DOCSLIB.ORG

From Frames to Inference

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
From Frames to Inference From Frames to Inference Nancy Chang, Srini Narayanan, and Miriam R.L. Petruck International Computer Science Institute 1947 Center St., Suite 600, Berkeley, CA 94704 nchang,miriamp,snarayan ¡ @icsi.berkeley.edu Abstract money ($1000) to another (Jerry) in exchange for some goods (a car) – but differ in the perspective This paper describes a computational they impose on the scene. formalism that captures structural rela- The shared inferential structure of verbs like buy tionships among participants in a dy- and sell is captured in FrameNet by the COMMERCE namic scenario. This representation is frame, which is associated with a set of situational used to describe the internal structure of roles, or frame elements (FEs), corresponding to FrameNet frames in terms of parameters event participants and props. These FEs are used for active event simulations. We apply our as annotation tags for sentences like those in (1), formalism to the commerce domain and yielding, for example: show how it provides a flexible means of handling linguistic perspective and other Buyer Goods challenges of semantic representation. (2) a. [Chuck] bought [a car] [from Jerry]Seller [for $1000]Payment. 1 Introduction b. [Jerry]Seller sold [a car]Goods [to Chuck]Buyer [for $1000]Payment. The development of lexical semantic resources is widely recognized as a prerequisite to progress in FE tags act as a shorthand that allows diverse verbs scalable natural language understanding. One of the to tap into a common subset of encyclopedic knowl- most semantically sophisticated efforts in this direc- edge. Moreover, regularities in the set of FEs real- tion is FrameNet (Baker et al., 1998; Fillmore et al., ized with specific lexical items can be taken as cor- 2001), an online lexical resource1 designed accord- related with their favored perspective. ing to the principles of frame semantics (Fillmore, 1985; Petruck, 1996). FrameNet takes as founda- A significant gap remains, however, between the tional the assumptions that (1) lexical items draw unstructured and intuitively chosen tag sets used in on rich conceptual structures, or frames, for their FrameNet and a formal characterization of the inter- meaning and function; and (2) conceptually related related actions and relations holding among them. lexical items may foreground different aspects of The explicit representation of such frame semantic the same background frame. Verbs involved with information is needed for FrameNet’s potential use commercial events serve as canonical examples: in text understanding and inference (Fillmore and Baker, 2001) to be fully realized. In this paper we (1) a. Chuck bought a car from Jerry for $1000. attempt to bridge the gap by defining a formalism b. Jerry sold a car to Chuck for $1000. that unpacks the shorthand of frames into structured c. Chuck paid Jerry $1000 for a car. event representations. These dynamic representa- d. Jerry charged Chuck $1000 for a car. tions allow annotated FrameNet data to parameter- e. Chuck spent $1000 on a car. ize event simulations (Narayanan, 1999b) that pro- duce fine-grained, context-sensitive inferences. We The sentences in (1) might describe the same inter- illustrate our formalism for the COMMERCE frame action – in which one individual (Chuck) transfers and show how it can account for some of the wide- 1http://www.icsi.berkeley.edu/framenet/ ranging consequences of perspective-taking. 1 Figure 1: Results of a query on the FrameNet COMMERCE frame, showing annotated data for the verb buy. 2 The FrameNet COMMERCE frame (e.g., many but not all appear in the ditransitive con- struction), and not all of them license the expression The FrameNet project has thus far produced two of all FEs (e.g., spend rarely appears with the Seller). databases: a collection of approximately 80 frames Also, some FEs are realized in different ways for with frame descriptions, chosen to cover a broad different verbs: the pattern of appearance with from- range of semantic domains; and a hand-annotated or to- headed PPs differs for buy and sell, and for- dataset of about 50,000 sentences from the British headed PPs may mark either the Payment (for buy National Corpus (Baker et al., 1998). The databases and sell) or the Goods (for pay). document both syntactic and semantic behavior of a Much of this diversity has been attributed to dif- wide variety of lexical items (or lemmas) and thus ferences in perspective, but the complex connec- have the potential to allow corpus-based techniques tions among perspective, argument structure and FE to be applied to semantically oriented tasks.2 realization have been difficult to explicate. One ap- The current release of the FrameNet databases3 proach is to distinguish the COMMERCE frame from defines a COMMERCE frame with frame elements other perspectivized frames exhibiting more con- including the familiar Buyer, Seller, Payment and sistent behavior; proposals along these lines differ Goods, along with several other FEs needed to cover in their criteria for making these divisions and the the data. The frame includes 10 verbs relevant to relationships among the resulting frames.4 commercial transactions, for a total of 575 anno- Our proposal likewise imposes additional struc- tated sentences. Figure 1 shows a sampling of data ture on the COMMERCE frame to reflect both annotated with respect to the COMMERCE frame. perspective-neutral and perspectivized situations. The COMMERCE frame verbs exhibit relatively But for current purposes, we concentrate on cap- greater variety in argument structure possibilities turing perspectival effects on inference in discourse 2See (Gildea and Jurafsky, 2000) for some promising ini- tial work in applying statistical techniques to the FrameNet 4FrameNet II is currently considering a reorganization database to automatically label frame elements. scheme along these lines. Gawron (ms.) and Hudson (in press) 3Throughout the paper we refer to data from FrameNet I; an address these and related issues, both arguing against handling interim release of FrameNet II data is expected soon. perspective solely with multiple inheritance. 