Abstract
There exists a very systematic limitation on natural compositional concept formation in natural language whose full complexity has not been laid bare. The first section of this chapter will revisit the lexical domains of logical constants, where conceptual ‘‘kinship and contrast’’ define a pattern of opposition first represented in the form of a kite in Seuren and Jaspers (2014). Next, I propose a kite analysis for the system of English finite tenses which has a partial precursor in a now-forgotten little article by Robert Blanché on the one hand and in the much more detailed system of binary temporal relations proposed by Vikner (1985) on the other. From the former the kite structure for the finite tenses differs in that it focuses on the inviolability of prior binary divisions for later ones – which is the operation in this realm of progressive universe restriction (PUR) as defined in Seuren and Jaspers (2014) – and on resulting asymmetries in the tense system; from the latter it differs in proposing a system of two pairs of binary oppositions, a temporal pair and an aspectual pair, yielding four binary relations in all (rather than three), with a surprising similarity between the internal architecture of the temporal and the aspectual pair of relations. On the whole, the pattern suggests that basic conceptual oppositions and lexicalization principles are guided by innate linguistic patterns of which binarity, opposition, and asymmetry are the central properties. If correct, the analysis proposed is striking confirmation in yet another semantic domain of the asymmetry approach to the square of opposition and its extensions of our earlier work.
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Notes
- 1.
The matter of quantifier readings in the protasis is complex, as there are many other types than future (predictive) conditionals, cf. [2].
- 2.
The term prototypical is used to remind us (i) that time is often indicated by means of other words than tensed verbs (‘‘yesterday,’’ ‘‘at five,’’ ‘‘week,’’ etc.) and (ii) that tenses can be used for non-temporal purposes (‘‘Could you do me a favor?’’: use of the past tense to make the utterance sound more polite).
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Acknowledgment
Thanks to Koen Roelandt of KU Leuven campus Brussels for crucial help with the tense figures. I dedicate this contribution to Jean-Yves Béziau, whose organizational skills and foresight about the relevance of Square studies for logic, philosophy and linguistics have done much to create a vibrant Square studies community. I hope this chapter adequately testifies to my gratitude and respect. Ad multos annos!
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Jaspers, D. (2015). The English Tenses, Blanché and the Logical Kite. In: Koslow, A., Buchsbaum, A. (eds) The Road to Universal Logic. Studies in Universal Logic. Birkhäuser, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15368-1_15
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