mass/count in linguistics, philosophy & cognitive science dec. 20, 2012
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Numeral Classifiers and the Mass/Count Distinction Byeong-uk Yi Philosophy Department University of Toronto [email protected]. Mass/Count in Linguistics, Philosophy & Cognitive Science Dec. 20, 2012. Contents. Preliminaries 3 Is the Mass/count D istinction U niversal? 18 - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
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Numeral Classifiers and the Mass/Count Distinction
Byeong-uk YiPhilosophy Department
University of [email protected]
Mass/Count in Linguistics, Philosophy & Cognitive ScienceDec. 20, 2012
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Contents
1. Preliminaries 32. Is the Mass/count Distinction Universal? 183. Count Noun Thesis 424. Paranumeral Account 655. Further Issues 836. Summary 104
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1. PRELIMINARIES
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Language & Ontology
Mass/Count Nouns
• Mass nouns– water, milk, beef, rice– furniture, cutlery– satisfaction, patience, success
• Count nouns– cow, house– raindrop, rice grain, furn. piece– mistake
Stuff/Individuals
• Stuff or substance– water, milk, beef, rice
• Individuals of the same kind– cows, houses– raindrops, rice grains, chairs
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Stuff/Individuals
• Aristotle (384-322 BC)• Matter & form– The bronze: matter/material– The statue: form/shape
• Compounds– Concrete– Individuals belonging to a kind
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Mass/Count
• Otto Jespersen (1860-1943)
• The Philosophy of Grammar (1924)
• Thing words/countables
• Mass words/uncountables
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Digression 1• Joseph Edkins– Shanghai dialect (1853/1868)– Mandarin (1857/1864)
• Yuen-Ren Chao– A Grammar of Spoken Chinese (1968)
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Diagression 2
• Bloomberg
• Language (1933)
• English nouns
• Determiner criteria
• Proper nouns• Common nouns– Bounded nouns– Unbounded nouns
• Mass nouns• Abstract nouns
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Count Nouns (Jespersen)• House• Horse• Day• Mile• Sound• Word• Crime• Plan• mistake
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Mass Nouns (Jespersen)
• The “material”– Silver, quicksilver, water, butter, gas, air
• The “immaterial”– Leisure, music, traffic, success, tact, commonplace– ‘nexus-substantives’• Satisfaction, admiration, refinement (from verbs)• Restlessness, justice, safety, constancy (from adverbs)
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What distinguishes them?
• “There are a great many words which do not call up the idea of some definite things with a certain shape or precise limits. I call these ‘mass-words’.” (198)
• Mistake vs. success
• Rice
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Syntactic Criteria (Jespersen)• “while countables are ‘quantified’ by means of
such words as one, two, many, few, mass-words are quantified by means of such words as much, little, less.” (198)
• The “notion of number” is “logically inapplicable to mass-words” (200)– “In an ideal language constructed on purely logical
principles a form which implied neither singular nor plural would be … called for” mass-words (198)
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Morphosyntactic Criteria (Standard)
• Morphology: Singular/plural forms– Count: cow/cows– Mass: water/*waters, milk/*milks
• Numeral– Count: three cows– Mass: *three {water(s), milk(s)}
• Determiners– Count: {many, few} cows– Mass: {much, little, less} milk
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Digression : Bare Noun Criterion
• Bloomberg (1933, 205)– Determiners– About English nouns
• “Bounded nouns in the singular number require a determiner (the house, a house)
• “Unbounded nouns require a determiner for the definite category only (the milk : milk)”
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Mass/Count: Semantics
Count
• Count nouns denote individuals belonging to a certain kind.
• ‘horse’ denotes any (individual) horse.
• J. S. Mill– Connotation & denotation
• Quine– “individuative” (1969)– “divided reference” (1960)
Mass
• Mass Nouns refer to (or are names of) stuffs or substances.
• ‘water’ (or ‘gold’) is a name of a stuff: water (or gold).
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THE USUAL MASS/COUNT DISTINCTIONSUMMARY
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• Otto Jespersen– The Philosophy of Grammar
• Two Features– Primarily Morphosyntactic Distinction– Drawn for English and the like
• Additional theories of semantics– Quine (1960)– Others• Chierchia
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2. IS THE MASS/COUNT DISTINCTION UNIVERSAL?
