Functional constraints in knowledge-based natural language understanding
Lars Ahrenberg · 1988
Many knowledge-based systems of semantic interpretation rely explicitly or implicitly on an assumption of structural isomorphy between syntactic and semantic objects, handling exceptions by ad hoc measures. In this paper I argue that constraint equations of the kind used in the LFG- (or PATR-) fomalisms provide a more general, and yet restricted formalism in which not only isomorphic correspondences are expressible, but also many cases of non-isomorphic correspondences. I illustrate with treatments of idioms, speech act interpretation and discourse pragmatics.