Re: [engelang] reformulating the core grammar

Mike S., On 29/09/2012 20:52:

> On Sat, Sep 29, 2012 at 2:48 PM, And Rosta <and.rosta@hidden.email <mailto:and.rosta@hidden.email>> wrote:
> 1. word-classes: Interjection, Unary-op, Binary-op, Formula (= Simple Formula), Formula-root
>

> Why would Formula-root be among the word-classes? Isn't the
> distinction between Formula-root and Formula somewhat analogous to
> that between noun phrases and nouns in English?

Highly analogous. The 'structural head' of a 'noun phrase' beginning with an article is the article, and the noun itself can be deeply subordinated, e.g. [a [very [easy [book] [to read]] indeed]]. But the 'distributional head' is the noun; the noun triggers number concord on verbs; the full phrase can alternate with a bare noun. Similarly, in the phrase Jorge calls 'formula', the distributional head is the simple-formula.

The reason why formula-root is a word class is that it captures the notion 'structural head of a phrase whose distributional head is a (simple) formula'.

> 2. A formula-root is a formula or a word whose complement is a formula-root
> 3. Interjections and Formula-roots have no complements.
>

> Would it be more accurate to say:
>
> 2. A formula-root is a formula or (the ?combination of ) any word
> with all its one or more complementary formula-roots>
> ?

It wouldn't be more accurate in the phrasing with "the combination of", since I was using a formulation that uses only terminal nodes. The phrasing "A formula-root is a formula or any word with all its one or more complementary formula-roots" seems to me to be equivalent to the wording I gave.

--And.