Ability, actuality, and implicativity

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter brings the implicative approach to actuality inferences to bear on the original problem of ability ascriptions (selective) actualisation. It argues for an implicative approach to the structure of ability ascriptions, suggesting that ability ascriptions stand in the same relationship to (lexically-specific) dynamic enough predicates as implicative manage has with respect to lexically-specific implicative verbs. The chapter examines the consequences of a causal implicative structure for ability for its interpretation under grammatical aspects and negation, and evaluates the implicative approach with respect to a number of outstanding questions about ability. It concludes by suggesting a number of avenues for continued investigation, including an extension of the analysis to teleological and goal-oriented constructions, a route to integration with the premise semantics approach to ability, and a number of questions in the linguistic representation of causers and (intentional) agents.