SCALAR

I M P L I C A T U RP
EoSL/ A R t r yr H E N o M E N AA/ N D T H ES y N T A x / e n n c u n r t c sT N T E R F A C E 79
78 S T R U C T U R EASN D B E Y O N D

as I din't eat a string of DE-heads C-commanding it, clearly only the closestrelevant head may
work with. Let me use a simple example. Consider a sentencesuch
will be (117a); after closure' it will agreewith the NPI (however, you will want to cash this in formally):
any potato. Before closure, its logical form
be (117b):
(t20) [ . . . NEG. . . . t . . . NEG. . . . t . . . Npr . . . ] . . . I . . . l
I atex))
potatoi[I atet,]l + r solllsepiootato';(],x lt
(ll7) a. not (anyerpr
6. O^enot(anyrloypotatol[I ateq]l + VgeA r I atex))
somee(oy'(potato')(l,x

(117a)] must be This, given my mapping hypothesis, forces the closest DE-head to act as the scope
According to (116), the closureof a sentence0 [i.e., in this case,
of g removed' That is, site for universal closure (and hence as the level at which the condition on strength-
stronger than q', which is identical to $ with all occurrences
ening must be checked).What happensabove that level (i.e., how many negative
(117b) must be strongerthan
operatorsthere may be) remains without consequence.2T
I atex)) To sum up, my hypothesisis that NPIs are parasitic on weak quantifiersand close
(11S) - somen'(Potato')(l.x
off quantificationally the domain (or situation) variable implicit in the former. In
(117a)is well de- positive contexts,this constitutesa loss of information with respectto plain exis-
since (117b) is in fact strongerthan (118), the result of closing
quantifier restricted to domain- tentials;in negative contexts,it leads, instead,to strengthening.Hence, pragmatic
fined. Essentially, O is u pt.roppositional universal
that the result must entail the meaning of and/or morphological considerationsprevent NPIs from occurring in positive con-
extending functions. The presuppositionis
texts (not embeddedunder a DE-head). The NPIs involve a comparisonof domains
the correspondingsentencewith some.
conditions (asproposedby K&L) but not alexicalized scale (like scalar terms).
Usually quantificational closure is taken to be subject to mapping
(Diesing tggil.we may exploit this general line of approach to closure to enforce
(presentin the lexical entry of NPIs)
tt. r.quir.ment that domain-extendingfunctions 4.3. Intervention
it. First, observe that in the
must be eventually closed. Here is one way of executing
relevant alternatives is done through The approachto NPIs outlined above capturestheir sensitivity to DE-contexts, a
case of scalar terms, the individuation of the
with eachother). property NPIs sharewith SIs. However, the two phenomenaalso differ in some im-
lexically specified scales(a list of words in paradigmaticopposition
morphology to flag that their use may portant respects.One difference between the two phenomenais the flip-flop versus
Becauseof this, scalar terms need no special
on the other hand, are not coded in roofing effects. This difference, too, now makes sense.The SIs are in turn inserted
lead to strengthening.Quantificational domains,
So if one wants to signal domain andremoved acrossDE-operators,in a pistonlike fashion becausethe scalarrequire-
lexicalized scalesUut in covert domain variables.
device specialized to this task' mentsare checkedat every stepof the derivation (as is necessaryto keep the strength-
expansion,one must resortto some morphological
relations. It is thus to be expected enedmeaning stronger)-whence the flip-flop effect. The NPIs, per contra, are not
RnA morphological featuresenter into agreement
suitable head, part of scales.They involve a generalizationover quantificational domains that must
that the morphology of NPIs must agreewith the morphology of some
with, for example, interroga- lead to a stronger statementthan plain indefinites. In virtue of their parasitic nature,
just as, say, wh-words must enter into such a relation
counts as a suitabile head. Given the they are subject to a constraint that relates their contribution to that of their host.
iiur.o.piementizers. The secondissueis what
(any other choice would lead the interpre- Roofing follows from this. In particular, I suggest (in the spirit of much previous
semanticsof NPIs, it must be a DE-head
carry a feature that, when work) that this constraint takes the form of a morphological requirement. If their
tive componentto crash).So we may assumethat DE-heads
in syntax possible scope sites specialmorphology (necessaryto signal potential domain widening) enters into an
active, must be checkedby an NPI. This feature marks
now obvious: agreementrelation with a negative head (the only kind of heads they could agree
for closure, the relevant mapping hypothesis being
with, in virtue of their semantics),then roofing follows from the properties of agree-
ment (e.g., the probe must seek out the closest goal). But even if such a mor-
(l 19) The domainof a +DE-headmapsonto the scopeof O'
phological requirement were not there, if strengtheningor blocking is just freely
have to be checked,the empirical effects of roofing would also be expected:in the presence
To recapitulate, supposean NPI is selectedin an enumeration.There will
feature that will consti- of c-commandingnegative heads,we would always have a site at which strength-
a head with the appropriate semantic quality and an active
will lead the derivation ening can be satisfied (namely, the closest one), and nothing that happensthere-
tute the domain oi quantificational closure.Any other option
after would affect that.
to crash either in the syntax or in the semantics'26
clo- So we have a proposal that does arguably improve some on the previous seman-
As an immediate consequenceof this way of implementing quantificational
heads), we get an ac- tic ones that directly inspired it, namely K&L's, Krifka's, and Lahiri's. With respect
sure (through a feature that may be associatedwith negative
If you have an NPI and to K&L, besidesthe generalissuesjust mentioned,we no longer haveto posit a specific
count of why NPI licensing is subject to a roofing constraint.