2 interpretation. Our structures are thus designed a predicate on accessible structures.6 The keyword to support dynamic inferences about interrelated self refers to the structure being defined, which we events and actions, and not specifically to reflect FE can consider a special kind of role. We use ‘//’ to realization patterns. introduce italicized comments. We take the original COMMERCE frame as ¤ schema £ name our starting point and define the interrelationships ¥ ¤ subcase of £ schema present among its FEs; the resulting event represen- ¦ evokes § ¤ £ ¤©¨ tation can license inferences for sentences like those £ schema as local-name in the annotated FrameNet data. We assume that roles ¤ £ local-role any frame reorganization scheme (as well as any £ ¤ £ ¤ local-role : restriction ¤£ ¤ method for labeling roles in novel text) will define £ local-role role ¤£ ¤ £ ¤ a mapping to the original FEs and thus could be in- £ local-role role : restriction tegrated with our dynamic representations within a constraints ¤£ ¤ larger language understanding enterprise. £ role role ¤ £ ¤ £ phase :: condition 3 Structured event representations Figure 2: Schema definition formalism. In this section, we present a formal specification The first line names the schema being defined. used for mapping the flat set of FEs in COMMERCE onto explicitly structured event representations that The next few lines (subcase of and evokes) indi- characterize commercial transactions. Our repre- cate how this schema relates to other schemas. The sentation is based on the Embodied Construction subcase relation defines a lattice of schemas, with Grammar (ECG) formalism (Bergen and Chang, the local schema inheriting all roles and constraints. 2002). As in that work, we assume that understand- The evokes relation also makes the specified struc- ing an utterance involves the evocation of a com- tures and constraints of the evoked schema (re- plex network of conceptual schemas and the mental ferred to within the current definition using a £ local- simulation of these schemas in context to produce name ¤ ) locally accessible, but it implies neither full a rich set of inferences.5 inheritance of the evoked schema’s roles nor con- Among the features of the ECG schema formal- tainment in either direction. ism that we exploit to represent commercial transac- The indented block labeled roles lists and con- tions are (1) the ability to flexibly evoke and relate strains the schema’s local roles, which are equiv- multiple schemas; and (2) the ability to assert dy- alent to frame FEs. Roles are declared with a lo- ¤ namic conditions that apply to specific event stages. cal name ( £ local-role ) and may be accompanied by We rely heavily on the fact that schemas can be in- type restrictions (indicated with ‘:’) and/or identi- terdefined in our eventual representation of differ- fication (or binding) constraints (‘ ! ’). The lat- ences in perspective. ter (which may also appear in the constraints block) We briefly describe the schema definition lan- causes roles and constraints to be shared between its guage shown in Figure 2, deferring additional de- arguments, similar to unification or coindexation in tails for the examples. Keywords are shown in other frameworks (Pollard and Sag, 1994). bold; a left square bracket ([) marks optional blocks; The final constraint type allowed is a simulation constraint, which uses the ‘::’ notation to assert and curly
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Formalism Or “The Regime of Truth”: a Reading of Adrienne Rich’S
    International Journal of Linguistics and Literature (IJLL) ISSN 2319-3956 Vol. 2, Issue 4, Sep 2013, 19-28 © IASET FORMALISM OR “THE REGIME OF TRUTH”: A READING OF ADRIENNE RICH’S A CHANGE OF WORLD NAHID MOHAMMADI Department of English Language and Literature, Alzahra University, Tehran, Iran ABSTRACT Formalism in Adrienne Rich‟s first book, A Change of World, has attracted different critics and scholars so far. In their interpretations, it seems that they have taken it for granted that Adrienne Rich was a formalist. But none of them has ever presented the cause for the emergence of formalism in Adrienne Rich‟s early poetry. In this paper, I draw upon Michel Foucault‟s theory of “repressive power” and demonstrate that formalism was actually “the regime of truth” which determined „true/false‟ poetry for the young poet and excluded some poetic discourses and permitted only some particular ones to come into being in her first book. KEYWORDS: Adrienne Rich, A Change of World, Formalism, Michel Foucault, Discourse Analysis, Repressive Power, Exclusion, Truth, The Regime of Truth INTRODUCTION Almost all critics of Adrienne Rich‟s poetry agree that her early poems in A Change of World (1951) have been the poet‟s practice of distancing devices of modernist formalism which was dominant among the poets in the United States in the 1950s. Trudi Dawne Witonsky, who has examined Adrienne Rich‟s works in terms of Paulo Freire‟s theory of praxis1, admits that, in her early poetry, Rich wrote under the doctrine of New Critical formalism. She goes further and states that Rich‟s transition from formalism in her early poetry to feminism in her later volumes happens because of the „inadequacy of formalist‟ theory (Witonsky)2.
