The issue is not coherence in the semantic sense, but syntactic intelligibility. The early phase of TG grammar did a remarkable job of explaining how certain transformations were possible and others not, in this case, in the English language. In this *sentence, "what" is the direct object of "sold".
On 06/10/2010 08:54 AM, c b wrote: > On 6/9/10, c b<cb31...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> Speakers proficient in a language know what expressions are acceptable >> in their language and what expressions are unacceptable. The key >> puzzle is how speakers should come to know the restrictions of their >> language, since expressions that violate those restrictions are not >> present in the input, indicated as such. This absence of negative >> evidence—that is, absence of evidence that an expression is part of a >> class of the ungrammatical sentences in one's language—is the core of >> the poverty of stimulus argument. For example, in English one cannot >> relate a question word like 'what' to a predicate within a relative >> clause (1): >> >> (1) *What did John meet a man who sold? >> > > ^^^^^^^ > CB: Aside from the learning acquisition issues, what, (speaking of > "what") does the above sentence mean ? It is semantically as well as > syntactically problematic. A child language learner might not use it > because it doesn't express a coherent thought . > > Why did John meet a man who sold ? > > When did John meet a man who sold ? > > How did John meet a man who sold ? > > Where did John meet a man who sold ? > > Did John meet a man who sold ? > > What did John meet a man who sold for ? = Why did John... > > _______________________________________________ > Marxism-Thaxis mailing list > Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu > To change your options or unsubscribe go to: > http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis > > _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
