In this study of how syntax relates to meaning, Paul Pietroski defends the hyposthesis that combining expressions corresponds to predicate-conjunction and not function-application. Chapters cover a range of constructions involving causative and serial verbs, plural noun-phrases, and complementizer phrases. The book represents a lucid contribution to the field by a leader of the new generation of philosopher-linguists.

In this study of how syntax relates to meaning, Paul Pietroski defends the hyposthesis that combining expressions corresponds to predicate-conjunction and not function-application. Chapters cover a range of constructions involving causative and serial verbs, plural noun-phrases, and complementizer phrases. The book represents a lucid contribution to the field by a leader of the new generation of philosopher-linguists.

Paul Pietroski presents an original philosophical theory of actions and their mental causes. We often act for reasons, deliberating and choosing among options, based on our beliefs and desires. But because bodily motions always have biochemical causes, it can seem that thinking and acting are biochemical processes. Pietroski argues that thoughts and deeds are in fact distinct from, though dependent on, underlying biochemical processes within persons.

Paul M. Pietroski presents an ambitious new account of human languages as generative procedures that respect substantive constraints. He argues that meanings are neither concepts nor extensions, and sentences do not have truth conditions; meanings are composable instructions for how to access and assemble concepts of a special sort.