Re: Probability of Article Replacement?

Joe scripsit:

> I disagree.  I think that definite and specific are synonyms in this case.
Not really.  A reference is +specific if you can only discover the
referent by understanding what the speaker intended to refer to, -specific
otherwise.  "The men went into the room" is +specific for both references;
which men? which room? I don't know unless you tell me or the context of
the conversation makes it clear.  But "Some men went into a room" can
be understood without knowing which men or which room you intended to
refer to.

Definiteness has to do with whether the speaker expects the listener
to be able to identify the referent: +definite if so, -definite if not.
"Certain men went into a certain room" is +specific -definite; the speaker
knows which men and which room, but doesn't expect the listener to know.
The opposite case, -specific +definite, is pretty unusual, but can come
up in echo questions:

A: A man went into the room.
B: A man?  Which man?

When A says "A man" it is probably +specific -definite (or he would
have said "Some man"); when B says "A man" he doesn't know the referent
(so -specific) but assumes that A did (therefore +definite).

--
John Cowan           http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowan@ccil.org
To say that Bilbo's breath was taken away is no description at all.  There
are no words left to express his staggerment, since Men changed the language
that they learned of elves in the days when all the world was wonderful.
        --_The Hobbit_