[matrix] constraint a VP to have a empty subject list

[Emily M. Bender]

Dear Altaf,

If I've understood the facts of Bangla right, you want to constrain
the complement of subj-obj-raising-verb-lex to have a *non*-empty
SUBJ list.  That is, it should be a VP, which has not yet picked up
its subject.  You can do this by saying [ SUBJ cons ] on the sole
element of the COMPS list of subj-obj-raising-verb-lex.

At any rate, the place where you want to implement this constraint
is on the COMPS list of subj-obj-raising-verb-lex, and not in the
definition of verb lex.  To better understand the valence features
and the type hierarchy, I refer you to Sag, Wasow and Bender 2003.

Emily

On Sun, Jun 03, 2007 at 02:03:23PM +0600, Altaf Mahmud wrote:
> Dear Madam:
> 
> Thank you so much for your kind replies. Those issues helped me a lot.
> However, I created a type "subj-obj-raising-verb-lex" and constrained the
> first complement to be an NP and second complement to be VP with 'infinite'
> form. But I got multiple parses for some ambiguities. For example: "naafid
> haammaadke ball maarte balbe"
>              "Naafid Haammaad-acc ball to-throw will-tell"
>              "Naafid will tell Haammaad to throw ball"
> 
> The noun 'ball' will be a complement of the verb 'maarte', but at some parse
> trees 'ball' appeared to be the subject of the verb 'maarte' and spawned
> into the 'head-subj' rule. Now, I want to constraint the infinite verb to
> have empty subject list. I inherited the "non-finite-verb-lex" from
> "basic-verb-lex" rather than "verb-lex", because "verb-lex" requires
> non-empty SUBJ list. But it shows errors while I tries to load the grammar
> as follows: "Atomic time NULL specified to have features at (SYNSEM LOCAL
> CAT VAL SUBJ)" for each subtype of non-finite-verb-lex (intransitive,
> transitive and ditransitive). So, how can I constraint the VP complement of
> the "subj-obj-raising-verb-lex" type to have empty subject list?
> 
> ************for non finite verbs************************
> 
> non-finite-verb-lex := basic-verb-lex &
> 
> [ SYNSEM.LOCAL [ CAT [ VAL [ SPR < >,
> 
> SPEC < >,
> 
> SUBJ < > ],
> 
> HEAD [ FORM inf,
> 
> AUX - ] ] ] ].
> 
> **************and for "subj-obj-raising-verb-lex"*************************
> 
> subj-obj-raising-verb-lex := verb-lex & ditrans-second-arg-raising-lex-item
> &
> 
> [ SYNSEM.LOCAL.CAT.VAL.COMPS < #comps1, #comps2 >,
> 
> ARG-ST < [ LOCAL.CAT.HEAD noun &
> 
> [ CASE-INFLECT nom+loc ] ],
> 
> #comps1 &
> 
> [ LOCAL.CAT [ VAL [ SPR < >,
> 
> COMPS < > ],
> 
> HEAD +np &
> 
> [ CASE-INFLECT acc+gen+inst+abl ] ] ],
> 
> #comps2 &
> 
> [ LOCAL.CAT.HEAD +vp &
> 
> [ FORM inf ] ] > ].
> **************************END*************************************************
> 
> Thank you again.
> 
> 
> -- 
> -Altaf