Givenness as a Ranking Criterion in Centering Theory: Evidence from Yapese

2004 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 49-72 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keira Gebbie Ballantyne
Keyword(s):  
Ranking Criterion ◽  
Centering Theory

Sacrificing the Patrol: Utilitarianism, Future Generations and Infinity

1997 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 159-174 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luc Van Liedekerke ◽  
Luc Lauwers
Keyword(s):  
Decision Criterion ◽  
Moral Community ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Original Position ◽  
Distant Future ◽  
Ethical Foundation ◽  
Future People ◽  
Ranking Criterion ◽  
Average Utility

Many people believe that we have responsibility towards the distant future, but exactly how far this responsibility reaches and how we can find a reasonable ethical foundation for it has not been answered in any definitive manner. Future people have no power over us, they form no part of our moral community and it is unclear how we can represent them in a possible original position. All these problems can be circumvented when you take an impersonal decision criterion like maximizing total or average utility. Such a sum-ranking criterion is neutral with respect to distance in time or space: my utility, my neighbour's and that of our descendants all carry the same weight. This makes future people an integral part of present decisions. Time-neutrality was defended by, among others, Sidgwick, Pigou and Ramsey.

scholarly journals A Reformulation of Rule 2 of Centering Theory

2001 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 579-587 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rodger Kibble
Keyword(s):  
Preference Ordering ◽  
Context Dependent ◽  
New Formulation ◽  
Centering Theory ◽  
Natural Way

The standard preference ordering on the well-known centering transitions Continue, Retain, Shift is argued to be unmotivated: a partial, context-dependent ordering emerges from the interaction between principles dubbed cohesion (maintaining the same center of attention) and salience (realizing the center of attention as the most prominent NP). A new formulation of Rule 2 of centering theory is proposed that incorporates these principles as well as a streamlined version of Strube and Hahn's (1999) notion of cheapness. It is argued that this formulation provides a natural way to handle “topic switches” that appear to violate the canonical preference ordering.

Contextually appropriate reference generation

2002 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
ÖZGÜR YÜKSEL ◽  
CEM BOZSAHIN
Keyword(s):  
Binding Theory ◽  
Centering Theory

We describe a system for contextually appropriate anaphor and pronoun generation for Turkish. It uses binding theory and centering theory to model local and nonlocal references. We describe the rules for Turkish, and their computational treatment. A cascaded method for anaphor and pronoun generation is proposed for handling pro-drop and discourse constraints on pronominalization. The system has been tested as a stand-alone nominal expression generator, and also as a reference planning component of a transfer-based MT system.

scholarly journals Centering Theory, transitions and referent marking in the corpus of the written Serbian language

2015 ◽  
Vol 71 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 69-87
Author(s):  
Radoslava Trnavac
Keyword(s):  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Previous Literature ◽  
Complex Sentence ◽  
Minimal Form ◽  
Local Coherence ◽  
Centering Theory ◽  
Type Of Transition ◽  
Written Corpus ◽  
The Way ◽  
Newspaper Articles

The aim of the paper is to map various types of anaphor to the centering transitions in the corpus of Serbian newspaper articles. Centering Theory (WALKER, JOSHI ET AL. 1998) is a theory of local coherence in which four types of transitions are used as parameters of coherence. As is hypothesized in the previous literature based on various languages, the CONTINUE transition is mostly characterized by a minimal form (a zero form of the topic), while the SMOOTH and ROUGH shifts are found with a full noun phrase topic. The analysis shows that the ?Ordering Rule? of Centering Theory is not fully followed in the written corpus of the Serbian language since SMOOTH SHIFT has been identified as a prevalent type of transition in the corpus. The following two reasons were identified for that: (1) the genre of the newspaper articles, and (2) the way clauses are combined within a complex sentence in the Serbian written corpus.

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