Event

An event is something that happens at a certain time and place, in a certain possible world.

When we use human language, we're not just stating abstract mathematical truths. More often, we're describing events that exist in the world around us.

Toaq follows Davidsonian event semantics: we model a claim like Nủo jí as meaning $\exists e:{\textsf {sleep}}_{w}(e,{\textsf {me}})$ (in world w, there is an event e in which I sleep).

Davidsonian event semantics

The Davidsonian idea is to give predicates like nuo an implicit slot for the sleeping-event, and for declarative sentences to claim the existence of such events.

This gives a nice semantics for type I adverbial adjuncts, called Predicate Modification by Toaqists:

Nủo jí nìe kúa
$\exists e:{\textsf {sleep}}_{w}(e,{\textsf {me}})\color {green}\wedge {\textsf {inside}}_{w}(e,{\textsf {room}})$

So, our model of adverbials is that they give us a way to make claims about the implicit event variable e.

Neo-Davidsonian event semantics

The "neo-" idea is due to Parsons (1990): we further break up predicate statement claims into claims about thematic role participation.

Nỏaq jí kúe nìe kúa
Davidsonian: $\exists e:{\textsf {read}}_{w}(e,{\textsf {me}},{\textsf {book}})\wedge {\textsf {inside}}_{w}(e,{\textsf {room}})$
Neo-Davidsonian: $\exists e:{\textsf {read}}_{w}(e)\wedge {\textbf {Actor}}(e,{\textsf {me}})\wedge {\textbf {Theme}}(e,{\textsf {book}})\wedge {\textbf {Location}}(e,{\textsf {room}})$