, dass es die einzige Alternative zu einem ”schwarzblauen Block” wäre.
‘The Liberals would only support a minority government of the SPÖ after the
elections only as an ultima ration (i.e. as a last resort). Namely, only in the
case that this is the only alternative to a black-brown block.’
As opposed to this, most examples involving und zwar are different. Here, there is no
specification in the host sentence that the und zwar -expression will be low on some
scale. In fact, mostly even non-articulated constituents are specified, as in the following
examples.
(62) Wird die Abfrage gestartet, erscheinen in sekundenschnelle alle den Suchkrite-
rien entsprechenden Einträge auf dem Bildschirm. Und zwar nur diejenigen,
die wirklich benötigt werden.
‘Once the query is started in a few seconds all the results corresponding to the
filters appear on the screen. In fact only those, which are really needed.’
(63) Und als ich noch in Arbon wohnte, nahm ich oft an Werbefahrten teil. Und
zwar nur wegen der Reisen.

‘When I still lived in Arbon, I often participated in advertisment journeys. In
fact only because they were journeys.’
Summing up, the prediction is supported by the corpus data. What may appear sur-
prising is that apparently nämlich is chosen more often than und zwar in conjunction
with nur in cases in which we already know that all possible answers to the poten-
tial question targeted are unordered. This may be because this gives rise to stronger
rhetorical effects, as in such cases, nämlich makes it even clearer that the answer is
really low on the scale: since they are not ordered, there are no lower alternatives.
5.2.2 Explanation and specification
The specificational particle nämlich in German has often been claimed to be poly-
semous. In any dictionary or learner’s grammar, one can find the information that
nämlich can either express specification or explanation. In particular, it expresses spec-
ification when its argument is a non-propositional term whereas it expresses explanation
whenever its argument is a whole clause. However, matters are not as straightforward
as they may seem, because entire clauses can also be short answers to wh-questions.
Consider:
(64) Why did Peter sleeps?

Because he was tired.
In this example, the because-clause can be considered to be a short answer to a why-

question. A full answer could be:
(65) Peter slept because he was tired.
Now, whenever nämlich has such a clause-argument which can be considered a short an-
swer to a wh-question, it is still specificational even though its argument is a proposition.
However, if it appears within a non-embedded clause it typically signals explanation.
Consider (66) from Onea and Volodina (2011) for illustration. While in (66-a), nämlich
precedes a subordinate clause headed by the complementiser dass (‘that’), which leads
to a specificational interpretation, in (66-b), nämlich is in a matrix clause and thereby
it leads to an interpretation as an explanation of the previous sentence.
(66) a. John hat etwas Blödes gesagt: Nämlich dass Maria klug ist.
John has something stupid said namely that Mary clever is
‘John said something stupid, namely that Mary is clever.’
b. John ist glücklich. Maria ist nämlich klug.
John is happy Mary is namely clever
‘John is happy because mary is clever’
The situation is syntactically complicated by the fact that in German, there are sub-
ordinate clauses which exhibit a matrix-clause structure. That means that sometimes
nämlich can also appear in a matrix clause (mostly, however, at the left periphery),
and yet it yields a specificational and no explanative reading.
(67) John hat etwas Blödes gesagt: Nämlich Maria ist klug.
John has something stupid said namely Mary is clever
‘John said something stupid, namely that Mary is clever.’
Building on the analysis of Truckenbrodt (2006), in Onea and Volodina (2011), a solu-
tion for this syntactic problem has been proposed. For the purposes of this book, the
details are, however, of no importance. Therefore, I will ignore the issue altogether. I
will rather focus on the semantics here.
In the literature, most scholars have assumed that the explanative reading of nämlich is
the basic one. For instance Granito (1984) and Pasch (2008, 2009) argue that nämlich
is a causal connective. They claim that nämlich marks a causal relation that does not
apply at the propositional level but rather at the speech act level, hence the correct
representation of (68) is (68-b) and not (68-a). The caused eventuality is the speech act
itself. Note that even if in our example there may, indeed, be a factual causal relation
between the two propositions, since Mary’s being pretty may indeed cause Peter’s love,
Granito (1984) considers this irrelevant: nämlich marks that the speaker provides the
reason for his utterance of ‘Peter loves Mary’.
(68) Peter liebt Maria. Sie ist nämlich schön.

Peter loves Mary she is namely pretty
‘Peter loves Mary, because she is pretty.’
a. CAUS(loves(Peter, Mary), pretty(Mary))
b. CAUS(SAY(loves(Peter, Mary)),pretty(Mary))
In German linguistics, this kind of analysis falls into a whole tradition of analysis of
causal connectives. Some connectives apparently only allow for indirect explanations
which do not directly target the reason why something happened, such are denn or
da. In Pasch et al. (2003) and Volodina (2007) an overview about the literature and
the main phenomena is given. The core idea is mostly that, as argued in Sweetser
(1990), there are different levels of causality, one is propositional, in that case the
causal subordinate clauses express the factual reason why something happened, and at
least one additional one is metaphoric and it addresses the reasons why something is
justified, believed, said etc. This is most probably the reason, why nämlich has been
also included into this category. Since nämlich generally does not specify the cause
(or if it does, only incidentally) of some event but rather some kind of background
explanation, it has been assumed that it is an metaphoric causal connective.
Typically, then, the specificational use of nämlich is treated as a special case of speech
act level causality. However, as argued in Onea and Volodina (2009) and Onea and
Volodina (2011), the derivation is not convincing. In fact, there does not seem to be
any natural intuitively comprehensive way in which one can spell out specification as
a special case of explanation. By saying who Peter kissed, nothing is explained neither
about the motives of uttering that Peter kissed someone, nor is a real cause of him
kissing someone given. In fact, for all cases, in which nämlich appears with an NP,
there is no conceivable way in which one could speak of explanation. As opposed to
this, it has been shown above that specification does cover the use of whole clauses
as an argument, for they can be short answers to specificational questions. Typically,
these are embedded clauses, but it has also been pointed out above that German does
allow root phenomena in semantically embedded clauses, which probably could explain
a grammaticalisation pattern from specification to explanation.
In fact, the analysis of specification as answers to potential questions gives a very

simple common semantic property between specification and explanation, which would
otherwise be easy to overlook: both answer potential questions about an utterance.
All we need to assume is that whenever a speaker utters any sentence, one type of
question that automatically arises involves questions like the following:
(69) Peter kissed Mary.

a. How come?
b. Why?
c. How come, you are so sure?
We can also assume that on a salience hierarchy, these questions are so high that
no other similar question can compete. Thereby an explanative usage of nämlich is
predicted. But it still remains to explain, why this only happens in matrix clauses.
While I do not have a full story about this, the answer could go along the following
lines:
Typically, there is not necessarily a ‘long’ answer that one can give to this kinds of
questions. In fact, in (70) we have an unnatural dialogue, while in (70) the dialogue
seems natural. Moreover, in (70) the reason why the answer seems unnatural is that
apparently the reason why Peter kissed Mary is given, whereas the question was not
directly about this reason.
(70) A: Peter kissed Mary.

B: How come?
A: He kissed her because he loves her.
(71) A: Peter kissed Mary.

B: How come?
A: He loves her.
In German, overt wieso-questions can be answered in at least three different ways:
(72) a. Peter hat Maria geküsst.

Peter has Mary kissed
‘Peter kissed Mary.’
b. Wieso?
How come?
‘How come?’
c. Weil er sie liebt.
Because he she loves
‘Because he loves her.’
d. Weil er liebt sie.
Because he loves her
e. Er liebt sie.
He loves her
On the one hand, the possibility to answer with (72-e) to the question (under the
assumption that this is indeed a matrix clause) is already a good explanation for the
availability of explanative readings of nämlich with matrix clauses: Nämlich always
encodes that it is inside a short answer to a potential question - matrix clauses are
only available as answers to wieso-questions, at least out of the highly salient potential
questions, hence in matrix clauses, nämlich can only encode an explanation (which is
the answer to a wieso-question).
But at the same time, this explanation comes with a prediction: if indeed, wieso-
questions are highly salient potential questions and nämlich can target them, then
also the answer types in (72-c) and (72-d) are available with nämlich . In fact, this
prediction is borne out, in fact it is very hard to find a semantic or at least pragmatic
difference between (73-a), (73-b) and (73-c). A competing theory, which would assume
that nämlich itself encodes some explanative meaning component would have a hard
time explaining these data.
(73) a. Peter hat Maria geküsst, weil er sie nämlich liebt.

Peter has Mary kissed because he she nämlich loves
‘Peter kissed Mary, because he loves her.’
b. Peter hat Maria geküsst, weil er liebt sie nämlich .
Peter has Mary kissed because he loves her nämlich
c. Peter hat Maria geküsst, er liebt sie nämlich .

Peter has Mary kissed he loves her nämlich
From this I conclude that it is safe to assume that nämlich answers the most salient
potential questions triggered by the host: whenever this question is a how come? -
question, we get an explanative reading.
However, at least one more question needs to be answered: Why is it that und zwar (and
for that matter most specificational constructions) cannot answer how come-questions.
I believe that the answer to this question is purely syntactic: und zwar , just like
most specificational particles and expressions in other languages, cannot appear inside
a matrix clause. They generally only appear clause/sentence initially. However, from
a sentence initial position it is not possible to have a root sentence as an argument, at
least not in German. What happens instead is that a root sentence dominated sentence
initially by a particle is interpreted as an embedded sentence. I will motivate this claim
shortly, but first, let us observe that if this claim is correct, this explains, why und
zwar cannot be used to mark explanation like nämlich . Since und zwar cannot appear
sentence internally, there is no way und zwar can mark the answer to a how come-
question. Moreover, it predicts that und zwar can actually appear with a subordinated
clause, but only in a sentence initial position, as in (74), but this will only have the
interpretation we get if we first accommodate the question: For what reason did Peter
kiss Mary? and interpret the und zwar -clause as an answer to this. In other words:
we get a strict causal interpretation. This is in fact the only interpretation of (74).
(74) Peter hat Maria geküsst, und zwar weil er sie liebt.
Peter has Mary kissed und zwar because he she loves
Let us now return to the claim that in German (and probably in other languages as
well), a specificational particle can take a whole root sentence as an argument only
from inside. This claim is supported by a fairly complex contrast involving nämlich .
In (75) there are two potential questions that are relevant for this argument: on the
one hand, the expression aus einem bestimmten Grund (‘for a certain reason’) triggers
a specificational question, and on the other hand, the whole utterance triggers the
specificational how come-question. Now, that Peter loves Mary is a valid answer to the
specificational question but a very implausible answer to the general how come-question.
As opposed to this, that Peter never acts without a reason, is absolutely implausible
as an answer to the specificational question, however it is a very good answer to the
how come-question. Now, if nämlich appears sentence initially, the continuation which
would qualify as an answer to the specificational question is acceptable, cf. (75-a),
but the continuation which qualifies as an answer to the how come-question is not
acceptable, as shown in (75-c). Exactly the opposite is true for sentence internal nämlich
. Now, assuming that a root sentence dominated by a particle from a sentence initial
position will always be interpreted as an embedded clause this predicts that it does not
qualify as an answer to a how come-question. This is precisely what we observe:
(75) Peter hat Maria aus einem bestimmten Grund geküsst.

Peter has Mary outa certain reason kissed
‘Peter kissed Mar for a reason.’
a. Nämlich : er liebt sie.
nämlich he loves her
‘That is, because he loves her’
b. ??Er liebt sie nämlich :
he loves her nämlich
‘For he loves her’
c. ??Nämlich : er handelt nie ohne Grund.
nämlich he acts never without reason
‘That is, he never acts without a reason.’
d. Er handelt nämlich nie ohne Grund.
he acts nämlich never without reason
‘For he never acts without a reason’
The argument, hence, boils down to the following simple claim: it is because nämlich
appears in adverbial positions inside root clauses that it could grammaticalise to extend
the range of potential questions it answers. Since how come questions are particularly
high on salience for each and every utterance, they are perfect candidates to be targetted
by such a particle. In most langauges, however, specificational particles do not appear
in adverbial positions and, for this reason, they do not develop this additional potential.
I cannot even conceive of any other analysis of nämlich and und zwar which could
have another convincing explanation for these facts. For this reason, I take it that
specification is a very strong argument in favor of the existence of potential questions.
Chapter 6
The case of indefinites
In the past twenty years, research on particular indefinite determiners has been fairly
successful in revealing interesting distributional facts and even in formally modelling
them. Following up on observations by Fodor and Sag (1982), Haspelmath (1997) gives
a typological overview of indefinite determiners, Farkas (1997) proposes a dynamic
model of dependent indefintes, Matthewson (1999) analyses wide scope and functional
indefinites with parameterised choice function, Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) develop
a Hamblin semantics for non specific indefinites, Endriss (2009) analyses topical indefi-
nites and recently Menéndez-Benito and Alonso-Ovalle (2011) give a domain restriction
model for plural indefinites. Most of the literature has recently been summarised in von
Heusinger (2011). A general unified framework for indefinites, however, is still missing.
While, generally, indefinites have been discussed in the literature either in terms of
reference (on a par with definites) or in terms of quantification (on a par with other
quantifiers), I suggest to focus on their function in communication, in particular on
their discourse function as in dynamic semantics (Kamp 1981, Heim 1982, and building
on them, e.g. Farkas (1997)). If one considers the ways by which more or less naive
speakers and occasionally even linguists (looking up from the handout and directly
addressing the audience) speak about the meaning of indefinite determiners, this should
come naturally:
If a speaker utters (1-a), the hearer might want to ask (1-b). Crucially, the speaker
knows that the hearer might ask such a question depending on the context, hence the
speaker may want to deal with this question right from the start, by giving explicit sig-
nals, such as in (1-c). One may than conjecture that natural language grammaticalises
this kind of message by using indefinite determiners, such as (2).
(1) a. A woman sleeps.

b. Which woman sleeps?
c. A woman sleeps. And, by the way, if you were to ask which woman sleeps,
the answer would be relevant for the topic of discussion.
241
242 CHAPTER 6. THE CASE OF INDEFINITES
(2) A certain woman sleeps.
Consider as another example the German sentence in (3-a). The simplest and most
direct way to express its meaning is something like (3-b). Potentially, this is - simpliciter
- the meaning of irgendein.
(3) German
a. Irgendeine Frau schläft.
Irgendein woman sleeps
‘Some woman or another sleeps’
b. A woman sleeps. But asking which woman sleeps is absolutely irrelevant in
the discussion.
I will take this intuition seriously and develop a sketch of a theory which spells out the
intuition in detail. The claim is, then:
(4) Hypothesis:
The function of specialised indefinite determiners is to signal whether the speaker
is able or willing to disclose the answer to a potential specificational question,
whether he considers the question relevant, sensible or whatever may prove
worthy of grammaticalisation in some language or another.
Hence, indefinites not only introduce new referents into the discourse, as captured in
dynamic accounts of meaning, but they also give information about the future discourse
function of those indefinites. This latter idea has never before been captured in a precise
manner, to my knowledge. In fact, the only similar observations in the literature are
found in Chiriacescu and von Heusinger (2009) and Chiriacescu (2011), who claim
report that certain specific indefinites as the Romanian pe-marked indefinite direct
objects (see also von Heusinger and Onea (2008)) tend to become topics at a later
stage of a conversation or story.
Actually spelling out this intuition in a formally respectable way is not going to be
easy. The main difficulty comes from the observation that indefinites can scope out of
scope islands, as observed in Fodor and Sag (1982) and many other papers ever since,
hence, care must be taken of their scope-taking behaviour.
To illustrate the problem, observe that (5-a) is ambiguous in a way that (5-b) is not.
In particular, (5-a) has a reading in which some professor has wide scope over exactly
five boys, and a reading in which it has intermediate scope between the two quantifiers,
but in (5-b) every professor only has a narrow scope reading.
(5) a. Exactly five boys read most books that were recommended by some profes-
sor.
243
(i) Narrow scope for some professor

There are exactly five boys x such that for most books y such that
there is a professor z such that z recommended y, x read y.
(ii) Wide scope for some professor
There is a professor z such that there are exactly five boys x such that
for most books y such that z recommended y, x read y.
(iii) Intermediate scope for some professor
There are exactly five boys x such that there is a professor z such that
for most books y such that z recommended y, x read y.
b. Exactly five boys read most books that were recommended by every pro-
fessor.
(i) Narrow scope for every professor
There are exactly five boys x such that for most books y such that for
every professor z z recommended y, x read y.
(ii) Wide scope for every professor
#For every professor z there are exactly five boys x such that for most
books y such that z recommended y, x read y.
(iii) Intermediate scope for every professor
#There are exactly five boys x such that for every professor z for most
books y such that z recommended y, x read y.
This observation is dramatic because of the traditional picture about the way quantifiers
take their scope. In particular, it is often assumed that the syntactic position at LF
determines the semantic scope of a quantifier. In order for a quantifier to scope over
another one surfacing above it, it must be moved to a higher position. Now, if we assume
that there is no LF-movement out of scope islands, we have an easy explanation for
the fact that quantifiers do not scope out of islands. This correctly captures (5-b).
But while indefinites are similar to quantifiers in many ways, and actually have been
traditionally modelled as the existential quantifier, they do scope out of scope islands,
see (5-a). The challenge has been accordingly to explain how indefinites manage to
scope out of islands.
In the literature, probably nearly every conceivable way to deal with this problem has
been proposed, and in section 6.1, I give a very brief overview of the most important
approaches. The conclusion to which I will come is that the scope of indefinites is a
problem for every compositional framework. I will present a compositional framework
which correctly derives the scope properties of indefinites, in many respects following
Onea (2013), but using a different, much more standard syntax.
The main focus of this chapter is not on the details of the compositional system, how-
ever. The main claim is that indefinites, while having a main function to introduce new
discourse referents into the discourse, also trigger potential questions. In fact, not only
do they trigger potential questions, but it is also possible to derive the corresponding
potential questions compositionally, and some of the indefinite determiners appear to

lexically encode information about the role the respective potential question triggered
by the indefinite ought to play in discourse.
A theory of discourse mainly built on the notion of potential questions can therefore
shed light on hitherto hard-to-study properties of indefinite determiners. As one should
expect from what has been said so far, this chapter will be both formally and empirically
the most explicit part of the book. It will attempt to show that we can trace back the
effect of potential questions in the depth of semantic composition.
6.1 The story so far
The ‘story’ of the odyssey semanticists have gone through while handling indefinites
is very long and very complicated. Fortunately, there are excellent guides for the
interested reader. To my knowledge, the best comprehensive overview of the first 20
years of travel is in the ESSLLI manuscript of Bende-Farkas and Kamp (2001), still
available for free download. There, one can find a very detailed discussion of problems
and solutions and new problems and new solutions and so on, until 2001, which one
could call the era of choice functions. After that, some new approaches have emerged,
some of which are totally independent of earlier work, such as the presuppositional or
topical accounts, the domain narrowing accounts, the independence friendly accounts
or the Hamblin-accounts (on which I will also elaborate). I will not be able to give
a full and comprehensive overview of the literature here. That would require a whole
book in its own right, a fairly exhaustive overview is given in Endriss (2009). What I
will do instead is to briefly reconstruct strategies of dealing with the indefinite problem
and show the kinds of new problems that arise if one pursues them, meanwhile I will
ignore chronology and many interesting aspects of the literature.
The start of the discussion is the observation already pointed out using example (5)
above that indefinites seem to scope out of scope islands such as relative clauses, con-
ditionals etc. I give some more examples to illustrate:
(6) a. If every friend of mine is happy, I am also happy.

b. If a friend of mine is happy, I am also happy.
(7) a. More than five friends of mine told me that more than three girls are
happy.
b. More than five friends of mine told me that some girl is happy.
(6-a) only has one reading, according to which I am happy if no relative of mine is
unhappy. Under this reading, every scopes under the conditional. However, there is no
wide scope reading according to which for every relative of mine, if he is happy, I am
6.1. THE STORY SO FAR 245
also happy, or in other words: every happy relative of mine is such that I am happy.
As opposed to this, the indefinite in (6-b) comes with two readings. On the narrow
scope reading, we get the prenex equivalence to the non-existing reading of (6-a). I.e.
if there is a happy relative of mine, I am happy means the same as for any relative of
mine, if he is happy, I am happy. This is a very natural reading, actually. But also,
there is another one, the wide scope reading: there is a friend of mine, such that if he
is happy, I am happy. There may well be others, whose happiness would not make me
happy. Similarly, for (7-a) there is no way for the embedded quantifier to scope over the
matrix one, but for (7-b) this is easily possible. Sceptical readers may easily construct
scenarios in which one reading of the b examples is true while the other reading is false,
in Ionin (2010a,b) one can find many such scenarios to strengthen the intuitions.
Under the assumption that there is no scope-relevant syntactic movement out of scope
islands, the challenge also known as the indefinite scope problem, is to somehow derive
the exceptional scope readings of indefinites without such movement. The strategies
existing are manifold: a class of approaches says that indefinites are not quantifiers,
therefore deriving scope has nothing to do with typical syntax-driven quantifier scope
mechanisms to start with. It then remains to be clarified in what sense the readings
that are derived can still be called “scopal” readings. Another class of approaches says
that actually, indefinites do not have exceptional scope readings, this is only apparently
so. Also, there is a class of approaches according to which indefinites are quantifiers,
and one can spell out how they manage to get exceptional scope independent of syn-
tax. Finally, there is a set of approaches which assumes that indefinites are not quite
quantifiers but something very similar.
6.1.1 Indefinites are not quantifiers
6.1.1.1 Indefinites are referential
In the original paper, Fodor and Sag (1982) argued that indefinites may – in a reading
which they call the specific reading – be referential. In this case, they function like
demonstratives in the sense of Kaplan (1978). They said this mainly because they
believed an exceptional intermediate reading for indefinites was not available. Consider
the example (8).
(8) If a student in the syntax class cheats on the exam, every professor will be fired.
The example has two readings. One according to which for every professor, if there
is a student who cheated on the exam, this professor will be fired. A natural scenario
for this example is when the dean made it clear that professors are responsible if their
students cheat. So if the students of any professor cheat, the respective professor will
lose his job. This reading is the narrow scope reading, hence, the indefinite scopes both
under the universal and under the conditional.
The second reading is such that there is one particular student, such that if he cheats on
the exam, all professors will be fired. A natural scenario for this reading is this: the son
of the king is attending the syntax class and it is known that if he cheats on the exam,
the university will be closed down. So, now the dean made it clear that all professors
have to watch out for him not cheating. This reading is the wide scope reading, which
Fodor and Sag take to be referential, for the indefinite apparently outscopes both the
universal and the conditional (which is the island).
Crucially, a reading does not exist according to which for every professor there is a
student, such that if he cheats, the respective professor will loose his job. Consider
as a scenario which would naturally verify this reading a version of the previous one.
This time, each professor has on famous student in his syntax class and if this student
cheats, the respective professor loses his job. However, no professor is going to be fired
if another one of his students cheats. Call this reading the intermediate reading. Such
a reading does not seem to exist in this example, or at least it seems hard to get.
Farkas (1981) and King (1988) provide lots of examples that show that intermediate
scope readings actually exist. Consider a simple example, loosely following Kratzer
(1998):
(9) Every professor suspected that some actress is a spy.
The point here is that we have a reading according to which for every professor an
actress can be found such that he suspected of her that she is a spy. Such a scenario
would be a cold war scenario in which every professor has a second job at the counter
intelligence agency and has to make sure one particular actress assigned to him from the
agency is or is not a spy. Now, assume that all professors came to the conclusion that
the respective actress is a spy, but they have no opinion as to whether other actresses
are spies or not. In this case, some actress scopes over the embedding intensional verb
suspected but under the universal quantifier, hence exhibiting intermediate scope. Note,
however, that intensionality is by no means a necessary ingredient in this discussion.
Non-intensional examples can also be given. The easiest is to add a bound pronoun
into the restrictor of the indefinite. Consider (10), in which a wide-scope reading of the
indefinite is not possible under the interpretation that the personal pronoun is bound
by the universal quantifier:
(10) [Every boy]i read most books that were recommended by some professor of
hisi .
6.1.1.2 Indefinites are Skolem functions
Another piece of technology that has been used involves Skolem functions. The idea
behind Skolem functional approaches is rooted in the logical equivalence between the use
of a narrow scope existential and a wide scope existential for a function that establishes
referential dependency between the existential and the higher quantifier, as shown in
(11).1
(11) ∀x.P (x) → ∃y.Q(y) ∧ R(x, y) ↔

∃f.∀x.P (x) → Q(f (x)) ∧ ∀x.P (x) → R(x, f (x))
We know since Groenendijk and Stokhof (1984) and Hintikka (1986), that narrow scope
indefinites may have so called functional readings, in which apparently the Skolem
function is anaphorically accessed, as in (12), where his mother seems to denote a
function like the required Skolem function.
(12) Every boy loves a woman. Namely his mother.
So, we could claim that indefinites enter the composition as Skolem terms instead
of plain existential quantifiers. The advantages are at hand: indefinites come with
an index variable they need to depend upon, and depending on the position of the
quantifier that binds this index variable, we automatically get any intermediate reading.
Also, if the index variable is bound by a constant, we get widest scope readings.
(13) a. Intermediate reading:

∃f.∀x.P (x) → Q(f (x)) ∧ ∀z.M (z) → ∀x.P (x) → R(x, f (x), z)
b. Wide reading:
∃f.∀x.P (x) → Q(f (x)) ∧ ∀z.M (z) → ∀x.P (x) → R(x, f (a), z)
Using plain Skolem functions does not seem to solve the island issue, however, since
we need to project the restrictor material of the indefinite into the restrictor of the
existential quantifier over the function variable. This seems to require movement out
of islands. If this is allowed, we could just as well use plain existential quantifiers. A
somewhat different solution is pursued in Steedman (2007), who does not run into this
problem, but shares the problems of choice functions to be discussed in the following
section.
1
I use standard predicate logic quantifiers in the following, not quantifiers of inquisitive logic. To
signal that this is a different notation, I will use capitals for predicates and a classical bracketed
notation as opposed to the notation used for inquisitive semantics with predicates in bold and without
bracketing.
6.1.1.3 Indefinites are choice functions
Another, more elaborate proposal assumes that indefinites denote choice functions.
A choice function is a function from non-empty sets to individuals which returns for
each set in its domain one of its members. Choice functions have been introduced
into the semantic literature in von Heusinger and Egli (1993); von Heusinger (1997)
and is occasionally noted as , e.g. in von Heusinger (2002b). Mathematically, choice
functions can be defined as:
(14) Choice functions

S
If S is a set of non-empty sets, then f : S → S is a choice function (CF) iff
∀a.a ∈ S → f (a) ∈ a
There are at least two ways in which choice functions can be used, exemplified in (15)
for some abstract sentence. In the first case, the choice function variable is existentially
closed, in the second case, it is left free.
(15) Every P stands in the relation R with all Ss and some Q

a. (i) ∃f.CF (f ) ∧ ∀x.P (x) → ∀y.S(y) → R(x, y, f (Q))
(ii) ∀x.P (x) → ∃f.CF (f ) ∧ ∀y.S(y) → R(x, y, f (Q))
b. ∀x.P (x) → ∀y.S(y) → R(x, y, f (Q))
In the first case, choice functions are nearly equivalent with simple existential quanti-
fiers. The two formulae in (16) are equivalent, provided that Q is not an empty set. So
why use choice functions?
(16) a. ∃f.CF (f ) ∧ ∀x.P (x) → ∀y.S(y) → R(x, y, f (Q))

b. ∃z.Q(z) ∧ ∀x.P (x) → ∀y.S(y) → R(x, y, z)
The idea behind choice functions is that they artificially divorce the quantificational
force of an existential quantifier from its restrictor, hence circumventing the island
effect. One can argue that the existential closure of the choice function is not movement
related but some kind of default semantic operation. Reinhart (1997) and Winter (1997)
propose that the existential quantification can freely occur at any level at LF. Of course,
this is not very satisfying, for what will determine where the choice function is supposed
to be existentially closed? Actually nothing. Later on, it has generally been assumed,
e.g. in Matthewson (1999) that existential closure of choice functions only happens at
the topmost level of LF, which can actually be integrated into the definition of truth
(as in DRT), hence being conceptually more solid.
It is important to see that choice functions are a step forward as compared to the
constant-analysis, for they provide a way to divorce syntactic and semantic scope. The
idea is: leave the restrictor in situ and somehow push the quantificational force of the
indefinite up the tree. But actually, apart from pointing at a kind of strategy, choice
functions fail do to the job for a principled reason (this problem is well known up to a
point, cf. Bende-Farkas and Kamp (2001)):
The way in which choice functions work is that, given a set, a choice function will
invariably pick the same individual each time. Intuitively, this is completely different
for indefinites (and the existential quantifiers), and it does indeed lead to empirical
problems: When two sets are accidentally identical (i.e. the friends of Mary could be
the same set as the friends of John) this will predict that the choice function will pick
exactly the same individual. Now, any theory of choice functions will at least allow for
the choice function to be existentially bound at the highest level (having a free variable
makes no difference in this respect). If so, there may be quantifiers that intervene in
the tree between the existential closure and the restrictor, and naturally, they can bind
into the restrictor, as in (17)
(17) Every man loves a certain friend of his.

a.
∃f.
∀x.x is a man
loves f(friend of x)
The tree in (17) gives a narrow scope reading for the indefinite. But assume that two
men have the same group of friends (while the others do not). Now, the sentence is
predicted to say that these two men love exactly the same person. This is wrong. Such
a reading does not exist.
Kratzer (1998) and Matthewson (1999) do not have this problem, for they use the
notion of a Skolemised Choice Function. Now, indefinites denote functions from the
quantified index to choice functions, as in (18), where i is an index that can be bound
by quantifiers or constants, and f is a function that is either bound in discourse or
existentially quantified over.
(18) Jindef P K = f (i)(P )
Once we existentially close the function variable, we get plain scopal readings, and if we
leave it a free variable, we get so called functional readings. In essence, Kratzer (1998)
argues that the function variable is contextually salient, whereas Matthewson (1999)
argues for default existential binding of the functional variable at the sentence level.
For the moment, the difference is irrelevant, however. So let us see, how the problem is
solved. In (19), there is not one choice function, but actually f will assign to each man
x a particular choice function, and this way the unwanted reading is avoided. It is no
longer necessary that if two men have the same set of friends, they must love the same
person.
(19) Every man loves a certain friend of his.