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2.1. LANGUAGE DIVERSITY
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Various Views
• Some languages don’t have the category of nouns.
• Some (or all) languages do not at all draw a distinction between mass and count nouns.
• Some languages do not have count nouns (or mass nouns).
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+Count Nouns -Count Nouns
+Mass Nouns English et al.Tagalog
CL Languages (the mass noun thesis)
-Mass Nouns Hopi (Whorff 1956)
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Classifier Languages• East Asia– Chinese (contemporary dialects) – Japanese– Korean– Thai, Malaysian, etc.
• Other Areas– in America
• Yucatec Maya, etc.– India
• Some Indo-European languages, etc.– Others
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Numeral Classifiers
English
• Three cows
• Three pounds of meat
Mandarin
• San tou niu 3 CL cow ‘three cows’
• San bang (de) rou 3 pound (GEN) meat
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English analogues
• Three head of cattle• Three head of {shorthorns, black men}• Three sail of ships• Three stems of roses
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Asides
• Development of Classifiers in Chinese• Classical Chinese & Tagalog• Mandatory & optional classifier systems
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The Standard Approach
• The mass/count distinction is a parochial feature of English and other similar languages.
• The distinction is inapplicable to a wide range of languages.
• Classifier languages have only mass nouns.
The Proposed Alternative
• The distinction runs deeper than the usual (syntactic) criteria suggest.
• It applies to a much wider range of languages.
• CL languages have (robust) count nouns as well as mass nouns.
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2.2. THE STANDARD APPROACHClassifier Languages and the Mass Noun Thesis
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Mass Noun Thesis
No Count Nouns
• Classifier languages have no count nouns.
Mass Nouns Only
• All common nouns of classifier languages are mass nouns.
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Proponents of the MNT
• Keith Allan (1977)• Chad Hanson (1983)• Godehard Link (1991)• Gil (1992)• John A. Lucy (1992)• Manfred Krifka (1995)• Gennaro Chierchia (1998)• Hagit Borer (2005): super-MNT
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Asides
Weak/Syntactic MNT
• CL language nouns ‘furniture’• semantically count yet
syntactically mass• Proponents
– Doetjes (1996)– Cheng & Sybesma (1998; 2005)– Chierchia (1998; 2010)
Semi-MNT
• W. V. Quine (1969)• Greenberg (1972)• Allan (1977)
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Measure Word Thesis
• Classifiers are a kind of measure words.
• Classifiers have the same semantic function as the usual measure words (e.g. pound or bang)
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Numeral Classifiers
English
• Three cows
• Three pounds of meat
Mandarin
• San tou niu 3 CL cow ‘three cows’
• San bang (de) rou 3 pound (GEN) meat
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Measure Word Thesis & MNT
Question
• Why does the Chinese niu need a classifier to combine with numerals while the English ‘cow’ can directly combine with numerals?
Answer/Explanation
Mass Noun Thesis: unlike ‘cow’, niu is a mass noun.
Measure Word Thesis: The classifier tou is a kind of measure word.
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2.3. THE PROPOSED ALTERNATIVECount Noun Approach
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• The mass/count distinction runs deeper than the usual criteria for the distinction suggests.
• It has a substantial cognitive basis.
• It applies to classifier languages as well.
• Classifier languages have (robust) count nouns as well as mass nouns.
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Count Noun Thesis
• CL languages have (robust) count nouns as well as mass nouns.
• CL languages have morphosyntactic devices for distinguishing count nouns from mass nouns.
• Syntactically count
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Paranumeral Thesis
• The role of classifiers (in the strict sense)
• Classifiers are paranumerals for one.• cousins of numerals for one• Syntactic peers of measure words• Other paranumerals: pair, couple, dozen, score, etc.
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• draw syntactic parallels with measure words (and other paranumerals)
• Diverge semantically from measure words
• Closer semantically to other paranumerals
• Numeratives– Measure words– Other paranumerals– Classifiers
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CNT & Paranumeral Thesis
• Paranumerals match only with count nouns.– three {dozen, dozens of}
cows– *three {dozen, dozens of}
water(s)
• Classifiers match only with count nouns.
