On Tue, Feb 17, 2009 at 9:48 PM, Yigal Chripun <[email protected]> wrote: > I was trying to be a bit more liberal than the strict mathematical > definition since I was talking about human (natural) languages.
Sorry, I heard CFG and CSG and alarm lights went of ;). > a context for natural languages contains more than what you described above. > for instance, I can say the exact same sentence and reveres it's meaning by > the intonation of my voice. Indeed. For instance, in Dutch we can put the direct object in the sentence initial position. A classical example: Elvis drinkt wijn (Elvis drinks wine) Wijn drinkt Elvis (Wine drinks Elvis) Depending on the intonation the second sentence either has the same meaning as the first sentence, or a very unlikely meaning ;). Of course, the fact that the verb 'drinken' tends to have a preference for having drinkable stuff as its direct object helps ;). Of course, you may also be referring to rethorics ;). Take care, Daniel