a.
∃f.
∀x.x is a man
loves f (x)(friend of x)
But it should be obvious that the solution is only apparent for two reasons: Firstly the
restrictor of the indefinite may depend (in principle) on an unlimited number of quan-
tified variables. Consider (20). The example suffers severely on the side of plausibility,
but the reading hinted at with the continuation exists: In a setting in which every man
and every girl have a set of mutual friends, and John happens to love all those members
of these respective sets which happened to take the first joint picture of the respective
man and girl, the sentence is true.
(20) Every man told every girl that John loves a certain mutual friend of him and
her. Namely the one who made their first joint photo.
a.
∃f.
∀x.x is a man
∀y.y is a girl
loves John, fx (friend of x and y)
Now, suppose that there are two men, namely Jack and Max, and two girls, namely
Anna and Jane. All of them happen to have the same set of mutual friends, namely
Mary, Peter and Dan (assume these are boys and women). As it happens, Dan shot
the first picture of Anna and Jack, and Peter shot the first picture of all the rest. So,
in the situation the sentence is true, if Max told Anna and Jane that John loves Peter,
since Peter shot the first picture of his and Anna’s and his and Jane’s, and if Jack, told
Anna that John loves Dan, and he told Jane that John loves Peter. Actually, given the
continuation, there is no other reading.
But for this situation the Skolemised Choice Function approach predicts that the sen-
tence is false, which it is not. The explanation is this: there will be as many choice
functions as there are men. One for Jack and one for Max. Since the set of mutual
friends is constant, the prediction is that John must love the same friend of Jacks and
Annas and Jacks and Janes and also the same friend of Max and Anna’s and Max’s
and Jane’s. This is only true for Max, however. So, we ran into the very same problem
as before.
Of course, one could add one more variable, but given that there are relations with
any number of arguments, any number of Skolem arguments will also be necessary.
Hence, unless we want choice functions with a potentially unlimited number of Skolem
arguments, the whole enterprise has to be given up.
The second reason why the solution of including Skolem variables is only apparent is
best exemplified by another kind of scenario.2
We consider a reading of (21) such that for every man there are two potentially different
women such that one of them is blond and he knows her and the other one is loved
by him and the respective man believes that if these two women meet, he will die. To
clarify the intuition, think of a thriller scenario in which there are blond killers who
would kill men if they meet their lovers. The reading is given with the existential
quantifier for ease of comprehension in (21-a). Consider what happens if we have only
one choice function, as in (21-b). Intuitively, (21-b) is exactly what we wanted, but
now assume that there is a man who incidentally loves all and only the blond women
he knows. In this case, the formula in (21-b) requires that the woman selected by f for
that man from the set of women he loves meets the woman selected by f from the set
of blond women he knows, but since these sets are identical, and since f is a function,
the two selected women will also need to be identical. Crucially, such a reading does
not exist.
(21) Every man believes that if a certain woman he loves meets a certain blond
woman he knows, he will die.
a. ∀x.man(x) →
∃y, z.woman(z) ∧ woman(y) ∧ love(x, y) ∧ know(x, z)∧
blond(z) ∧ believe(x, (meet(y, z) → die(x)))
b. ∀x.man(x) →
∃f.C(f ) ∧ believe(x, (meet(f (λy.loves(x, y) ∧ woman(y)),
f (λz.knows(x, z) ∧ woman(z) ∧ blond(z))) → die(x)))
The problem can be solved if we assume that for each indefinite having exceptional
scope we need (for the general case) an own choice function variable, but then, of
course, the whole idea of choice functions is rendered uninteresting, because, now, we
need to existentially close one function variable for each indefinite outside the island,
which is fully equivalent to movement, the difference being purely cosmetic.
2
This argument is also present in Onea (2012).
While the problem is similar to the one that motivated the introduction of so called
Skolemised choice functions in Kratzer (1998), the example in (21) is such that Skolem-
izing the choice function variable as in (22) does not help. This is because a Skolemised
choice function is a function from individuals to choice functions and is meant to cap-
ture that the choice made from a set is dependent on some quantified variable, thereby
making so called functional readings available. Crucially, in the example above, both
indefinites scope directly under the universally quantified variable for men, so Skolem-
izing the choice function, would still give exactly the same choice function for the
two relevant sets of women (namely fJ for instance), hence making the same wrong
prediction as (21-b).
(22) ∃f.∀x.man(x) →
C(fx ) ∧ believe(x, (meet(fx (λy.loves(x, y) ∧ woman(y)),
fx (λz.knows(x, z) ∧ woman(z) ∧ blond(z))) → die(x)))
In my view, the argument above shows the main conceptual flaw of choice functions:
the very nature of choice functions is to output the same individual for the same set,
the indefinite article lacks such a property.
In (15-b), the choice function is used as a constant f. As compared to the referential

individual approach, we have little progress, as we just replaced one constant with
another. In fact, I am not aware of any explicit formulation of this precise possibility
in the literature, but one particular version of the this has become very famous. It is
the one in Kratzer (1998), who claims that the function variable need not be bound by
an existential quantifier, but instead it can appear as a free variable, somehow made
salient in the discourse. In my view, she is wrong, for there is no sense in which that
function variable can be contextually salient for the hearer. In fact, if anything, making
the function one step more complex makes the enterprize less plausible. But Kratzers
theory has been so influential that one cannot claim just like that that she is wrong.
After all, there must be a reason why so many scholars (including Kratzer) found the
analysis appealing.
I find the following quote from Kratzer (2003) instructive:
To sharpen intuitions, here is an example describing a custom from my

home town Mindelheim. After every funeral, all the mourners gathered
around the still open grave say a prayer that starts with the words: “And
now let us pray for the person among us who will die next.” Suppose an
anthropologist attended one or more funerals in Mindelheim, and reports
on what she found out in a lecture using (1), or the more general (2):
(1) After the funeral, the mourners prayed for some (particular) person
among them.
(2) After every funeral in Mindelheim, the mourners pray for some (partic-
ular) person among them.

On a referential theory of “some”, the anthropologist’s utterance of “some”
refers to a particular method of picking out the person prayed for. In our
case, that method is a function that assigns to every funeral in Mindelheim
that person among those who attend the funeral who will die next. (For
the sake of our example, you might assume that there are provisions for
simultaneous deaths.) If the anthropologist understood what was going on
at the funeral, she knew what the method for picking the person prayed for
was. But if she reports what she found out as (1) or (2) in her lectures,
her students might no longer have that piece of information. Yet they, too,
might report what they learned by uttering (1) or (2), still referring to the
very same method established in Mindelheim.
Intuitively, all that Kratzer reports seems correct. But let us take a closer look:
Let us assume that the anthropologist was aware of such a method to select one person,
and thereby used one of Kratzer’s example sentences. Clearly, he did not have one
specific person on mind but rather an individual or say a kind of individual not known
exactly by him but which is selected by a particular method, which he happens to
know. Certainly there is a difference between a method and an individual to which
a method leads us whether we know the result or not. The method would be named
as selecting the next individual who dies in that group whereas the individual refers to
the result of that method. For that reason, it is false to say that some person refers
to a method. Methods and persons are entirely different entities. While this difference
may seem trivial (and I certainly cannot doubt that Kratzer is aware of this) pointing
it out is significant and not just a matter of being pedantic, because the rest of her
story really relies on this category-mistake. She continues by saying that a student
of the anthropologist, would be able to repeat the sentence even if he does not know
the method. Now, having said that the student understood the sentence, one would
readily accept that the student refers to whoever the anthropologist wanted to refer
to. If, now, that was a method, the students also refers to the method (even if he
cannot name the method). This conclusion, however, is not supported under the other
analysis just provided: the student refers to a person identified by some method or
another which he does not know, the only difference to his teacher is that the latter
but not the former knows the method. Since no one of them actually refers to the
method, the example shows exactly this: knowing the method is irrelevant for using
an indefinite. One may know the method, the other one may not, both refer just as
successfully to an unknown individual.
At this point, it is worth noting that Kamp and Bende-Farkas (2006) observe that in
such cases, what really matters is to have some kind of trust that the individual under
discussion can be identified. The student might invoke his teacher, his teacher might
invoke death. One could then try to save the story and say: well, neither the teacher
nor the student actually refer to the method, they both refer to an unknown individual,
but they both do know one method (just what Kamp and Bende Farkas call anchoring):
the teacher can report the method described by Kratzer, meanwhile the student can
mean whoever my teacher had in mind.
But actually, even this is too strong. For we are speaking about the meaning of natural
language expressions and not facts about particular utterances and their communicative
settings. It is a fact that when I hear a sentence such as the ones reported by Kratzer,
I will not know the method unless I am told. Yet, I do understand the sentence. And
what that means is - at best - that I accept that there is a method (and the speaker
may know it). If in any way, by uttering an indefinite the speaker had said more, the
hearer would have understood more. So he did not. Kratzer example therefore shows
that there is absolutely no reason to say that the function variable should be left salient
in discourse - rather, it is existentially quantified over (at best). So we end up with the
existentially quantified version given in Matthewson (1999).
Unfortunately, apart from the conceptual problems pointed out above, there are a
whole number of other problems with the approach as well, in particular that they
cannot derive plain intermediate scope readings as pointed out in Chiearchia (2001) and
Schwarz (2001), which finally have lead most scholars to give up on choice functional
approaches, cf. Heim (2011) for instance.
6.1.2 Only apparent wide scope
Schwarzschild (2002) discusses cases like (23). Example (23) has two readings that are
interesting for this discussion: the wide scope reading given in (23-a), which is most
plausible for normal people, and the narrow scope reading given in (23-b) which is
plausible for people coming from very rich families given. Schwarzschild claims that
the wide scope reading is not a matter of scope assignment but rather a special case
of the narrow scope reading. Assuming that the domain of quantification is restricted
to the one and only rich relative of the speaker, the two readings have the same truth
conditions, since in both cases (given an appropriate semantics for the conditional) only
the particularly rich relative can verify or falsify the sentence. This is a very general
mechanism of scope neutralisation, and in fact, not only applicable in scope islands. If
the hearer assumes that the speaker quantifies over a set containing only one individual,
he will never be able to distinguish between narrow and wide scope readings.
(23) If some relative of mine dies, I will inherit a fortune.

a. There is a relative of mine such that if he dies I inherit a fortune.
b. If there is a relative of mine who dies, I inherit a fortune.
While this may seem intuitive, the question could arise, why an indefinite is used in
(23) in the first place, since, typically, if the domain of quantification is a singleton set,
a definite expression is used. However, if the speaker were to use the definite article
he would imply that either he only has one relative or that the hearer knows which
relative he has in mind (or is at least familiar with him or her). What happens here
instead is something like reducing the restrictor set to a singleton whose extension is
not assumed to be known to the hearer and maybe not even to the speaker. In fact, in
order to get the wide scope reading the hearer will guess (if supported by the context)
that the speaker is actually speaking about one particular relative of his, which he, the
hearer, may not be familiar with.
Schwarzschild (2002) goes on to argue that intermediate scope readings can also be
derived in a similar way. Recall the example of King (1988) given in (24).
(24) Each author in this room despises every publisher who would not publish a
book that was deemed pornographic.
For example (24), the singleton indefinite theory would either predict a narrow scope
or a wide scope reading, but not an intermediate scope reading. However, it is easy to
construct a similar example which proves to be more instructive. Let us consider (25).
(25) Each author1 in this room despises every publisher who would not publish a
book he1 had written that was deemed pornographic.
In this example, the indefinite quantifies over a set that is restricted by the value of a
variable bound by the quantifier each author. Now, under the assumption that each
author has written exactly one book that was deemed pornographic (and is relevant in
the discussion), we get the truth conditional equivalence between the narrow scope and
the intermediate scope reading, which is exactly what we wanted. Remember, that this
way we do not actually derive an intermediate scope reading but rather we neutralise
the difference between the narrow scope and the intermediate scope in the process of
interpretation.
To extend this analysis to the example (24) all that needs to be done is to postulate
a covert domain restriction in (24) that includes a bound variable, similar to the re-
striction he had written. Note that the non-overt material he had written is only one
way to restrict the domain, one could just as well use completely different material like
he had written in one year, he has heard that his best friend has written, he has been
working on, he has been reading about, etc.
The system comes with a high level of flexibility that allows to derive a high number
of readings. There are, however some serious issues with this line of attack.
First, if indeed domain narrowing is at work, we would expect that in cases in which
the context makes the domain of quantification as explicit as possible, no other domain
narrowing will occur. One such example is the case of explicit partitives, as discussed
in Endriss (2009). In (26) the domain of quantification of one of them seems to be the
set of three relatives introduced into the discourse in the previous sentence. If this is
correct, the domain of quantification is not a singleton set, and hence, a wide scope
reading as in (26-a) should not arise. But as a matter of fact, (26-a) is the most natural
reading of (26).
(26) Fritz has three relatives. If one of them dies, he will inherit a fortune.
a. There is a relative of Fritz’ (out of the three introduced before) such that
if he dies he will inherit a fortune.
b. If there is a relative of Fritz’ (out of the three introduced before) who dies,
I will inherit a fortune.
I show the second problem discussed in Endriss (2009) on an additional example: (27)
has two interesting exceptional scope readings, given in (27-a) and (27-b). Schwarzschild
(2002) can derive the reading (27-b) by adding some covert material, as shown in (28).
(27) Every linguist thought of every solution some problem may have.
a. There is a problem such that every linguist thought of every solution that
problem may have.
b. For every linguist, there is a (possibly different) problem, such that he
thought of every solution it may have.
(28) For every linguist there is a problem he likes most such that he thought of
every solution it may have.
Of course he likes most could be replaced by any relative clause containing a bound
pronoun, however, in all cases there will be special kind of uniform relation between
linguists and problems. Hence, if one linguists thought of every solution of his favorite
problem, we expect all linguists to have thought about all solutions of the problems
they like most. If one linguist, instead, only thought of every possible solution of the
problem his son hates the most, Schwarzschild (2002) would predict the sentence to be
false. Indeed, there is such a reading under which (27) is false in the given situation,
that is the functional reading. But there is also another, weaker, intermediate scope
reading given in (27-b) such that the sentence is verified in a situation in which for
every linguist there is any problem such that he thought of every solution that problem
may have. Crucially, Schwarzschild (2002) cannot derive this reading.
(29) (∀x)(L(x) → ((∃y)(P(y) ∧ ((∀z)(S(z, y) → (T(x, z)))))))
I conclude that domain narrowing is an important factor in semantics, and it has proven
useful in a great number of ways from dealing with vagueness up to quantifications and
presupposition accommodation. And also, domain narrowing does exist in indefinites.
However the arguments above have shown that domain narrowing cannot be, contrary
to Schwarzschilds analysis, the key to understanding the exceptional scope readings of
indefinites.
6.1.3 Indefinites are quantifiers
The only theory that sticks to a conservative view on quantification in which the scope
is determined by syntax but at the same time attempts to explain the difference be-
tween the existential and, as they call them, bona fide quantifiers, is Brasoveanu and
Farkas (2011). The key conceptual innovation can be paraphrased as follows: while in
classical first order predicate logic, an existential will be interpreted depending on the
values assigned to variables bound by any quantifiers syntactically dominating them,
in independence friendly logics, an existential quantifier may explicitly specify which
variables it will necessarily be interpreted independent of. Hereby, “∃x is interpreted
independent of y” means that the values assigned to x are fixed relative to variation
in the evaluation of the variable y. So there is a constraint saying that for any value
y receives, x will have the same value. Once the value x receives is fixed via some
constraint relative to y, we can say that the quantifier over x has semantic scope over
the one binding y. In order to make this idea precise the evaluation of variables is
modelled using sets of assignments. I illustrate in Table 6.1, where z has fixed values
relative to x and y, y has fixed values relative to x.
assignments x y z
g1 a a a
g2 b a a
g3 a b a
g4 b b a
...
Table 6.1: Multiple assignments in independence friendly logics
Indefinites must choose some of the variables introduced by quantifiers syntactically

dominating them, in order to specify whether or not they are independent of them,
i.e. they will end up scoping over them or not semantically. This means that we need
the set of variables over which quantifiers dominating the indefinite operate. Moreover,
the indefinite must have the power to choose some elements of that set and specify
whether the indefinite is fixed/independent relative to them. Conceptually, then, the
calculation of scope is driven by the choice of witnesses.
One problem of the system involves negation. Indefinites are free to disrespect the
syntactic scope of negation, as shown in (30).
(30) Peter did not see a car driven by a woman.

a. ∃ ¬: ... namely Mary.
b. ¬ ∃: ... all the drivers were men.
If wide scope is conceptualised as a fixed value relative to something, we need a variable

to be able to get fixed values relative to it. Negation, however, standardly does not
introduce variables. Brasoveanu and Farkas (2011) acknowledge the problem and give
a semantics of negation as quantification over worlds. The issue remains conceptually
problematic, however, since it really does not seem that worlds are the kinds of variables
one can in some interesting sense ”depend upon”.
On the more technical side, there is another problem that is known under the label
of binder roof constaint.3 Once a theory divorces quantifier scope (in the semantic
interpretation) from syntax, it must somehow avoid that a quantifier scopes above
another one which binds into its restrictor, a problem syntax-driven approaches do not
have, because binding theory turns such syntactic configurations illicit. For example
in (31) we wish to avoid the indefinite scoping over the universal. DRT has no natural
solution to this problem, but one can postulate a rule which blocks such readings.
Brasoveanu and Farkas (2011) deal with this problem such that if the indefinite is
interpreted independently of the universal, i.e. having wide scope over it, the result
will come out as either undefined (because there is no value for the pronoun in its
restrictor) or false (depending on minor decisions).
(31) Every boyi loves a woman who loves himi
While their treatment of the BRC can be seen as progress, I still do not find it par-
ticularly attractive. I show later that in my approach there is no way to derive the
unwanted reading, even if the syntax is set up in a way which would naturally lead to
such a reading. When deriving the wide scope reading for (31), we will get an unbound
reading of the pronoun even if it is co-indexed with the universal quantifier. Such a
reading exists.
The independence friendly logical approach in Brasoveanu and Farkas (2011) and the
Skolem functional analysis have in common that they postulate a slot in the semantic
representation of indefinites which the indefinite uses to link to some other element of
the clause or the context.4
Theories may differ as to how the link to the context is being realised and how it is
implemented. One can think of binding, as in Kratzer (1998), or some more involved
selection procedure as in Brasoveanu and Farkas (2011). However the essential aspect is
3
This argument is taken from Onea (2012).
4
Implicitly, Schwarzschild (2002) also has such a slot, once he allows for covert material in the
restrictor of indefinites. This becomes obvious in the equivalent reformulation in Onea and Geist
(2011). Fodor and Sag (1982), Reinhart (1997) and Winter (1997) are exceptions, but then again, it is
known that their theories are not powerful enough to capture the data.
that in the corresponding representations something is provided that acts as the anchor
to this linking on the indefinite side. The consequence is that the meaning of indefinites
is complex. It is complex in the sense that it anticipates possible complications once
additional quantifiers/operators are around. In a sense this is a workaround for the
locality issue arising once we do not want to move indefinites to their intended scope
position. This leads to the somewhat bewildering consequence, that the at least some
of the potential meanings of the simple examples in (32) become very complex.
(32) a. Peter saw a woman.

b. Peter did not see a woman.
Consider (32-a). If indefinites are modelled as Skolemised choice functions, we need

some independent anchor variable which the referent of a woman will depend upon and
some sophisticated choice function as the denotation of the indefinite. However, this
seems like an overkill for the example under discussion. Occasionally it has been argued
that the complication accounts for the so called epistemic specific readings, according
to which the speaker has some particular individual on mind. But a choice function
that assigns the speaker whatever he has in mind seems to be fairly useless once the
speaker wants to refer to two different individuals under the same description, as in
(33).
(33) Peter looked at a certain woman1 . A certain woman2 did not like that.
While the independence friendly approach does not get this kind of complication for
(32-a), in (32-b), the indefinite will have to decide whether or not the value assigned to
the variable quantified over by the existential will have to be fixed or not with regard
to possible worlds.
6.1.4 Indefinites are nearly quantifiers
There two theories which I still wish to review at this point: first I will discuss the
theory of Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) and then I will turn to the treatment of
indefinites in DRT.
6.1.4.1 Kratzer and Shimoyama
Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) are actually not interested in exceptional scope for
indefinites. They rather propose a theory of narrow scope indefinites, in particular the
German irgendein(‘some or another’) for which they develop a theory of quantification
in Hamblin semantics. I will not discuss the details of their treatment of irgendein,
even though the paper has become very influential in the domain of free choice and non
specific indefinites. What I am more interested in is the potential of their system to

derive exceptional scope for indefinites. Actually, there are different ways in which one
can implement exceptional scope in their framework, for example Alonso-Ovalle and
Menéndez-Benito (2007) combine insights from Hamblin-semantics and the domain
narrowing theory of Schwarzschild (2002) in order to derive exceptional scope.
I will first focus here on the basics of the system and then I will show how exceptional
scope can be derived.
Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) assume that there are two kinds of quantifiers in nat-
ural language. On the one hand, we have standard generalised quantifiers as given in
(34), but also a new kind of quantifiers, they call propositional quantifiers, building on
Shimoyama (2001).
(34) λP.λQ.Quant(P )(Q)
Roughly, Shimoyama (2001) observes that in Japanese some expressions can function
both as existential and as universal quantifiers, depending on some sentential operator
they apparently stand in some kind of non-local relation with. Call that agreement.
This leads to the assumption that actually, in Japanese, there are expressions which
somehow feed quantifiers, which on their turn, appear to be propositional operators.
The way Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) implement this idea is to say that some ex-
pressions generate alternatives and these alternatives are caught up by propositional
quantifiers at the top of the tree. Compare the simple examples in (35) and (36) in
which I ignore intensionality for illustration purposes. The essential observation is that
combining every man with sleeps and combining a man with sleeps will result in ex-
actly the same prima facies, in a set of alternatives who sleeps. It is only in the last
step, when the propositional operator steps in, that the different truth conditions are
derived.
(35) A man sleeps.

{∃p ∈ {sleeps(a), sleeps(b), sleeps(c)...} ∧ p = 1}
{∃} {sleeps(a), sleeps(b)....}
{a, b, c, ...} {sleeps}
(36) Every man sleeps.

{∀p ∈ {sleeps(a), sleeps(b), sleeps(c)...} → p = 1}
{∀} {sleeps(a), sleeps(b)....}
{a, b, c, ...} {sleeps}

I will not go into the details of composition at this point, although, after the discussion
of alternative semantics in the previous chapter, the details should be self-understood.
What is essential, is that one can embed an indefinite as deeply as one wishes into a
tree, in particular also into islands. The indefinite will generate alternatives, and if the
existential closure is propositional, it will work as if the indefinite had widest scope.
This only works if all the other quantifiers on the way are generalised quantifiers.
Consider an example to understand the mechanism:
(37) Every man loves a boy.

a. Ja boyK = {a, b, c, d}
b. Jloves a boyK = {λx.loves(x, a), λx.loves(x, b), λx.loves(x, c)...}
c. Jevery man loves a boyK = {∀x.man(x) → loves(x, a),
∀x.man(x) → loves(x, b),
∀x.man(x) → loves(x, c)...}
d. ∃ + Jevery man loves a boyK =
{∃p.p ∈ {∀x.man(x) → loves(x, a), ∀x.man(x) → loves(x, b), ∀x.man(x) →
loves(x, c)...} ∧ p = 1}
In (37) there is no island, but it is easy to see that there is no element in the system
which is island sensitive. Kratzer and Shimoyama (2002) do have a very simple way to
derive exceptional scope for indefinites. But do they really? Consider two more cases
to see the contrary.
First we can reflect on the way in which they can derive narrow scope for indefinites.
Assume, we have a propositional quantifier for the indefinite and a propositional quan-
tifier for the universal, but we let the universal scope over the existential, so we get
(38-e), which is a weird reading, saying that all propositions5 in the singleton set con-
taining a proposition equivalent to someone loves someone are true, in other words:
someone loves someone, or there is a pair of men and boys such that the men loves the
boy. Not quite what we wanted. So, what we learn from here is that we should not
ever have two propositional quantifiers.
(38) Every man loves a boy.

a. Ja boyK = {a, b, c, d}
b. Jloves a boyK = {λx.loves(x, a), λx.loves(x, b), λx.loves(x, c)...}
c. Jevery man loves a boyK = {loves(e, a), loves(e, b), loves(f, a)...}
d. ∃ + Jevery man loves a boyK =
5
Notice that the term proposition used here is not in the sense of inquisitive semantics. I will use
the term proposition in the sense of a classical proposition on the next pages. I will signal the point at
which, again, propositions will be sets of classical propositions, as established in Chapter 1.
{∃p.p ∈ {loves(e, a), loves(e, b), loves(f, a)...} ∧ p = 1}

e. ∀ + ∃ + Jevery man loves a boyK =
{∀q ∈ {∃p.p ∈ {loves(e, a), loves(e, b), loves(f, a)...} ∧ p = 1} → q = 1}
Assume, another option: let the indefinite be a generalised quantifier, and the universal
can then be either the propositional or the generalised quantifier with higher scope. The
result is what we want, as is obvious without a derivation (for a derivation would involve
predicate abstraction, which I only treat later). Still, this is no problem, as one can say:
whenever indefinites scope out of islands, they are the only propositional quantifier.
But here the story ends, for intermediate readings should also be possible, hence we
want the syntactic configuration in (39) and the reading in (40).
(39)
Every1
Every2
Island-Border Indef
(40) Every1 [ Indef [ Every2 ] ]
But in order to derive intermediate exceptional readings, the indefinite should be a

propositional quantifier (in order to get out of the island). But once that is said, how
is the higher universal quantifier going to scope over the indefinite? Using another,
higher, propositional quantifier will not work. So, we have to try to use a generalised
one. But firstly, at LF a generalised quantifier should not appear above a sentential
quantifier, and second, even if it would, it would be difficult to combine the generalised
universal quantifier with the sister node, for the respective variable to be abstracted
over is embedded in a set already. We have no rule to do something like that. So the
only solution is brute force: allow generalised quantifiers above propositional quanti-
fiers and formulate a rule for predicate abstraction which can deal with all the arising
complications. Even if that was possible, the cost is too high: if one can allow anything
in the LF, one can just as well allow indefinites to escape islands directly, as argued in
Heim (2011) as the simplest solution.
6.1.4.2 Indefinites as discourse referents
Finally I very briefly discuss the DRT treatment of indefinites. In DRT, indefinites
introduce a discourse referent, in our case, a professor is said to introduce the discourse
referent v. Now, there are no constraints onto where the discourse referent will appear
in the DRS universe, it can appear anywhere.
(41) Every man gave every woman the book a professor recommended to her.
(42) Narrow reading
z, v
x
y
book(z)
→
man(x) → prof essor(v)
woman(y)
recom(v, z, y)
gave(x, y, z)
(43) Intermediate reading
prof essor(v)
x z, v
y
→
man(x) book(z)
→
woman(y) recom(v, z, y)
gave(x, y, z)
(44) Wide reading

prof essor(v)
z, v
x
y
→ book(z)
man(x) →
woman(y) recom(v, z, y)
gave(x, y, z)
Just because there is no genuinely built in island constraint in DRT, this does not
mean that one cannot specify one. But crucially, saying that quantifiers (or double-box
structures) are sensitive to island constraints, is going to be easy and will not necessarily
include indefinites, which have absolutely nothing to do with quantification.
It is solely at the moment of truth evaluation of the whole DRS structure that quan-
tification comes in, in particular each box will act as an own existential quantifier, in
a fairy complicated system. I will not discuss the details of truth evaluation in DRT,
but what matters is that variables introduced by indefinites can be assigned any value,
and the whole DRS is turned true if at least one such value is found which satisfies all
the specified conditions.
In fact the situation is somewhat similar in a number of other frameworks for quantifi-
cation, such as Cooper storage Cooper (1983), which is absolutely insensitive to islands.
I believe, however, that DRT has one essential conceptual advantage.
6.1.4.3 Discourse referents and questions
I believe that the essential advantage of DRT as compared to systems in which indef-
inites are quantifiers (but somehow unsensitve to islands) is that DRT preserves one
essential property of indefinites: a certain indeterminacy, that I call inquisitiveness and
that I will model by means of potential questions. Whenever an indefinite appears in
a structure, one can ask, who it is.
As a matter of fact, in most cases interlocutors do not ask who a referent introduced
by an indefinite is exactly. They rather prefer to speak about the referent disregarding
the indeterminacy, to give more information about it. Now the really unique feature
of DRT is that at all times in discourse one could come back to the question who
the referent is, for a referent is available and one could ask questions about it. Other
6.2. THE COMPOSITIONAL THEORY OF INDEFINITENESS 265
dynamic frameworks such as DPL do not have this feature.
Unfortunately DRT has not been used as a framework for questions, even though
implementing questions in DRT is not particularly difficult (at least not in an obvious
way). Moreover, DRT does not incorporate a deterministic compositional system. Once
the DRS is construed, we have a deterministic interpretation, but we do not have a
function from syntax to DRSs. UDRT (Reyle, 1993) has made some progress in this
respect, but even in UDRT, capturing island constraints tends to become difficult and
the system is built up as a disambiguation mechanism rather than an interpretation
function.
The theory that I will propose in the following is widely a version of DRT, even though
it is static. But it will come with enough conceptual possibilities to generate questions
compositionally; this is precisely what we aim for.
6.2 The compositional theory of indefiniteness
In the following I present a compositional system that can correctly handle the scope
properties of indefinites, meanwhile giving a reasonable interface to discourse in terms
of making questions of specification compositionally accessible from the meaning of
indefinites. It is essential to see that this does not claim (and one also should not
claim) that indefinites are devices of question-generation. On the contrary, indefinites
are treated as referential expressions, on a par with definites, proper names and pro-
nouns. However, their discourse function of generating questions of specification, can
be captured in a very direct way in the process of composition.6
Establishing reference is a fundamentally different task then to make a predication over

some referent and quantification is fundamentally different from both. The meaning of
natural language expressions should then be able to represent all these three aspects di-
rectly: referential expressions restrict referential contexts, predicates hold in referential
contexts (i.e. they impose restrictions on the world variable) and quantifiers establish
relationships between referential contexts. Semantic composition is a mechanism of
gathering referential restrictions and predications on the way. Predicates are such that
they add a new predication while storing all available referential restrictions. Referen-
tial expressions totally disregard predications and only restrict referential contexts. A
referential context is best understood as a environment in which the same referential
restrictions hold, e.g. one family of assignment functions.
Consider, for example the sentence in (45). P eter1 is a referential expression which
restricts the referential contexts such that the referential index it carries is evaluated
to the individual named Peter. sleeps is a predicate that is generally said to hold of
6
The content of this section is identical with the relevant part of Onea (2012).
an individual. But I prefer to think of sleeps as a predicate that holds in a particular

referential context, determined by its argument. So sleeps will require an expression
that is able to restrict a referential context. At the same time, the result of combining
sleeps with P eter should be a function from a referential context, restricted by P eter,
to a proposition. In other words, the sentence denotes a proposition, with the proviso
that we get rid of the referential context.
(45) Peter1 sleeps.
Referential contexts can be local and global. Some expressions such as relative pro-
nouns, conditionals, quantifiers, negation etc. have the special ability to establish local
contexts, i.e. they act as a filter with respect to the global context they are evaluated
in. Referential restrictions imposed in their scope are always relevant to the local con-
text but may or may not be inherited to the global context. Referential expressions
come in two types: indefinites may but need not inherit their restrictions to more global
contexts, whereas definite descriptions and proper names must always inherit their ref-
erential restrictions to the global context.7 Consider the contrast between (46-a) and
(46-b).
(46) a. Every man loves Mary1 .