    [Show full text]
  • Formalism and Realism in Ruins (Mapping the Logics of Collapse)
    University of Colorado Law School Colorado Law Scholarly Commons Articles Colorado Law Faculty Scholarship 2009 Formalism and Realism in Ruins (Mapping the Logics of Collapse) Pierre Schlag University of Colorado Law School Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.law.colorado.edu/articles Part of the Jurisprudence Commons, and the Law and Politics Commons Citation Information Pierre Schlag, Formalism and Realism in Ruins (Mapping the Logics of Collapse), 95 Iowa L. Rev. 195 (2009) (reprinted with permission), available at . Copyright Statement Copyright protected. Use of materials from this collection beyond the exceptions provided for in the Fair Use and Educational Use clauses of the U.S. Copyright Law may violate federal law. Permission to publish or reproduce is required. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Colorado Law Faculty Scholarship at Colorado Law Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Articles by an authorized administrator of Colorado Law Scholarly Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. +(,121/,1( Citation: 95 Iowa L. Rev. 195 2009-2010 Provided by: William A. Wise Law Library Content downloaded/printed from HeinOnline Thu Mar 2 17:47:48 2017 -- Your use of this HeinOnline PDF indicates your acceptance of HeinOnline's Terms and Conditions of the license agreement available at http://heinonline.org/HOL/License -- The search text of this PDF is generated from uncorrected OCR text. -- To obtain permission to use this article beyond the scope of your HeinOnline license, please use: Copyright Information Formalism and Realism in Ruins (Mapping the Logics of Collapse) PierreSchlag* ABSTRACT: After laying out a conventional account of the formalism vs.
    [Show full text]
  • Mechanism, Mentalism, and Metamathematics Synthese Library
    MECHANISM, MENTALISM, AND METAMATHEMATICS SYNTHESE LIBRARY STUDIES IN EPISTEMOLOGY, LOGIC, METHODOLOGY, AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE Managing Editor: JAAKKO HINTIKKA, Florida State University Editors: ROBER T S. COHEN, Boston University DONALD DAVIDSON, University o/Chicago GABRIEL NUCHELMANS, University 0/ Leyden WESLEY C. SALMON, University 0/ Arizona VOLUME 137 JUDSON CHAMBERS WEBB Boston University. Dept. 0/ Philosophy. Boston. Mass .• U.S.A. MECHANISM, MENT ALISM, AND MET AMA THEMA TICS An Essay on Finitism i Springer-Science+Business Media, B.V. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Webb, Judson Chambers, 1936- CII:J Mechanism, mentalism, and metamathematics. (Synthese library; v. 137) Bibliography: p. Includes indexes. 1. Metamathematics. I. Title. QA9.8.w4 510: 1 79-27819 ISBN 978-90-481-8357-9 ISBN 978-94-015-7653-6 (eBook) DOl 10.1007/978-94-015-7653-6 All Rights Reserved Copyright © 1980 by Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht Originally published by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland in 1980. Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1980 No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any informational storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright owner TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE vii INTRODUCTION ix CHAPTER I / MECHANISM: SOME HISTORICAL NOTES I. Machines and Demons 2. Machines and Men 17 3. Machines, Arithmetic, and Logic 22 CHAPTER II / MIND, NUMBER, AND THE INFINITE 33 I. The Obligations of Infinity 33 2. Mind and Philosophy of Number 40 3. Dedekind's Theory of Arithmetic 46 4.
