Prolegomena to a Theory of Lexical and Syntactic Knowledge

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The grammatical operation Merge as a construct in the Minimalist Program applies to derive conceptual structures in the semantic component of language in the technical sense elucidated in Jackendoff (2002), so that the construal processes of language are cumulative. The stages of the merging of linguistically significant conceptual units are licensed by what I call Truth Driven Verification (TDV). The TDV has strictly controlled access to prepositional truths conveyed by lexically and syntactically restricted sets of conceptual structures, which are in turn governed (i) by the principle of lexical representation, that is, Underspecification, and (ii) by the principle of lexical and post-lexical (syntactic) derivation, which is Structure Preservation, both of which come from research on Lexical Phonology by Kiparsky (1982) and Mohanan (1982). My unification of combinatory formation rules of conceptual structures as have been assumed by Jackendoff (1990) is a better and more viable alternative to approaches to semantics from an OT (Optimality Theory) perspective, in the sense that the former approach is simple and explicit enough to be scientifically refutable in the sense of Popper (1959, 2002).

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