b. Every man loves a1 woman.
In the local context of the VP both the proper name and the indefinite impose restric-
tions, in particular, the proper name will impose the restriction that g(1)=M whereas
the indefinite will impose the restriction that woman(g(1)). In the global context of
the entire clause the referential restriction imposed by the proper name must be in-
herited, so for the entire clause it must hold that g(1)=M, whereas for the indefinite
there are two readings, one in which the referential restriction is inherited to the global
context and one in which it is not. The first one corresponds to the wide scope reading,
the second one to the narrow scope reading. In the first case, for the entire sentence
there will be a restriction that woman(g(1)) whereas in the second case, such a general
restriction will not be imposed.
The general answer to the scope problem raised by indefinites is then that they are
a natural class of referential expressions which need not inherit their referential re-
strictions to a global context. This means that indefinites may “scope” out of any
quantificational environment, whereas other referential expressions must “scope” out
of any quantificational environment. Put differently, in this setup it is no explanan-
dum that indefinites can have “exceptional scope”, instead the specifically interesting
7
A third type of referential expressions are pronouns, however they do not impose constraints on
referential contexts.
(and maybe surprising) property they have, is that they can have “narrow scope” at
all. Having narrow scope in this sense means: their imposed referential restrictions are
limited to the local context they appear in ( they are not inherited).
This is the point at which the similarity of this approach to the choice functional ap-
proaches becomes evident: choice functional approaches treat indefinites as referential
expressions, thereby neglecting their existential force. In particular this means that
an indefinite will pick one element of the denotation of its restrictor, and it does not
encode the peculiar information that this set is not empty. In fact, for any indefinite
whose restrictor denotes an empty set, choice functions will be undefined. I have men-
tioned this as a problem for choice functional approaches but a problem which I do not
see as particularly deep because it naturally follows from the basic intuition of being a
referential expression. A referential expression is such that it is meant to refer (though
in the case of indefinites reference is indefinite) and not assert that its restrictor set is
not empty. I will not focus on real existential readings, though I will hint at how one
could think of them.
The similarity to DRT should also be evident: a referential context can be understood as
a box, referential expressions introducing new discourse referents and quantifiers create
boxes in boxes, i.e. local environments, and predicates hold in boxes. Inheritance is
then floating to a higher box. This similarity is not unintended, and I have explicitly
stated above that I will follow a path very similar to DRT in my analysis. There
are important asymmetries, however. E.g. relative clauses come with local referential
contexts here but not in DRT, the notion of accessibility in DRT is not reflected in
this system, which leads to lack of donkey anaphora, though the system will have
the expressive power to handle donkey anaphora and I will briefly hint at the kind of
syntactic representation that would be needed.
I assume that syntax fully determines the meaning of natural language expressions, in
particular scopal disambiguation. I will use two technical tools to this end which are
fairly standard: indexing and quantifier movement. Each referential expression and
each quantifier comes with a so called referential index. In addition, I will also use sets
of indices occasionally in ways to be explained in what follows.
Now we turn more technical. The interpretation function J K is given relative to a world
variable w and is written classically as J Kw . I also assume fully disambiguated LF’s
including referential indices that are interpreted in the interpretation function.
I assume that the meaning of CPs are functions from assignments8 to propositions.
I generally note assignments as h or g. Meanings, in general, are then, functions of
assignments. The conceptual motivation is that I do not think of the referential context
as an accidental component of meaning, which could have (just as well) been delegated
8
Assignments are surjective but not necessarily bijective functions over their domain.
to a parameter of evaluation. Instead I think of the referential context as a fundamen-

tal component of meaning which is involved in every step of the semantic composition
meaningfully: there is no aspect of meaning that may disregard the referential context.
That means: meaning is not calculated relative to assignments but inherently incorpo-
rates assignments. And it does this in a way in which assignments are not parasitic on
the composition. So instead of (47-a) we do not have the parasitic g variable (47-b)
but rather (47-c). The resulting meaning is a function from assignments which satisfy
the restrictions imposed by P eter having the referential index 1 to propositions that
contain the respective predication.
(47) a. JPeter1 sleepsKw,g

b. JPeter1 sleepsKw = λg.JsleepsKw (g)(JPeter1 Kw (g))
c. JPeter1 sleepsKw = JsleepsKw (JPeter1 Kw ) =
= λg[g(1)=P].λv.sleep(g(1), v)
For ease of notation I will generally abbreviate hi, ei9 as a type for assignments as
the type a, so meanings are generally of type ha, σi . I generally ignore the type-
subscripts whenever the types should be obvious. The following conventions should
help disambiguating types whenever missing:
(48) Type h, h0 , g, g 0 .. = a assignments

Type x, y... = ha, ei referential expressions
Type P, Q... = hha, ei, ha, hs, tiii properties
Type H, I... = ha, hs, tii CP-meanings
i,j... are natural numbers.
Similar to Heim and Kratzer (1998) and many others I use partial functions in this
system, noted as λxσ [ψ].φ. Thereby σ is a type, ψ is a condition and φ is some
expression. This is then a function from the subset of Dσ which fulfils the condition ψ
and has the value φ. One could also say: λx.[x∈Dσ ∧ψ].φ which would technically mean
exactly the same, but I find this notation more transparent because ψ is a referential
restriction and conceptually different from a type-restriction.
Expressions such as ψ and φ are either truth values, individuals or functions, however
I will mostly use standard predicate logic notations which evaluate to truth values. So
instead of λx.true iff x is a hat. I use λx.hat(x). I do not stick, however, with predicate
logical notations, I also use direct set theoretic notations in the meta-language. For
example I use h∈D(ψ) which reads as true iff the argument h is in the domain of
the function ψ. Like other one-dimensional systems, I only use the meta-language
9
i is the type for natural numbers.
to directly refer to model-theoretic entities and do not define an extra-interpretation

procedure for expressions of the meta-language. Doing so, would be a different research
agenda.
As opposed to Heim and Kratzer (1998) who only make use of the partiality of their
functions in order to constrain functional application, I explicitly allow cases in which
in later stages of β-reduction expressions arise which could be undefined within the
meta-language. So, for instance I may say ∀a.a∈D(b) → b(a)=c. This reads as: For
all a’s which are in the domain of b it holds that b(a)=c, i.e. the formula is false if for
some a which is in the domain of b, b(a) 6= c and true otherwise.
In order to get this interpretation in a fully formalised meta-language one either needs
a three-valued logic which gives expressions such as b(a) a third truth value if they
do not beta-reduce or some slight adjustments in the definition of the semantics of
meta-language quantifiers, such that e.g. the scope is only evaluated for values which
satisfy the restrictor. But there is no inherently difficult issue underlying here. As is
customary in functional programming, one can always get rid of the partial functions
and switch to total functions which have a built in error handling. I show this only
briefly for an abstract function using a Haskell notation. The only thing we have to
make sure is that undefined will be included in each type. In fact such a type exists in
Haskell, which is the type of error messages, which can be the output of any function.
(49) λx.λh[h ∈ D(x)].x(h)
f:: (a -> e) -> a -> b

f x h = if ((x h) == undefined)
then undefined
else x h
Even though in the process of composition, now, meanings are functions of assignments,
no new notion of propositions or questions is needed. Instead, I assume that there are
speech-act-type operators like ASSERT, QUEST, IMPER which turn functions from
assignments to propositions into propositions, sets of propositions or the like. I only
give the definition of ASSERT (A) here.

(50) A(α) = λw.∃h.h∈D JαKw ∧ JαKw (h)(w)
Notice that in this entire chapter there is absolutely no interface to inquisitive semantics.
This is the reason why assertion operators and question operators will be used which
create classical propositions and not inquisitive propositions. Similarly, I will use the
term proposition in this section to mean classical propositions. The reason for this
terminological decision is that using inquisitive semantics in this chapter could suggest
that the compositional system proposed is in any sense connected to the decision to
use inquisitive semantics in this book. This is not correct. This compositional system
is a proposal in its own right. I will discuss extensively the implications of this system
on the general setup of this book in the next chapter. For now, one can think of the
assertion and question operators as devices which turn denotations into the sort of
thing we assumed denotations to be in chapter 1 and 2. Applying inquisitive assertion
Ass and question Q operators to these entities is possible.
Readers may find bewildering that (as suggested by (47-c) and (50)) apparently I derive
intensions even though evaluation is dependent on a world variable, i.e. one would have
expected extensions at that point. Reference is fundamentally intensional, however, in
my view. The world variable is treated widely on a par with the assignment variable in
this system in the sense that the world variable imposes intensionally local contexts of
evaluation and intensional operators manipulate those contexts exactly the same way in
which quantifiers in general manipulate assignments in what follows. I will not discuss
the details of intensional operators because that appears as an entirely different line of
research. The only thing that is important for now is that each time constraints imposed
by referential expressions are calculated, they are (at least implicitly, e.g. for names)
dependent on some world variable, while predicates are generally not dependent on the
world of evaluation. Put differently: predications constrain the set of worlds whereas
referential expressions constrain the set of assignments and these two are intertwined
fundamentally: some referential expressions can only constrain assignments if they are
evaluated relative to a world, whereas predications constrain only worlds relative to the
evaluation of referential expressions.10
Given these general assumptions, in the following I first discuss some simple meanings. I
then go on to quantification and relative clauses. I start, however, with some notational
conventions that will be helpful in what follows.
6.2.1 Some notational conventions
This is a purely abstract section which introduces some notations and relations between
notations, one may call it, the maths of assignments and partial functions. In what
follows I will make extensive use of a number of these notations. I assume that they
are intuitive enough to be used directly in most cases, i.e. without being first converted
into their respective definitions in the formulae.
I define equality between assignments relative to sets of indices (i.e. natural numbers):
(51-a) requires that two assignments are equal relative to a set A if they assign each
index from A the same value, and (51-b) requires that the two assignments are equal
relative to the complement set of A. The pure equality of two assignments can be
10
It is true, however that in some cases the treatment of the world variable seems somewhat ad-hoc.
A more principled discussion in a paper concerned with de-re and de-dicto readings should follow.
spelled out in (51-c) as the the equality relative to some set and its complement. We
could also say that h = g iff h =N g, i.e. they are equal relative to the set of natural
numbers, i.e. all possible indices. (51-d)-(51-f) are then self understood. Also, for ease
of notation, whenever A consists of exactly one element i I write h =i g instead of
h ={i} g.
(51) a. h =A g iff ∀j.j ∈ A → h(j) = g(j)

b. h =A g iff ∀j.j ∈
/ A → h(j) = g(j)
c. h = g iff ∃A.h =A g ∧ h =A
d. h 6=A g iff ∃j.j ∈ A ∧ h(j) 6= g(j)
e. h 6=A g iff ∃j.j ∈
/ A ∧ h(j) 6= g(j)
f. h 6= g iff ∃A.h 6=A g
As is easy to prove, with these definition it holds that :
(52) ∀h, h0 .h0 =∅ h
Another notation previously introduced was D(ψ) which is the domain of ψ. Now,
assume that the domain of ψ are assignments. In (53-a) we have a notation already
introduced that says that the assignment h is in the domain of ψ, i.e. ψ(h) is defined.
In (53-b) a new notation is introduced that says that h is in the domain of ψ if one
disregards the values assigned by it to elements of A. Put differently, if there is a reason
why h is not in the domain of ψ it will definitely concern a value allocated by h to some
element of A.11
(53) a. h ∈ D(ψ)
b. h ∈A D(ψ) iff ∃g.g =A h ∧ g ∈ D(ψ)
c. h ∈ D(ψ) ↔ h ∈∅ D(ψ)
Consider for example that ψ requires that assignments in its domain assign Mary to the
index 1 and Jane to the index 2. Consider now an assignment h such that h(1) = M ary
and h(2) = Anna. Now, we can say that h ∈{2} D(ψ) since indeed, the only reason
why h is not in the domain of ψ concerns the fact that h(2) = Anna. More technically,
11
There is a question as to whether this definition perfectly matches the idea described, for if ψ
imposes impossible restrictions relative to some particular index, say 3, e.g. that index should be
assigned to an element of an empty set, we would want that h ∈{3} D(ψ) comes out as true if the only
reason why h is not in the domain of ψ is the value assigned to the index 3, but actually the definition
(53-b) will turn the formula false because no g will find an element of an empty set that can be assigned
to 3. While this seems a technical finesse, it will ultimately lead to the consequence that indefinites
presuppose non-emptyness of their restrictor set. In order to avoid that conclusion one needs to refine
(53-b). I do not pursue this issue any further, since I have noted above already that I readily share this
problem with choice functional approaches, and – in addition – there are interesting ways to handle
this problem at the semantics-pragmatics interface as I will show later.
we can find g which equals h in the complement of {2}, i.e. in all values except 2 such
that g(1) = M ary and g(2) = Jane, and this g is indeed in the domain of ψ. At the
same time, it does not hold that h ∈{1} D(ψ), because we are now searching for a g
which equals h in the value assigned to 2, but such a g will never be in the domain of
ψ. With this said, the equivalence in (53-c) should be obvious. Again, I may ignore
the set brackets if the respective set is a singleton, so I may use h ∈2 D(ψ) instead of
h ∈{2} D(ψ).
Assume that we have a function ψ from assignments to some other entities. Further we
assume that ψ is a partial function, so not all assignments are in the domain of ψ. We
say that an assignment is not in the domain of ψ because it assigns the wrong entity to
some index. In most cases, ψ will have a restricted domain with respect to a particular
set of indices, e.g. ψ may require that 1 is assigned to Mary, 2 to John etc. which is
for the most cases not very large. For the rest of the indices the value assigned to them
by an assignment does not matter as to whether the assignment is in the domain of ψ
or not. Given this, we may be interested in the following question: assume we have a
candidate assignment h, and we want to know whether it is in the domain of ψ, which
of the indices do we have to check to decide, or put differently, which of the indices
are relevant to decide this issue? Given a function, we are then interested in the set
of indices which are relevant/irrelevant for an assignment for being in its domain. For
this, we first define a relevance relation between an index and a set of assignments in
(54): an index i is relevant for a set of assignments A if we find two assignments which
only differ in the value assigned to i and one of them is in the domain of A and the
other one is not.
(54) R(i, A) iff ∃h, g.g =i h ∧ g ∈ A ∧ h ∈

/A
With this notion we can define the set of indices that are relevant for deciding whether
an assignment is in the domain of ψ, noted as ψ + and the complement set of these
indices, which are not relevant to decide whether an assignment is in the domain of ψ.
(55) a. ψ + = {i|R(i, D(ψ))}

b. ψ− = N \ ψ+
Assume then, for example, that an assignment h is only in the domain of ψ if h(1) =
M ary and h(5) = John. We now say that ψ + = {1, 5} and ψ − = {2, 3, 4, 6, 7...}.
One important theorem which is easy to prove is then given in (56). This theorem says
if we derive a function which has a larger domain than ψ by the set of indices A then
A will be irrelevant for deciding whether an assignment is in the domain of the new
function.
(56) A = (λh.[h ∈A ψ]φ)−
Another interesting and useful theorem is given in (57):
(57) g ∈A H iff ∃h.h =A g ∧ H(h)
6.2.2 Names, properties and pronouns
The main rules of semantic composition are given in (58). They include both functional
application, (58-b) and predicate modification (58-a):
(58) For any α and β expressions:

a. iff T JαKw = T JβKw = hha, ei, ha, hs, tiii then:

w w w
JαβK = λx.λh h∈ D JαK (x) ∩ D JβK (x) .
w
= = = = λw.JαK (x)(h)(w)
∧ JβKw (x)(h)(w)
b. else, iff JβKw ∈D JαKw then:

JαβKw = JαKw JβKw
c. else:
JαβKw = undefined12
All referential expressions, i.e. definites, indefinites, pronouns and proper names have
a (virtually) identical denotation. They come with a referential index and they denote
the individual to which the referential index evaluates. However, they impose different
referential restrictions. Here we first discuss the simplest cases, pronouns and proper
names. A pronoun imposes no restriction whatsoever (assuming that gender features
are not interpretable), whereas a proper name imposes the restriction that the index is
evaluated to the individual bearing that name.
JP eteri Kw = λh h(i)=P .h(i)

(59) a.
b. Jhei Kw = Jhimself1 Kw = Jt1 Kw = λh.h(1)
Given the rules above, the meanings for properties naturally follow. Consider some
examples: 13
JsleepKw = λx.λh h∈D(x) .λv.sleep x(h), v

(60) a.
12
Where T(α) is the type of α. If JαβKw is undefined, that means that the computation stops, i.e.
the sentence cannot be interpreted.
13

To prevent misunderstanding one should note that h∈ D(x) ∩ D(y) if fully equivalent with h ∈
D(x) ∧ h ∈ D(y), and I will use the notations interchangeably (mostly for reasons of readability).
JmanKw = λx.λh h∈D(x)

b. h .λv.man x(h), v
i
JseeKw = λx.λy.λh h∈ D(x) ∩ D(y) .λv.see y(h), x(h), v

c.
There are two aspects of the above definitions which are in need of a small comment
because they will be of some importance in what follows: generally, when we combine
a predicate with some argument, the predicate will transmit the referential restrictions
imposed by the referential expressions onto the result, this is generally achieved by
the constraint: h∈D(x). Secondly, in the result of these functions we find the formula
x(h). This is the standard way to designate an individual in this framework. This is
because a referential expression, by itself, never denotes an individual but a function
from assignments to individuals. If we need the resulting individual (e.g. in a predicate
logic formula) we then wish to first apply an assignment to the referential expression
and then we get the right individual, provided that the assignment has the correct
restrictions. This is how, a property first makes sure that the assignment preserves the
referential restrictions of the arguments and then it evaluates the arguments relative
to the assignment.
The simplest conceivable example is given in (61) in a full ‘derivation’ (though in

fact, from the first step onwards it is just a simplification for readability). Observe
that in (61) we can apply the functional application because the denotation of P eter1
is in the domain of the denotation of sleeps, since sleeps has no selectional restric-
tions. In (61-a) we have replaced the relevant semantic entries. In (61-b) we have
β-reduced the expression. The step from (61-b) to (61-c) is possible because the do-
main of λh0 h0 (1)=P eter0 .h0 (1)) is the set of assignments for which holds that they

assign Peter to the integer 1. The step from (61-c) to (61-d) is a simple reformulation,
since being an element of a set of individuals having the property P is the same as
having the property P. Finally, in the last line we have β-reduced the expression in the
first argument slot of the predicate sleep, here h’ is replaced by h, hence getting the
final result.

(61) JPeter1 sleepsKw = JsleepKw JP eter1 Kw = by (58-b)

a. = λx.λh h∈D(x) .λv.sleep x(h), v λg g(1)=P .g(1)

b. = λh h∈D(λg g(1)=P .g(1)) .λv.sleep λg g(1)=P .g(1)(h), v

c. = λh h∈{g|g(1)=P} .λv.sleep λg g(1)=P .g(1)(h), v

d. = λh h(1)=P .λv.sleep λg g(1)=P .g(1)(h), v

e. = λh h(1)=P .λv.sleep h(1), v
The result of the composition can be applied to the ASSERT operator as shown in
(62). Observe that the world variable is manipulated without changing anything in
this operation and also observe that the result is fully equivalent with λw.sleeps(P, w)
under the reasonable assumption that there is an assignment which assigns P to 1.
Then, the result is exactly as desired.
(62) A (Peter1 sleeps)

=
= λw.∃g.g∈D λh h(1)=P .λv.sleep h(1), v ∧

= λh h(1)=P .λv.sleep h(1), v (g)(w)

= λw.∃g.g(1)=P ∧ sleep g(1), w
As a second example consider the case of a clause containing a transitive verb like
Peter loves Mary. This example is interesting because it shows that the referential
restrictions add up in the process. I give only the relevant steps of the derivation:

w w w
(63) JP eter1 loves M ary2 K = JlovesK JM ary2 K JP eter1 Kw
JV P Kw = λy.λh h(2)=M ∧ h∈D(y) .λv.love y(h), h(2), v

(64)
JCP Kw = λh h(2)=M ∧ h(1)=P .λv.love(h(1), h(2), v)

(65)
(66) A(CP ) = λw.∃h.h(2)=M ∧ h(1)=P ∧ love(h(1), h(2), w)

equivalent with: λw.love0 (P, M, w)
If, instead of Peter or Mary we had a personal pronoun, we would only have one
referential restriction:
JPeter1 loves himself1 Kw = λh h(1)=P .λv.love(h(1), h(1), v)

(67)
6.2.3 The indefinite article
The indefinite article differs in the kind of referential restriction it imposes, in particular,
an indefinite like [a man]1 will require that the individual assigned to the index 1 is a
man. There are two issues here:
Firstly, as opposed to being an individual, which is under standard assumptions irrel-

evant of the world variable, being a man is dependent on the world of evaluation. For
this reason we will require that the individual assigned to 1 is a man in the world of
evaluation. Crucially, it is not an option to say that the individual assigned to 1 is a
man in the world over which the λv operator abstracts in predicate denotations because
we generally get the world argument only after the assignment variable. This seemingly
problematic issue is, however, easily fixed by the way in which the A operator works,
i.e. it makes sure that the two world variables are the same, as seen in the example
(72-b). Similarly, intensional operators can also manipulate the world of evaluation,
hence this gives rise to interesting flexibility. Moreover, a question operator then has
natural alternatives to generate at the clause level. Intuitively the solution amounts to
say that an indefinite requires that the individual it designates has some property in
the intensional local context.
The second problem is that if we want to have a compositional semantics of the indef-
inite driven by the indefinite article, it will be useful to index indefinites differently, so
we will say that the referential index for any DP is introduced by the determiner. If
syntax requires an index on the entire DP, a rule is easy to formulate which percolates
the index to the entire DP from the determiner: so instead of [a man]1 we will have
[a1 man]. Under these assumptions the lexical entry for the indefinite article is given
in (68-a) and an example is given in (68-b):
h i
Jai Kw = λP.λh h∈D P λg.g(i) ∧ P λg.g(i) (h)(w) .h(i)

(68) a.
h i
b. Ja1 manKw = λh man h(1), w .h(1)

The somewhat unfamiliar formulation P λg.g(i) (h)(w) may be in need an explanation:
the first argument of P is the pronoun ti , cf. (59-b), which turns P into a function
from assignments to propositions. Given the index of the pronoun, we can read this
is saying that the property holds of the individual referred to by the pronoun. For
our example a1 man reads as : the DP denotes an individual assigned to 1 by some
assignment function and it imposes the restriction on the assignment that he1 is always
a man. We generally use this technique, i.e. applying a co-indexed pronoun as a first
argument of a predicate in order to access the referential restrictions it carries, but also
for binding.
While the official version of the indefinite article remains the one in (68-a), it is easy
to see that for practical purposes we can often ignore the condition that h is in the

domain of P λg.g(i) for this will be a weaker condition than the second one, namely

that P λg.g(i) (h)(w) is true. So for simplicity I write (69). Notice, however, that
depending on further referential restrictions stored in P, there are conceivable cases in
which the official version is needed.
Jai Kw = λP.λh P λh0 .h0 (i) (h)(w) .h(i)

(69)
To simplify the notation in the general case, we will also use a shorthand notation, i.e.
the predicate H which reads holds and is in the domain of, i.e. h is in the domain of P
applied to hei and P of hei holds of h in w.
(70) H(P, h, i, w) = h∈D(P (λg.g(i)) ∧ P (λg.g(i))(h)(w)
This naturally allows for a very practical way to write up indefinites:
Jai Kw = λP.λh H(P, h, i, w) .h(i)

(71)
Consider now two simple examples:

h i
JA1 man sleepsKw = λh man h(1), w .λv.sleep h(1), v

(72) a.

b. A(A1 man sleeps) = λw.∃h.man h(1), w ∧ sleep h(1), w
w
(73) a. JA1 man
h loves a2 womanK =
i
= λh man h(1), w ∧ woman h(2), w .λv.love h(1), h(2), v
b. A(A1 man loves a2 woman) =

= λw.∃h.man h(1), w ∧ woman h(2), w ∧ love h(1), h(2), w
6.2.3.1 Relative clauses and the indexer
Relative clauses are treated syntactically very similar to Heim and Kratzer (1998), how-
ever given the more powerful denotations, it is no longer necessary to define predicate
abstraction as an extra operation . This is because the lexical entry of the relative
pronoun (e.g. who) comes with an own index that automatically binds all of its traces.
The lexical entry for the relative pronoun is given in (74), followed by the example in
(75).
h i
Jwhoi Kw = λH.λx.λh h∈D x ∩ D H ∧ h i =x h .λv.H h v

(74)
(75) ... who1 t1 sleeps. RC
who1 CP
t1 sleeps
w
a. JCP K = λh.λv.sleep
h h 1 ,v
w i
b. JRCK = λx.λh h∈D x ∧h 1 =x h .λv.sleep h 1 , v
The formulation h(i)=x(h) may, again, seem puzzling on first sight, but it straight-
forwardly expresses that a referential expression x evaluates to the same individual
under the assignment h as the individual h assigns to 1. One interesting advantage of
this formulation is that it is totally irrelevant whether the determiner of the entire DP
modified by the relative clause is or is not co-indexed with the relative pronoun, as we
get equivalent results.For precisely this reason, it seems more economical to co-index
the determiner and the relative pronoun.14
(76) a man who sleeps

w
a. Jman who
h 1 t1 sleepsK =
i
= λx.λh h∈D x ∧h 1 =x h .λv.man x h , v ∧ sleep h 1 , v
14
We get (76-a) by predicate modification, defined in (58-a).
w
b. Ja2 man
h who 1 t1 sleepsK =
i
= λh h 1 =h 2 ∧ man h 2 , w ∧ sleep h 1 , w .h(2)
w
c. Ja1 man
h who 1 t1 sleepsK =
i
= λh h 1 =h 1 ∧ man h(1), w ∧ sleep h(1), w .h(1)
The discussion above ignores one essential property of relative clauses: they are natural
boundaries of a local referential context, in fact they are scope islands. As argued above,
we think of the relation between local and global referential contexts as inheritance,
therefore relative clauses need a mechanism to handle inheritance.
The way I suggest to think about inheritance is that at LF the indices which should
not be inherited will be listed in an index set. We could also list the indices which
should be inherited, but formulae tend to get harder to read in that case. Alongside we
include an operator I (the indexer) that handles the inheritance directly. Intuitively,
what I says is this: we have a CP with some referential restrictions, from that we get
a new function from assignments to propositions such that all referential restrictions of
the CP are inherited, meanwhile those referential restrictions which concern the indices
in the specified index set A are existentially closed and thereby no longer relevant. One
can think of I as a default existential quantifier for indefinites, which gives them the
option to have narrow scope at all.
(77) RC
whoi
A I CP
We now define the indexer in (78). The idea of the definition is that the overall
restrictions of the CP are weakened such that the indices in the index set A are no
longer relevant (by theorem (56)) for the overall resulting function, which, on its turn
existentially quantifies over precisely these indices.
(78) JIKw = λA.λH.λh[h ∈A D(H)].λv.∃g.g =A h ∧ g∈D(H) ∧ H(g)(v)
Given this definition we can calculate a reading in which an indefinite is not inherited
over the relative clause it is generated in meanwhile a proper name is inherited. For each
not so transparent step I give explanations below, since to understand this derivation
is essential to understand the way the system works.
(79) a man1 who1 introduced Mary2 to a3 woman

a. DP
a1
man RC
who1 CPI
CP
{3} I
t1 introduced Mary2 to a3 woman

w
b. JCP K = λh[h(2)=M ∧ woman(h(3),w)].λv.intro(h(1),h(2),h(3),v)
w
c. JCP IK =
w w w
λh[h ∈3 D(JCP K )].λv.∃g.g =3 h ∧ g∈D(JCP K )∧JCP K (g)(v)
w
(i) D(JCP K ) = {g|woman(g(3),w) ∧ g(2)=M}
w
(ii) h ∈3 D(JCP K ) = h ∈3 {g 0 |woman(g 0 (3),w) ∧ g 0 (2)=M}
w
(iii) h ∈3 D(JCP K ) = (h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3),w)
w
d. JCP IK = λh[(h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3),w)].λv.∃h0 .h0 =3 h∧
= h0 ∈{g|woman(g(3),w) ∧ g(2)=M} ∧ intro(h0 (1),h0 (2),h0 (3),v)
w
e. JCP IK = λh[(h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3),w)].λv.∃h0 .h0 =3 h∧
= woman(h0 (3),w) ∧ intro(h0 (1),h0 (2),h0 (3),v)
w
f. JRCK = λx.λh[h∈D x ∧ h 1 =x h ∧ h(2)=M) ∧ ∃g.woman(g(3),w)].
= λv.∃h0 .h0 =3 h ∧ woman(h0 (3),w) ∧ intro(h0 (1),h0 (2),h0 (3),v)
w
g. JDP K =λh[(h(2)=M) ∧ (∃h0 .woman(h0 (3),w)) ∧ ∃g.g =3 h∧
= woman(g(3),w) ∧ intro(g(1),g(2),g(3),w) ∧ man(g(1),w)].h(1)
w
h. JDP K =λh[(h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3),w))∧
= ∃g.woman(g(3),w) ∧ intro(h(1),h(2),g(3),w) ∧ man(h(1),w)].h(1)
Observe that in (79-c-iii) there is an existential quantification of h0 (which stands in

no relation to h) which guarantees that the set of women is not empty. This is a
consequence of the property of the ∈A operator discussed in footnote 11. Observe,
also that in (79-e) we realised that we do not need the requirement that h0 (2)=M ary
because we know that h0 (2) equals h(2). In fact, this step is only licit because we
already have the requirement that h(2)=M ary in the selectional restrictions. Finally,
in (79-h) we have simplified the formula exactly according to the same reasoning as for
(79-c-iii). Crucially, now the result involves two existential quantifications over h’ and
g. The quantification over g is stronger, so one can just as well omit the quantification
over h’, however it is important to see that this will not happen in every case. So we
could just as well have:
(80) JDP Kw = λh[(h(2)=M)∧

= ∃g.woman(g(3),w) ∧ intro(h(1),h(2),g(3),w) ∧ man(h(1),w)].h(1)
6.2.3.2 Quantification
Quantification is a complicated issue in semantics, and I neither intend nor am able

to give a full story about quantification. I will give a basic treatment of the universal
quantifier to exemplify how one can think of quantification in this framework.
I assume that quantifiers receive their scope by movement. The syntax for quantification
is given in (81).15 It is thereby assumed that both the scope and the restrictor may be
indexed by the indexer I (if they have a derivational history as CPs).
(81)
S
Qauntifieri R
...
...
The lexical entry for the universal quantifier then says: a) inherit the referential restric-
tions of the scope and the restrictor to input assignments h, and for any assignment h’
which only differs from h in indices which are irrelevant to being in the domain of the
restrictor and for which the restrictor holds true, there will be at least one assignment
g which only differs from h’ in values irrelevant for being in the domain of the restrictor
or the scope and for which the scope holds true. Notice that the index quantified over
is kept constant in going from the restrictor to the scope.16
Jeveryi Kw = λR.λS.λh h∈D(R(λg.g(i))) ∩ D(S(λg.g(i))) .λv.