    [Show full text]
  • Aesthetic Formalism, Reactions and Solutions
    Hekmat va Falsafe (Wisdom and Philosophy) vol.6, no.4, 2011, pp. 101-112 Aesthetic Formalism, Reactions and Solutions Khosrow Bagheri Noaparast Mohammad Zoheir Bagheri Noaparast Abstract It seems necessary to introduce the basic concepts used in this article i.e. formalism, anti-formalism and moderate formalism. Formalists believe that the aesthetic appreciation of an artwork generally involves an attentive awareness of its sensory or perceptual qualities and does not require knowledge about its non-perceptual properties. Anti-formalists on the other hand hold that none of the aesthetic properties in a work of art are formal. A number of philosophers have recently advocated a more moderate formalism. According to this view, although not all aesthetic qualities are formal, many are, and some artworks possess only formal aesthetic qualities. The quarrel among these three rival views concerns what sort of knowledge, if any, is required for appropriate aesthetic appreciation of an artwork. In what follows, we will give a brief exposition of these three viewpoints. Subsequently, we will give our preferred position with regard to these views. Keywords: Aesthetic formalism, anti-formalism, aesthetics, Nick Zangwill. 101 1. Formalism, anti-formalism and moderate formalism Before getting involved with the details of the three viewpoints, it seems necessary to introduce the notions of aesthetic and non-aesthetic properties and formal and non- formal properties. Observable properties are properties that can make a difference in our perceptual experience of the artwork. In contrast, non-observable properties refer to instances such as the artist‟s intention, the artist‟s love life, the artist‟s mental health, the artwork‟s history.
    [Show full text]
  • A Formalism for Argument Over Rules of Inference
    Tenacious Tortoises: A Formalism for Argument over Rules of Inference Peter McBurney and Simon Parsons Department of Computer Science University of Liverpool Liverpool L69 7ZF U.K. g fP.J.McBurney,S.D.Parsons @csc.liv.ac.uk May 31, 2000 Abstract Eighty years later, philosopher Susan Haack [9] took up the question of how one justifies the use of MP as a As multi-agent systems proliferate and employ different deductive rule of inference. If one does so by means of and more sophisticated formal logics, it is increasingly examples of its valid application, then this is in essence likely that agents will be reasoning with different rules a form of induction, which (as she remarks) seems too of inference. Hence, an agent seeking to convince an- weak a means of justification for a rule of deduction. If, other of some proposition may first have to convincethe on the other hand, one uses a deductive means of justi- latter to use a rule of inference which it has not thus far fication, such as demonstrating the preservation of truth adopted. We define a formalism to represent degrees across the inference step in a truth-table, one risks us- of acceptability or validity of rules of inference, to en- ing the very rule being justified. So how can one person able autonomous agents to undertake dialogue concern- convince another of the validity of a rule of deductive ing inference rules. Even when they disagree over the inference? acceptability of a rule, two agents may still use the pro- That rules of inference may be the subject of fierce posed formalism to reason collaboratively.
    [Show full text]
  • The Place of Formalism in Legal Theory, 70 N.C
    NORTH CAROLINA LAW REVIEW Volume 70 | Number 5 Article 4 6-1-1992 The lP ace of Formalism in Legal Theory Michael Corrado Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/nclr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Michael Corrado, The Place of Formalism in Legal Theory, 70 N.C. L. Rev. 1545 (1992). Available at: http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/nclr/vol70/iss5/4 This Comments is brought to you for free and open access by Carolina Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in North Carolina Law Review by an authorized administrator of Carolina Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ESSAY THE PLACE OF FORMALISM IN LEGAL THEORY MICHAEL CORRADO* I understand formalism to be the claim that law is an autonomous area of knowledge. To say that it is autonomous is to say that it is self- contained, that it is not dependent on other areas of knowledge like mo- rality or politics or sociology. In particular it is to say that law is not reducible to those other areas, in a sense of reducibility I will try to make clear. There is a version of formalism that is true. This version of formal- ism does not claim that law is unrelated to other areas of knowledge. It admits that legal argument makes use of moral, political, and sociologi- cal information. But it insists that, although much that is extra-legal is taken into account in deciding a question of law, it remains extra-legal; it does not become part of the law.' I.
    [Show full text]
  • What Does It Mean to Say That Logic Is Formal?
    WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO SAY THAT LOGIC IS FORMAL? by John Gordon MacFarlane A.B., Philosophy, Harvard College, 1991 M.A., Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh, 1994 M.A., Classics, University of Pittsburgh, 1997 Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Arts and Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Pittsburgh 2000 i Robert Brandom, Distinguished Service Professor of Philosophy (Director) Nuel Belnap, Alan Ross Anderson Distinguished Professor of Philosophy (Second Reader) Joseph Camp, Professor of Philosophy Danielle Macbeth, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Haverford College (Outside Reader) Kenneth Manders, Associate Professor of Philosophy Gerald Massey, Distinguished Service Professor of Philosophy ii WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO SAY THAT LOGIC IS FORMAL? John Gordon MacFarlane, PhD University of Pittsburgh, 2000 Much philosophy of logic is shaped, explicitly or implicitly, by the thought that logic is distinctively formal and abstracts from material content. The distinction between formal and material does not appear to coincide with the more familiar contrasts between a pri- ori and empirical, necessary and contingent, analytic and synthetic—indeed, it is often invoked to explain these. Nor, it turns out, can it be explained by appeal to schematic inference patterns, syntactic rules, or grammar. What does it mean, then, to say that logic is distinctively formal? Three things: logic is said to be formal (or “topic-neutral”) (1) in the sense that it provides constitutive norms for thought as such, (2) in the sense that it is indifferent to the particular identities of objects, and (3) in the sense that it abstracts entirely from the semantic content of thought.
    [Show full text]
  • Logic in Philosophy of Mathematics
    Logic in Philosophy of Mathematics Hannes Leitgeb 1 What is Philosophy of Mathematics? Philosophers have been fascinated by mathematics right from the beginning of philosophy, and it is easy to see why: The subject matter of mathematics| numbers, geometrical figures, calculation procedures, functions, sets, and so on|seems to be abstract, that is, not in space or time and not anything to which we could get access by any causal means. Still mathematicians seem to be able to justify theorems about numbers, geometrical figures, calcula- tion procedures, functions, and sets in the strictest possible sense, by giving mathematical proofs for these theorems. How is this possible? Can we actu- ally justify mathematics in this way? What exactly is a proof? What do we even mean when we say things like `The less-than relation for natural num- bers (non-negative integers) is transitive' or `there exists a function on the real numbers which is continuous but nowhere differentiable'? Under what conditions are such statements true or false? Are all statements that are formulated in some mathematical language true or false, and is every true mathematical statement necessarily true? Are there mathematical truths which mathematicians could not prove even if they had unlimited time and economical resources? What do mathematical entities have in common with everyday objects such as chairs or the moon, and how do they differ from them? Or do they exist at all? Do we need to commit ourselves to the existence of mathematical entities when we do mathematics? Which role does mathematics play in our modern scientific theories, and does the em- pirical support of scientific theories translate into empirical support of the mathematical parts of these theories? Questions like these are among the many fascinating questions that get asked by philosophers of mathematics, and as it turned out, much of the progress on these questions in the last century is due to the development of modern mathematical and philosophical logic.
    [Show full text]
  • Fourteen Arguments in Favor of a Formalist Philosophy of Real
    Baltic J. Modern Computing, Vol. 3 (2015), No. 1, pp. 1–15 Fourteen Arguments in Favour of a Formalist Philosophy of Real Mathematics Karlis PODNIEKS University of Latvia, Rain¸a bulvaris¯ 19, Riga, LV-1586, Latvia [email protected] Abstract. The formalist philosophy of mathematics (in its purest, most extreme version) is widely regarded as a “discredited position”. This pure and extreme version of formalism is called by some authors “game formalism”, because it is alleged to represent mathematics as a meaning- less game with strings of symbols. Nevertheless, I would like to draw attention to some arguments in favour of game formalism as an appropriate philosophy of real mathematics. For the most part, these arguments have not yet been used or were neglected in past discussions. Keywords: foundations of mathematics, philosophy of real mathematics, formalism, platonism, consistency, inconsistency 1 Introduction The formalist philosophy of mathematics (in its purest, most extreme version) is widely regarded as a “discredited and hopeless position”. This pure and extreme version of for- malism is called by some authors “game formalism”, because it is alleged to represent mathematics as a meaningless game with strings of symbols (for references, see the account by A. Weir (2011)). Nevertheless, I would like to draw attention to some arguments in favour of game formalism as an appropriate philosophy of real mathematics. For the most part, these arguments have not yet been used or were neglected in past discussions. 2 Carl Johannes Thomae as Founder of Game Formalism The idea of the game formalist foundations of mathematics can be traced to 1898 when Carl Johannes Thomae stated in his book: “The formal conception of numbers..
