Re: RT list: inference in encoding?

Hi everyone,

Thanks a lot for your comments. What I am thinking now is: it seems that
there are two kinds of inferences speakers (writers) make at the level of
production: (a) inferences related to the assumptions they want to make and
how they correspond to their own abilities and preferences (which is part of
the RT comprehension procedure); and (b) inferences related to the speaker's
assumptions about the hearer's cognitive environment (as Thornstein
explains) which would also include the assumptions Billy talks about
('*assumptions
not only about which assumptions will be manifest to addressees but also
about what addressees will do when presented with the evidence provided by
their utterances'* )
The question is, does any one kind of inferences have primacy over the
other? In other words, in analysing specific examples, can we say that in
choosing a particular linguistic form (say, a referring expression) the
speaker has achieved a certain cognitive effect (a certain implicated
conclusion for example) because he has made a set of inferences of one
specific kind? Another question is, as far as speakers (or writers) are
concerned, do they make a conscious decision about which kind of inferences
they will let to prevail?

On the other hand, in regards to the chicken-and-egg questions Ernst-August
asks, isn't it in effect asking Why do people communicate? I think the
layman's explanation would be "to convey certain assumptions", but the
technical explanation would add "which extends the mutual cognitive
environment"..

Mai

On 1/23/09, Billy Clark <B.Clark@mdx.ac.uk> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> Just butting in a bit on the discussion which Mai's message started.
> Mai's question, about how communicators choose which linguistic form to
> use, is closely connected to the question I asked on behalf of myself
> and Nicky, about the inferences writers make when choosing what to
> write. Ernst-August makes some useful comments which show he's thinking
> along similar lines to us. We also think that there's a sense in which
> the communicator's inferential task is more complex than the
> interpreter's. Quoting ourselves (in an abstract we just submitted),
> 'Communicators need to make assumptions not only about which assumptions
> will be manifest to addressees but also about what addressees will do
> when presented with the evidence provided by their utterances'.
>
> We're focusing particularly on writing partly because there's quite a
> lot of informal discussion among writers about these inferences (even
> though they don't always recognise this explicitly) and partly because
> of our interest in applying these ideas in teaching.
>
> We're aware of work on production in general, but there seems to be very
> little specifically on the inferences made by communicators, which makes
> us a bit nervous that we're missing something. One source we are
> referring to, of course, is Ernst-August's work on translation, which
> has a lot to say about all of this.
>
> So do let us know if you come across anything else you think we should
> know about.
>
> Thanks and best wishes,
>
> Billy
>
>
>
>
>
Received on Fri Jan 23 11:38:13 2009