(83)
= ∀h0 .h0 =(R(λg.g(i)))+ \{i} h ∧ R(λg.g(i))(h0 )(v)
= = → ∃g.g =(R(λg.g(i)))+ ∩S(λg.g(i)))+ ∪{i} h0 ∧
= = = = R(λg 0 .g 0 (i))(g)(v) ∧ S(λg 00 .g 00 (i))(g)(v)
Since it is required that the values h’ assigned to any index that is relevant for being in
the domain of the restrictor are the same as the values assigned by h to the same index,
15
I assumed that both the scope and the restrictor are properties, i.e. of type hha, ei , ha, hs, tiii.
However, it is easy to give a version of the quantifier in which both the scope and the restrictor (or
only one of them) is of type ha, hs, tii, which obviates abstraction over traces.
16
At this point a note on donkey sentences is in order: if we choose not to use the indexer I for the
restrictor (which makes the variable existentially quantified over (with narrow scope) invisible for the
quantifier) but rather turn the index set which is now an argument of I to an argument of the quantifier
as in (82), it is possible to define a version of the quantifier which locally performs the function of the
indexer for the restrictor in such a way that donkey sentences are licensed.
(82)
S
R
Qauntifieri A ...
...
I did not choose this trajectory here to keep the syntax-semantics interface as familiar as possible.
we will generally directly write h instead of h’ when we use those assignment-values

and we therefore can ignore the condition: h0 =(R(λg.g(i))+ \{i} h altogether. Similarly,
since g is the same as h’ for the same values, we also write h instead of g for those
indices which are relevant for being in the domain of the restrictor in the scope. Since,
furthermore g is the same as h’ for the values assigned to the quantifier index we
directly write h’(i) instead of g(i) in the scope (i.e. after the arrow), and therefore we
can also ignore the condition g =(R(λg.g(i)))+ ∪{i} h0 altogether. Moreover, if both the
scope and the restrictor are lexical properties, such nouns and intransitive verbs, the
whole semantics simplifies radically, as shown in (84), since we can - in addition - also
ignore the existential quantification after the arrow.
(84) JEvery1 man sleeps.Kw =

= λh.λw0 .∀h0 .man h0 1 , w0 → sleep h0 1 , w0

We now turn to two more complex examples involving indefinites and proper names
in the restrictor and scope respectively. For (85) I derive the narrow scope reading
for a woman. That means that the referential restriction introduced by a woman will
not be inherited to the global context, whereas the referential restriction introduced by
the proper name must be inherited to the global context. In the derivation we use the
result in (79-f) above, for the identical sub-tree.
(85) Every1 man who introduced Mary2 to a3 woman is happy.

a. CP2
QP VP
every1 NP is happy
man RC
who1 CPI
CP
{3} I
t introduced Mary2 to a3 woman

w 1
b. JRCK = λx.λh[h∈D x ∧ h 1 =x h ∧ h(2)=M) ∧ ∃g.woman(g(3),w)].
= λv.∃h0 .h0 =3 h ∧ woman(h0 (3),w) ∧ intro(h0 (1),h0 (2),h0 (3),v)
JN P Kw =λx.λh[h 1 =x h ∧ h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w)].λv.

c.
= ∃g.g =3 h ∧ woman(g(3), w) ∧ intro(g(1), g(2), g(3), v) ∧ man(x(h), v)
d. JV P Kw =λx.λh.λw0 .happy(x(h), w0 )
e. JCP 2Kw = λh[h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w)].λv.
= ∀h0 .h0 =2 h ∧ man(h0 (1), v)∧

= = ∃g.g =3 h0 ∧ woman(g(3), w) ∧ intro(g(1), g(2), g(3), v) →
= = = ∃g 0 .g 0 ={1,2} h0 ∧ man(g 0 (1), v) ∧ ∃g 00 .g 00 =3 g 0 ∧ woman(g 00 (3), v)∧
= = = intro(g 00 (1), g 00 (2), g 00 (3), v) ∧ happy(g 0 (1), v)
Since, as argued above we can generally replace the higher assignment for the lower
one whenever the lower one has the condition that it equals the value of the higher one
for a particular index, the formula simplifies to:
(86) JCP 2Kw = λh[h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w)].λv.

= ∀h0 . ∧ man(h0 (1), v)∧
= = ∃g. ∧ woman(g(3), w) ∧ intro(h0 (1), h(2), g(3), v) →
= = = ∃g 0 .man(h0 (1), v) ∧ ∃g 00 .woman(g 00 (3), w)∧
= = = intro(h0 (1), h(2), g 00 (3), v) ∧ happy(h0 (1), v)
Moreover, we can eliminate vacuous quantifications, i.e. quantifications which are not
used: in our case g’, and the condition which are the same on the left and the right of
the arrow, hence getting:
(87) JCP 2Kw = λh[h(2)=M) ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w)].λv.

= ∀h0 .man(h0 (1), v) ∧ ∃g.woman(g(3), w) ∧ intro(h0 (1), h(2), g(3), v) →
= = happy(h0 (1), v)
The descriptions of the denotations in (85-e) and (87) are two descriptions of the very
same set-theoretic object. The description in (87) should be more intuitive whereas the
one in (85-e) is more transparent with regard to the compositional procedure. Finally,
we apply the ASSERT operator to check the final result (88). Observe that in (88)
the world variable asymmetries are solved by the A variable and that the existential
quantification over women which may seem to suggest that we have a wide scope
reading is actually fully independent of the interpretation of the universal quantification
altogether, so in fact we have a narrow scope reading for a woman and a general
requirement that some woman exist, which comes from the intuition that indefinites
are referential expressions, just like in the case of choice functions.17 .
(88) A(CP 2) = λw.∃h.h(2)=M ∧ ∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w)∧

= ∀h0 .man(h0 (1), w) ∧ ∃g.woman(g(3), w) ∧ intro(h0 (1), h(2), g(3), v) →
= = happy(h0 (1), v)
17
I will discuss some way to eliminate the non-emptyness requirement from the asserted content in
the last section
Now consider an example with wide scope. Here, we derive the wide scope reading for
a5 man. We achieve wide scope for an indefinite either by not having an indexer on the
relevant local context, in our case the scope, or by having one which does not include
the referential index of the indefinite. In our case, we do not need an indexer.
(89) Every1 man who introduced a2 woman to Mary3 introduced John4 to a5 man.
a. CP2
QP VP
every1 NP
introduced John4 to a5 man
man RC
who1 CPI
CP
{3} I

w
b. JV P K =
λx.λh[h(4)=J ∧ man(h(5), w)].λw0 .intro(x(h), h(4), h(5), w0 )
c. JCP 2Kw = λh[h(2)=M)∧(∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w))∧h(4)=J∧man(h(5), w)].λv.
= ∀h0 .h0 ={2,4,5} h ∧ man(h0 (1), v)∧
= ∃g.g =3 h0 ∧ woman(g(3), w) ∧ intro(g(1), g(2), g(3), v) →
= ∃g 0 .g 0 ={1,2,4,5} h0 ∧ man(g 0 (1), v) ∧ (∃g 00 .g 00 =3 g 0 ∧ woman(g 00 (3), v)∧
= = = intro(g 00 (1), g 00 (2), g 00 (3), v)) ∧ intro(g 0 (1), g(4), g(5), v)
Again, we can simplify the notation remembering that g’(1,2,4,5)=h’(1,2,4,5) and

h(2,4,5)=h’(2,4,5), so we get (90).
(90) JCP 2Kw =

λh[h(2)=M) ∧ (∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w)) ∧ h(4)=J ∧ man(h(5), w)].λv.
= intro(h0 (1), h(4), h(5), v)
Now, we can apply the A operator, which - this time - yields a clear wide scope reading
for a man, exactly as desired:
(91) A(CP 2) =
λw.∃h.h(2)=M ∧ (∃h0 .woman(h0 (3), w)) ∧ h(4)=J ∧ man(h(5), w)∧

= = intro(h0 (1), h(4), h(5), v)
Finally a note on quantifier movement. In the current system we can use the relative
pronoun as a predicate abstraction operator, hence allowing classical QR in the sense
of Heim and Kratzer (1998), but we need no extra rule for predicate abstraction. Put
differently, the system is more economical than the Heim and Kratzer (1998) version
because it handles a phenomenon for which they needed an extra rule by plain function
application. While I will not pursue this issue any further, I do give the syntactic tree
needed for QR:
(92) CP2
QP1
who1
vP
every1 NP index-set I
t1 VP
man RC
who1 CPI introduced John4 to a5 man
CP
{3} I
6.2.4 The solution of the indefinite scope problem
In this section, I discuss, given the compositional system above why indefinites ignore
scope islands and I discuss the Binder Roof Constraint, which naturally arises, whenever
semantic scope is no longer governed by syntax. First, I show how indefinites can escape
scope islands, by giving the wide-scope reading of the example in (85). Second, I show
the solution is conceptually sound, i.e. it contains absolutely no element which in
any sense disrespect the island-hood of islands. And finally, I discuss the Binder Roof
Constraint, showing that is is actually impossible to express its violation in this system.
6.2.4.1 An exceptional scope example
I show that indefinites now can escape scope islands by an example. I use the example
(93), which is the same as (85), however with the wide-scope syntax for the indefinite
a woman. The only difference between (85-a) and (93-a) is that we drop the indexer.
Alternatively we could have kept the indexer, all that is really required is that the index
3 does not appear in the index set.
(93) Every1 man who introduced Mary2 to a3 woman is happy.

a. CP2
QP VP
every1 NP is happy
man RC
who1 CP

w
b. JRCK = λx.λh[h∈D x ∧ h 1 =x h ∧ h(2)=M) ∧ woman(h(3),w)].
= λv.intro(h(1),h(2),h(3),v)
JN P Kw =λx.λh[h 1 =x h ∧ h(2)=M ∧ woman(h(3), w)].λv.

c.
= intro(h(1), h(2), h(3), v) ∧ man(x(h), v)
d. JCP 2Kw = λh[h(2)=M ∧ woman(h(3), w)].λv.
= ∀h0 .h0 ={2,3} h ∧ man(h0 (1), v) ∧ intro(h0 (1), h0 (2), h0 (3), v) →
= = = ∃g 0 .g 0 ={1,2,3} h0 ∧ man(g 0 (1), v) ∧ intro(g 0 (1), g 0 (2), g 0 (3), v)∧
= = = = happy(g 0 (1), v)
The result simplifies to (94) and by assertion the wide scope reading becomes trans-
parent in (95).
(94) JCP 2Kw = λh[h(2)=M ∧ woman(h(3), w)].λv.

= ∀h0 .man(h0 (1), v) ∧ intro(h0 (1), h(2), h(3), v) → happy(h0 (1), v)
(95) A(CP 2) = λw.∃h.h(2)=M ∧ woman(h(3), w)

= ∀h0 .man(h0 (1), w) ∧ intro(h0 (1), h(2), h(3), w) → happy(h0 (1), w)
The example above shows that it is fact the default behaviour of indefinites to scope over
anything. Unless an indefinite is ‘caught’ by an indexer, it will always end up having
widest scope. In a sense, one should think of this as a natural consequence of the
approach: this approach is specifically designed for referential readings of indefinites,
not for existential readings, hence it is not surprising that indefinites tend to get widest
scope.
6.2.4.2 The islandhood of islands
In this section, I briefly reflect on the resources needed to get a widest scope reading
in comparison to the choice function approach.
There are two elements of the solution: firstly there is an assertion-level existential
closure over assignments which is used to create a proposition from a denotation: i.e.
a function from assignments to propositions is turned into a proposition by saying that
an assignment exists which satisfies the requirements. Strictly speaking the assertion
operator does not manipulate a CP denotation but rather a syntactic tree forcing the
evaluation of the tree under a lambda-bound world variable, hence making sure that
the world variable in the referential restrictions and the world variable in the resulting
proposition are the same.18 The second conceptually relevant element of the solution
is the indexer I, which acts as a local existential quantifier.
Firstly, it is essential to observe that the function of the assertion-level existential

closure over assignment is in no specific way related to indefinites. We generally need
this step to create a proposition from a CP denotation, so it is not the case that the
fact that we have an exceptional scope (or not-exceptional scope) indefinite in a CP
would somehow trigger the existential quantification. In that sense, there is no ‘hidden’
syntactic or semantic function of an indefinite which would go outside an island in this
respect. Secondly, it is important to see that the indexer is inside the relative clause,
and in fact in each other island. So, it is true that the existence of the indexer is - in
a sense - parasitic on the existence of an indefinite, since we do not use the indexer
for anything but indefinites for now (though it may turn out that it has other uses as
well). But since the indexer is inside the island, it does not incorporate any forbidden
activity of an indefinite by virtue of which it could ‘look’ outside an island. Finally, one
could say that the referential restrictions themselves which an indefinite introduces are
somehow implicitly carried along to the level of assertion, hence cheating on the island
constraint. But again, that is not true, since whenever we combine two expressions
by some semantic rule, we do not distinguish between different types of referential
restrictions for the domain of the resulting function. Put differently, we treat indefinites
fully on a par with proper names.
It is little surprising that this approach is - in this respect - equivalent to the choice
functional approaches. But there are some differences. Note, firstly that a default
assertion level closure (or discourse binding) for a choice function is just about the
same as the assertion-level existential closure over assignments in the current system.
In particular, it does not depend on the existence of a particular indefinite in the
utterance. We can add an existential closure over choice functions by default to any
assertion - which will just be superfluous (but not harmful) if there are no indefinites
18
Of course, we could have defined an assertion operator relative to a world of evaluation.
that invoke the choice function. Yet, there is a sense in which the existential closure over
assignments is conceptually superior, namely that it has an independent motivation:
while the only reason we have choice functions are indefinites, we need the assignment-
closure fully independently of them. Second, observe that the indexer works similar to
the binding of the Skolem argument of a choice function in Kratzer (1998). However,
crucially, the semantic effect is different. While Kratzer’s Skolem argument can only
help deriving a functional reading, cf. e.g. Kratzer (2003), the indexer is equivalent
with a full existential quantification, hence reproducing the results of Reinhart (1997).19
While, however the solution of Reinhart (1997) involves existential quantification of
choice functions outside of islands, indexers work inside islands, hence respecting island
constraints in a deeper sense.
The current system does not come with a specialised treatment of functional read-
ings. However, since we know from Schwarzschild (2002) that functional readings are
generally derivable from existential readings if we assume that the restrictor contains
an implicit definite description, as in (96) (following the implementation in Onea and
Geist 2011), the current system can handle functional readings in the same way as
Schwarzschild (2002).
(96) Every man loves a woman. Namely his mother.

a. Kratzer style: ∃f.∀x.man(x) → loves(x, fx (woman))
b. Schwarzschild style:
∀x.man(x) → ∃y.woman(y) ∧ y = F (x) ∧ loves(x, y)
6.2.4.3 The Binder Roof Constraint
The Binder Roof Constraint is a conceptual problem that arises when the syntactic
scope of a quantifier does not determine its semantic scope. If the syntactically higher
quantifier binds into the restrictor of the syntactically lower quantifier, no reading exists
in which the syntactically lower quantifier semantically scopes over the higher quantifier.
In a system in which syntax determines semantic scope, such a problem cannot occur.
Also, this reading cannot be expressed in predicate logic using a transparent translation
procedure. Specifically Brasoveanu and Farkas (2011) discuss this issue at length.
Consider for example:
(97) a. Every1 man loves a3 friend of his1 . * indef > universal

b. Every1 man loves a3 friend of his2 . indef > universal
19
For this reason it immediately follows that there is no conceptual reason, why the current system
would run into the famous Chierchia problem (Chiearchia 2001, see also Schwarz 2001 for ample
discussion).
Given that in the system spelled out above indefinites are technically scopeless, one
worry one may have is that the reading in (97-a) is not excluded. The syntactic rep-
resentation that gives rise to the worry is this the one in (98), in which in lack of an
indexer a wide-scope reading for the indefinite might wrongly be predicted.
(98) CP
QP VP
every1 NP
loves a3 friend of his1
man
Actually, however, no wrong reading can be derived from this syntactic tree, as shown
in the derivation:
(99) a. JV P Kw = λx.λh.[h∈D(x) ∧ f riend(h(3),h(1),w)].λv.love(x(h),h(3),v)

b. JN P Kw = λx.λh.[h∈D(x)].λv.man(x(h), v)
JCP Kw = λh f riend(h(3),h(1),w) .λv.

c.
= ∀h0 .h0 =3 h ∧ man(h0 (1), v)
= = → ∃g.g ={3,1} h0 ∧ man(g(1), v) ∧ love(g(1),g(3),v)
JCP Kw = λh f riend(h(3),h(1),w) .λv.∀h0 .man(h0 (1), v) →

d.
= = love(h0 (1),h(3),v)
Now, applying the A assertion operator, naturally gives a wide scope reading for the
indefinite in which, crucially, the universal does not bind the pronoun in the restrictor
of the indefinite.
(100) A(CP ) =
= λw.∃h.f riend(h(3),h(1),w) ∧ ∀g.man(g(1), w) → love(g(1),h(3),w)
The moral of this example is that even if we do our best to violate the BRC, our present
system resist our subversive syntactic tree and ignores the “rubbish”-indexing, i.e. it
interprets as if the pronoun had a different index.
6.2.5 More on the compositional system
Above, I have presented everything that was needed to understand the conceptual
reason why indefinites disrespect scope islands in the present approach. I have not only
shown how this comes about but also I have discussed the conceptual advantages of
the present approach. In this section, I wish to briefly discuss three issues: I will give
a preliminary lexical entry for clausal negation, I will suggest one way of treating the
definite article and I will explore one particular way in which the assertion operator can
be used as an interface to the context in such a way that the non-emptyness constraint
associated with narrow scope indefinites will no longer appear as part of the assertion.
6.2.5.1 Negation
In the present system, negation can understood as a CP level operation. Quantifiers

can take scope over negation by virtue of QR. Essentially, if negation is at CP level,
the indexer I can be applied directly under negation to ensure that some indefinite in
the syntactic scope of the negation has narrow ‘scope’ under negation. An indefinite
will then ‘scope’ over negation if either the indexer is not present or its index set does
not contain the referential index of the respective indefinite. In (101) the indefinite a
man has narrow scope over negation whereas the indefinite a woman has wide scope
over negation.
(101) CP2
neg
CP1
{1} I
a1 man loves a2 woman.
A preliminary entry for negation is then given in (102):
(102) JnegKw = λH.λh[h ∈ D(H)].λv.¬H(h)(v)
For the example in (101) this derives:
(103) a. JCP 2Kw = λh[woman(h(2), w) ∧ ∃h0 .man(h0 (1), w)].λv.

= ¬∃g.g =1 h ∧ woman(g(2), w) ∧ man(g(1), w)) ∧ love(g(1), g(2), v)
b. JCP 2Kw = λh[woman(h(2), w) ∧ ∃h0 .man(h0 (1), w)].λv.
= ¬∃g.man(g(1), w)) ∧ love(g(1), h(2), v)
c. A(CP 2) = λw.∃h.woman(h(2), w)) ∧ (∃h0 .man(h0 (1), w))∧
= ¬∃g.man(g(1), w)) ∧ love(g(1), h(2), w)
Notice that this is indeed the desired result, apart from the again only apparent wide
scope for a man. A man in fact has narrow scope under negation, which can be seen
by the fact that there is no relation whatsoever between g and h’. So the reading we
get is: There are men (generally) and there is a woman such that there is no man who
loves her.
6.2.5.2 The definite article
A theory of presuppositions goes beyond my aims here, but at least as far as the
basic compositional system is concerned it is instructive to consider the way in which
Heim and Kratzer (1998) think about presuppositions: a presupposition is modelled
by partial functions, i.e. whenever a presupposition is not satisfied, the denotation of
one node will not be in the domain of the sister node, hence blocking the semantic
composition.
In the current system, partial functions have been used in a different way, however.
While according to the general semantic rules, one can only interpret a branching
node if the denotation of one daughter is in the domain of the denotation of the other
daughter, we have seen that referential restrictions are inherited in such a way that we
generally do not run into the situation that one daughter of a node cannot be combined
with another one. Instead, referential restrictions are generally existentially quantified
over by the assertion operator, hence if there is no assignment that satisfies them all,
we get false as a result. The essential idea of a presupposition is, instead, that it should
not lead to false as a result when it is not satisfied.
As it comes to the specific presupposition of the definite article, generally, there are
two approaches. On the one hand, e.g. Heim and Kratzer (1998) require that the pred-
icate the definite article is combined with must denote a singleton set in the context
of evaluation. Hence, the man is only interpretable if in the context there is exactly
one man. Another way to think about definiteness is that it presupposes that there is
a familiar individual it refers to. Under this view a definite description anaphorically
refers back to some entity in the context Here, there is no (strong) uniqueness pre-
supposition, but rather that the definite description can find a suitable antecedent in
discourse. Typically, dynamic theories of meaning such as Heim (1982), Kamp (1981)
take this approach.
While there are several ways in which one can define both uniqueness and familiarity
in this system, I wish to draw the attention to one particular spell-out which I find
interesting because it comes particularly natural in this system and it combines insights
from the uniqueness and the familiarity theories. Consider (104):
(104) Jthei Kw = λP [∃h00 .∀g.g 6=i h00 → ¬P (λh0 .h0 (i))(g)(w)].

= = = = = = λh[P (λh0 .h0 (i))(h)(w)].h(i)
In (104) the definite article can only be combined with predicates which have at most
one element, hence the so called uniqueness presupposition is weaker than usual, since
the definite article can be combined with the empty set.20 Say, for instance that we
wish to combine the with man. Now, in a model in which there are several men,
this is not possible. In a model in which there is exactly one man (or no man at
all) the combination is possible. We then go on to the referential restriction. The
referential restriction of the1 man will be that the index 1 is assigned a man in the
world of evaluation. One can furthermore require that the referential restriction must
be inherited, i.e. cannot be captured by an indexer.
Given this assumption the uniqueness condition is a strong constraint on the semantic
computation whereas the existential presupposition behaves just the same as a wide-
scope indefinite. This would predict that for (105) we get different interpretations
depending on how the presupposition is violated:
(105) The man sleeps.

a. There are two men around: no interpretation.
b. There is no man: false.
c. There is exactly one man and he does not sleep: false.
In the next section, I will show that one can remove the existential inference from the
asserted material by revisiting the assert operator, hence the prediction in (105-b) could
be refined to: pragmatic presupposition failure.
The suggestion in (104) is more food for thought than a serious proposal. What is
important is only that: a) it shows the difference between a presupposition and a
referential restriction, and b) it shows that it is possible to split the presupposition of
a definite description in a way which is not available in most other frameworks.
6.2.5.3 Assertion revisited
I wish to conclude this section by pointing out how one could treat the non-emptyness
inference we get even for narrow scope indefinites with regard to their immediate re-
strictor. Put differently, even if the indefinite has scope under some operator which
would cancel this inference, the inference is predicted to survive. For instance (106-a)
is not predicted to have a reading which is true if there are no women. Nevertheless,
intuitively, such a reading exists: if there are no men and there are no women, the
sentence should be judged as true. Similarly, it is predicted that (106-b) also lacks a
reading which is true if there are no women.
(106) a. Every man loves a woman.

b. No man loves a woman.
20
One can relativize uniqueness to contextual uniqueness, but this is irrelevant here.
For this, I wish to suggest two modifications to the ASSERT operator A.
Firstly, it may be allowed to use the indexer I immediately below the assert operator.
Any referential expression which has assertive existential power is then captured by the
indexer. Consider for instance a natural difference which arises between indefinites and
definites in (107). Here, the indexer may ‘catch’ the indefinite which is generally able
to have its referential index in the index set of an indexer, but the indexer may not
catch the definite article, which is, just like names, doomed to inherit its restrictions
over any indexer it may encounter.
(107)
A
CP
{1} I
A1 man loves the2 woman
Once we introduce this option we can formulate a general rule for indexing:
(108) The referential index of each indefinite must be in the index set of exactly one
indexer.
On the first sight we are heading the wrong way - instead of getting rid of the non-
emptyness requirement for narrow scope indefinites, we are now messing around with
the wide scope indefinites, which should indeed have a non-emptyness requirement as
part of their asserted content. But actually, this generalisation now naturally captures
the idea that each and every indefinite has existential power.
In order to solve the problem we need a second amendment: the ASSERT operator
will - itself - inherit referential restrictions referential expressions impose to the context
instead of existentially quantifying over them. One possible formulation of this idea
is given in (109). Here, X informally stands for the set of indices already fixed in the
common ground plus the set of indices relevant for being in the domain of α.

w
(109) A(α) = λh ∀w.w ∈ CG → h∈D JαK .λw[w ∈ CG].
= = = = ∃g.g =X h.JαKw (g)(w)
It very much depends on further assumptions about the content of the common ground
and the particular treatment of the constraints inherited to the common ground,
whether this solution makes useful predictions. It is, however clear that one can easily
‘isolate’ pure non-emptyness constraints and make sure they are handled differently as
compared to the referential restrictions provided by names or definite descriptions. The
6.3. THE DERIVATION OF QUESTIONS 293
crucial point here should be that those restrict h itself whereas the ones coming from
indefinites are more general, since they have an own quantification over assignments.
6.3 The derivation of questions
In this section, I discuss three topics. First, I show how to give a version of the A
operator which instead of deriving a proposition, derives a question. This is important,
because it shows that we can derive questions from indefinites, as desired. In fact,
because A uses the same resources as in relative clauses, we can basically derive so called
‘local’ questions as well. Second, I discuss so called functional readings of indefinites,
which turn out to be a bit more complicated.
6.3.1 The question-operator
In this section, I present a question operator which can extract the relevent potential
questions triggered by indefinites, i.e. which-NP question for a-NP indefinites.
Building on the original A operator defined in (50), we can define a question-creation

operator. The operator is then given in (110):

(110) Qw (α) = {λw.JαKw (h)(w)|h∈D JαKw }
It should be obvious that as opposed to the parsimonious way in which the assertion
operator equates worlds of evaluation and of quantification does not transpose to the
questions hence derived. In particular, we get the variation of the assignments relative
to a single world of evaluation, whereas the propositions derived are independent: in
the formula, the w variable in the second part of the set definition is identical to the
world-index of the Q operator, but in the first part of the set definition, the world
variable is bound by the lambda.
Consider a simple example like (111), repeated from above. We can use the question
operator defined in (110) to immediately derive a potential question that is intuitively
triggered by the respective indefinite as in (112). (112) is exactly the denotation of the
question: Which man sleeps?.21
h i
JA1 man sleepsKw = λh man h(1), w .λv.sleep h(1), v

(111) a.

b. A(A1 man sleeps) = λw.∃h.man h(1), w ∧ sleep h(1), w
Qw (A1 man sleeps) = {λv.sleep h(1), v |man h(1), w }

(112)
21
Of course, this is only true disregarding the complications in algebraic inquisitive semantics, as we
generally do in this chapter.
This is not exactly what we would like, but one should note that this is what we typically
get in the literature on free choice indefinites using Hamblin semantics: Menéndez-
Benito (2010) for example, see also Giannakidou and Quer (2010). The problem here is
that the individual alternatives of the question do not actually entail that the individual
who is supposed to sleep is a man in the respective world22 : so one alternative could
be true if Peter is a man in the world of evaluation, is asleep in some other world and
is not a man in that world. Such a proposition is not what we search for.
We can remedy the problem, however, if we assume that when we generate a question of
this kind, we are really not interested in who the men are, but rather, we want to know
which of them sleeps. We could model this by assuming that as part of the common
ground, we have already answered the question, who the respective men are (at least
as far as the domain of the question-alternatives are concerned). We can then re-define
the question-operator which now inherently uses this information, by using the context
set, c as an argument:23

(113) Q(α, c) = {λw.w ∈ c ∧ JαKw (h)(w)|∀w.w ∈ c → h∈D JαKw }
This then gives:

(114) Q(A1 man sleeps, c) = {λw.w ∈ c∧sleep h(1), v |∀w.w ∈ c → man h(1), w }
These propositions could be considered a bit too strong, as they will really only include
men into the domain of alternatives, if their manhood is beyond any doubt as far as the
common ground is concerned. But then again, we have argued extensively in Chapter
1 that precisely this is what we want for which-questions: we really ought to use a
which-expression with a restrictor to ask about individuals of whom we really know
that they satisfy the condition used to designate them. For this reason I will use (114)
as the official operator for deriving questions.
We are not fully done yet, however. Consider what happens if we have a sentence
containing two indefinites as in (115):
w
(115) a. JA1 man
h loves a2 womanK =
i
= λh man h(1), w ∧ woman h(2), w .λv.love h(1), h(2), v
b. A(A1 man loves a2 woman) =

= λw.∃h.man h(1), w ∧ woman h(2), w ∧ love h(1), h(2), w

c. Q(A1 man loves a2 woman, c) = {λw.w ∈ c ∧ love h(1), h(2), w |∀w.w ∈

c → man h(1), w ∧ woman h(2), w }
22
This problem has been discussed in more detail in Chapter 1
23
Observe that this is slightly different from the solution adopted in Chapter 1 but we will return to
this issue in the next Chapter.
The question derived corresponds to: Which man loves which woman?. This is a fancy
result, but we are ultimately aiming for an operator which can actually extract the right
question for any indefinite in the sentence. So we would want an operator, which can
extract Which man loves a woman for the index 1 and Which woman does a man love?
for the index 2. We will need this, because we want to say that indefinite determiners
such as a certain semantically target the question triggered by the respective indefinite.
But, if the question operator cannot distinguish the questions triggered by individual
indefinites, this it will be utterly useless with respect to what we aim for.
What we need is a combination of the assertion operator and the question-operator

presented above: a question operator which existentially quantifies over part of the
indices but can extract precisely one turning it into a set-generating device. Such a
definition is given in (116). The trick here is that while we vary the assignment h on
each of the relevant indices, we will get the same proposition each for all the variations
which are not concerning the index i, since we only require that g equals h in the value
assigned to i.