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2.4. TWO APPROACHESSummary
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Standard Approach CN Approach
Noun System Mass Noun Thesis Count Noun Thesis
Role of Classifiers Measure Word Thesis Paranumeral Thesis
Implication CL nouns require classifiers. Classifier-taking nouns must be count.
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3. COUNT NOUN THESISClassifier Language Nouns
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Count Noun Thesis
• Classifier languages also have count nouns as well as mass nouns.
• They also have devices for drawing a syntactic distinction between mass and count nouns.
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• Non-mandatory classifier system
• Quantifiers specific to numbers
• Counterparts of ‘each’ (adverbial use)
• Size and shape adjectives
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3.1. NON-MANDATORY CLASSIFIER SYSTEMS
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• Some languages have non-mandatory classifier systems.
• Some nouns of those CL languages can combine directly with numerals.
• Cf. Standard Approach– CL nouns require
classifiers.
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• Incomplete classifier system– Vietnamese
• Nouns with non-mandatory classifiers– Korean– Malay
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3.2. QUANTIFIERS SPECIFIC TO NUMBERS
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The usual observation
• CL languages have no separate words for many & much
• Nor for few & little
henduo niu a.lot cow‘many cows (a lot of cows)’
henduo shui‘much water (a lot of water)’
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Number-specific
• Counterparts of ‘countless’
• Counterparts of ‘a majority (of)’
• Cousins of ‘many’ or ‘few’– ‘a (large) number of’– ‘a small number of’
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A. Counterparts of ‘countless’
• ‘countless’, ‘innumerable’
• [Not] + [Number/Count] + adjective marker
• ChineseWu.shu-de
• Japanesemu.suu-no
• Koreanmu.swu-han
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B. Counterparts of ‘a majority’
• ‘a majority (of)’
• ‘a greater number (of)’
• [Large(r)] + [a.lot] + [number] (+ adj. marker)
• Chinese Da.duo.shu
• Japanese Dai.ta.su
• Korean tay.ta.su
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C. Cousins of ‘many’
• ‘many’• ‘a large number (of)’, ‘a
lot in number’• [number] + [a.lot] + adj.
marker
• Japanese Kazu-ooku-no
‘(very) many’ • Korean
Swu.man(h).un‘(very) many’
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Mass/count
Count Nouns
• Wu.shu-de niu ‘countless cows’
• Da.duo.shu niu ‘a majority of cows’
• Swu.man(h).un so ‘many cows’ (Korean)
Mass Nouns
• *Wu.shu-de {shui, rou} ‘*countless {water, meat}’
• *Da.duo.shu {shui, rou} ‘*a majority of {water, meat}
• *Swu.man(h).un {mwul, koki} ‘*many {water, meat}’ (Kor.)
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3.3. THE ADVERBIAL ‘EACH’
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The adverbial ‘each’
• The adverbial use of ‘each’
• ‘They each are somewhat different.’– ‘Each of the cows is
somewhat different.’– ‘*Each of the water is
somewhat different.’
• Chinesege (各 )
• Japanesesorezore
• Koreankak.kak
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Chinese ge
• Niu (dou) ge you . . . . cow (all) each have . . . ‘Each cow has . . . .’
• *Shui (dou) ge you . . . . water (all) each have . . . ‘*Each water has . . . .’
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3.4. SIZE-SHAPE ADJECTIVES
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Size-shape adjectives
• ‘large’, ‘big’, ‘triangular’, ‘square’
• Quine (1960), McCawley (1975), Bunt (1975)
• Not combine with mass nouns– Exception: ‘?large furniture’ (McCawley)
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• CL languages have count nouns combining directly with size-shape adjectives.
• Many classifiers relate to sizes or shapes.
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3.5. THE SYNTACTIC MNTDigression
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Different Kinds of Mass Nouns
• Central group• “substance-mass”• Silver, quicksilver,
water, butter, gas, air, etc.
• “Object-mass” nouns
• furniture, silverware, jewelry, clothing, traffic, infantry, footwear, etc.
• Hybrids• syntactically mass• semantically count
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Syntactic MNT
• Doetjes (1996), Cheng & Sybesma (1998; 2005), Chierchia (1998; 2010)
• Classifier language count nouns are akin to ‘furniture’.
• Syntactically mass, albeit semantically count
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Count Noun Thesis
• CL language count nouns are robust count nouns.
