Yoad Winter - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Yoad Winter
Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics, 2007
We propose an enhanced Part-of-Speech (POS) tagger of Semitic languages that treats Modern Standa... more We propose an enhanced Part-of-Speech (POS) tagger of Semitic languages that treats Modern Standard Arabic (hence- forth Arabic) and Modern Hebrew (henceforth Hebrew) using the same probabilistic model and architectural set- ting. We start out by porting an existing Hidden Markov Model POS tagger for Hebrew to Arabic by exchanging a mor- phological analyzer for Hebrew with Buckwalter's (2002) morphological
This paper proposes a new approach to the interpretation of reciprocal expressions using the Stro... more This paper proposes a new approach to the interpretation of reciprocal expressions using the Strongest Meaning Hypothesis of Dalrymple et al. (1998). We propose a sys- tem in which reciprocal meanings are derived directly from semantic restrictions using the SMH, and characterize this derivation process. We present methods to construct a linguistic test for the availability of a reciprocal meaning,
IntroductionThe distinction between syntactic and semantic techniques in linguistic theory isby n... more IntroductionThe distinction between syntactic and semantic techniques in linguistic theory isby now sufficiently clear. What is often debated is the extent to which syntacticand semantic considerations should be used in analyzing a given phenomenon.An empirical domain where the division of labour between syntax and semanticsis especially problematic is the case of "non-overt" scope, or what I prefer tocall the scopal
this paper is to contribute for bridging this gap.We refine and extend the proposal in Zwarts (19... more this paper is to contribute for bridging this gap.We refine and extend the proposal in Zwarts (1995), arguing for a vectorspace as the underlying ontology in the compositional analysis of locative PP structures.In section 2 we introduce a general semantic framework that uses such amodel. Section 3 studies some denotational properties of prepositions in the proposedsystem. Certain properties introduced in
this paper it is argued that the Boolean assumption is too strong inone point: the lexical connec... more this paper it is argued that the Boolean assumption is too strong inone point: the lexical connection it makes between conjunctive coordinators like
this paper I treat conditionals using material implication, ignoring the well-known semantic/prag... more this paper I treat conditionals using material implication, ignoring the well-known semantic/pragmatic problemsconcerning their correct interpretation. Of course, one may doubt whether (7a), which is verified by any situation in which there isone woman who did not come to the party, reflects correctly the wide scope reading of the indefinite in (7). Obviously, this problemis independent of the scope problem
Proceedings of the 24th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval - SIGIR '01, 2001
Proceedings of the ACL Workshop on Computational Approaches to Semitic Languages - Semitic '05, 2005
Journal of Logic, Language and Information, 2000
Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 2007
This paper concentrates on the syntax and semantics of bare nominals in Germanic and Romance lang... more This paper concentrates on the syntax and semantics of bare nominals in Germanic and Romance languages. These languages do not normally allow nominals to occur without an article. However, some syntactic configurations, including predicative constructions, supplementives and some prepositional phrases, allow bareness of certain nominals. We argue that bare nominals in these constructions refer to capacities: professions, religions, nationalities or
Natural Language Engineering, 2008
Words in Semitic texts often consist of a concatenation of word segments, each correspond- ing to... more Words in Semitic texts often consist of a concatenation of word segments, each correspond- ing to a Part-of-Speech (POS) category. Semitic words may be ambiguous with regard to their segmentation as well as to the POS tags assigned to each segment. When designing POS taggers for Semitic languages, a major architectural decision concerns the choice of the atomic input tokens
This paper describes the process of building the first tree-bank for Modern Hebrew texts. A major... more This paper describes the process of building the first tree-bank for Modern Hebrew texts. A major concern in this process is the need for reducing the cost of manual annotation by the use of automatic means. To this end, the joint utility of an automatic morphological ana- lyzer, a probabilistic parser and a small manually annotated tree-bank was explored. An
IntroductionTwo general paradigms have influenced the study of nominals since the middle eighties... more IntroductionTwo general paradigms have influenced the study of nominals since the middle eighties. According tothe syntactic DP hypothesis of Abney (1987), the syntactic unit that had formerly been known as nounphrase should in fact be analyzed as a phrase headed by a determiner, hence the label DP. Figure 1 givesa simple version of the DP hypothesis, without deciding here about
This paper argues that multiple coordinations like tall, thin and happy are interpreted in a &quo... more This paper argues that multiple coordinations like tall, thin and happy are interpreted in a "flat" iterative process, but using "nested" recursive application of binary coordination operators in the compositional meaning derivation. Ample motivation for flat interpre- tation is shown by contrasting such coordinations with nested, syntactically ambiguous, coordinate structures like tall and thin and happy. However, new evidence coming
Political Theory - POLIT THEORY, 2007
Natural language interface to spatial databases have not received a lot of attention in computati... more Natural language interface to spatial databases have not received a lot of attention in computational linguistics, in spite of the potential value of such systems for users of Geographical Information Systems (GISs). This paper presents a controlled language for GIS queries, solves some of the semantic problems for spatial inference in this language, and introduces a system that implements this controlled language as a novel interface for GIS.
Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics, 2007
We propose an enhanced Part-of-Speech (POS) tagger of Semitic languages that treats Modern Standa... more We propose an enhanced Part-of-Speech (POS) tagger of Semitic languages that treats Modern Standard Arabic (hence- forth Arabic) and Modern Hebrew (henceforth Hebrew) using the same probabilistic model and architectural set- ting. We start out by porting an existing Hidden Markov Model POS tagger for Hebrew to Arabic by exchanging a mor- phological analyzer for Hebrew with Buckwalter's (2002) morphological
This paper proposes a new approach to the interpretation of reciprocal expressions using the Stro... more This paper proposes a new approach to the interpretation of reciprocal expressions using the Strongest Meaning Hypothesis of Dalrymple et al. (1998). We propose a sys- tem in which reciprocal meanings are derived directly from semantic restrictions using the SMH, and characterize this derivation process. We present methods to construct a linguistic test for the availability of a reciprocal meaning,
IntroductionThe distinction between syntactic and semantic techniques in linguistic theory isby n... more IntroductionThe distinction between syntactic and semantic techniques in linguistic theory isby now sufficiently clear. What is often debated is the extent to which syntacticand semantic considerations should be used in analyzing a given phenomenon.An empirical domain where the division of labour between syntax and semanticsis especially problematic is the case of "non-overt" scope, or what I prefer tocall the scopal
this paper is to contribute for bridging this gap.We refine and extend the proposal in Zwarts (19... more this paper is to contribute for bridging this gap.We refine and extend the proposal in Zwarts (1995), arguing for a vectorspace as the underlying ontology in the compositional analysis of locative PP structures.In section 2 we introduce a general semantic framework that uses such amodel. Section 3 studies some denotational properties of prepositions in the proposedsystem. Certain properties introduced in
this paper it is argued that the Boolean assumption is too strong inone point: the lexical connec... more this paper it is argued that the Boolean assumption is too strong inone point: the lexical connection it makes between conjunctive coordinators like
this paper I treat conditionals using material implication, ignoring the well-known semantic/prag... more this paper I treat conditionals using material implication, ignoring the well-known semantic/pragmatic problemsconcerning their correct interpretation. Of course, one may doubt whether (7a), which is verified by any situation in which there isone woman who did not come to the party, reflects correctly the wide scope reading of the indefinite in (7). Obviously, this problemis independent of the scope problem
Proceedings of the 24th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval - SIGIR '01, 2001
Proceedings of the ACL Workshop on Computational Approaches to Semitic Languages - Semitic '05, 2005
Journal of Logic, Language and Information, 2000
Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 2007
This paper concentrates on the syntax and semantics of bare nominals in Germanic and Romance lang... more This paper concentrates on the syntax and semantics of bare nominals in Germanic and Romance languages. These languages do not normally allow nominals to occur without an article. However, some syntactic configurations, including predicative constructions, supplementives and some prepositional phrases, allow bareness of certain nominals. We argue that bare nominals in these constructions refer to capacities: professions, religions, nationalities or
Natural Language Engineering, 2008
Words in Semitic texts often consist of a concatenation of word segments, each correspond- ing to... more Words in Semitic texts often consist of a concatenation of word segments, each correspond- ing to a Part-of-Speech (POS) category. Semitic words may be ambiguous with regard to their segmentation as well as to the POS tags assigned to each segment. When designing POS taggers for Semitic languages, a major architectural decision concerns the choice of the atomic input tokens
This paper describes the process of building the first tree-bank for Modern Hebrew texts. A major... more This paper describes the process of building the first tree-bank for Modern Hebrew texts. A major concern in this process is the need for reducing the cost of manual annotation by the use of automatic means. To this end, the joint utility of an automatic morphological ana- lyzer, a probabilistic parser and a small manually annotated tree-bank was explored. An
IntroductionTwo general paradigms have influenced the study of nominals since the middle eighties... more IntroductionTwo general paradigms have influenced the study of nominals since the middle eighties. According tothe syntactic DP hypothesis of Abney (1987), the syntactic unit that had formerly been known as nounphrase should in fact be analyzed as a phrase headed by a determiner, hence the label DP. Figure 1 givesa simple version of the DP hypothesis, without deciding here about
This paper argues that multiple coordinations like tall, thin and happy are interpreted in a &quo... more This paper argues that multiple coordinations like tall, thin and happy are interpreted in a "flat" iterative process, but using "nested" recursive application of binary coordination operators in the compositional meaning derivation. Ample motivation for flat interpre- tation is shown by contrasting such coordinations with nested, syntactically ambiguous, coordinate structures like tall and thin and happy. However, new evidence coming
Political Theory - POLIT THEORY, 2007
Natural language interface to spatial databases have not received a lot of attention in computati... more Natural language interface to spatial databases have not received a lot of attention in computational linguistics, in spite of the potential value of such systems for users of Geographical Information Systems (GISs). This paper presents a controlled language for GIS queries, solves some of the semantic problems for spatial inference in this language, and introduces a system that implements this controlled language as a novel interface for GIS.