[Prev][Next][Index]

CSLI Calendar, January 21, 3:14


       C S L I   C A L E N D A R   O F   P U B L I C   E V E N T S
_____________________________________________________________________________
21 January 1988                    Stanford                    Vol. 3, No. 14
_____________________________________________________________________________

     A weekly publication of The Center for the Study of Language and
     Information, Ventura Hall, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305
                              ____________
	   CSLI ACTIVITIES FOR THIS THURSDAY, 21 January 1988

   2:15 p.m.		CSLI Seminar
     Room G-19          Factorization in Grammar: 
     Redwood Hall  	What we can learn about grammar design from Chichewa
			Joan Bresnan
			(bresnan@csli.stanford.edu)
			Abstract in last week's Calendar
			
   3:30 p.m.		Tea
     Ventura Hall		
                             --------------
	   CSLI ACTIVITIES FOR NEXT THURSDAY, 28 January 1988

   12 noon		TINLunch
     Ventura Hall       Reading: "True Believers: The Intentional
     Conference Room  	Strategy and Why it Works"  
			by Daniel Dennett
			Discussion led by Adrian Cussins
			(cussins.pa@xerox.com)
			Abstract below

   2:15 p.m.		CSLI Seminar
     Room G-19          Modal Subordination, Situations, and Reference Time
     Redwood Hall  	Craige Roberts
			(croberts@csli.stanford.edu)
			Abstract below
			
   3:30 p.m.		Tea
     Ventura Hall		
                             --------------
			  NEXT WEEK'S TINLUNCH
  Reading: "True Believers: The Intentional Strategy and Why it Works"
			    by Daniel Dennett
	    In D. Dennett, The Intentional Stance, chapter 2,
       Bradford Books, 1987.  Also in A. F. Heath, ed., Scientific
	       Explanation, Oxford University Press, 1981.
		    Discussion led by Adrian Cussins
			 (cussins.pa@xerox.com)
			       January 28

   Dennett's article "True Believers" is, as he says, the flagship
   expression of his theory of the intentional stance replacing his 1971
   article "Intentional Systems."  It seems to me that the theory should
   be discussed around CSLI since there appear to be many commonalities
   between his position and the Barwise/Perry/Israel attitude to
   psychology.  For example (and a little flippantly): there is no
   qualitative difference between people and frogs; there is no such
   thing as intrinsic intentionality; the language of thought is false;
   the notion of representation is not primary in psychological theory;
   psychological properties are not natural kinds.  I will briefly
   introduce Dennett's theory for those not familiar with it, and raise
   one or two objections.  I think that what Dennett is really saying is
   that there can be no such thing as The Science of the Mind, or, in
   other words, that the best a psychologist can hope for is to be a
   hacker.  Now, if CSLI shares this view it might explain a lot ...

			     --------------

			   NEXT WEEK'S SEMINAR
	   Modal Subordination, Situations, and Reference Time
			     Craige Roberts
		      (croberts@csli.stanford.edu)
			       January 28

   The phenomenon of modal subordination involves the apparent extension
   of the scope of modal operators intersententially across segments of a
   discourse.  This presents problems both for the analysis of the
   logical entailments of individual sentences in such contexts, and for
   theories of anaphora in discourse.  In earlier work, I proposed an
   account of modal subordination which involved extending discourse
   representation theory to include modal operators.  In this talk I will
   briefly review that proposal and present recent work that attempts to
   address two unresolved problems: the existence of similar examples,
   which involve non-modal operators, such as temporal operators and
   adverbs of quantification, and a restriction on the interpretation of
   tenses in modal subordination contexts.  I will suggest that these
   problems may be resolved by taking modal operators to range over
   situations (whether the situations of situation semantics, or the
   partial worlds situations recently proposed by Angelika Kratzer), and
   by taking temporal units to be defined in terms of primitively ordered
   events (themselves a type of situation).  I will present a theory of
   the interpretation of discourse representations, which implements
   these ideas in a possible-worlds semantics.