• They can be distinguished syntactically from mass nouns.
• They differ syntactically from “object-mass” nouns of English.
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CL Language Count Nouns
• counterparts of ‘cow’– Niu (Chinese)– ushi (Japanese)– So (Korean)
• wu.shu-de niu ‘countless cows’
“Object-mass” nouns
• *countless furniture
• *Very many furniture
• *three pairs of furniture
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4. PARANUMERAL ACCOUNTThe Function of Classifiers
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• What is the role of classifiers?
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• Why do CL languages count nouns require classifiers to combine with numerals?
• Why do (all/most/some) CL language count nouns regularly take classifiers to combine with numerals?
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The function of classifiers
Syntactic
• Syntactic peers of measure words (and other numeratives)
Semantic
• Diverges semantically from measure words
• Paranumerals for one• Cousins of numerals for one
(serving as numeratives)
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Paranumerals
English Paranumerals• ‘pair’, ‘couple’, ‘dozen’,
‘score’
• Numerative use– ‘Three dozen eggs’– ‘Three dozens of eggs’
Chinese Paranumerals• Dui ‘pair, couple’, shuang ‘pair,
couple’, da ‘dozen’
• Paranumerals for one– zhi CL (one.of.a.pair)– Other classifiers
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Classifiers & Numeratives
Numeratives
• “Classifiers” in the broad sense
• include measure words
• Edkins (1853/68; 1857/64)• Yuen Ren Chao (1968)
– lingc– “Measure word” (“quantity
word”)
Classifiers
• Classifiers in the proper sense
• Do not include measure words
• Chao (1968)– Individual measures– Classifiers– “numeratives”
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Diversity of Numeratives
• Measure words– Pound, gram, feet– Cup(ful)– Piece, slice
• Classifiers– Tou (animal), ben (book)
• Others?
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Bipartite Classification
• Lyons (1977)– Mensural classifiers– Sortal classifiers
• James Tai & L. Wang (1990)– Measure words– classifiers
• Cheng & Sybesma (1998; 1999; 2005)– Massifiers (mass classifiers)– Classifiers (count classifiers)
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Further Diversity
• Edkins (1853/68; 1857/64)– 5 groups
• Chao (1968)– 9 groups– 5 (central) + 4 (peripheral)
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Chao’s Classification
• Classifiers• Group– Qun ‘group flock’, zu ‘section, group’– Zhong ‘kind, species’, lei ‘kind, category’– Dui ‘pair, couple’, shuang ‘pair, couple’, da ‘dozen’
• Partitive: pian ‘slice’• Container: bei ‘cup’• Standard: bang ‘pound’
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Paranumeral numeratives• Chinese
• Dui ‘pair, couple’• shuang ‘pair, couple’• da ‘dozen’
• English– pair, couple– dozen– Score
• Paranumerals for 2, 12, 20, etc.
• Are there paranumerals for one?
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Classifiers as Paranumerals
• Classifiers are paranumerals for one.
• Cousins of numerals for one.
• There are usually many classifiers because they have constraints on the kind of nouns they can match.
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Classifiers as Numeratives
English
• Three pounds of meat• Three boxes of oranges• Three slices of bread• Three pairs of parrots
• Three cows
Chinese
• San bang rou• San xiang juzi• San pian mianbao• San dui yingwu
• San tou niu
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Digression
• Three pounds of meat• Three boxes of oranges• Three slices of bread• Three pairs of parrots
• Three cows
• Three head of {cattle, shorthorns, black men}
• Three sail of ships• Three stems of roses
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Paranumeral Account
• Classifiers are paranumeral numeratives for one.
• Syntactic parity with measure words and other paranumeral numeratives.
• Diverge semantically from measure words.
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Classifiers and One (Yi 2100a)• The Chinese classifier zhi (one.of.a.pair)
• Numerals for powers of ten as numeratives (Burling & Chao)
• The Burmerese general Cl –khu (Burlign 1965)
• The Korean general CL –kay and nath ‘one’
• Others
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The Burmese -khu
• “Burmese speakers sometimes include –khu in the same series as the classifiers for the powers of ten: she, ‘ten,’ ya, ‘hundred,’ thaun, ‘thousand,’ etc.” (Burling 1965, 262)
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Paranumerals & Count Nouns
• Classifiers can match only count nouns, because they are paranumerals.
