Re: [tied] Re: verb agreement in one stage of English

On Mon, 13 Oct 2003 05:56:15 +0000, Ray <ray28238317@...> wrote:

>In the framework, a sentence, like any phrase, has the structure of
>specifier, head, and complement. In a sentence, the specifier is
>taken by the subject, the head is either overly occupied by
>auxiliaries or covertly by tense/agreement features. Within a
>sentence, we also have the VP complement, where the head is the verb
>and the complement may be an NP or PP.
>
>In the cases where the idea of perfect construction is manifested in
>a single verb, there is no problem with the implicational universal.
>
>However, in that particular stage of Old English, the perfect
>construction is expressed by two lexical items. If we treat the
>auxiliary-subject agreement and verb-object agreement separately on
>the basis of auxiliaries and verbs belonging to different
>constituents, we may claim the auxiliary and the verb are not a whole
>(however,we may claim the auxiliary and the Verb phrase(VP) itself
>constitute a unit called I-bar) and the OE sentence violates the
>universal.

You claimed that the universal was: "if a particular phenomenon applies to
direct objects, it should also apply to subjects", with a prediction that
"there are no languages in which the verb agrees with just the direct
object".

Two questions:

- Was the universal formulated by persons adhering to GB, Minimalism, or
some such framework? In a framework unhindered by INFL-nodes, we are free
to view both the auxiliary and the participle as constituent parts of "the
verb", as it is mentioned in the second formulation of the universal.

- What are the exact requirements of the universal? It is plainly the case
that Old English is not a language in which the verb agrees only with the
direct object. In fact, in the vast majority of sentences, the verb rather
agrees exclusively with the subject (e.g. "Ælfred kyning háteð grétan
Wærferð biscep"). Is the universal formulated such that it should hold in
_every sentence_ or just in general?

=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...