Article

Explaining quantity implicatures

Authors:

Tikitu de Jager,

Robert van RooijAuthors Info & Claims

TARK '07: Proceedings of the 11th conference on Theoretical aspects of rationality and knowledge

Pages 193 - 202

https://doi.org/10.1145/1324249.1324276

Published: 25 June 2007 Publication History

Abstract

We give derivations of two formal models of Gricean Quantity₁ implicature and strong exhaustivity (Van Rooij and Schulz, 2004; Schulz and Van Rooij, 2006), in bidirectional optimality theory and in a signalling games framework. We show that, under a unifying model based on signalling games, these interpretative strategies are game-theoretic equilibria when the speaker is known to be respectively minimally and maximally expert in the matter at hand. That is, in this framework the optimal strategy for communication depends on the degree of knowledge the speaker is known to have concerning the question she is answering.

In addition, and most importantly, we give a game-theoretic characterisation of the interpretation rule Grice (formalising Quantity₁ implicature), showing that under natural conditions this interpretation rule occurs in the unique equilibrium play of the signalling game.

References

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Cited By

Potts CLassiter DLevy RFrank M(2015)Embedded Implicatures as Pragmatic Inferences under Compositional Lexical UncertaintyJournal of Semantics10.1093/jos/ffv012(ffv012)Online publication date: 18-Dec-2015
https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffv012
Rothschild D(2013)GAME THEORY AND SCALAR IMPLICATURESPhilosophical Perspectives10.1111/phpe.1202427:1(438-478)Online publication date: 29-Dec-2013
https://doi.org/10.1111/phpe.12024
Franke M(2013)Game Theoretic PragmaticsPhilosophy Compass10.1111/phc3.120158:3(269-284)Online publication date: 12-Feb-2013
https://doi.org/10.1111/phc3.12015

Explaining quantity implicatures
1. Theory of computation

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TARK '07: Proceedings of the 11th conference on Theoretical aspects of rationality and knowledge

June 2007

296 pages

ISBN:9781450378413

DOI:10.1145/1324249

Program Chair:
Dov Samet

Copyright © 2007 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 25 June 2007

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Overall Acceptance Rate 61 of 177 submissions, 34%

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Cited By

Potts CLassiter DLevy RFrank M(2015)Embedded Implicatures as Pragmatic Inferences under Compositional Lexical UncertaintyJournal of Semantics10.1093/jos/ffv012(ffv012)Online publication date: 18-Dec-2015
https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffv012
Rothschild D(2013)GAME THEORY AND SCALAR IMPLICATURESPhilosophical Perspectives10.1111/phpe.1202427:1(438-478)Online publication date: 29-Dec-2013
https://doi.org/10.1111/phpe.12024
Franke M(2013)Game Theoretic PragmaticsPhilosophy Compass10.1111/phc3.120158:3(269-284)Online publication date: 12-Feb-2013
https://doi.org/10.1111/phc3.12015

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