• Stefan Müller AG Syntax

  • Contact
  • Publications
  • Talks
  • Software
  • Resources
  • Demos
  • Projects
  • Teaching
  • Events
  • Language Science Press
  • CV
  • Reviewing
  • HPSG Literature
  • LingPhot
  • Mastodon (EN ling)
  • Mastodon (DE ling+climate)

Evaluating theories: Counting nodes and the question of constituency

Subject Areas: Dependency Grammar, Phrase Structure Grammar, constituency, theory evaluation, Minimalism

This paper is a reply to Timothy Osborne's paper Tests for constituents: What they really reveal about the nature of syntactic structure that appeared 2018 in Language under Discussion.

This paper discusses how constituent tests work and why it is no problem if they are not applicable. It is argued that Osborne's claims regarding simplicitiy of Dependency Grammar in comparison to Phrase Structure Grammar are unwarranted and that DG models that include semantics make use of auxiliary structure that is equivalent to the nodes assumed in PSG. A final section of the paper discusses the general validity of counting nodes for theory evaluation and the assumption of empty elements vs. spezilaized phrasal rules.

• pdf (481K)
• BibTeX Entry