Semantics: a coursebook, second edition

U N I T   5
Predicates
47
Feedback
(2) in (3) between (4) stink (5) red (6) genius
Comment The words we have just isolated from their original sentences we call the
predicators of those sentences.
Definition  The PREDICATOR of a simple declarative sentence is the word (sometimes a 
(partial) group of words) which does not belong to any of the referring expressions
and which, of the remainder, makes the most speci
fic contribution to the
meaning of the sentence. Intuitively speaking, the predicator describes the
state or process in which the referring expressions are involved.
Example asleep is the predicator in Mummy is asleep and describes the state Mummy is
in.
love is the predicator in The white man loved the Indian maiden and describes
the process in which the two referring expressions the white man and the
Indian maiden are involved.
wait for is the predicator in Jimmy was waiting for the downtown bus and
describes the process involving Jimmy and the downtown bus.
Comment Note that some of the elements that we have stripped away in isolating the
predicator of a sentence do carry a certain amount of meaning. Thus the
indicators of past and present tense are clearly meaningful. The semantics of
tense is interesting, but its contribution to the meaning of a sentence is of a
di
fferent type from the contribution made by the predicator, and will not be
pursued here. Notice also that the verb be in its various forms (is, was, are, were,
am) is not the predicator in any example sentence that we have seen so far.
Practice Strip away referring expressions and the verb be (and possibly other
elements) to identify the predicators in the following sentences:
(1) I am hungry
(2) Joe is in San Francisco
(3) The Mayor is a crook
(4) The man who lives at number 10 Lee Crescent is whimsical
(5) The Royal Scottish Museum is behind Old College
Feedback
(1) hungry (2) in (3) crook (4) whimsical (5) behind
Comment The predicators in sentences can be of various parts of speech: adjectives (red,
asleep, hungry, whimsical), verbs (write, stink, place), prepositions (in, between,
behind), and nouns (crook, genius). Despite the obvious syntactic di
fferences
between these di
fferent types of words, semantically they all share the property
of being able to function as the predicators of sentences. Words of other parts
of speech, such as conjunctions (and, but, or) and articles (the, a), cannot serve
as predicators in sentences.

PA RT  T WO
From reference . . .
48
The semantic analysis of simple declarative sentences reveals two major
semantic roles played by di
fferent subparts of the sentence. These are the role
of predicator, illustrated above, and the role(s) of argument(s), played by the
referring expression(s).
Example Juan is Argentinian
predicator: Argentinian, argument: Juan
Juan arrested Pablo
predicator: arrest, arguments: Juan, Pablo
Juan took Pablo to Rio
predicator: take, arguments: Juan, Pablo, Rio
Practice In the following sentences, indicate the predicators and arguments as in the
above examples:
(1) Dennis is a menace
predicator: ......................................
argument(s): ..............................
(2) Fred showed Jane his BMW
Predicator: ......................................
argument(s): ..............................
(3) Donald is proud of his family
predicator: ......................................
argument(s): ..............................
(4) The hospital is outside the city
predicator: ......................................
argument(s): ..............................
Feedback
(1) pred: menace, arg: Dennis (2) pred: show, args: Fred, Jane, his BMW
(3) pred: proud, args: Donald, his family (4) pred: outside, args: the hospital,
the city
Comment The semantic analysis of a sentence into predicator and argument(s) does
not correspond in most cases to the traditional grammatical analysis of a
sentence into subject and predicate, although there is some overlap between
the semantic and the grammatical analyses, as can be seen from the examples
above. We shall be concerned almost exclusively in this book with the
semantic analysis of sentences, and so will not make use of the notion
‘grammatical predicate (phrase)’. But we will use the term ‘predicate’ in a
semantic sense, to be de
fined below, developed within Logic.
Definition A PREDICATE is any word (or sequence of words) which (in a given single
sense) can function as the predicator of a sentence.
Example hungry, in, crook, asleep, hit, show, bottle, are all predicates; and, or, but, not,
are not predicates.
Practice Are the following predicates?
(1) dusty
Yes / No
(2) drink
Yes / No

U N I T   5
Predicates
49
(3) woman
Yes / No
(4) you
Yes / No
(5) Fred
Yes / No
(6) about
Yes / No
Feedback
(1) Yes (2) Yes (3) Yes (4) No (5) No (6) Yes
Comment The de
finition of ‘predicate’ above contained two parenthesized conditions.
The 
first, ‘(or sequence of words)’, is intended to take care of examples like
wait for, in front of, which are longer than one word, but which it seems
sensible to analyse as single predicates.
The second parenthesized condition, ‘(in a given single sense)’, is more
important, and illustrates a degree of abstractness in the notion of a
predicate. A ‘word’, as we use the term, can be ambiguous, i.e. can have more
than one sense, but we use ‘predicate’ in a way which does not allow a
predicate to be ambiguous. A predicate can have only one sense. Normally,
the context in which we use a word will make clear what sense (what
predicate) we have in mind, but occasionally, we shall resort to the use of
subscripts on words to distinguish between di
fferent predicates. (We do this
especially in Unit 16 ‘About dictionaries’.)
Example The word bank has (at least) two senses. Accordingly, we might speak of the
predicates bank
1
and bank
2
.
Similarly, we might distinguish between the predicates man
1
(noun) 

human being, man
2
(noun) 
 male adult human being, and man
3
(transitive
verb) as in The crew manned the lifeboats.
Comment Notice that ‘predicate’ and ‘predicator’ are terms of quite di
fferent sorts.
The term ‘predicate’ identi
fies elements in the language system,
independently of particular example sentences. Thus, it would make sense
to envisage a list of the predicates of English, as included, say, in a
dictionary. The term ‘predicator’ identi
fies the semantic role played by a

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