(116) Q(α, c, i) = {λw.w ∈ c ∧ ∃g.g =i h ∧ JαKw (g)(w)|∀w.w ∈ c → h∈D JαKw }
An example should show the progress (116) represents:
(117) Q(A1 man loves a2 woman, c, 1) =

{λw.w ∈ c ∧ ∃g.g(1) = h(1) ∧ love g(1), g(2), w |

∀w.w ∈ c → man h(1), w ∧ woman h(2), w }

= {λw.w ∈ c ∧ ∃g.love h(1), g(2), w |

∀w.w ∈ c → man h(1), w ∧ woman h(2), w }

= {λw.w ∈ c ∧ ∃g.love h(1), g(2), w |∀w.w ∈ c → man h(1), w }
That means that for any indefinite with an index i, if that indefinite does trigger a
potential question of specification, i.e. from an-NP P we get which-NP P, we can,
from outside of the respective CP, generate that question just by knowing the index.
This, in turn means that we can propose a fully compositional analysis for indefinite
determiners using LFs such as (118) or (119). I will return to discuss the advantages
of such representations in the next main section. For the moment it should suffice
that the framework empowers us to establish a non-local interpretation of (parts of)
the meaning of indefinite determiners, which are interpreted high at LF similar to
discourse particles. The idea is then that indefinite determiners target the questions
that can be derived on their particular index by using the operator in (116).
(118) a. A1 certain man sleeps.

b.
certain-OP1
sleeps
a1 man
(119) a. A1 certain man loves some2 woman.

b.
certain-OP1
some-OP2
a1 man
loves
some2 woman
6.3.2 Functional readings
The system given above might be taken to predict that only wide scope indefinites raise
potential questions in a special way. However, it is well known that indefinites may
also exhibit so called functional readings.
Classically, functional readings are derived by using choice and Skolem functions in the
literature. See, most notably Kratzer (1998), von Heusinger (2002a) and Steedman
(2007). The historical reason for using such functions was, however, that they were
considered as a potential solution to the island escaping behavior of indefinites. Now
that we have a system to derive syntax-independent wide scope for indefinites, the need
for Skolem and Choice functions as part of the meaning of indefinite determiners may
be questioned.
Indeed, once scope is no longer a problem, we can say that Skolemization, which we
need, once we want functional readings, is a pragmatic operation, or call it, part of the
conceptual system. Skolemization is nothing but the logical equivalence between the
two formulae given in (120).
(120) a. ∀x.P (x) → ∃y.Q(y) ∧ R(x, y)

b. ∃f.∀y.Q(f (y)) ∧ ∀x.P (x) → ∧R(x, f (x))
c. Which function assigns Qs to Ps such that all Ps R the Q assigned to
them?
In words, for a simple example: if each boy loves at least one woman, there is, by
necessity, a way to assign each boy a woman such that he loves the woman assigned to
him by that function. We do not need any specific semantic technology to know that
this equivalence holds. From (120-a) (120-b) follows by entailment, just the same way
as from the existence of a garage, the existence of a garage door follows, and from the
existence of a bus-driver the existence of a bus follows. We know, that such entailments
do license anaphoric relations, well known under the label of bridging.
I claim that functional readings of indefinites are an example of bridging, once we take
the narrow scope reading for granted. However, just like for bridging, the salience does
not come for free. For bridging we need definite descriptions as triggers just like we
need specialised indefinite determiners to trigger the functional questions. Let us give
this bridging operation in a non-compositional way (for it is not a compositional issue
in my view):24
(121) {λw.∀x.P1 (x) ∨ P2 (x)...w|Pi ∈ P} SK

{λw.∀x.(f1 (x))(x), λw.∀x.(f2 (x))(x), ...|∀x.∀i.fi (x) ∈ P}
Note that for most expressions that explicitly target the potential questions of some
sentence, adding Skolemization will make no difference, except for allowing them to
deal with functional readings. This is desirable e.g. for namely and also for most indef-
inite determiners. But there are indefinite determiners which do not license secondary
potential questions triggered by their indefinite, as will be discussed for German gewiss
or Russian koe-kakoj.
Also, another interesting effect that can be captured by this distinction is that we may
be able to handle a puzzling generalisation: once we embed a question, often functional
readings are no longer available: while both continuations in (122) are acceptable, in
(123), the functional continuation becomes less acceptable or marked.
(122) Who was kissed by every boy?

a. His mother?
b. Mary?
(123) I know who was kissed by every boy.

a. #His mother.
b. Mary.
Once we say that functional readings are derived readings, we can say that verbs like
know target the compositional semantic value of a question, but once overt questions
are asked, Skolemization may apply.
24
Note that the definition is given for simple Hamblin-Semantics. We have discussed above that
the compositional system here is a generalisation thereof. Also: it should apply to question meanings
anyway. If they have exactly one alternative (i.e. the indefinite has narrow scope, thereby not triggering
a question compositionally, as the reader may easily check) the rule will still apply, but it can also extract
functional reading from questions.
6.4 The meaning of indefinite determiners
In order to explain the idea of how to capture the meaning of indefinite determiners, I
will need some additional terminology.
(124) Q is a primary potential question triggered by α if Q can be composi-

tionally be derived from α by using the operator Q.
(125) A secondary potential question triggered by a sentence s is a primary

question triggered by s after applying the operation SK defined in (121) for
some quantifier in the denotation of s.
Put this way, I have shown above how to derive a primary potential question triggered
by an indefinite compositionally and I have given a notion of secondary questions which
we gain by Skolemization. Essentially, a secondary question is a (delayed) primary
question.
The key assumptions is that indefinite determiners are actually speech act or at least
sentence level operators, that are interpreted similar to other discourse particles, such as
the German ja, wohl etc. Hence, their aspect relevant for interpretation is syntactically
high (at least if one wants a syntax-driven semantic framework).
(126) Ai certain man sleeps.

a.
certain-OPi
Q(c, i)
sleeps
Ai man
What these operators do is to take a primary potential question derived from the
meaning of the sentence they dominate. While sentences trigger all kinds of potential
questions, indefinite determiners are special, because they only care about primary
potential questions (triggered by the respective indefinite).
The meaning of these operators can be given as taking as an argument the inquisitive
denotation of the sentence they operate upon. They are only defined if this denotation
is inquisitive, and if so, they contribute information about the attitude of the speaker
to the respective question. In the simplest form, we would get something like:
(127) J certain-OPK = λψ.|ψ| > 1.

not at issue: speaker takes ψ to be a relevant question in the discourse
at issue: ψ.
6.4. THE MEANING OF INDEFINITE DETERMINERS 299
Applied to (126), we get the result given in (128):
(128) felicity condition: There are more than one men in C.

not at issue contribution: The speaker takes the question Which man sleeps?
to be relevant in the discourse.
Similarly, we can analyze some, as an operator, that has no further not-at issue compo-
nent, but does presuppose that p triggers a primary specificational potential questions:
(129) J some-OPK = λψ.ψ triggers at least one primary or secondary question.

at issue: ∨p ∈ ψ.
This simple felicity condition will make sure that whenever some is used with narrow
scope, the functional reading becomes salient enough. In such a case, p does not denote
an inquisitive expression, but the Skolem-Question must be computed in order to satisfy
the felicity condition of some. For this reason, the prediction is that some is more likely
to receive a functional reading than a in English. This prediction is correct.
I should wish to end this discussion with two provisos. The one is purely technical.
The tree in (118-a) is not very useful, since it will interfere with the application of the
assertion operator. It only serves illustration purposes. What we actually need is to
create a functional composition of the operator Q and the lexical entry sketched above.
This would be, formally, a bit more opaque. The second one is more general: The
entries above are not meant to be the last word on the semantics of these expressions.
What I wished to show is how a lexical entry can be implemented. Much more space
(and in fact also more empirical study) would be needed to develop a more accurate
representation. I believe however, that the above sketch will suffice to show that the
we are heading in an intuitively correct direction. In what follows, I will give somewhat
more detailed analyses for German and Russian indefinite determiners, but even those
will remain rather sketchy in this book.
6.4.1 German bestimmt vs.gewiss
In this section, I give a sketch of an analysis for the difference between German bes-
timmt and gewiss. First, I give the relevant formulations, and I then show the relevant
distributional facts captured.
(130) bestimmt signals that the potential question primary or secondary triggered
by the corresponding indefinite is relevant in the discourse (just like certain
in Englilsh)
(131) gewiss signals that the primary potential question triggered by the correspond-
ing indefinite can be answered by the speaker, however asking the question
may not be relevant or even harmful in the discourse.
I now turn to a few selected distributional facts about these determiners, for a more
complete account of the distribution cf. Umbach and Ebert (2010) and Ebert et al.
(2012)
First, both determiners tend to have wide scope, but unlike gewiss, bestimmt may also
have functional readings.
(132) a. Jeder Mann liebt eine bestimmte Frau.

Every Man loves a certain woman
‘Every man loves a certain woman’
(i) Nämlich Maria.
namely Mary
‘Namely Mary’
(ii) Nämlich seine Mutter.
namely his mother
‘Namely his mother’
(iii)#Nämlich John Petra, Max, Anna ...
namely John Petra Max Anna ...
‘Namely John Mary, Max Anna etc.’
b. Jeder Mann liebt eine gewisse Frau.
(i) Nämlich Maria
(ii) #Nämlich seine Mutter.
(iii)#Nämlich John Petra, Max, Anna ...
The account sketched above can explain the fact that plain narrow scope readings
are not available. This is because once we have narrow scope readings, the indefinite
determiners do not trigger any potential questions. It is only due to Skolemization that
we can get some inquisitive potential out of narrow scope readings, but we may assume
that non-natural functions, i.e. functions that the speaker cannot express except for
giving a pair-list, do not qualify as answerable. However, note that in particular cases,
in which we have a very restricted set of individuals under discussion, especially only a
very small set of individuals universally quantified over, a pair list reading for bestimmt
becomes much better, not however for gewiss.
Why is it then, that for gewiss only real wide scope readings are available? The answer
is as simple as saying that gewiss requires primary potential questions. Since functional
readings are secondary potential questions, it follows, that Skolemization is no option
for gewiss.
Also, there are examples, in which bestimmt refers to some entity which is perceived as
specific but cannot be identified by the speaker, in fact, cannot be identified potentially
by anyone.
6.4. THE MEANING OF INDEFINITE DETERMINERS 301
(133) a. Du brauchst eine bestimmte Zahlenkombination, damit du diese Tür

You need a certain code for you this door
öffnen kannst.
open can
‘You need a certain code to open this door’
(i) Aber ich glaube, niemand in der Welt weiß, welche. Ich
But I believe noone in the world knows which I
natürlich auch nicht.
naturally also not
‘But noone knows which code, and of course neither do I’
b. Du brauchst eine gewisse Zalenkombination, damit du diese Tür öffnen
kannst.
(i) #Aber ich glaube, niemand in der Welt weiß, welche. Ich natürlich
auch nicht.
This contrast is very easy to capture with the entry above. bestimmt does not say
anything specific about whether the speaker can or cannot disclose the identity of the
referent introduced by bestimmt, whereas gewiss does. So, using gewiss above would
let the hearer know that the speaker knows the code under discussion.
In addition, gewiss but not bestimmt appears to have a conspiracy feature. So for
instance, one could report the fact that B has been called by a lover he is not supposed
to have, by uttering (134-a) but not (134-b).
(134) a. Eine gewisse Frau hat dich gesucht.

A certain woman has you looked-for
‘A certain woman was looking for you.’
b. # Eine bestimmte Frau hat dich gesucht.
Again, this contrast is predicted by the entries above. In the context described, it
is true that the speaker knows the answer to the question, which woman has called,
however, at the same time, it is also true that that question should not be discussed
further. Whence the conspiracy feature. Note, however, that there may be many other
reasons why a question should not be pursued in the discourse, so the conspiracy flavor
is only an implicature.
6.4.2 Russian koe-kakoj and kakoj-nibud’
Another set of indefinite determiners which have been difficult to analyze before comes
from Russian. The distributional facts to be given below are taken from Onea and
Geist (2010)
In particular, the indefinite determiners koe-kakoj has been known to exhibit the fol-
lowing two essential properties: it can only appear with widest scope and it always
signals that the speaker can but is not willing to disclose the identity of the entity he
is speaking about.
(135) Kazhdyj student voschischchaetsja koe-kakim professorom.

Every student admires KOE-which professor
‘Every student admires a certain professor the speaker can identify, but is not
willing to.’
Now, competing approaches find the analysis of koe-kakoj problematic, since the locally
present information that the speaker can but does not want to disclose the referent, will
somehow need to percolate to the clause level. While such a technology is available, in
principle, such as the coma operator used in Potts (2005), it is not so clear whether it
makes any conceptual sense to speak of this information as a conventional implicature,
see Onea and Geist (2011) for discussion. Instead, the analysis the current framework
provides is of extreme simplicity:
(136) koe signals that the speaker is not willing but able to answer the primary
specificational question triggered by the corresponding indefinite.
Let us now consider a putatively even more complex example. The indefinite kakoj-
nibud’ has apparently astonishing distributional properties: it cannot appear in ex-
tensional contexts, unless in very marked cases, and those cases it requires a pair-list
narrow reading relative to some other quantifier. Normally, however, nibud’ appears
with narrow scope in the scope of some intensional operator.
(137) Kazhdyj student objazatel’no voschischchaetsja kakim-nibud’

Every student necessarily admires which-NIBUD’
professorom.
professor
‘As a rule, every student admires a professor.’
(138) Petja hochet pogovorit’ s kakim-nibud’ juristom.

Petja wants to-speak with which-NIBUD’ lawyer
‘Petja wants to speak with some lawyer.’
Now, while there is a similar analysis for Hungarian reduplicated indefinites such as
egy-egy in Farkas (1997), which also require some kind of quantifier in the scope of
which they have to interpreted, and hence referentially depend on that quantifier, the
application of this theory to nibud is problematic. Pereltsvaig (2008) argues, for in-
stance, that nibud’ is just an intensional version of egy-egy, which can depend on world
variables quantified upon. Conceptually, however, this fails to make any sense. The
reason for this is that there are no knowledgable functions which assign referents to
worlds, hence speaking of referential dependence on worlds is at best misleading. Also,
6.5. CONCLUSION: THE FUNCTION OF INDEFINITES IN DISCOURSE 303
in recent implementations of the idea of Farkas (1997), as in Brasoveanu and Farkas

(2011), it turns out that negation also should be a good quantifier to bind the world
variable of nibud’, which is not correct. Negation does not license nibud’.
Under the current theory, things are again simpler. nibud’ signals that there is no
sensible question triggered by nibud’. Now, assuming standard composition to nibud’
this amounts to ruling out wide scope readings in general, and this also immediately
rules out non-quantificational examples and cases of negation with narrow scope, as in
all of these cases, we cannot even avoid a specificational question.
I illustrate the power of the new framework by discussing two predictions. For one
thing, this does not allow for functional readings. This is because, functional readings
qualify as questions triggered by an expression in some utterance even if they are derived
by a pragmatic rule rather than compositionally. But functional readings, and this is
the second point, are only allowed for ”sensible” functions, i.e. functions which can be
naturally answered. Pair-list readings, as opposed to this, are not excluded. Indeed,
we get pair-list readings with nibud. Moreover, Onea and Geist (2010) even provide
experimental evidence that these pair list readings are intrinsically unsystematic, i.e.
the message conveyed is that there was no system in the relevant assignment. This
amounts to the not at issue meaning of nibud : it is ruled out that functional readings
exist. Moreover, giving pair-list readings with possible worlds, seems impossible in
natural language, unless uttered by some very committed follower of David Lewis, who
actually believes in the ontological reality of possible worlds. This predicts that pair-list
readings are not available in intensional contexts.
So, it turns out that nibud’ is not puzzling at all for this framework. In fact its
conventional meaning is just as simple as the one of koe-kakoj and other determiners.
This is little surprising, after all: the current framework does nothing but give semantic
theory a piece of technology that allows it to handle a very natural intuition in a formally
respectable way. Of course, some things still remain to be settled: what is relevance,
for instance? But this lack of explicitness I share with every other competing theory.
6.5 Conclusion: the function of indefinites in discourse
I conclude this chapter by turning back to the big picture.
Whenever an interlocutor says something, the development of the discourse has to make
a decision, namely whether to continue the strategy to answer some question agreed
upon or to react to the new piece of information in a more or less expectable way.
Interlocutors may ask for explanation, further details, or just about things that come
to their minds when hearing some utterance.
In such a setup, indefinites are doomed to have a very special kind of function. Indef-
inites generally give limited information as compared to definites. This is obvious, for
one can only use an indefinite NP or pronoun if there are several individuals the NP
could refer to as far as the expressed meaning is concerned. There are two main reasons
why one would use an indefinite: either because that limited information transmitted
by the indefinite suffices for the purposes of the communication or because the speaker
has limited information himself. Additional, more fine-grained reasons are of course
conceivable: the speaker does not want to give more informations because it would be
harmful to the speaker or some other individual (e.g. a husband may say I will meet a
friend tonight instead of saying I will meet Mary tonight if his wife is jealous of Mary),
the speaker wants to divulge the identity later in discourse as part of some strategy to
surprise the hearer etc.
It should be clear that once an indefinite is being used, a potential question is triggered
(if the indefinite has an appropriate scope relative to the appropriate operators, cf. the
discussion of nibud in Russian above). This is because the hearer does not know why
the speaker has chosen to limit the information given: is it because it is not relevant,
because he does not want to say, etc.?
I have argued above that we should think of different indefinite determiners (potentially
all of them) as devices to control the reaction of the hearer to the indeterminacy of the
proposition (or question) uttered. The speaker may want to encourage the hearer to ask
the potential question triggered by the respective indefinite, he may want to discourage
him, he may want to signal that it is no good idea to ask, but he would be able to given
an answer if asked, he may want to signal that he does not know the answer, but he
may be able to find the answer by asking other people, he may signal that he has more
information, but not enough to actually reduce the range of individuals to a single one
etc.
We have to think of indefinites then from two perspectives: from the purely truth
conditional semantic perspective they are like referential expressions with the specific
trait that they impose weaker constraints on assignments than names or definite de-
scriptions; from the discourse perspective, however, indefinites also put some pressure
on the handling of the natural follow up question: indef −N P which−N P . Under
such a perspective, the great variety of indefinite determiners found in natural lan-
guage, cf. Haspelmath (1997), appears very natural and in fact a predictable result of
grammaticalisation.
In fact, one may now give a really simple account for the main pragmatic difference
between unarticulated constituents and indefinites. Unarticulated constituents do not
on their own have any impact on the further development of discourse. Interlocutors
may ask about them, but they may also not. The speaker has no control. Once an
indefinite is used instead (especially if it has a very large restrictor) the attention of
the interlocutors is drawn to that particular constituent and therefore asking about it
is prima facies more probable: we get a primary potential question. But at the same
time, the speaker may also signal by using indefinite determiners whether he encourages
6.5. CONCLUSION: THE FUNCTION OF INDEFINITES IN DISCOURSE 305
the hearer to ask or on the contrary, whether he discourages him to ask. Hence, using
indefinites is a subtle way to influence discourse development, which naturally predicts
that grammar not only has ways of anaphoric discourse anchoring but also of cataphoric
control over future discourse.
Chapter 7
Focus, Question and Indefinites.

Meaning in discourse
In the last three chapters I have proposed an analysis for appositives as answers to
potential questions triggered by the host utterance. I have, in addition, argued that
specificational constructions are a special class of appositives which answer a special
class of potential questions triggered by their host, namely specificational questions.
Finally, I have argued that indefinite determiners conventionally encode answers to or
comments on specificational potential questions raised by their host.
In order to capture this intuition about indefinites, I had to develop a fairly complex
theory of semantic composition. This system was presented in total isolation of the for-
mal tenets of the discourse model adopted in this book. One reason for this was partly
because the formalism presented can be used totally independently of any other idea in
this book. In particular, it not only provides an interface to potential questions but it
also solves totally independent problems regarding the scope properties of indefinites.
Another one is, however, that the consequences of this formal system are deep enough
to be worth exploring in a separate chapter. This is what we will do in this chapter,
which concludes the exploration of the grammar-discourse interface in this book.
In the first part of this chapter I will discuss the relationship between the theory
proposed above and Hamblin Semantics, in particular I show that this theory can
solve one classical problem of Alternative Semantics concerning double focus and focus
question congruence. However, I will not provide a fully compositional account in that
chapter.
In the second part, I will show, how we can give a theory of focus-semantics of the
semantics of interrogatives and the semantics of indefinites in the compositional the-
ory proposed. In particular, I will propose a unified treatment of indefinites and wh-
expressions, but I will propose a somewhat different, though analogous, treatment of
focus. I will end by observing that there are some additional problems of Alternative
307
308 CHAPTER 7. MEANING IN DISCOURSE
Semantics my own theory does neither trigger nor solve but which must be resolved in
further research.
7.1 Assignments and Hamblin Semantics
Historically, the formal proposal made in the previous section is derived from Hamblin
Semantics. In fact, there is an obvious connection between the scope of indefinites
and Hamblin Semantics: it is well known that indefinites can have wider scope than
syntactically accessible to standard existential quantifiers, and if we treat them as
alternative generating devices in Hamblin Semantics we basically make sure they will
end up having widest scope, as we have shown that in the discussion of Kratzer and
Shimoyama (2002) in the previous chapter. Moreover, ever since Kratzer (1991) we
know that we can actually give a version of Alternative Semantics which is entirely
based on assignments.
It turns out, however, that the current system is related to Hamblin Semantics in a
more specific way. To see that, I will first discuss a well known, and in fact very deep,
problem of Alternative Semantics and show how an intuitive solution to that problem
naturally extends to the compositional system given in the previous chapter.
7.1.1 The problem of multiple foci
It has been argued by Krifka (2001, 2004) that Alternative Semantics cannot not pre-
dict the unacceptability of so called over-focused answers to questions. Consider the
question-answer sequence in (1). It can be assumed that focus signals the alternatives
in (1-b) and the interrogatives denotes the alternatives in (1-a), as shown above.1 At
the same time, it is clear that the answer is not congruent to the question, actually,
the answer is congruent to the question: Who kissed whom?.
(1) a. Who did Peter kiss? {Peter kissed Jane, Peter kissed Anna, Peter kissed
Diana ... }
b. #PETer kissed JAne. {Peter kissed Jane, John kissed Jane, Peter kissed
Anna, John kissed Anna, Peter kissed Diana, John kissed Dianna... }
Now, under the assumption that the congruence rule between questions and answers
requires that the set of propositions denoting the question is a subset of the set of
alternatives signalled by focus, alternative accounts predict that (1-b) is a perfectly
1
We abstract away from technical issue concerning the exact match of alternatives in inquisitive
semantics for the moment.
7.1. ASSIGNMENTS AND HAMBLIN SEMANTICS 309
good answer to (1-a), because the set denotation of the question is indeed a subset of
the focus alternative set.
Once we assume that subset relation suffices for question-answer congruence, the wrong
prediction for (1) cannot be avoided, for there is no way, by virtue of which one could
distinguish the alternatives in a set: they are not ordered, and one cannot ‘look into’
their content. In fact, I believe that this is indeed the most serious problem for Alter-
native Semantics pointed out in the whole discussion.
There are some proposals for remedy,e.g. Büring (2003) argued that there are general
principles to minimise accent because of GIVENnes (Schwarzschild, 1999) , which turn
the over-focused answers unacceptable on independent grounds. But if the question
answer congruence is – in the end – not modelled in the semantics but in a constraint
to minimise focus in particular contexts this does not seem to be very satisfying.2
One may wonder whether the problem only applies to Alternative Semantics. Krifka
(2004) assumes that in the representation of the question the context will determine
the set of possible answers. This does not differ in any significant way from the solution
in Alternative Semantics:
(2) Who did Peter kiss? λx ∈ De ∩ C.P eterkised(x)
However, Structured Meanings has a different treatment of double foci. He assumes

that tuples (or complex objects) are abstracted, which yields a type mismatch, for any
question that only requires a single argument.
It is worth asking whether the problem also applies given the congruence rules developed
in Chapter 2. In particular, we have a more complex focus presupposition and we do
not actually require that the question denotation, a proposition in terms of inquisitive
semantics, is a sub-set of some focus-denotation. Rather, we request that one of the
propositions presupposed by focus is identical to the question under discussion. Could
this solve Krifka’s problem? The answer is: no. What is the difference between the
alternatives generated by double focus as compared to the alternatives generated by
single focus: the latter is a sub-set of the former. Now, forming questions from each
sub-set of the former will invariably also include the latter set of alternatives. Hence,
we have exactly the same problem as before.
Put differently, the problem is not a matter of technical implementation, it is a deep

issue: in Alternative Semantics we have no way to say where alternatives come from.
Hence, double focus and single focus cannot be distinguished properly. To solve the
problem, we will need to add some device which tells us where alternatives come from.
2
Moreover, Büring’s argument is totally irrelevant for the accommodation of implicit questions. For
a theory of discourse using implicit questions and accommodation, this is a very serious problem.
7.1.2 An intuitive solution
One solution3 to this problem is to introduce somewhat more structure into the alter-
natives, in particular, to store where we have the alternatives from. So, if we have two
foci, we will know for each and every alternative at all times, how it came about. We
therefore will be able to tear over-focusing and contextual domain narrowing apart:
First, each meaning is now a set containing a tuple. This tuple contains a possibly
empty set and the usual denotation.
(3) JP eterK = {h∅, Pi}
Functional application calculates, then, standard meanings but creates set theoretic
unions for whatever is in the first element of the tuples. I give simplified version in (4).
(4) Functional
s { application
α β = {hi ∪ j, a(b)i|hi, ai ∈ JαK ∧ hj, bi ∈ JβK}
As long as we stay with empty sets, the first element will never be affected. Now for
wh-words, I assume a local indexer. Note that it is easy to decompose the rule, but
this version is more transparent. I give an example in (6).
(5) wh-
u with index
}
v ~ = {h{hu, xi}, xi|∃hi, ji ∈ JαK ∧ j(x) = 1}
α
wh u
u }
w
(6) w
v
=
~
woman
which 1
{h{h1, ai}, ai|∃hi, ji ∈ JwomanK ∧ j(a) = 1} =
= {h{h1, ai}, ai|∃hi, ji ∈ {h∅, womani} ∧ j(a) = 1} = (i = ∅, j = woman)
= {h{h1, ai}, ai|woman(a) = 1} =
= {h{h1, Mi}, Mi, h{h1, Ji}, Ji, ...}
Since the bracketed notation is fairly complex, I introduce the following notation, which
automatically ignores empty sets.
(7) Simplifying notation

h{hi, ji, ha, bi, ...}, αi 99K αi−j,a−b,...
3
In this sketch of a solution I do not use notions from inquisitive semantics
For the denotation of which man we normally expect: (8-a). However, adding wh1 gives
us (8-b).
(8) a. {J, P, M..}

b. {J1−J , P1−P , M1−M ..}
From here we can derive (9-a), and get the denotation in (9-b).In principle, what we
have done here is marking which word generated which alternative, and carrying in
every alternative the sources along.
(9) a.
which1 man
loves
which2 woman
b. {John loves Mary1−J,2−M ,
Paul loves Mary1−P,2−M ,
John loves Jane1−J,2−J ,
Paul loves Jane1−P,2−J ..}
One can repeat this procedure for focus as well: this time one will have to specify that
focus alternatives come with an index given by a focused expression. Once this is done,
the classical question-focus congruence rule can be restated as follows, an inquisitive
semantics version being trivial to derive from here:
(10) Question-answer congruence rule:

The focus semantic value of a sentence is a subset of the denotation of the
question it directly answers in discourse and the cardinality of the index set on
each alternative in the focus semantic value will be identical to the cardinality
of the index-set on each alternative in the question denotation.
This solves Krifkas problem immediately. Note that for the current purposes, the
indices of the wh-expressions and the corresponding focus need not coincide, all that is
needed, is that we get different indices for the each focus and for each wh-expression. 4
This has consequences. E.g. in any question with more than one wh-word, we can
actually easily distinguish the sub-questions that arise due to each of these wh-words.
Also, we will not need an additional level of meaning to derive the so called contrastive
topic semantic value in Büring (2003). Once we can see where each alternative comes
from, we can group the alternatives of a double-focus in precisely the way Büring
4
In the generalised version of this approach meanings are no longer just tuples but actually functions
from assignments to standard meanings. The compositional rules will differ, however.
wanted them to be grouped.
Consider, for instance the example (11). This focus semantic value might have arisen in
a very small model in which say girls and boys are of different types and both Peter and
Jane have been focused. Now, if one of them was actually a contrastive topic, Büring
will want to group these alternatives into two groups, such that the contrastive topic
actually signals the higher question. But which of the groupings in (11-a) and (11-b)
will occur cannot be said directly, for we cannot look into the alternatives. Büring
(2003) decided to derive the two groups compositionally, thereby introducing a new
level of meaning, which boils down to embedding sets of sets of worlds under one more
layer of sets. Needless to say, the expressive power of such a system is immense.
(11) {Peter loves Mary, Peter loves Jane, John loves Mary, John loves Jane }
a. {{Peter loves Mary, Peter loves Jane}, {John loves Mary, John loves Jane
}}
b. {{Peter loves Mary, John loves Mary}, {Peter loves Jane, John loves Jane
}}
However, using the indices above, the problem can be solved without an additional
layer of set brackets. Now, all one needs to specify is that if the first index is the
contrastive topic, we will group alternative which keep the first index constant, and if
the second index is the contrastive topic, we will group the alternatives such that we
keep the second index constant.
(12) {John loves Mary1−J,2−M ,

a. {John loves Mary1−J,2−M , Paul loves Mary1−P,2−M },
{ John loves Jane1−J,2−J , Paul loves Jane1−P,2−J ..}
b. {John loves Mary1−J,2−M , John loves Jane1−J,2−J },
{, Paul loves Mary1−P,2−M ,Paul loves Jane1−P,2−J ..}
If so we do not even need to actually group them, hence creating these complex se-
mantic entities. Instead we can access them directly since the sets now contain enough
information: we can quantify over such sub-questions, we can eliminate them, we can
form congruence rules to some of them etc.This argument shows that the very same
technology that immediately solves Krifkas overfocusing problem, also gives a handle
on contrastive topics without positing anything new in the system.
Unfortunately, however, such a modification of Alternative Semantics really seems ad

hoc, since these index cary devices do not seem to play any role except for distinguish-
ing between alternatives. Moreover, from a type theoretic point of view, it is totally
unclear, what they ought to be, which further strengthens the impression that this is
a workaround and not a real solution to Krifka’s problem, or to any problem.
7.1.3 From sets to assignments
In the following, I show how the conception of meaning developed in the last chapter
is related to the solution to Krifka’s problem sketched above.
We have shifted denotations from sets containing classical meanings to sets containing
tuples containing sets and meanings. These sets inside the tuples have turned out to
be lists of pairs of indices and individuals, so we got denotations like (13). Also we
have introduced some handy notation to keep the formulae more transparent as in (14),
where an entire example is given.
u }
w
(13) w
v
=
~
woman
which 1
= {h{h1, Mi}, Mi, h{h1, Ji}, Ji, ...}
(14) a.
which1 man
loves
which2 woman
b. {John loves Mary1−J,2−M ,
Now, it should be obvious, that the set containing tuples of indices and individuals is
nothing but a partial assignment:
(15) a. g1 = {h1, Mi}

b. g2 = {h1, Ji}
c. ...
d. {h{h1, Mi}, Mi, h{h1, Ji}, Ji, ...} = {hg1 , Mi, hg2 , Ji, ...}
Assignments may grow bigger if we have several sources of alternative generation in

one sentence:
(16) {hg1,John loves Maryi, hg2,Paul loves Maryi, ..}

where
g1 = {h1, John, i, h2, M aryi} and

g2 = {h1, P aul, i, h2, M aryi} ...
That means that in fact we have a function from (very) partial assignments to classical
meanings. The only difference between the system proposed in the last chapter and
the one sketched here is that in last chapter we worked with total assignments. But
just because we work with total assignments (which makes composition go smoother),
not much has changed.
Notice that we did some cheating here: we have used the format in (16) for indefinites
and not for focus. On the one hand, it is good news that the theory that we use has a
high enough expressive power to distinguish between alternatives in a clear way. But
if ordinary meanings already are so powerful, the question naturally arises whether a)
focus can be handled at all in this system and b) how focus will be handled in detail.
7.2 Integrated formalism
In this section, I will show how we can treat indefinites, wh-words and focus in the
very same way in the formalism proposed in the previous chapter. At the same time,
this formalism will naturally interface with the general inquisitive semantics framework
adopted in the rest of this book. I start by giving the standard denotations and com-
positional rules that we will use. I will ignore quantification and relative clauses at
this point, for two reasons: firstly, the interaction between wh-words and quantifiers is
complicated and goes beyond the scope of this book and secondly, the overall point to
be made such aspects would only hinder transparency. This is not to suggest that the
only reason I omit such aspects is for presentation. Many aspects of the theory are not
yet totally worked out. However, I do not see that any of the aspects that I will have
omitted in this chapter would impose serious, novel problems.
We start with the standard rule of composition:
(17) Rule of composition

For any α and β expressions:
a. iff Type JαKw = Type JβKw = hha, ei, ha, hs, tiii then:
JαβKw = λx.λh h∈Domain JαKw x and h∈Domain JβKw x .