• ‘pair’, ‘dozen’, etc. also match only count nouns.
• Edkins– “distinctive”
numeratives and “appellative” nouns
• Chao– “Individual measures”
and “individual nouns”
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5. FURTHER ISSUES
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5.1. FEAFURES OF CL LANGAUGES
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CL Languages:Commonly Cited Features
• Absence of the singular/plural morphology
• Classifier system
• Bare nouns
• Absence of the many/much distinction
• (Mass Nouns Only)
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• Chierchia• Claim: the features
cluster together.
• The features do not cluster together.
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• Mass nouns only (mass noun thesis)?– Count noun thesis
• Absence of the many/much distinction?– Counterparts of ‘(very) many’, ‘few’, ‘countless’
• Mandatory classifiers?– Incomprehensive classifier systems– Optional classifiers– Paranumeral thesis
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Bare nominals• Can count nouns form bare
singular nominal phrases?
Absence of S&P Forms• Can count nouns lack
singular & plural forms?
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5.2. BARE NOUNS
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Articles & Bare Nominals
Languages with articles• Development of determiner
system• Restricted use of bare
nominals
Languages without articles• No substantial determiner
system
• Regular use of bare nominals
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+ CL system - CL system
+ article system Some CL languages?Hungarian?
Modern GermanicRomanceTagalog (no S/P morphology)
- Article system (most) CL languages LatinHindiOld EnglishArchaic Chinese
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Bloomberg on determiners
• This habit of using certain noun expressions always with a determiner is peculiar to some languages, such as the modern Germanic and Romance. Many languages have not this habit; in Latin, for instance, domus ‘house’ requires no attribute and is used indifferently where [sic] we say the house or a house. (1933, 203)
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• Yi (2012) & (preprint)
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5. SINGULAR/PLURAL MORPHOLOGY
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• Why do classifier language count nouns not take singular or plural forms?
• Can count nouns lack singular & plural forms?
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• The s/p morphology is not an essential feature of count nouns.
• The morphology is par of the grammatical number system.
• Languages with and without a GN system
• In languages without a GN system, count nouns do not take singular or plural forms.
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+ CL system - CL system
+ GN system Some CL languages?Hungarian?
Most Indo-European
- GN system Most CL languages TagalogArchaic Chinese
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Tagalog & Classical Chinese
• No grammatical number system– Nouns do not have singular or plural forms.
• No classifier system• The mass/count distinction– Count nouns combine directly with numerals.– Count nouns denotes any two or more of some
things belonging to a certain kind as well as any one of those.
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Aside
• Tagalog has articles (or noun markers).
• Archaic Chinese has no articles.
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Count Nouns with S/P Forms
Nouns• Cow
• Denotes any one or more cows
Singular & plural forms• Singular form
– cow-– Denotes any one cow
• Plural form– Cows– Denotes any (one or) more
cows
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Archaic Chinese• San niu 3 cow (cf. cow-) ‘three cows’
Mandarin• San tou niu 3 CL cow (cf. cow-) ‘three cows’
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Contemporary Korean
Non-CL form• haksayng seys student 3 ‘three students’
CL form• haksayng sey myeng student 3 CL ‘three students’
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• CL language count nouns are counterparts of English nouns.
• Not of their singular forms.
• CL language counterparts of ‘cow’ denote– Any (two or more) cows, as well as– Any (one) cow
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6. SUMMARY
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The Mass/Count Distinction
• Runs deeper than the usual accounts suggest.
• Runs across a much wide variety of languages.
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• Does not depend on the s/p morpholoy.
• Does not depend on the possibility of direct combination with numerals.
• Compatible with the possibility of (regularly) forming bare nominals.
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Classifier Languages
• Dissociation of Commonly Cited Features of Classifier Languages– Absence of the singular/plural morphology– Classifier system– Bare nouns– Absence of the many/much distinction– (Mass Nouns Only)
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Classifier languages
• The Count Noun Thesis
• Count nouns without the singular/plural morphology.
• The paranumeral account
• Classifiers match only with count nouns.
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• THANK YOU!
• http://philosophy.utoronto.ca/people/faculty/byeong-uk-yi– “Numeral classifiers and count nouns”
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