This self-contained introduction to natural language semantics addresses the major theoretical questions in the field. The authors introduce the systematic study of linguistic meaning through a sequence of formal tools and their linguistic applications. Starting with propositional connectives and truth conditions, the book moves to quantification and binding, intensionality and tense, and so on.

System requirements:

- Apple Macintosh with a 68040 or better processor; Power Macintosh (PPC) recommended

- 16MB of free RAM (20MB recommended)

- approximately 25MB of free hard drive sapce

- 256 color, 640x480 pixel monitor or better

- MacOS System 7.5 or later

- QuickTime 3.0 or later

Optional:

- PlainTalk microphone (for voice recording)

- Macintosh text-to-speech (TTS) software

Throughout the history of ideas, various branches of philosophy have spun off into the natural sciences, including physics, biology, and perhaps most recently, cognitive psychology. A central theme of this collection is that the philosophy of language, at least a core portion of it, has matured to the point where it is now being spun off into linguistic theory. Each section of the book contains historical (twentieth-century) readings and, where available, recent attempts to apply the resources of contemporary linguistic theory to the problems under discussion.

Language and Problems of Knowledge is Noam Chomsky's most accessible statement on the nature, origins, and current concerns of the field of linguistics. He frames the lectures with four fundamental questions: What do we know when we are able to speak and understand a language? How is this knowledge acquired? How do we use this knowledge? What are the physical mechanisms involved in the representation, acquisition, and use of this knowledge?