= = = = λw.JαKw x h w and JβKw x h w

b. else, iff JβKw ∈Domain JαKw then JαβKw = JαKw JβKw
c. else: JαβKw = undefined
We continue with simple sample denotations:
(18) Lexical denotations

7.2. INTEGRATED FORMALISM 315
JP eteri Kw = λh h i=P .h i

a.
b. Jhei Kw = Jhimself1 Kw = Jt1 Kw = λh.h i
JsleepKw = λx.λh h∈Domain x .λv.sleep (x h) v

c.
JmanKw = λx.λh h∈Domain x .λv.man (x h) v

d.
JseeKw = λx.λy.λh h∈Domain x and h∈Domain y .λv.see (y h) (x h) v

e.
Jsomei Kw = λP.λh h∈Domain (P (λg.g i)) and P λg.g i h w .h i

f.
With these definitions, we now turn to the semantics of interrogatives and focus.
7.2.1 The semantics of interrogatives
In the current system there are only three types of expressions: predicates, referential
expressions and quantifiers. wh-expressions will be interpreted as referential expres-
sions, just like indefinites. Nevertheless, there need to be some differences:
(a) wh-phrases are subject to movement whereas indefinites are not (or at least not
necessarily),
(b) wh-phrases will generate questions, hence, in some way they must be connected to
a question operator and
(c) the treatment of the world variable in wh-expressions must be appropriate, in the
sense discussed in Chapter 1, i.e. we have to make sure the arising question is valid.
In this section, I will not be concerned with an actual question operator, instead, I
will only make sure we arrive at the alternatives that the question operator defined in
Chapter 1 needs to create a question. The question operator from Chapter 1 is repeated
here in (19).
(19) Question operator

Qσ α = {℘(a)|there is b ∈ α such that the characteristic set of b is a}
S
and it is presupposed that this denotation is a question in σ.
Hence, we are interested in deriving a set of classical propositions. From there on, Q
can take over.
The simplest solution is to adopt exactly the same denotation as for indefinite deter-
miners, as shown in (20).
Jwhichi Kw = λP.λh h∈Domain (P (λg.g i)) and P λg.g i h w .h i

(20)
However, we need to make sure that at some point in the composition some operator
will be able to distinguish wh-expressions from indefinites. One way to achieve this
is by assuming that there must be a purely syntactic agreement relation between an

alternative generating operator, say the Q operator and wh-expressions.
(21) licit tree:

Qi
...
whichi ...
(22) ilicit tree:

Qi
...
somei ...
Another one is to assume that there is a range of indices specifically reserved for wh-
expressions. For instance, we could assume that wh-expressions have negative indices.
We will opt for the second possibility.
Jwhichi Kw = λP.λh h∈Domain (P (λg.g i)) and P λg.g i h w .h i

(23)
defined only if i < 0.
In the composition, this will work exactly as we have seen in the last chapter for
indefinites, as shown in (24):
Jwhich−1 man sleepsKw = λh man (h(−1)) w .λv.sleep (h (−1)) v

(24)
Now, we can adapt the Q operator defined in the last chapter to only generate alter-
natives from wh-expressions, i.e. it will generate alternatives from negative indices.
(25) Q(α, c) =
{λw.w ∈ c and exists g.g=N − h and JαKw g w|
for any w s. t. w ∈ c , h∈Domain JαKw }
where N − is the domain of negative integers and c the set of worlds compatible
with the common ground.
This operator creates alternatives for any assignment which is in the domain of α,
hence for all kinds of referential expressions. However, it also existentially closes all
assignments which only differ from each alternative assignment in values assigned to
positive numbers. That means that all alternatives over positive indices created by
Q are going to be the same set of worlds. For any negative index, however, we get
a different alternative, if that index is used and determines the domain of α. Put
differently, whatever number of indefinites there may be in the expression and whatever
number of wh-expressions, Q will generate alternatives only for wh-expressions.
Two examples are given in (26) and (27). Note that in (26) and (27) I eliminated
redundancies in the notation.
(26) Q(which−1 man sleeps, c) =

{λw.sleep (h (−1)) w| for any w s. t. w ∈ c it holds that man (h(−1)) w}
(27) Q(which−1 man loves some2 woman, c) =

{λw.exists g.g=N − hwoman (g(−2)) w and loves (g (−1)) (g 2) w|
for any w s. t. w ∈ c , man (h(−1)) w}
Q will be able to use these alternatives in the usual way to generate questions out of
them. Crucially, the problem of which-interrogatives pointed out in Chapter 1 is also
solved, since we only generate alternatives for those elements of the extension of the
—which-NP which are uncontroversial in the common ground. Of course, we can add
a presupposition that actually the entire extension of the NP is already clarified in the
common ground.
One potential complaint brought up to me by Udo Klein (p.c.) is that the operator
Q takes a linguistic expression rather than a denotation as an argument. This is
problematic on the conceptual side. After all, we really want to have all syntactic
operators inside the tree and we also want to interpret the tree recursively with as few
rules as possible. That means that the argument of Q should rather be meanings than
linguistic expressions. But one can read this operator as a shortcut for a compositional
rule roughly given in (28):
(28) For an expression β such that β = ,

Q c α
JβK = {λw.w∈c and exists g.g=N − h and JαKw g w|
for any w s. t. w∈c, h∈Domain JαKw }
Now, (28) is still syncategorematic, however, just as in the case of the ∼ operator of
Rooth (1992) discussed in chapter 2 in very much detail, this is not per se a problem. We
have criticised scholars who have given syncategorematic declarations for the denotation
of which-NP expressions, because in the view adopted here, these should really be
regular natural language expressions and they should not require any special machinery.
If, however, specific operators which only appear once in a sentence and which are
heavily concerned with the discourse-grammar interface, do not compose in the ‘usual
way’, this should take no surprise and should not be seen as a problem.
7.2.2 The semantics of focus
Let us now turn to the semantics of focus. One the one hand, we can use the same
mechanism to generate alternatives as in the case of wh-words for referential expres-
sions.
On the other hand, however, as compared to wh-alternatives, focus presents some

challenges:
(a) We wish to keep the wh-alternatives in the focus alternative set,
(b) we want to clearly distinguish between focus alternatives and wh-alternatives and
(c) we also wish to allow alternatives for the restrictor NPs of indefinites and wh-
expressions.
(d) More generally, focus alternatives are not limited to referential expressions: any
expression can be focused, properties, determiners, transitive verbs etc.
On the other hand, focus alternatives also make the situation easier in some respects. In
particular, there will never be restrictions on focus alternatives, i.e. we do not have to
worry about the correct handling of the world variable or any kind of domain narrowing.
The focus alternatives for any expressions will be the entire domain of entities of the
same type.
Notice that this latter aspect is very important and makes a huge difference as compared
to the treatment of indefinites and wh-expressions. The problem with wh-expressions
and indefinites was to avoid over-generation; i.e. we had to make sure that we do not
get meanings which we should not get. But for focus alternatives, having too many
alternatives is typically not a problem, for we will only check question congruence
considering a sub-set of the focus alternatives. Now, if we do have the right alternatives,
we will not need to worry about the rest.
This leads to three conclusions:
1. Focus semantic value must be different from ordinary semantic values.
2. Each element of a focus semantic value must be an ordinary semantic value.
3. We can use unrestricted types for focus alternatives, i.e. we can use total functions
instead of partial functions.
We will implement these conclusions in a fairly standard way, using a composition rule
adapted from Poesio (1996).
(29) Alternative semantic values

a. JαKw,F = λg.JαKw for any expression α if α is not focused.
b. JαF oc,i Kw,F = λg[Type g i = TypeJαKw ].g i
(30) Rule of composition

Jα βKw,F = λg[g ∈ Domain JαKw,F and g ∈ Domain JβKw,F ].(JαKw,F g) (JβKw,F g)
if the Types for ordinary meanings match.
Observe that in order for this to work, we will need to assume that every single word
bears an index. For referential expressions this can be the same index that J Kw , the
ordinary semantic value, would use anyway. Observe that even if this is the same
index, it will be interpreted by different functions and thereby it is only accidentally
the same. For non-referential expressions, this index is newly introduced. It is obvious
that we need all this indexing partly because we want to solve Krifka’s over-focusing
problem, partly because we generally need some device to expressions having higher
order meanings.
Let us now get to two simple examples which should suffice to demonstrate how the
system works.
(31) a. Peter1 sleeps2 .

b. Peter1 SLEEPSF oc,2 .
c. PETERF oc,1 sleeps2 .
d. PETERF oc,1 SLEEPSF oc,2 .
(32) a. JP eter1 Kw = λh.[h 1=P].h 1

b. JP eterF oc,1 Kw = λh[h 1=P].h 1
c. JP eter1 Kw,F = λg.λh[h 1=P].h 1
d. JP eterF oc,1 Kw,F = λg.[g 1 ∈ Dae ].g 1
e. Jsleep2 Kw = λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.sleep (x h) v
f. JsleepF oc,2 Kw = λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.sleep (x h) v
g. Jsleep2 Kw,F = λg.λx.λh[h∈Domain
h x].λv.sleep
i (x h) v
w,F
h. JsleepF oc,2 K = λg. g 2 ∈ Dhae,ha,stii .g 2
Since we know that the ordinary semantic value does not depend in whatsoever way
on the accent placement, we need not calculate the ordinary meanings, the reader may
check in the previous chapter for the details.
We now turn to the focus semantic value of the four examples. We start with the
simplest one which contains no focused expression.
(33) JPeter1 sleeps2 Kw,F =

λg[g∈DomJP eter1 Kw,F and g∈DomJsleeps2 Kw,F ].
(Jsleeps2 Kw,F g)(JP eter1 Kw,F g) =
λg.((λg 0 .λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.sleep (x h) v) g) ((λg 0 .λh[h 1=P].h 1) g) =
λg.(λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.sleep (x h) v)) (λh[h 1=P].h 1))
λg.(λh[h 1=P].λv.sleep (h 1) v))
Notice that (33) is precisely what we wanted, a constant function from assignments
to the the ordinary semantic value. It is now entirely trivial to transform this into a
set containing λh[h 1=P].λv.sleep (h 1) v) or to even apply A such that we get what
would be needed by the assertion operator Ass.
It is important to see that the ordinary composition is not perturbed at all in this
theory.
Let us now consider what happens if a referential expression is focused.
(34) JPETERF oc,1 sleeps2 Kw,F

λg[g∈Domain JP eterF oc,1 Kw,F and g∈Domain Jsleeps2 Kw,F ].
(Jsleeps2 Kw,F g)(JP eterF oc,1 Kw,F g) =
λg[g 1 ∈ Dae ].((λg 0 .λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.sleep (x h) v) g) ((λg 0 .[g 0 1 ∈
Dae ].g 0 1) g) =
λg[g 1 ∈ Dae ].(λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.sleep (x h) v) (g 1)
λg[g 1 ∈ Dae ].λh.λv.sleep ((g 1) h) v
The result may be a bit hard to read: observe that g is a function from integers to
some discourse entities, crucially, this is a partial function such that we know that
the value of g 1 is going to be a functions from assignments to individuals, or put
differently, a denotation of referential expressions. Now, g 1 applied to h will be an
individual, accordingly. The crucial point, however is that in the process of composition
we have lost the requirement that this individual should be Peter. It could be just any
individual. After applying the A operator within the tree, we get the function in (35),
from which we trivially derive the set in (36), which is the range of the function in (35).
(35) λg[g 1 ∈ Dae ].λw.∃h.sleep ((g 1) h) w
(36) {λw.∃h.sleep ((g 1) h) w|g 1 ∈ Dae }
The set in (37) is precisely what Rooth (1992) would derive as focus alternatives:
(37) {λw.∃h.sleep (h 1) w and h 1 = x|x ∈ De }
Let us, finally, consider the example in which a property is focused, which is derived in
(38).
(38) JPeter1 SLEEPSF oc,2 Kw,F

λg[g∈Domain JP eter1 Kw,F and g∈Domain JsleepsF oc,2 Kw,F ].
(JsleepsF oc,2 Kw,F g)(JP eterh1 Kw,F g) = i
λg[g 0 2 ∈ Dhae,ha,stii ].((λg 0 . g 0 2 ∈ Dhae,ha,stii .g 0 2) g) ((λg 0 .λh[h 1=P].h 1) g) =
λg[g 0 2 ∈ Dhae,ha,stii ].(g 2) (λh[h 1=P].h 1)
On the one hand, this is precisely what we wanted to derive, but this shows a fairly
dramatic problem:
Attentive readers may observe that there is a guarantee that g 2 is a property, however,
there is absolutely no guarantee that this property will actually be what one would
intuitively count as natural focus alternative. For instance, the properties in (39) are
all perfectly acceptable values for g 2:
(39) a. λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.sleep (x h) v

b. λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.rain v
c. λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.it is not the case that sleep (x h) v
d. λx.λh[h∈Domain x].λv.kissed M (x h) v
The first point is that this problem applies to standard Alternative Semantics for focus
exactly the same way, cf. Rooth (1992) and it also already applied to our own version
in Chapter 2. Part of the problem is noticed already in Rooth (1985) who discusses
the trivial property λx.x = x which in his analysis of the meaning of only creates
problems unless there is some contextual restriction on alternatives which would rule
out all those properties which are ‘irrelevant’ for quantification. We will not discuss
the semantics of only here, though it is easy to give examples in which the contextual
domain restriction on alternatives should (normally) fail. For instance, we may assume
that the complement of any salient property is also salient. Hence, if only rules out
∧ λx.rain x it will also rule out ∧ λx.not−rain x which would lead to a contradiction.
For question-answer congruence we have included the content-wise answerhood con-

dition precisely to solve this problem. There will be lots of expressions which are
congruent to a question but which do not qualify as answers on grounds of content.
Peter SLEEPS is congruent to Is it raining?. However, fortunately, Peter sleeps does
not qualify as an answer on independent grounds.
But, of course, saying that this is a complete solution is quite simply making a false
statement. It is easy to construct many question-answer patterns for which any rule
for congruence and answerhood will make wrong predictions. One of them is shown in
(40). But notice that this problem is not only a problem of the current system. Rooth
(1992) shares the problem and I leave it to further research to solve this problem.5
5
I wish to mention that under any implementation known to me, Structured Meanings approaches
also share this problem. This is because whenever the background has the form λP.... the property
given in the answer could be just any property, similar to the versions of Alternative Semantics under
discussion. So, this problem seems to be completely independent of the discussion whether Structured
Meanings or Alternative Semantics is better suited for the semantics of focus.
(40) a. Whom does Peter love?

b. ?Peter LOVESF oc Jane.
The problem here is that the alternatives to loves will be functions from individuals to
properties. However, there is no guarantee whatsoever that these functions will actively
‘use’ Jane as an argument, even if they will receive Jane as an argument. Consider some
examples in standard Alternative Semantics (I give standard denotations for simplicity,
the problem being shared in both frameworks).
(41) a. λx.λy.love P J
b. λx.λy.love P A
c. λx.λy.love P D
d. λx.λy.love P M
e. ...
There will be many other, much more intuitive functions as alternatives to loves. How-
ever, there is no really good way to avoid all of these constant functions6 . Once they are
in the denotation, they also form a sub-set of the focus-alternatives. And ultimately,
they will then generate the the right alternatives for the question in (41), even though
the answer is (with this intonation) not congruent, as an empirical fact. Since, however
the answer is a good answer on grounds of content, it is predicted as a fully acceptable
answer in discourse.
I conclude this section with the result of the derivation of the last example:
(42) JPETERF oc,1 SLEEPSF oc,2 Kw,F = λg[g 0 2 ∈ Dhae,ha,stii and g 1 ∈ Dae ].(g 2)(g 1)
The focus alternatives will ultimately be simply the set of all propositions. This is
because any proposition can be written as an application of a property to an argument.
But of course, empirically, there is a difference between our example and the same
sentence with a CP level focus. This is shown in (43):
(43) a. Who does what?

(i) PETER SLEEPS
(ii) ?Peter SLEEPS
b. What happened?
(i) ??PETER SLEEPS
6
Observe that simply ruling out constant functions by a meaning postulate makes no sense here, as
the reader can easily check. The general problem is that we can have functions which depend on the
first but not on the second and third argument, thereby not being constant functions, but still generate
the very same problem. Also, it is no option to say that such functions are not part of a relevant model.
7.3. CONCLUSION 323
(ii) Peter SLEEPS
But, again, the very same problem applies to standard Alternative Semantics as well. If
the alternatives to SLEEP is the set of all properties and the alternatives to PETER is
the set of all individuals, trivially, combining them, will yield all possible propositions.
This does not differ in any way from CP level focus, which, we claimed, also derives
the set of all propositions as focus alternatives.
7.3 Conclusion
This section concludes the discussion of the grammar-discourse interface in this book.
While in the previous chapters I have shown how three different classes of expressions
interface with potential questions at the level of their conventional meaning, in the last
chapter, I have proposed a compositional system which differs in significant ways from
the standard semantics used in Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 for composition. This chapter
had the aim to show that the modifications made to the compositional system do not
come with any problems concerning the possibility to do focus semantics and question
semantics. In fact, if there is any difference imposed by this new compositional system,
the difference will simply be that the new system has a slightly higher expressive power
which allows to handle the problem of over-focusing discussed in Krifka (2001).
What I did not do in tis chapter is to provide a fully detailed compositional analysis of
focus in the new system. I have pointed out how the basic operations can be defined.
Extending the framework to reach the complexity of the one provided in Chapter 2
should be easy enough.
However, in this chapter I have also pointed out some fundamental problems of Al-
ternative Semantics which have not been discussed in the literature to my knowledge.
My own theory shares these problems of Alternative Semantics, even though one might
have expected that we could have more flexibility in the present problem which allows
us to escape those problems. At least for now, I do not know how to solve these prob-
lems, however. It is important to see that these problems are independent of both the
compositional system per se and the general theory of discourse and potential questions.
But the fact that the problems exist in other frameworks as well does by no means
mean that the frameworks are the same. The current system naturally made the
problems visible because it has a built-in deep differentiation between properties and
referential expressions. The conclusion that Alternative Semantics has a hard time
modelling alternatives to properties correctly was not obvious in the classical version of
Alternative Semantics precisely because, there, properties and individuals were handled
very similarly. In the current system, in which property denoting expressions and
referential expressions are fundamentally different (which becomes obvious by the level
of embedding of the assignment argument), an attempt to handle them the same way
becomes much more problematic. In the end the predictions are by no means worse than
for Rooth (1992) but I take it to be a big advantage of the current compositional theory
that these predictions are clearer even when they are problematic. This is important
to facilitate further research.
Finally, I wish to note that the denotations given in the compositional theory are
static. Also, the entire framework of algebraic inquisitive semantics that I have used
in chapter 1 is static. However, I have pointed out several times throughout this book
that, actually, we need some dynamic component. We need a dynamic component both
from the side of inquisitive semantics, c.f. the problem of witnesses and unbounded sets,
and from the perspective of potential questions, for we wish to claim that referential
expressions only trigger potential questions on first mention. Now, the current system is
inherently related to dynamic systems, e.g. Onea (2013) shows how it can be extended
to handle sentence internal donkey anaphora. In the previous chapter I have also
pointed out some ways in which we can carry over presupposed referential variables
to the common ground. Given these observations one should expect a version of this
theory in future research which unifies insights from dynamic semantics and discourse
structure, in analogy to SDRT, which builds a discourse theory extending classical
DRT.
Chapter 8
Back to discourse
The title of this book suggests two places in which potential questions play a role: in
grammar and in discourse. We have strongly focused on the role potential questions play
in grammar in the past chapters. In fact, we have only discussed their role in discourse
at a very abstract level which allowed us to make some interesting claims about the
role potential questions, as parts of discourse representation, play in grammar. The
primary aim was, thereby, to provide insights into the discourse-grammar interface and
not into the theory of discourse. This is similar to Roberts (1996).
A theory of discourse such as Roberts (1996) was never intended to be an analytical

tool which captures an entire discourse, rather it was meant as a locally useful discourse
representation device, which captures facts about information structure and, as further
research has shown, also about some particles. This is the same for classical DRT
(Kamp, 1981): we can use DRT to model anaphoric relations across a few sentences,
but we will not find out anything interesting about discourse if we attempt to analyse
a novel in DRT. Again, being a theory of discourse which reveals interesting properties
of discourse instead of grammar and logics was not the intention behind DRT.
But just as SDRT, Asher (1993); Asher and Lascarides (2003) is a natural extension
of DRT which allows to intuitively analyse an entire discourse as a structured entity,
thereby making interesting predictions about coherence and interpretation of discourse,
we can attempt to extend a question-based theory to analyse a real discourse with
question trees.
The model sketched in chapter 3 is incomplete for several reasons: it has no natural
take on real interaction problems, e.g. the rejection of some discourse update proposal,
the negotiation process between interlocutors, it has nothing to say about conditionals,
mismatches in the modal base of interlocutors and has not even a dynamic component
to represent individuals the discourse is about. Without closing such gaps, a theory of
discourse which is truly comparable with a formally worked out model such as Asher
and Lascarides (2003) is not possible. I will not even attempt to close these gaps at
325
326 CHAPTER 8. BACK TO DISCOURSE
the level of formal precision that was aimed for in the first part of this book.
Nevertheless, in this chapter, I wish to show how we can use the notion of potential
questions as an intuitive tool in the analysis of naturally occurring discourse, in par-
ticular, how we can annotate some realistic texts using potential questions. Thereby, I
mean annotation by human annotators, not automated or half-automated procedure.
Such a task requires a somewhat lower level of precision because we can make use of
intuitions human annotators have about discourse. In fact, the more and the more
coherent intuitions human annotators have about the notions used in the annotation,
the more this signals that the theory as a whole is on the right track. Still, formally
spelling out such intuitions, remains the primary aim for further research.
In the first part of this cahpter, I will discuss some constraints on potential questions
licensed in discourse, I will introduce some ideas on the technical implementation and I
will explore some consequences on the actual analysis of discourse. In the second part,
I discuss the general guidelines for annotation. Finally, in the third part I will give
some (fairly simple but realistic) examples.
8.1 Potential questions in realistic discourse
According to the definition in Chapter 3, repeated here as (1), any question that cannot
be asked in discourse at some stage of the discourse on grounds of presupposition failure,
but can be asked in the new stage of discourse development gained from making some
assertion ϕ is a potential questions licensed by ϕ in discourse.
(1) Potential questions licensed by some assertion

σ, iff ϕ is a question in ψ∧!σ and ϕ is not a question in the discourse state σ.
There is a class of questions which can never become potential questions. These include
questions without any presuppositions whatsoever e.g. the ones given in (2). These are
questions which are non-informative in any discourse state, i.e. their non-inquisitive
closure is the totally non-informative state.
(2) a. Is it raining?
b. Is water humid?
c. Did anything happen?
d. ...
8.1. POTENTIAL QUESTIONS IN REALISTIC DISCOURSE 327
In the theory discussed in chapter 3, such questions may arise in discourse either as
starting questions or as sub-questions of some other questions.1
In addition, there is a much larger class of propositions which can become potential
questions in some discourse. These are propositions which can be questions, but only
in certain discourse states. This is the entire set of hybrids in inquisitive semantics, i.e.
propositions which are informative relative to the totally non-informed state but which
are nevertheless inquisitive. In any context in which these propositions are no longer
informative (but still inquisitive), they are questions.
At the very point in the process of discourse development at which a hybrid becomes a
question, it is licensed in the discourse as a potential question triggered by the respective
assertion. We call such a question potential, because it is not really a question in that
discourse unless interlocutors decide to ask/raise/address that question.
One crucial property of the theory is that one may not only ask potential questions
licensed by the last utterance but also potential questions licensed by other utterances
”up the tree”. This is shown in (3), where in the first example from left to right all
potential questions licensed by the nodes 6, 5 and 1 can be addressed, in the second
example only the potential questions licensed by the nodes 5 and 1 can be addressed
and in the last example only the potential questions licensed by the node 1 can be
addressed.
(3) 1 1 1
2 5 2 5 2 5
3 4 6 3 4 6 3 4 6
There will be really many potential questions licensed in any discourse. Most of them
will be indistinguishable to the human intuition. Such are questions which only differ
in one world from each other, e.g. two questions which only differ in that w1777 and
w9821 are grouped together in the first question and are separated in the other question.
These are questions, which cannot be simply formulated by using some simple natural
language expression. Under the assumption that anything that can be represented in
a model can be formulated in natural language, such questions would require a very
complex spell-out.
Moreover, most of the other questions will be orthogonal to the topic of discussion,
e.g. once we introduce the individual Peter, we may ask the question in (4). This will,
for all these definitions tell us, generally be a potential question unless it is already
1
Nevertheless, I will propose some additional possibilities in the annotation guidelines spelled out
in the next section.
common ground that Peter has (or has not) witnessed a murder.
(4) Has Peter ever witnessed a murder?.
Some similar examples are given in (5):
(5) a. Peter has fallen from the window.

PQ: How old was the window?
b. Peter kissed Mary.
PQ: Does Mary have an iphone?
c. Peter dreamed of California.
PQ: Is California bankrupt?
I have argued above that for a hard-theory of discourse-grammar interface, we probably

need no further constraints on potential questions. The reason is that such questions
are not necessarily absurd. It seems to us that they are, but one can imagine texts in
which they become perfectly natural. Moreover, I have argued that grammar does not
‘care’ whether a text is natural or not in terms of content and coherence (though this
is a very disputed claim). The only aspect of discourse grammar cares about appears
to be structure, not content.
But if we are to analyse a real text using question-trees suggested in the model sketched
in chapter 3, we should come up with some optimisation which takes into account some
of the aspects I argued are not important for a theory of grammar-discourse interface.
One may, thereby, think of a trivial optimisation and a non-trivial one.
The trivial optimisation is to let the annotator find the best interpretation he can
come up with using his very own heuristics and intuitions. The theory of discourse will
rule out any tree in which some answer is not congruent to the question it answers,
some proposition is not licensed by the dominating node, etc. Among the rest of the
interpretations that occur to the annotator, the annotator will have his own intuition
about what is the best one.
While empirical research on this topic has not yet been conducted using question trees,
we may assume that different annotators will agree (mostly) on the trees they will
derive. This is simply because knowing what question is targeted by each utterance
and knowing what assertion licenses what question is something we generally seem to
have good intuitions about, as first pilot studies conducted at the Courant Research
Center ”Text structures” at the University of Göttingen suggest. In particular, two
student annotators were given some complex narrative texts from classics of the German
literature which they had to annotate in XML using an earlier version of the theory
presented in this book. While there has been lots of divergence in the exact formulation
of accommodated questions, the general structure (i.e. what we got once we replaced
the content of questions with variables) was fairly similar. Another reason for optimism
is that similar, much larger annotation projects in SDRT and RST tend to have a
relatively high Kappa agreement index between annotators. Since rhetorical relations
can be (for the most part) paraphrased as implicit question-answer patterns, we may
expect similar results for question-trees as well.
The non-trivial optimisation is to attempt to maximise success in annotation by further

constraining potential questions that are licit, given some discourse state. I will suggest
three general types of optimisation. Firstly, instead of checking whether (given a dis-
course representation) a potential question can be licitly attached to a non-inquisitive
node, we should rather pre-generate an open list of potential questions triggered by
each assertion-node. Then, when analysing texts we rather attempt to match potential
questions than to check whether and where they are licit. Matching with already pre-
annotated potential questions, seems to be a more reliable tool. Secondly, I will suggest
that potential questions are ordered on salience. And thirdly, I will suggest that there
are further constraints on accommodation of potential questions in a discourse tree.
8.1.1 Generation constraints
We will assume that for a discourse represented as a tree α, such that every node is a
proposition, i.e. an information state, we add to every non-inquisitive proposition a set
of questions. These questions are the set of potential questions licensed by that node
in discourse. Since, generally, we will have a very large number of potential questions
licensed by any assertion in any discourse (even if an assertion rules out only one word,
we will get astronomical numbers of questions licensed by that assertion), this cannot
mean listing all potential questions. We rather intend to pre-generate some highly
salient potential questions using some specific rules.
This set of potential questions is generally represented by a function PQ from individual

nodes to sets of questions, or alternatively in the tree notation we can represent these
potential questions as if they were actual questions, however we do not activate them
by setting the pointer A to point to them. Both representations are given in (6) and
(7) respectively. Observe that in this notation some of the nodes are questions, they
do not give rise to potential questions because they are not informative.2
(6) ϕ1
ψ0 π0
%1 κ1
PQ ϕ = {}
2
Tree geometry alone often tells us whether a node is a question or not.
PQ ψ = {}
PQ % = {γ10 , γ12 , γ13 , ..}
PQ ψ = {}
PQ κ = {γ15 , γ16 , γ17 , }
(7) ϕ1
ψ0 π0
%1 κ1
1
γ10 1
γ12 1
γ13 1 1 1
γ15 γ16 γ17
Observe that, according to the rules of attachment discussed in Chapter 3, there is no

way to move downward or backward (to the left) the tree, that is to say all questions
γi , although in principle they are open attachment sites (i.e. their property Available
is set to 1) cannot be accessed for further attachment since there is no way to get to
them from the respective active node. As opposed to this, a real question, such as π in
(8), is the active node or dominates the active node:
(8) ϕ1
ψ0 π1
%1
1
γ10 1
γ12 1
γ13
This property of the theory guarantees that even if we add potential questions to the
discourse tree, we will always be able to distinguish them from real questions. The
rule is simply: a real question is either the active node or its property Available is
0, i.e. it is answered in some sense, or it has sub-questions; a non-activated potential
question, however, is not the active node, it has the Available property set to 1 and
has no sub-questions.
We need to alter somewhat the algorithm to make the potential questions licensed by
the active node actually available for activation meanwhile not making any potential
questions available which are derived from a node that cannot be reached in the tree
geometry, but such a rule is fairly easy to give: instead of asking whether a question
is licensed as a potential question by a node p, we first check whether the question is
already a daughter of p such that it is indexed with 1 i.e. it is open for attachment.
Put differently, all we need to do is to check whether what we want to attach to the
tree is already there (at the exact place at which we want to attach it).
This representation has some advantages. But observe, first, that apart from the work-
load it takes to annotate pre-generated questions, it has no disadvantages: since the
list of potential questions pre-generated by each node is open and has no impact on
accessibility, we do not loose anything from the generality of the theory.
The main advantage is that when we attempt to accommodate a potential question in

discourse, we can check whether the respective question is already present in discourse
or not instead of checking whether it is licit or not. This is an advantage because
accommodation is recursive, hence, at each node, we have could contemplate for a very
long time whether a certain assertion or question can actually be attached or not. If
the available attachment sites are already pre-generated, finding a match is significantly
speeding up the procedure. Pre-generation does involve a certain workload, but given
that the rules are fairly simple and intuitive, this workload seems limited.
Moreover, if we pre-attach some elements of the open list of potential questions, we can
actually ‘see’ what questions we considered to be intuitively ‘open’ at the respective
discourse state. This allows to make some interesting predictions. For instance, a text
which generally tends to answer open questions is fundamentally different from a text
that generally leaves lots of questions open. While I will not venture into spelling out
any specific claims about this issue, I conjecture that, for instance, suspense in narrative
texts can be modelled in terms of open questions which are answered later in discourse
whereas academic texts could be a special class of texts which tend to answer most
open questions before continuing. Thereby, specifying which questions one refuses to
discuss, may count as an answer to that question in purely technical terms.
Let use, now, consider what principles could apply in generating potential questions.3
(9) Principle 1: Follow formal hints.