    [Show full text]
  • The Semantics of Grammar Formalisms Seen As Computer Languages
    The semantics of grammar formalisms seen as computer languages The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Fernando C. N. Pereira and Stuart M. Shieber. The semantics of grammar formalisms seen as computer languages. In Proceedings of the Tenth International Conference on Computational Linguistics, pages 123-129, Stanford University, Stanford, California, July 2-6 1984. Published Version http://dx.doi.org/10.3115/980491.980518 Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:2309658 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA The Semantics of Grammar Formalisms Seen as Computer Languages Fernando C. N. Pereira and Stuart M. Shieber Artificial Intelligence Center SRI International and Center for the Study of Language and Information Stanford University Abstract a declarative semantics z extended in the natural way from the declarative semantics of context-free grammars. The design, implementation, and use of grammar for- The last point deserves amplification. Context-free ma]isms for natural language have constituted a major grammars possess an obvious declarative semantics in branch of coml)utational linguistics throughout its devel- which nonterminals represent sets of strings and rules rep- opment. By viewing grammar formalisms as just a spe- resent n-ary relations over strings. This is brought out by cial ease of computer languages, we can take advantage of the reinterpretation familiar from formal language theory the machinery of denotational semantics to provide a pre- of context-free grammars as polynomials over concatena- cise specification of their meaning.
    [Show full text]
  • Why Has Aesthetic Formalism Fallen on Hard Times? David E.W
    University of North Florida UNF Digital Commons Philosophy Faculty Publications Department of Philosophy Fall 2010 Why Has Aesthetic Formalism Fallen on Hard Times? David E.W. Fenner University of North Florida, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.unf.edu/aphi_facpub Part of the Esthetics Commons Recommended Citation Fenner, David E.W., "Why Has Aesthetic Formalism Fallen on Hard Times?" (2010). Philosophy Faculty Publications. 2. http://digitalcommons.unf.edu/aphi_facpub/2 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Philosophy at UNF Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of UNF Digital Commons. For more information, please contact Digital Projects. © Fall 2010 All Rights Reserved Why Has Aesthetic Formalism Fallen on Hard Times? David E. W. Fenner University of North Florida 1. Introduction Nick Zangwill has done more than any person recently to resuscitate aesthetic formalism.1 I say ―resuscitate‖ because formalism has not been in favor for several decades. Zangwill writes that ―Aesthetic Formalism has fallen on hard times. At best it receives unsympathetic discussion and swift rejection. At worse it is the object of abuse and derision.‖2 The reasons many today believe aesthetic formalism is not viable have been the subject of discussion since the pendulum swing away from New Criticism, via the work of William Wimsatt, Cleanth Brooks, Clement Greenberg, André Levinson, and Heinrich Wolfflin. Most of these reasons have been discussed thoroughly, and those that I will review here that have been discussed I will spend little time reconsidering.
    [Show full text]
  • Curry's Formalism As Structuralism∗
    Curry’s Formalism as Structuralism∗ Jonathan P. Seldin Department of Mathematics and Computer Science University of Lethbridge Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada [email protected] http://www.cs.uleth.ca/ seldin ∼ September 8, 2005 Abstract In 1939, Curry proposed a philosophy of mathematics he called formalism. He made this proposal in two works originally written in 1939. These are the two philosophical works for which Curry is known, and they have left a false impression of his views. In this article, I propose to clarify Curry’s views by referring to some of his later writings on the subject. I claim that Curry’s philosophy was not what is now usually called formalism, but is really a form of structuralism. 1 Curry’s early philosophy of mathematics In [2], which is a shortened form of the original manuscript of [4], Curry proposed a philosophy of mathematics he called formalism. These two works, which represent Curry’s views in 1939, early in his career, are often the only works by which Curry’s philosophical ideas are known; see, for example, [15, Chapter 6, 5], where [4] is mistakenly identified as a mature work. § ∗This work was supported in part by a grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. 1 In these early works, Curry proposed defining mathematics as the science of formal systems. For some writers on the philosophy of mathematics, formalism seems to mean that all mathematics can be interpreted inside a formal system. See, for example, [9].1 But this was not Curry’s view. In [4, p.
    [Show full text]