Thursday, August 28, 2008

two readings?

Some philosopher admires every linguist.

Somehow I get the existential universal reading only; but apparently native speaker of English can get the universal existential reading as well.


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Some paper of his is an embarrassment to every philosopher.

I can make sense of the universal existential reading here, understanding 'his' as bound by 'every philosopher.'
But this reading takes more time to get (for me).


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Someone is robbed every 15 minutes in NYC.

This one is much better.
It is probably because of the pragmatics--- it's not very likely that there is such an unfortunate person.

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