If the linguistic realisation of some utterance conventionally signals the pres-
ence of some potential questions, e.g. appositives, indefinite determiners, over-
answers, unexpected foci, etc. the respective potential question must be gener-
ated.
This principle should be the most obvious one. It predicts that if for instance (10) is
added to the discourse for whatever reason, (11) will automatically be attached to it
as a potential question. Intuitively, if the hearer did not want this potential question
to be generated, he would not have used the determiner a certain.
(10) A certain man is eating.
3
Notice that these are suggestions based on intuition only. Validating and modifying these principles
is a task for further empirical research.
(11) Which man is eating?
(12) Principle 2: Unarticulated constituents

If there are unarticulated constituents in a sentence expressing an assertion,
specificational questions about those constituents will be generated.
This principle predicts patterns like the one given in (13) and (14):
(13) Peter is eating. What is he eating?
(14) Steel is strong enough What is steel strong enough for?
The intuitive motivation for this kind of questions is that unarticulated constituents
(Recanati, 2002), in a sense, make a sentence feel incomplete. Once the hearer observes
that the sentence is in some sense incomplete, he may ask for further details. The
speaker, on his turn, may know in advance that the hearer could have such questions
on his mind. We have seen in the discussion of specificational constructions, especially
in the analysis of German und zwar that such potential questions are often targeted.
(15) Principle 3: Indexicals

For any assertion, whenever the indexicals are not clarified by the context, ask
questions of clarification about them.
This principle predicts patterns such as (16) and (17).
(16) Peter is eating here. Where is he eating?
(17) Peter is eating. When is he eating?
(18) Principle 4: Rhetorical relations

Given some assertion p, generate typical questions of result, justification, elab-
oration and explanation.
This principle is, in a sense, theory external. However, there is plenty of evidence from
the study of discourse in the framework of Asher and Lascarides (2003) that these
are specifically important, very often used discourse relations. Generally, interlocutors
will want to know why things happen, where the speaker knows from what he says,
how things happened exactly and what is the result of actions, especially, if action is
undertaken with a certain (implicit) aim. Some predicted potential questions:
(19) Peter is eating. Why is he eating?

(20) Peter has eaten. Did he have enough?
(21) Peter has eaten. Where do you know that from?
(22) Peter has eaten. Did he use a spoon?
(23) Principle 5: Parallelism and Contrast

For any question already present in the discourse representation, attempt par-
allel or contrastive questions. If any of them are potential questions triggered
by the respective assertion, add them to the representation.
This one may be the most important of all optimisation principles. For reasons beyond
my understanding, parallelism and contrast seem to be very powerful categories of
human cognition. While it is hard to formalise these notions, it really seems easy to
recognise and generate parallelism and contrast. At least for use by human annotators,
therefore, this principle should be self explanatory:
(24) Mary was drinking. After that she died. Peter is eating. What will happen?
(25) Mary was drinking. After that she kiss John. Peter is eating. Is he going
to kiss someone after that?
(26) Mary was drinking. She was drinking hot chocolate. Peter is eating. What
is he eating?
(27) Mary was drinking. She drank too much. Peter is eating. Will he eat too
much?
(28) Principle 6: Animacy hierarchy

Whenever new human (or animated) individuals are introduced into the dis-
course, ask for more information about them.
It is well known that [+human] is an important grammatical category. It is relevant

for a whole range of phenomena starting from word order, case assignment up to focus
marking, topicality, specificity etc., cf. Comrie (1975); Aissen (2003); von Heusinger
and Onea (2008) and many others. Human referents are simply more important than
non human referents in human discourse. Therefore it seems natural that whenever
a human is introduced into the discourse we will want more information about that
individual as compared to non-human, especially non-animate individuals:
(29) Peter is eating What else do we know about Peter?
(30) A man is eating What else do we know about the man?

(31) A wolf is eating 6 What else do we know about the wolf?
(32) John saw a chair 6 What else do we know about the chair?
(33) John saw a chair What else do we know about John?
This principle can be extended by noting that it is more likely to ask about subjects
as compared to objects, it is more likely to ask about agents as compared to patients,
however verb semantics may also play a role in such matters.
(34) Principle 7: Mystery

Ask about surprising or mysterious events/objects.
This principle would predict that some objects or events naturally trigger questions
about their content.
(35) Peter is eating sitting on a bag. What is in the bag?
(36) Peter is solving a puzzle. What is the puzzle about?
I do not claim that the principles above constitute an exhaustive list. I do believe,
however, that they are a good start in a research agenda which should ultimately
attempt to come up with predictions about coherence and naturalness of text in terms
of an analysis with question-trees.
8.1.2 Ordering constraints
We may assume that potential questions licensed by individual nodes of a discourse

representation tree are ordered by salience. Hence, for any node ϕ, there is an ordering
relation ϕ such that for any γi , γj ∈ PQ ϕ it holds that iff γi ϕ γj then γi is more
salient than γj .
Then, we may assume that, given two valid interpretations such that both of them
address a potential questions licensed by ϕ and one of them addresses γi and the other
one addresses γj , we should choose the one addressing γi if γi ϕ γj .
The empirical predictions of this rule really depend on the ordering principles. Again,
I can only give some general suggestions for ordering rules. More will be necessary to
achieve optimal results. In particular, I will propose two rules: the strength rule and
the normality rule.
8.1.2.1 The strength rule
Assume the ordering rule in (37):
(37) Strength Rule:

For any two potential questions licensed by ϕ , γi , γj ∈ PQ ϕ, if γ2 could
also have been triggered by a weaker utterance ψ, and γ1 could not have been
triggered by a weaker utterance, then γ1 γ2
The rule (37) amounts to saying that more specific potential questions licensed by an
utterance are higher in ordering. So, for instance, (38) licensed all of the questions in
(38-a)-(38-c) but the second and the third ones could have been licensed by weaker
utterances as well, so they are lower on the ordering.
(38) Peter loves a beautiful girl.

a. Which beautiful girl does Peter love?
b. Which girl does Peter love?
c. Whom does Peter love?
This rule seems to follow general principles of communication, in particular the Quan-
tity principle of Grice (1975) which is here adapted to the licensing of potential ques-
tions:
(39) Quantity for questions:

Ask as specific questions as you can, given the discourse state.
For the example (38), using this rule helps predicting that a continuation in which
it is specified that Peter loves Mary will be interpreted as suggesting that Mary is a
beautiful girl. For the contrast between (40) and (41), it is assumed that and signals
at least that the next sentence does not answer a potential questions triggered by the
previous sentence.
(40) Peter loves a beautiful girl. He loves Mary. ` Mary is a beautiful girl.
(41) Peter loves a beautiful girl, and he loves Mary. 6` Mary is a beautiful girl.
8.1.2.2 The normality rule
The notion of strength is purely linguistic/locical, not inherently connected to world

knowledge and expectations. We do, however, know that world knowledge and expec-
tations play a decisive role in the development of natural discourse. One way to capture
this is to postulate the rule for ordering given in (42):
(42) Normality rule:

For any two potential questions licensed by ϕ , γi , γj ∈ PQ ϕ, if γ1 is triggered
in more normal contexts than γ2 , then γ1 γ2
The rule (42) involves the notion of normal contexts. Intuitively, we can think of
‘normal’ contexts in terms of usual or unsurprising. We can then say that a context is
more normal than another if the information in the common ground is more expectable.
For instance, it is more expectable that two interlocutors share the common ground
information that humans have two rather than three ears, also, it is more expectable
that they have the common ground information that a woman is the president of the
United States rather than a child. One could conceive situations in which humans have
three ears and one could conceive that the US change their constitution and elect a
child for president, but this is less plausible than that they would elect a woman for
president (for all we know).
This constraint is good for ordering plausible questions higher than totally weird ques-
tions as shown in (43): In a normal context we know that sandwiches are not with
screws, so the question is not even open, but, technically, this knowledge may not be
part of the common ground.
(43) Peter is eating a sandwich.

a. Is the sandwich with ham?
b. #Is the sandwich with screws?
c. What is in the sandwich?
The two ordering rules given above are not necessarily consistent: it can happen that
according to one of them γ1 γ2 and according to the other one γ2 γ1 . In such
cases, we will conclude that γ2 = γ1 on the ordering. If such a conflict does not arise,
we may strengthen to ≺.
8.1.3 Accommodation constraints
When analysing texts, we will very often find that questions need to be accommodated.
This was already part of the setup of Roberts (1996). Similarly, in the model used in
this book, we have the option to accommodate a sub-question of some question which
is already present in the discourse. Moreover, we can also accommodate potential
questions.
There is, however, a question whether we want to call accommodating potential ques-
tions accommodation proper, since we have suggested above that we could represent
highly salient potential questions even if they are not actually activated in discourse.
Then, speaking of accommodation may seem misleading. But notice that when we
write up highly salient potential questions as daughters of a node which licenses them,
we do not actually changedthe discourse context in any relevant way. This is because
the relevant discourse context is always the part of the tree which is to the left and
upwards the tree as compared to the active node.4 Hence, those questions play no
active role, in a sense, unless the active node points to them, they change the discourse
in no detectable way. Activating them, is justly seen, therefore, as an act of changing
the discourse context, thereby one may call this accommodation.
A more important point is that in the system of Roberts (1996), accommodation was
not recursive, i.e. one could only accommodate one single question in one step. In the
present system we can not only accommodate one question or one assertion. We can
accommodate entire trees of question-answer sequences, or, put differently, we can inte-
grate one discourse into another one using the mechanism of recursive accommodation.
This recursive accommodation procedure is very powerful and will over-generate in a
ruthless manner unless (or in fact even if) we constrain it very strongly.
In this section, I will discuss some principles which can be used to constrain accommo-
dation, however, it is worth noting that such principles should not be regarded as hard
constraints because every text has an interpretation unless it is contradictory. There
is no collection of random sentences which is not contradictory or tautological, which
cannot be interpreted as coherent if we think long enough.
Unconstrained accommodation is just about the same as the principle:
(44) Unconstrained accommodation:

Find an interpretation at any price!
Certainly, there are texts which actively make use of such a principle. One can write
a story which is inherently nonsensical in order to play with reader expectations and
interpretation steps a reader may undertake. Also, lots of poems are deliberately such
that they can only be interpreted if we assume (44). Consider one famous example:
’A.M.’
(Kurt Schwitters)
Er fiel in einen Narrenstall.

Da rauscht ein zäher Wasserfall.
Da sank ein zäher Gummiball.
4
Of course, there is an exception, i.e. when we are interested in the entire informative content of a
discourse. Then, we will use the function Content ξ for some discourse ξ. But notice that questions will
never change anything in the output of this function, because this function calculates non-inquisitive
closure and questions are never informative.
Er aß von seinem Widerhall.

Da gab er seinen zähen Knall.
Wer gab da seinen zähen Knall?
Der zähe Gummiwasserfall?
So endete der zähe Prall
Im allgemeinen Knall und Fall:
Von Arp und Merz in diesem Fall.
So springt ein zäher Wasserball.
The point of interest here is that this text is not only hard to understand because
the particular sentences are hard to understand as such. Even if we manage to find
a metaphoric interpretation for each and every sentence such that we gain something
that can have truth conditions, and even if we successfully manage to disambiguate all
anaphora, the connections between these sentences remain mysterious nevertheless. It
is simply not clear what questions each of the sentences answer. A discourse model
with unconstrained accommodation is more than useful in such a case. Generating an
interpretation may be difficult, but the discourse model can at least distinguish between
valid and invalid interpretations.
In reality, humans only seldomly have such a radical view on texts. We tend to ‘give up’
a text as incoherent much quicker. One way to capture this is in terms of constraints on
accommodation. Put differently, we do not generally attempt to find an interpretation
at all costs. We rather only consider a few obvious steps and if they do not lead to
success, we give up and conclude that the text is incoherent.
In the following, I discuss two constraints on accommodation and some principles of

optimisation which help extending the abstract model developed in Chapter 3 such
that it can also handle coherence (at least in a rudimentary way).
8.1.3.1 Safe accommodation
One first, important constraint on accommodation is given in (45), which says that
we should only consider accommodation for content if it is safe, uncontroversial and
unavoidable.
(45) Safe accommodation

One can only accommodate a proposition which is presupposed or entailed
by an utterance or is element of the common world knowledge (but not the
common ground).
Thus, we never introduce unjustified information into the discourse by virtue of accom-
modation. Typically, accommodation of content (i.e. of propositions) will only play a
role in recursive accommodation, because it is always an assertion which will introduce
new information, but assertions will require the accommodation of questions and not
of assertions, so we need more steps of accommodation for assertions.
But in some – rather marked – cases, we can see how direct accommodation works.
Consider (46). Assume that a person asks (46-a). Now, his interlocutor answers by
asking another question: (46-b). Typically, this will be interpreted as suggesting that
this is the wrong question, instead we should ask (46-b). But actually, it is also an
indirect answer. We can then accommodate that John kissed Mary, which is an answer
to (46-a) and then ask (as a potential question triggered by the accommodated infor-
mation) (46-b). We are entitled accommodate that piece of information only because
(46-b) presupposes it.
(46) a. Who kissed Mary?

b. Why did John kiss her?
Accommodated: John kissed Mary
Why did John kiss Mary?
(47) may not be a rhetoric masterpiece but it is certainly valid to accommodate the
information that John kissed Mary here. But at the same time, we are not entitled to
accommodate information which is not entailed by the overt question, such as in (48):
(48) ?? Who kissed Mary?
Accommodated: John kissed Mary
Accommodated: Where did John kiss Mary? Why did John kiss Mary?
Accommodated: John kissed Mary in the bedroom.
While this rule may, intuitively, seem superfluous, the discourse model per se does
not predict it, and indeed, I believe that for certain texts we need to make unsafe
assumptions in order to find an interpretation.
Another kind of examples for accommodated assertions involves accommodating obvi-

ous world knowledge information. Consider, for instance, that it is world knowledge
that Jackson died. Now, a discourse could start with the question When exactly did
Jackson die? Since this question presupposes that Jackson died, one way to analyse
this discourse start is by accommodating first the information that Jackson died and
then asking this question in terms of activating a potential question thereby triggered.
8.1.3.2 Thematic closure
Thematic closure attempts to capture an intuition already discussed in chapter 3. We

have argued there that we need potential questions to capture non-strategic elements of
discourse. However, we have also pointed out that depending on the kind of discourse
we are facing, there are differences as to whether and how much non-strategic discussion
is permitted in discourse. There are cases in which there is time pressure or there are
other reasons not to deviate from the discourse topic too much.
Just consider an example: In a company, there is a problem which must be solved in

the next five minutes. Now, one manager suggests that his secretary will solve the
problem immediately. Certainly, once this new discourse referent is introduced, lots of
potential questions are triggered, like the ones in (49). It is expectable that the only
question that might come up in the given situation is (49-d).
(49) a. Who is your secretary?

b. How old is your secretary?
c. Does your secretary have children?
d. Does your secretary have experience in solving that kind of problems?
As opposed to this, if the same manager would mention his secretary to a fried at
dinner (for the first time) he may expect the first three kinds of questions.
So, why is only (49-d) expectable in the problem-solving scenario? One potential answer
to this is that the big QUD for the discussion is how the problem can be solved. Now, in
this case, whether the secretary has enough experience in solving that kind of problems
may turn out to be a sub-question of some sub-questions of this big QUD given a large
enough common ground. It is unlikely that the other questions will be sub-questions
of the QUD.
At the same time, we may expect that the QUD at dinner is entirely different, for
instance, some quite general question such as What is the relevant part of the world
like?. Under such a QUD, one can assume that all questions in (49) are or can become
sub-questions.
We may, therefore, conclude a principle for selecting potential questions given in (50):
(50) Thematic closure

A potential question γi licensed by ϕ, may only be accommodated if it is a
sub-question of some other question in discourse.
Notice that this principle does not mean that we are actually returning to Roberts
(1996). The organisation of discourse is still going to be very different, since we ac-
commodate a sub-question still as a node licensed by some assertion and we will not
need to go back to the question the sub-question of which it may be. This still allows
the dynamic and intuitive kind of trees we were aiming for. This principle simply con-
strains the set of possible questions in discourse by making sure that we do not leave
the topic of discussion.
There are two ways to implement this idea. Either we assume that very often there is
a much wider QUD than apparently assumed. Then, this principle will always hold.
Or, we assume that in cases in which this principle is violated, the update will be
less felicitous. In a sense, one would not always expect that the interlocutors protest,
but certainly, someone who often violates this principle will face consequences, e.g.
people may stop paying attention to his contributions, because they may assume that
the respective person is not going to be on topic. Finally, we may assume that this
principle does not hold for every discourse. General social rule may render this rule
unimportant. However, potentially, even in very colloquial discussions, this rule will
play some role.
8.1.3.3 Optimisation
Finally, it is worth considering some ways in which interpretation can be optimised.

Since there will be many interpretations for any text, by optimisation I mean a set of
rules which help decide which interpretation is to be preferred.
I cannot cover this domain here in the detail that it would require. In fact, if we
assume that the theory presented and defended in this book is on the right track, we
would expect that the question how to optimise interpretations is a large and important
one which cannot be solved entirely in the domain of only one scientific field such as
linguistics. Hence, I will only hint at some principles that could be used here.
Firstly, there are at least three obvious parameters of optimisation:
(51) Parameters of optimisation:

a. The length of the sub-tree to be accommodated.
b. The place of attachment
c. The quality of questions in the sub-tree.
The length of the sub-tree should be an obvious parameter. If there is an option to

choose between a sub-tree involving three questions and three answers, and a sub-tree
consisting only of one question, we should choose the shorter one. This is because as
trees get longer annotators are more likely to diverge, i.e. the speaker has less control
on how the hearer will interpret the utterance. The less accommodation is necessary,
the better, because that makes discourse less ambiguous.
The quality of questions in the sub-tree is, again, a fairly obvious parameter. We have
said above that we should pre-generate some potential questions and we should order
them on salience. Now, if that would not play any role in accommodation, this entire
procedure would have been a waste of time. The idea is that we should choose sub-trees
which only have potential questions in them which are maximally high on the ordering
relative to their sisters.
The place of attachment is less clear. One principle could require to stay as low as
possible, because this would mean that we really stick to the topic. However, another
principle could require that we move as far up the tree as possible, because this would
mean that we have thematic advancement, i.e. we are making as many nodes as possible
unavailable as further attachment sites, hence getting closer to the solution of the big
QUD, since all those nodes could have licensed potential questions which might have
been off topic.
This leads to three principles:
(52) Principles of optimisation:

a. Minimise the length of the sub-tree to be accommodated.
b. Find the optimal place of attachment
c. Maximise the height of questions in the sub-tree in terms of ordering of
PQs.
The problem is, however, that these principles may or may not converge. So, it could
be the case that one sub-tree can be attached more optimally, however, it has more
nodes than another one, which can be attached less optimally, but has less nodes.
Similarly, it could be that we can choose between a very short sub-tree with a not
very salient potential questions and a longer sub-tree with a highly salient potential
question. Finding the right weighting of these principles is a topic which I entirely leave
to further research.
8.2 Annotation of texts using potential questions
In this section, I propose a preliminary system of annotation for realistic discourse.

While the formal theory developed above is vey limited in range, when discussing the
annotation guidelines, I will informally extend the annotation to domains empirical
domains that are not formalised above.
8.2.1 The units of annotation
One of the essential problems with natural texts is that they very often employ long
clauses and even longer sentences which come with large numbers of accents. One
example taken from Riester and Baumann (2013) is given in (53):
8.2. ANNOTATION OF TEXTS USING POTENTIAL QUESTIONS 343
(53) In GHAna fand ein FESTakt im Ehemaligen SKLAven-Handelsposten ElMIna

statt.
In Ghana, a ceremonial act took place in the former slave trading post Elmina.
Riester and Baumann analyse this sentence by assuming that we have a main point
which is that there was a ceremonial act in Ghana. This answers the question What
happened in Ghana?. Then, there is another question, Where did the ceremonial take
place? which is answered by the information that the festivity has been held in Elmina.
Finally, there is a question What is Elmina? which is then answered by the information
that Elmina is a former slave trading post. In the current theory, this can be naturally
represented in terms of potential questions:
(54) What happened in Ghana?
There was a ceremonial act in Ghana.
Where, in Ghana, was the ceremonial act?
The ceremonial act took place in Elmina
What is elmina
A former slave trading post
In fact, this is the very analysis for over-answers that we have proposed in Chapter
3. The main difference between the theory of Riester and Baumann (2013) and the
current theory rather concerns the conclusions. Riester and Baumann conclude that
one single sentence has different types of foci, some of them addressing the QUD, some
other addressing secondary issues. As opposed to this, the version of the analysis given
in (54) using potential questions licensed by each node uses only one single notion of
focus, the complexity of the analysis rather arises from discourse structure. The latter
is much more economical in terms of theoretical parsimony: we do not multiply the
grammatical notion of focus but rather some pragmatic notions of discourse.
But once we want to do real corpus annotation, we encounter a similar problem as

Riester et al. (2010) or Riester and Baumann (2013). The problem is that we only have
one sentence on the surface, but we have an entire tree of questions in the analysis.
So, we need some way to split a sentence into information units5 If we were to choose
this path, we had to solve two problems. One is to provide a natural handle in the
5
Reese et al. (2007) have a totally similar problem in the annotation scheme for SDRT, though they
are more flexible in one respect. In particular, they allow that one sentence stands in multiple different
relations to various other discourse segments, hence they do not need to take sentences apart in very
much detail. They do, however, split appositives. In fact, we will do the latter, to a certain extent,
too.
annotation system for the split information units such that we can still reconstruct the
original text from the annotated text and the second one is to provide a precise theory
of how to split a sentence into information units. Both tasks are fairly difficult. So, we
will consider another way here, which will not involve any kind of re-structuring of the
text.
We will split the sentence into two units, namely the appositive and the host. Splitting
any sentence into an appositive and a host is fairly simple and needs no further theo-
rising. Once this is done, however, the theory of discourse discussed above will validate
the interpretation in (54) for free. In the following, I show, how we can achieve this in
some detail.
Assume that we know that the question under discussion is (55). We can assume this
either because of the contrastive topic intonation reported by Riester and Baumann
(2013) or from the general context. Crucially, in the discourse state, there must be at
least the information that something happened in Ghana, which licenses the question
under discussion.6
(55) Initial state: σ = Something happened in Ghana.
ϕ =What happened in Ghana?
Then, our job is to attach the sentence in (56) to ϕ.
Observe that in ψ the information encoded in the apposition is missing. This is because
the appositive grammatically signals that it will be interpreted as an answer to a
question that is licensed by its host.
(56) ψ = In Ghana, there was a ceremonial in Elmina.
We can assume that ψ is an over-answer to ϕ because it not only says what happened
but also where it happened.7 We then apply the standard analysis for over-answers.
For this reason, ψ will be interpreted as an answer to some question which is licensed
by an answer to ϕ (this is just the general rule to handle over-answers). Crucially, this
answer must be entailed by ψ, otherwise it could not be accommodated according to
principle (45). Now, one could easily come up with the following candidate sub-tree in
6
One may be concerned that we do not find the respective question, but Riester and Baumann
would also have the same problem.
7
Attentive readers may have noticed that, actually, according to the rules of semantic computation
given in Chapter 1 and Chapter 7, this is not really an over-answer, because what happened -questions
will presumably have all propositions as alternatives. But the point here is rather to capture the
intuition of Riester and Baumann. Adapting the formalism such that the denotation of What happened -
interrogatives is more restrained is just as easy as assuming that actually in discourse it is not the
denotation of What happened which is in the tree, rather What happened is just an approximation for
the real question to which ψ is an over-answer.
(57).8
(57) % = In Ghana there was a ceremonial somewhere.
γ =Where was the ceremonial?
The tree in (57) can now be accommodated as a whole and attached to the previous
tree. This gives the valid interpretation in (58). Notice that we did not actually need
to split the utterance into any further parts after eliminating the appositive.
(58) Initial state: σ
Now, finally, we can interpret the appositive as an answer to a potential question trigged
by ψ. This part is trivial after what we have done so far. Notice that there was nothing
ad hoc in this procedure, we have merely used the idea that assertions trigger potential
questions and we have made one piece of safe accommodation.
8.2.2 Basic tags
Let us now consider the basics of the annotation. We will use simple XML tags which
can be translated into any kind of structure automatically. Our basic tags are given in
Figure 8.1, for questions, assertions and appositives.
<Quest> ... </Quest>

<Ass>... </Ass>
<App> ... </App>
Figure 8.1: Basic tags
The actual example will appear inside the tags, as shown in Figure 8.2:
We will use a system of embedding to simulate trees. The idea is fairly simple: we
embed the daughters of a node between the opening and closing tags of that node. The
8
It is important to see that the system does not generate (57). It only validates it. To actually
come up with such a tree is the job of the annotator.
<Quest> Is John happy? </Quest>

<Ass> John is happy. </Ass>
<App> who I met yesterday </App>
Figure 8.2: Basic tags - example
”name” of the node, which is the same as its content, will remain between the tags.
In writing a script that uses this annotation one should pay attention to notice that any
bare string element in a tag forms its “name”. Alternatively, we could always extract
the name and write it into a property, but this would be more difficult for everyday
practice. Also, doing it this way, has the advantage that we can add additional layers
of annotation, e.g. we could add the tag:
<word> ... </word>
This would further embed phonetic properties, syntactic categories etc.
Whenever an appositive is moved to the end of an assertion we leave a trace tagged:
<Trace id="someid" />
For embedding the following rules apply9 .
(59) Rules for embedding:

a. Questions may be embedded under questions or under assertions.
b. Appositives may be embedded under questions.
c. Assertions may be embedded under questions.
d. If an assertion or an appositive is embedded under a question, nothing else
may be embedded under that question.
e. No further embeddings are possible.
This correctly boils down to the licensing conditions specified above:
(60) a. A question ψ is licensed by another question ϕ if Sub ψ ϕ

b. A question ψ is licensed by an assertion ϕ if ψ ∈ PQ ϕ
c. An assertion ψ is licensed by a question if ϕ if is an extended answer to ϕ.
d. An appositives ψ is licensed by a question if ϕ if is an extended answer to
ϕ.
For an example like (61), hence, a correct tagging is given in the figure 8.3
(61) John is happy. He saw Bill, a popstar.
9
These rules must be specified in a .dtd file to make sure they are always respected.
<Quest> Is John happy?

<Ass> John is happy.
<Quest> Why is John happy?
<Ass> He saw Bill,
<Quest> Who is Bill?
<App> a popstar
</App>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.3: Correct embedding
We will finish the basics with three properties. The first property is very usual in XML
tagging: every tag will have the property id="some string". IDs should be unique.
The second property will be used to distinguish between overt material and recon-
structed structure. If we consider the example in (61), we see that the example cannot
actually be distinguished from the dialogue in (62):
(62) A: Is John happy?

B: John is happy.
A: Why is John happy?
B: He saw Bill, a popstar.
We will introduce the property accomodated="yes/no", which has the value "yes" for
accommodated material and the value "no" for overt material.10
The third property is more problematic. We have said in the discussion of appositives
that the fact that they are not at issue is modelled by the assumption that they do
not license any further potential questions. Technically, we have implemented this by
saying that the pointer which makes it the active node will simply not be set onto the
appositive. Nevertheless, we have left the index 1 for appositives, because we have
argued that one can actually make an appositive at issue. In the definitions above,
however, there is absolutely no way to embed a question under an appositive. In fact,
nothing can be embedded under an appositive. The property sameas="someid" solves
this problem. In order to make an appositive at issue, it will be necessary to somehow
refer back to it, in general that means re-asserting it. We will then note that this
proposition is the same as the appositive. sameas should be, of course, an optional
property.
10
Notice that in a .dtd declaration, one should make sure that this property is optional and has no
as a default value. This makes annotation much faster.
These tags naturally allow us to capture the difference between (61) and (62). For (61),
we see in Figure 8.4 that many tags the first questions are accommodated, whereas for
(61) only the question answered by the appositive is accommodated as shown in Figure
8.5.
<Quest id="1" accommodated="yes"> Is John happy?

<Ass id="2" accommodated="no"> John is happy.
<Quest id="3" accommodated="yes"> Why is John happy?
<Ass id="4" accommodated="no"> He saw Bill,
<Quest id="5" accommodated="yes"> Who is Bill?
<App id="6" accommodated="no"> a popstar
</App>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.4: Correct embedding with properties for text
<Quest id="1" accommodated="no"> Is John happy?

<Quest id="3" accommodated="no"> Why is John happy?
</App>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.5: Correct embedding with properties for dialogue
In this basic tagging system we may also embed potential questions which are not
answered or activated. For instance, we could end up with the result shown in Figure
8.6 which includes some ‘open’ questions:
The language XML has a formal feature that very nicely captures a last necessary aspect
of discourse interpretation: any discourse will have exactly one root. This root is the
big question under discussion of Roberts (1996). This corresponds to the requirement
of XML that any markup sequence must have one unique root. Hence, every discourse
must be embedded into a question.
8.2.3 Advanced tagging
In the two examples to follow in the next section we will only need the basic tagging
shown above. In fact this is the part of the theory which is formalised above. However,
<Quest id="1" accommodated="yes"> Is John happy?

<Quest id = "2.1" accommodated "yes"> Who is John?
</Quest>
<Quest id = "2.2" accommodated "yes"> How happy is John?
</Quest>
<Quest id="3" accommodated="yes"> Why is John happy?
</App>
</Quest>
<Quest id="5" accommodated="yes"> Where did he see Bill?
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.6: Correct embedding with properties for text
for natural text, much more is needed. I will propose some more or less ad hoc but
quite intuitive tagging solutions for those cases. In particular, I will handle conditionals
and embedding. The point in both cases is not to seriously propose to analyse condi-
tionals and embedding as follows, but to maintain a valid and intuitive interpretation
transparent in the annotation.
8.2.3.1 Embedding and modal subordination
We start with embedding. There are all kinds of embedding, exemplified in (63):
(63) a. Peter said that Mary comes.

b. Peter thinks that Mary comes.
c. Peter wants that Mary comes.
d. Peter knows that Mary comes.
What is common to all of these cases of embedding is that they can embed entire
discourses not only one single proposition. For instance:
(64) Peter said the following: Mary comes, Bill goes and John said that ...
Part of this phenomenon is known as modal subordination in the semantic literature,

cf. Roberts (1989), Kaufmann (1997), Asher and Pogodalla (2010), etc. and is focused
on examples like: (65).
(65) A wolf might come. It would eat you first.
But it seems that the phenomenon is much more general in discourse. In fact, embed-
ding is not always explicit. In narratives we often find the phenomenon of internal fo-
calisation Genette (1988), spelled out in linguistic terms in Klauk et al. (2012) strongly
building on Schlenker (2003). In such cases there is no explicit signal but still a part
of a text is interpreted as if it were embedded under some attitude verb, consider e.g.
(66).
(66) Peter was standing at the window. The enemy was approaching. Only minutes
were left to decide whether to fight or flee.
In this example, one interpretation is that actually the enemy was not approaching,
rather Peter just thought that whatever he sees out of the window qualifies as a descrip-
tion of the approaching enemy. Potentially, Peter is insane and actually the mailman
was approaching. In such a scenario this narrative may still be true as a whole.
We will say that an embedding structure generally answers some question of the types
given in (67):
(67) a. What does Peter think?

b. What does Peter know?
c. What does Peter want?
The answer itself will not be simply a proposition but rather an entire discourse. The
idea is that this discourse should be interpreted as a whole, independently of the rest
of the discourse and it is only integrated via the embedding operator. Consider an
example:
(68) Peter thinks that Mary comes Peter thinks: σ = ...
Every discourse is defined only if it starts with a question under discussion, as it has
been established above. That means that we would need to embed a question under
some assertion like Peter thinks:.... We will do that by introducing a new tag:
<Opaque> </Opaque>
The usage of the Opaque tag is exemplified in Figure 8.7
The semantics of Opaque is, roughly that whatever is inside the Opaque tags will not
necessarily be valid in the outside environment. But in each case, there will be some
relation between the proposition inside the Opaque tags and the discourse state outside.
This relation is specified by the respective semantics of the value of the kind property
<Quest id="1" accommodated="yes"> What does John think?

