Generics as Expectations: Typicality and Diagnosticity
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| Titel: | Generics as Expectations: Typicality and Diagnosticity |
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| Autoren: | Gärdenfors, Peter, Osta-Vélez, Matías |
| Weitere Verfasser: | Lund University, Joint Faculties of Humanities and Theology, Departments, Department of Philosophy, Cognitive Science, Lunds universitet, Humanistiska och teologiska fakulteterna, Institutioner, Filosofiska institutionen, Kognitionsvetenskap, Originator, Lund University, Joint Faculties of Humanities and Theology, Departments, Department of Philosophy, Cognitive modeling, Lunds universitet, Humanistiska och teologiska fakulteterna, Institutioner, Filosofiska institutionen, Kognitiv modellering, Originator |
| Quelle: | Ratio. 38(1):16-26 |
| Schlagwörter: | Humanities and the Arts, Languages and Literature, Studies of Specific Languages, Humaniora och konst, Språk och litteratur, Studier av enskilda språk |
| Beschreibung: | Generic statements play a crucial role in concept learning, communication and education. Despite many efforts, the semantics of generics remain a controversial issue, as they do not seem to fit our standard theories of meaning. In this article, we attempt to shed light on this problem by focusing on how these sentences function in reasoning. Drawing on a distinction between property and diagnostic generics, we defend three theses: First, property generics are not about facts but express relations between concepts. Second, generics play an important role in everyday reasoning by interacting with our expectations about the world. Third, diagnostic generics emphasise properties that separate the category in the generics from other categories in the same contrast class. We use the theory of conceptual spaces to advance measures of typicality and diagnosticity capable of modelling different aspects of generics and apply them to the modifier effect and the inverse conjunction fallacy. Finally, we discuss the pragmatics of generics. |
| Zugangs-URL: | https://doi.org/10.1111/rati.12424 |
| Datenbank: | SwePub |
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Nájsť tento článok vo Web of Science | Abstract: | Generic statements play a crucial role in concept learning, communication and education. Despite many efforts, the semantics of generics remain a controversial issue, as they do not seem to fit our standard theories of meaning. In this article, we attempt to shed light on this problem by focusing on how these sentences function in reasoning. Drawing on a distinction between property and diagnostic generics, we defend three theses: First, property generics are not about facts but express relations between concepts. Second, generics play an important role in everyday reasoning by interacting with our expectations about the world. Third, diagnostic generics emphasise properties that separate the category in the generics from other categories in the same contrast class. We use the theory of conceptual spaces to advance measures of typicality and diagnosticity capable of modelling different aspects of generics and apply them to the modifier effect and the inverse conjunction fallacy. Finally, we discuss the pragmatics of generics. |
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| ISSN: | 00340006 14679329 |
| DOI: | 10.1111/rati.12424 |