Derived Nominals and Concealed Propositions

摘要

Vendler described derived nominals (DNs) like the collapse/ing of the Germans as ambiguous between event denoting expressions and proposition denoting expressions. DNs can combine with event-selecting predicates (1a), like gradual, which bona fide propositional that-clauses or fact-denoting expressions cannot (1c), and have event-readings, ((1a) can be paraphrased as 'the event of the Germans collapsing was gradual'.) DNs can also combine with proposition-selecting predicates like aware of (2a) which always also allow finite complements (2b) and, in such cases, have propositional readings-(2a) and (2b) are synonymous. We call DNs in the latter cases Concealed Propositions (ConPs), and we defend the idea that they are analogous in important respects to concealed questions (CQs).1 Here we argue against Vendler's Ambiguity Hypothesis (3) and defend an analysis of DNs in which they uniformly denote (or quantify over) events. In doing so, we overcome a challenge, discovered by Zucchi , to the unambiguous event approach, and provide an analysis to both definite and quantified DNs. We show that a copy-theoretic account overcomes the problem and aligns ConPs with concealed questions (CQs) in the analysis of Frana.