<Ass id="2" accommodated="no"> John thinks that:
<Opaque id = "2.1" accommodated = "no" kind = "think">
<Quest id = "2.2" accommodated = "yes"> What is the way things are?
<Ass id = "2.3" accommodated = "no"> Max is happy.
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Opaque
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.7: The tag Opaque
of the Opaque tag. Only Opaque has this property. For instance, in the case of <Opaque
kind="want"> this relation will be entirely different than for <Opaque kind="want">
. We can use various kinds of modal logics to spell out the semantics of different values
of kind
We say that Opaque is accommodated in the case of internal focalisation whereas

Opaque is not accommodated wherever we have a clear linguistic marker such as an
attitude verb or some overt modal.
8.2.3.2 Conditionals
Conditionals are the most difficult linguistic structure if one desires to model the dis-
course effect of conditionals under the assumption that conditionality may be directly,
i.e. conventionally, related to discourse structure. The problem is that we have con-
ditionals in at least four variations which do not seem compatible with one single
discourse function. This suggests that the discourse function of conditionals should
rather be derived from their meaning than be conventionally associated with them.
Consider (69):
(69) a. In answer to transparent questions about the antecedent

Does Peter come?
If Peter comes, it will rain.
b. In answer to transparent questions about the consequent
Does Peter come?
If it rains, Peter comes.
c. In conditional questions
Does Peter come if it rains?
d. In answers to conditional questions
Does Peter come if it rains?
If it rains, Peter comes if Mary comes.
Any attempt to discuss the discourse function of conditionals within guidelines for text
annotation, must be handled with caution for precisely this reason. Nevertheless, since
conditionals exist and appear quite often in natural discourse, we need some transparent
method to annotate then.
For conditionals as in (70) we will generally assume that they involve a decision. For the
simplest case, in which the conditional answers a transparent question about the conse-
quent, I will assume that there is a question under discussion such that the consequence
of a conditional will answer that question. Then, I will assume that we update with
the classical translation of a conditional into the disjunction of the negated antecedent
and the consequent . Similar to what is generally assumed in erotetic logics, I will also
assume that conditionals trigger the potential questions whether the antecedent holds.
This gives the sketch in (71).
(70) a. Does Peter come?

b. If Mary comes, Peter does not come.
(71) a. Does Peter come?

b. Mary does not come or Peter comes.
c. Does Mary come?
The intuition captured here is that a conditional differs from a disjunction in that it
conventionally triggers a potential question, put differently, it delegates one question
(the one about the consequent) to another question (about the antecedent) without
forcing the new question to be activated. Thereby, a strengthened conditional estab-
lishes equivalence between the questions whereas a normal conditional will preserve the
positive answers only.
Why is this not a serious proposal to analyse conditionals? Because in the current
setup of the theory, (71-c) is not a potential question triggered by (71-b). Moreover,
(71-b) does not qualify as an answer to the polar question it apparently targets. Put
differently, the analysis is ad hoc, even if it may be intuitive.
For annotation, however, it seems to suffice, as shown in Figure 8.8.
<Quest id="1" accommodated="yes"> Does Peter come?

<Ass id = "2.3" accommodated = "no"> If Mary comes, Peter does not come.
<Quest id = "3.2" accommodated = "yes"> Does Mary come?
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.8: Conditionals
Observe that in Figure 8.8 we have left the conditional as such untouched, all we did
is to accommodate a question it answers and a question it triggered.
Second, consider conditional questions, as in (72):
(72) Does Peter come if it rains?
For such examples, the analysis is the same as for the previous one. The question
itself is about the truth conditional denotation of the conditional, hence, it equals (73).
But at the same time, there is a conventionally triggered potential question about the
antecedent, as in (74).
(73) Is it true that it does not rain or Peter comes?
(74) Does it rain?
The problem is that a question cannot trigger potential questions. Moreover, (74) is not
a sub-question of (73). We will assume, therefore, that (73) does not directly trigger
(74), instead, there is a conventional rule saying that whatever answer is accepted to
(73), that answer will trigger the potential question (74).
This leads to the annotation in Figure 8.9. Whatever the answer is, it will replace ”??”.
<Quest id="1" accommodated="no"> Does Peter come if it rains?

<Ass id = "2.3" accommodated = "no"> ??
<Quest id = "3.2" accommodated = "yes"> Does it rain?
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.9: Conditionals
For an analysis of cases in which the question is about the antecedent, as in (75). We
will certainly need to make many more assumptions. One could be the interpretation
in (76), which involves conditional strengthening. But others could also come about,
some even involving the operator Opaque.
(75) Does Peter come?

(76) Does Peter come?

a. If it rains, Peter comes.
(i) Will it rain?
Does Peter come?
The annotation of conditionals and embedding is more difficult and the difficulty goes
back to the fact that we do not have an explicit theory of what happens in such cases.
It is expected, therefore, that annotators will agree less on such examples. It may be
noted, however, that in discourse, embedding and conditionals, intuitively, indeed give
rise to more interpretation options.
8.3 Two annotated examples
In this final section, I give two examples for text annotation. The first one will use a
small text from a textbook on discourse pragmatics. It will turn out that for this kind
of example the annotation tool is particularly powerful. The second one is the Nero
example from chapter 3.
8.3.1 A textbook example
In this section, I give a first, naturalistic example, cited from the literature. I use a
German example in this section with the English translation given in (78). While the
annotation of the example is fairly simple, it is instructive in several ways.
(77) from Musan (2010)

a. Eva und Miriam sind so gegen vier dorthin gegangen.
b. Eva ist zur Schaukel gegangen.
c. Miriam ist zur Wippe gegangen.
d. Dann ist Eva (an der Schaukel) hochgeklettert.
e. Dann hat Miriam (nach Eva) gerufen.
f. Daraufhin ist Eva die Schaukel (wieder) runtergeklettert.
g. Dann ist Eva (auch) zur Wippe gegangen.
(78) a. Eva and Miriam have gone there at about four.

b. Eva went to the swing.
c. Miriam went to the rocker.
d. Then, Eva climbed up the swing.
e. Then, Miriam called Eva.
f. As a result, Eva climbed down the swing.
g. Then, Eva also went to the rocker.
In a first step the text is read naturally, which yields an information structural anno-
tation, which is handy in what follows. This is given in (79).
(79) .
a. Eva und Miriam sind so gegen vier [ dorthin gegangen ]F oc .
b. [ Eva ]CT ist [ zur Schaukel]F oc gegangen.
8.3. TWO ANNOTATED EXAMPLES 355
c. [ Miriam ]CT ist [ zur Wippe]F oc gegangen.

d. Dann ist Eva [ (an der Schaukel) hochgeklettert]F oc .
e. Dann hat Miriam [ (nach Eva) gerufen]F oc .
f. Daraufhin ist Eva [ die Schaukel (wieder) runtergeklettert]F oc.
g. Dann ist Eva (auch) [ zur Wippe gegangen]F oc .
According to the intonation observed, questions the particular utterances answer are
marked directly. It is important to remember that even with a particular intonation
pattern, an assertion may be compatible with different questions, and actually, it is
only later, once we disambiguate the discourse structure, that a decision can be made,
which question was actually marked. Put differently, the algorithm is ultimately a
backtracking one. However, if a text is naturally read, annotators will generally have
good intuitions on which question to choose, hence one should ponder, whether after
all, another question may have been marked, as the one that occurred to him naturally,
if there are problems with the connection of the questions.
In our example, we have simple question-answer pairs, and due to the contrastive
intonation in (79-b) and (79-c), one somewhat more complex question tree following
Büring (2003). This step is shown in Figure 8.1011
In the next step, the assertion-question pairs will be integrated into a more coherent
picture, i.e. such that the entire annotation can be validated. The rules for validation
are the general rules for tagging: what can be embedded under what and what must be
the case for a certain embedding to be valid. Finally, the entire text must be embedded
under some question tag.
For our example, a first interpretive decision has to be made when integrating q1-s1
with q2. One interpretation is given figure 8.11.
In this case, it is assumed the fact that we don’t know where dorthin(‘there’) is, gives
rise to an underspecification, which on its turn leads to the question q2 directly. In
other words, it is assumed that s2 and s3 specify exactly where dorthin (‘there’) is.
In particular, it is assumed that s1 has a distributive interpretation (which is not
very salient), and then, for each individual, it is specified, where she has gone. This
interpretation might be possible if the sentences were in isolation.
An alternative interpretation is given in figure 8.12, in which a more complex discourse

strategy is accommodated. In particular, it is assumed that in s2 and s3, it is not
actually disambiguated where the two girls have gone. Instead, it is assumed that
dothin is a large place, and within this place there are many possible finer grained
locations, to which the two girls can go. Note that in this strategy, not only questions
have been accommodated, but also answers to these questions.
11
I generally omit the property: accommodated="no" since I assume that "no" is the default value.
<Quest id= "q1" accommodated ="yes"> Was haben Eva und Maria gegen vier getan?
<Ass id ="s1"> Eva und Miriam sind so gegen vier dorthin gegangen.
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id="q2" accommodated="yes"> Wer (aus Eva und Maria) ist wohin gegangen?
<Quest id="q3" a="yes"> Wohin ist Eva gegangen?
<Ass id ="s2"> Eva ist zur Schaukel gegangen.
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id="q4" accommodated ="yes"> Wohin is Miriam gegangen?
<Ass id ="s3"> Miriam ist zur Wippe gegangen
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Quest>
<Quest id="q5" accommodated ="yes"> Was hat Eva danach getan?
<Ass id ="s4"> Dann ist Eva (an der Schaukel) hochgeklettert.
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id="q6" accommodated ="yes"> Was hat Miriam danach getan?
<Ass id ="s5"> Dann hat Miriam (nach Eva) gerufen.
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id="q7" accommodated ="yes"> Was hat Eva daraufhin getan?
<Ass id ="s6"> Daraufhin Eva ist die Schaukel (wieder) runtergeklettert.
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Ass id ="s7"> Dann ist Eva (auch) zur Wippe gegangen.
</Ass>
</Quest>
Figure 8.10: Annotation, Example 1, Step 1
<Quest id="q2" accommodated ="yes"> Wer (aus Eva und Maria) ist wohin
gegangen?
<Quest id="q3" accommodated ="yes"> Wohin ist Eva gegangen?
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
...
Figure 8.11: Annotation, Example 1, Step 2a
For the start given in Figure 8.12, is is easy to integrate the rest of the sentence, as
shown in Figure 8.13. However, for the alternative strategy, I have not managed to
find any plausible interpretation. Many interpretations still exist, but they cannot be
accepted as intuitive.
<Quest id= "q10" accommodated ="yes"> Was haben Eva und Maria wann getan?
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id= "q9" accommodated ="yes"> Was haben Eva und Maria danach getan
getan?
<Ass id="s8" accommodated ="yes"> Sie sind auseinander gegangen.
gegangen?
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Quest>
...
Figure 8.12: Annotation, Example 1, Step 2b
It is important to see that 8.13 succeeded without violating any constraint, and the
text is revealed as maximally coherent under the given interpretation.
This was a lot of work, for an example as simple as this one. In fact, we even cheated
a bit: we did not annotate all the generated potential questions and we did not order
them. Moreover, we did not consider alternative strategies.
But then again, the example is instructive because it revealed an interesting aspect of
the text. In particular, only the interpretation of the first part of the small discourse
given in Figure 8.11 leads to a valid interpretation, at least if we are aiming for an
optimal interpretation. That means that finding a valid interpretation for a part of the
discourse may not mean that we are done. It can be an optimal decision to give up an
interpretation already established in order to gain another one, which better integrates
the rest of the discourse.
8.3.2 The Emperor Nero example
In this final section, we now turn to one of the examples that motivated the very idea
of potential questions. Let us consider whether the annotation tools sketched above
will suffice to give a natural analysis. Recall the example:
Title: Emperor Nero

§1. He was quite simply a megalomaniac from a long line of psychopaths.
<Quest id= "q10" accommodated ="yes"> Was haben Eva und Maria wann getan?
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id= "q9" accommodated ="yes"> Was haben Eva und Maria danach getan?
<Ass id="s8" accommodated ="yes"> Sie sind auseinander gegangen.
gegangen?
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id="q5" accommodated ="yes"> Was hat Eva getan?
<Ass id ="s4"> Dann ist Eva (an der Schaukel) hochgeklettert.
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Quest>
<Quest id="q6" accommodated ="yes"> Was hat Miriam getan?
<Ass id ="s5"> Dann hat Miriam (nach Eva) gerufen.
<Quest id="q7b" accommodated ="yes"> Was hat Eva daraufhin getan?
<Ass id ="s7b" accommodated ="yes"> Eva hat zwei Sachen nacheinander getan.
<Quest id="q7" accommodated ="yes"> Was hat Eva daraufhin zuerst getan?
<Ass id ="s6"> Daraufhin Eva ist die Schaukel (wieder) runtergeklettert.
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Ass id ="s7"> Dann ist Eva (auch) zur Wippe gegangen.
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Quest>
</Quest>
Figure 8.13: Annotation, Example 1, Step 3 final
§2. His grandfather led the way. Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus had been
savage and cruel. The gladiatorial contests he organised were so bloody and
vicious that the Emperor Augustus had to ask him to tone down things a
little.
§3. His father, Gnaeus, once rode his horse over a small child on the Appian
Way. [...]
.. Evil Psychopaths (True Crime) by Gordon Kerr.
We have proposed an intuitive analysis repeated here in (80):
§1
Why psychopath? Why psycho?
Augustus
We now add some more elements like the interpretation of the title and an embedding
because we interpret the text as fiction. With this background, the arising annotation
is given in Figure 8.14. Notice that we have used the kind of embedding ”fiction”
presumably this is interpreted quite exactly in the way suggested by Lewis (1978) as a
fiction operator.
In this analysis, we have applied a greater level of detail as compared to the analysis
sketched in (80). We have not only added the information that this is a fiction, we
have also added some additional steps in the analysis. For instance, we have split the
sentence in (81) into a main sentence and an appositive in (82).
(81) He was quite simply a megalomaniac from a long line of psychopaths.
(82) quite simply
Intuitively, quite simply is an appositive which answers a question triggered by this

rough start of a novel. Similarly, we have introduced the information that Neros grand-
father was called Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus in two steps, even though, in chapter 3
we did not have the formal tools to show that knowing the name of someone is actually
a piece of information which requires some additional discourse move. This leads to a
more complex tree in (83).
Notice that in (83), the active node is not the appositive, rather the information that
his father was a psychopath. This is because, we have settled for the claim that the
<Quest id="1" accommodation = "yes"> What does the fiction tell us?
<Ass id="2" accommodation = "yes"> The fiction tells us that:
<Opaque id="3" accommodation = "yes" kind = "fiction">
<Quest id="4" accommodation = "yes"> What is the way things are?
<Quest id="5" accommodation = "yes"> Who is the story about?
<Ass id="6"> Emperor Nero
<Quest id="7" accommodation ="yes"> How was Emperor Nero?
<Ass id="8"> He was <trace id="9" /> a megalomaniac
from a long line of psychopaths.
<Quest id= "8.5" accommodation = "yes"> How could the narrator say
such a thing?
<App id= "9"> quite simply
</App>
</Quest>
<Quest id = "10" accommodation ="yes"> Who was the first psychopath
in the family?
<Ass id = "11"> His grandfather led the way.
<Quest id = "12" accommodation = "yes" > What was his name?
<Ass id = "13" accommodation = "yes"> Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id = "14" accommodation = "yes" > How was he?
<Ass id = "15" > Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus had been savage
and cruel.
<Quest id= "16" accommodation = "yes"> What justifies this?
<Ass id = "17"> The gladiatorial contests he organised were
so bloody and vicious that the Emperor Augustus
had to ask him to tone down things a little.
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id = "18" accommodation ="yes"> Who was the second psychopath
in the family?
<Ass id = "19" accommodation = "yes"> His father
<Quest id = "19.5" accommodation = "yes"> What did his father do?
<Ass id = "19.6"> His father, <trace id = "21" />, once rode his horse
over a small child on the Appian Way.
</Ass>
</Quest>
<Quest id = "20" accommodation = "yes"> What was his name?
<App id = "21"> Gnaeus
</App>
</Quest>
</Ass>
</Quest> </Ass> </Quest> </Ass> </Quest> </Quest> </Opaque> </Ass> </Quest>
Figure 8.14: Annotation, Emperor Nero Example
pointer for the active node never points to appositives.

8.4. LIMITS OF ANNOTATION 361
psychopath
How say? Who were the psychopaths?
quite simply
Grandfather Father
What name? Why psychopath? Why psycho? What name?
Lucius savage and cruel. Killed child Gnaeus
Augustus
8.4 Limits of annotation
In this chapter, I have sketched how one can think about discourse in the model pre-
sented in Chapter 3. In particular, I have proposed some informal additions, some
optimisation principles and especially some annotation guidelines for texts. It has been
shown in the discussion of the two examples in the last section that a very detailed
analysis of texts is possible in the current framework.
In fact, that an analysis is possible should not be very surprising after what we have
said in this book. We have said several times that this framework rather tends to over-
generate than to under-generate. Put differently, it is the case that this framework will
find an interpretation for any text, not only for the coherent ones. We have argued
above that this is actually the way it should be.
Nevertheless, if we want to use such a tool for text analysis, over-generation tends to
become a problem, because there are really many options to analyse some text. And
if the different annotators opt for different options, the inter annotator agreement rate
will, obviously, suffer.
But one may wonder whether this is actually a problem.
It is a well known fact that there is plenty of underspecification in language, in com-

munication in general. A speaker will utter some message having something on his
mind. He will formulate a message which only partly fits what he actually wants to
say, even if he is an expert. In fact, there may even be parts in it which do not fit at
all, because most human action is prone to performance errors. Now, the hearer will
have to reconstruct what the speaker had in mind. As things stand, he generally has
pretty bad odds.
Zeevat (2012) observes the same situation, but he concludes that humans do a really
great job in communication and, therefore, in the process of production and interpreta-
tion of natural language utterances we need some very powerful tools of optimisation.
He then goes for various versions of optimality theory and Bayesian reasoning on prob-
abilities. To a certain extent, I believe that Zeevat is right, but he cannot be entirely
right. Humans may be very good at producing and interpreting grammatically encoded
information, but on the face of what happens in discourse, there may be serious doubt
as to whether communication is really that successful.
Given even texts with a relatively low difficulty, it turns out that most readers do
not develop very exact interpretations (this is not related to any framework). If a
framework forces them to do so, they are sometimes astonished by the complexity of
the apparently simple text. There are serious interpretive decisions to make and it
turns out that in many cases, there are really many options. Readers, however, very
often did not even realise there was an option and they certainly did not have a very
detailed representation. A text can often be understood in various ways, and even more
often it is understood only very vaguely.
I do not know whether we should attempt for a theory that forces us to find the one
and only correct interpretation. The main argument for assuming that there is such
a one and only interpretation is that communication is successful. But if we observe
that readers often do not go into details when they read a text, we may doubt that
actually communication is so successful. If it is not, it is perfectly legitimate to assume
that many different interpretations are correct in their own right if the theory validates
them. Thereby, a theory may not exceed the limits of general rationality.
One may say that in certain cases, the speaker or author really knew which interpre-
tation he intended. But even so, if the text does not force us to choose one particular
interpretation, and texts hardly ever do, other interpretations may be just as good. If
this way of thinking is correct, we should not expect that inter annotator agreement
is a serious measure of theories of discourse. A theory which can discriminate invalid
readings as compared to valid ones, given some level of intuitive optimisation, will
perfectly suffice.
If we intend to automatise this procedure, we will need much more optimisation. But
a deterministic system for the interpretation of discourse just seems to be the wrong
kind of thing. The question, therefore, should not be how to create a deterministic
discourse interpreter but rather whether one would want such a device.
Chapter 9
Outlook
There are various reasons that linguists might get interested in the analysis of discourse,
regardlessly as to whether it is structured as a complex narrative text or a dialogue.
Some are concerned with a serious predictive theory of anaphoric availability (Kamp
1981, Kamp and Reyle 1993, Grosz et al. 1995, Walker et al. 1998), others with the
computation of the intended temporal order of the events expressed (Kamp 1979, Kamp
and Rohrer 1983, ter Meulen 1997), yet others with making explicit rhetorical relations
between particular discourse segments and thereby making explicit a notion of coher-
ence (Mann and Thompson 1988, Asher 1993, Asher and Lascarides 2003) etc. While to
some extent this holds true for all of the above as well, there are other discourse models
more focused on explicating a discourse-grammar interface which allows the explication
of the meaning of natural language expressions/structures in an insightful way. The
theory of Roberts (1996) in which discourse is analysed as a strategic enterprise to
answer questions has been introduced to capture some notion of focus and has been ex-
tended by Büring (2003) and Beaver and Clark (2008) in significant ways to contrastive
topics and focus sensitive particles, but it also has been used in a version like Farkas
and Bruce (2010), Farkas and Roelofsen (2012) to analyse polar questions. A similar
approach has more generally been used to analyse the rules and grammatical features
of interaction (Ginzburg 1992, 2012) with questions and answers in dialogue. But this
is only to mention those papers which focus on the notion of discourse. In everyday
linguistic practice, the paper Roberts (1996) and, especially, the notion of the QUD, are
so widespread that the fact that meanwhile Craige Roberts has an entire bibliography
on QUDs on the Web under http://www.ling.ohio-state.edu/~croberts/QUDbib/
is fully justified.1
I believe that the fact that the ideas of Roberts (1996) have turned out to be so fruitful
in the analysis of natural language is no accident. One should assume that the theory
1
In fact, that bibliography is extremely incomplete as compared to the real number of papers out
there.
363
364 CHAPTER 9. OUTLOOK
of Roberts (1996) captures some very deep insight about what discourse is “really”
about. Therefore, QUDs appear to be a tool which seem to fit very many phenomena.
Otherwise, the tremendous impact of that work is not understandable.
So, what is that very deep insight in Roberts (1996)? I do not believe that there is one
big point in what that paper proposed that made it so interesting for so many scholars.
Instead, it is a combination of two important claims: discourse is about answering
questions in a strategic way and focus is about signalling what question is currently
discussed. Certainly, there is a lot more in that paper and in the subsequent literature,
but I think the most important observation is that there is a natural way to think
about discourse which at the same time opens a very direct and very clear perspective
on grammar. Formal pragmatics, then, is not a matter of formalising something alien
to the core concerns of linguistic theory but rather it is about formalising bits and
pieces of conventional meaning which interface with a model of discourse.
This entire book is one answer to Roberts (1996) and Roberts (2012a) and the core
claim is this: I agree with everything she says, but it will not suffice. It is precisely
if Roberts is right, if discourse is really about answering questions, that we have to
extend her theory in at least two, potentially, three ways:
Firstly, we have to introduce a non-strategic, still intuitively rational and reasonable

element of discourse organisation, the notion of potential questions. We have to do
that not only for reasons of empirical adequacy of discourse description and analysis
but also, and even more so because grammar cares about potential questions. In fact,
I have claimed (more or less directly) that a lot of things that one could not really
explain using the QUD theory (though attempts have been made over and over again)
appear to be very natural and simple once we have this additional tool.
But in addition, there are many other phenomena one can analyse, once potential
questions enter the stage. I do not know whether it is possible to find a more natural
analysis of appositives or indefinites than the one proposed here. Certainly, my analysis
is in many respects incomplete and there are serious problems in the implementation,
problems that are, as far as I can see, not inherent to my own formalisation, but
rather general problems of the formal tools. Problems can, however, hopefully be
solved. Regardless of those problems, I believe that the idea that these constructions
are grammatical devices that directly interact with potential questions triggered by the
respective utterances is on the right track, because it fits in with a very wide range of
apparently unrelated data too well to be a coincidence.
Secondly, a theory of discourse is a theory of interpretation. But what is the aim of such
a theory? For a theory of semantics we have a more or less clear idea about the aims:
derive the truth conditions of a sentence (or its truth conditional contribution), ideally
in a compositional way. But what about discourse pragmatics? Roberts claimed that
questions are important in the process of interpretations because they are a special
case of intention recongnition. If I know what questions we are discussing, I know
365
part of the intentions of my interlocutor and that helps me understand him. I have
rejected this argument and argued in this book at some length that we should aim
for a theory of discourse as far as possible free of the notion ”intention”. I have
three arguments against such a view. Firstly, I do not believe that we have a better
understanding of intentions than the discourse phenomena we want to explain with
them. Secondly, to the extent that intentions are specifically relevant to discourse,
they can be paraphrased as questions; otherwise, they are orthogonal to the theory of
discourse. The third argument I did not put forth in the previous chapters, so I will
elaborate on it somewhat here:
What is pragmatic interpretation? Under the assumption that pragmatics is about

speech acts in some way or another, I believe that Roberts believes that interpretation
means understanding why someone does something. As opposed to this, I believe that
interpretation is understanding what someone does. To a certain extent, we cannot
have the one without the other, because very often, as various philosophers have argued,
human action is defined by the goals it follows. But the essential question is which one
is the crucial point for a theory of discourse: goals in general or just a small sub-set of
the goals, which define the action. I claim that the latter are questions.
Consider an example: If I observe someone chopping vegetables in a kitchen I may be

able to reconstruct what he is doing in the sense that I realise that he is cooking and I
may even be able to make sense of every single step he undertakes as a part of a cooking
action. In understanding this, it is essential to know what the man in the kitchen is
cooking. This is certainly part of his intentions. But I do not need to care about
the question why he is cooking. Maybe he expects guests for dinner, maybe he is just
practicing for a competition, maybe he is cooking for his kids. That does not matter for
a theory of cooking. I believe that the very same holds for discourse: we certainly need
intentions to understand what people are doing when they are involved in discourse.
But I believe that questions are the natural limit of what intentions are relevant in
discourse. A theory of discourse should be a theory which is able to connect every
single utterance in a discourse such that the bits and pieces build a coherent action in
terms of answering some question(s). Thereby, strategic elements are important, but
non-strategic elements are also important, as I have argued above.
If this general line of attack is correct, adding potential questions to the model of
discourse is one step forwards. However, it still does not suffice.
Part of the reason is that I made a very important simplification in this book: I have
only considered discourse which is about exchanging information. There is, however,
another kind of discourse as well: discourse which aims at finding out information in a
joint effort. Strategy may help in such as discourse as well, potential questions may play
a role too, but the rules of inquiry seem to be totally different: we build hypotheses,
consider where they lead us, reject them, make different assumptions, attempt to prove
what we claim etc. Both potential questions and sub-questions are, in such a scenario,
366 CHAPTER 9. OUTLOOK
just special cases of the sources of questions we find in erotetic logics.
Indeed, if we think of discourse as a general device to answer questions, a theory of

discourse must be a theory of asking and answering questions and this is, at least in
part, what erotetic logics is about. Developments in inquisitive semantics that finally
allow a unified and systematic treatment of questions and assertions may turn out to
be useful to this end. However, for the moment, it is not clear, how an inquisitive logic
ultimately connects to a theory of discourse which, at the same time, can also provide
a natural interface to grammar. The theory proposed in this book has attempted to
close a small part of this gap.
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Potential Questions in Discourse and Grammar

Thesis · July 2013

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

Of course, all mistakes in what follows are my own.

1 Questions and Answers 23

2.1.2.2 Polar questions and verum focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92

3 Potential questions in discourse 121

4 Appositives and non-restrictive relative clauses 193

5 Specificational constructions 215

5.2 Nämlich and und zwar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226

6 The case of indefinites 241

7 Meaning in Discourse 307

8 Back to discourse 325

(1) What are potential questions?

(2) Why do we need potential questions in linguistic theory?

I will claim that specificational constructions are specialised grammatical devices to

compositional framework (specifically to handle some issues raised by indefinites but at

0.1 Potential questions in discourse

(5) a. Who introduced whom to whom at the party?

(6) Who introduced Jack to whom at the party?

There is a question whether a serious theory of strategic inquiry in discourse should be

(7) A: Is Peter coming to the party?

(8) Is Mary coming to the party?

The conclusion is that sub-questions will be part of a theory of rational discourse,

(9) Why did a pipeline explode?

Consider an example completely independent of discourse or language. Jenkins, a

(10) A: Who saw Mary in the park?

On arriving in Moscow by a morning train, Levin had put up at the house of

I will propose a fairly liberal but content-driven limitation of non-strategic moves in

If we add potential questions to a theory of strategic discourse as suggested in Roberts

0.2 Potential questions in grammar

0.2.1 Indefinites and potential questions

(11) a. A: I used to cheat on my wife when I was younger.

(12) Someone came in.

(13) Peter or Mary came in.

(14) A man sleeps.

(15) A certain man came in.

0.2.2 Specification and appositions

(16) A certain man came in. Namely John.

(17) A certain man came in. Namely John.

(18) a. My best friend came in. Namely Mary.

Moreover, in German, the specificational particle nämlich, in many respects equivalent

(19) Peter liebt Maria, sie ist nämlich schön.

I will show that such an explanation-question is also distinguished in a grammatically

0.2.3 Appositives and non-restrictive material

Another phenomenon which is syntactically closely related to the case of specification

Moreover, it seems to be part of the communicative advantage of such constructions

(21) John is surprised, that Mary, a virgin, is pregnant.

(23) Why is Peter an idiot?

0.3 The structure of this book

(24) a. Settle what potential questions are in a formally precise way.

c. Show that a particular class of potential questions licensed by an assertion,

In the second chapter, we will turn to the notion of question-answer congruence. In

role played by hybrids in communication totally differently as compared to the classical

Questions and Answers

A theory of discourse based on questions requires some assumptions about questions.

1.1 The architecture of meanings and terminology

The semantics of questions deals with the interrogative sentence radicals

Ling. expression Denotations Propositions

‘Peter sleeps” {λw.sleep P w} ℘({w|sleep P w})

Figure 1.1: Semantic Objects and Linguistic Objects

When discussing about semantic objects, I will – as customary in inquisitive semantics –

1.2 Questions in inquisitive semantics