And wrote:
> I'm not sure if this is a deliberate red rag to a bull, on a topic
> we've debated to death before, but...
;)
> There is a condition on every single syntactic structure that for
> the parts to go together they must make sense together.
Actually, I was just joking about the making sense part, but
the semantics of the examples we are talking about has to do
with interpreting a certain string as a "list" (either unordered
or ordered). So, actually my smart-a...ed comment can be made
more specific than just merely "making sense."
> Either nothing in syntax is an argument con autonomy of syntax,
> or absolutely everything is...
Not to be talking past you, seriously, but the thing about Dylan's
example is that it can be extended to complements:
(1) * Bill likes redheads, blondes.
(2) Bill likes redheads, blondes... all women, in fact.
You would agree that (1) is "unsyntactic," right? I mean,
complements aren't supposed to be able to be iterated (as
opposed to coordinated). Yet, if the iterated complement
can be construed as a list (as in (2)), then it becomes
okay. Semantic interpretation is turning an "unsyntactic"
structure into a "syntactic" one. (Of course, (2) has
a special intonational contour, but that would be part
of my argument too---if I only knew more about phonology,
that is.)
Joe
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