In
formal semantics a responsive predicate is an embedding predicate which can take either a
declarative or an
interrogative
An interrogative clause is a clause whose form is typically associated with question-like meanings. For instance, the English sentence "Is Hannah sick?" has interrogative syntax which distinguishes it from its declarative counterpart "Hannah is ...
complement
A complement is something that completes something else.
Complement may refer specifically to:
The arts
* Complement (music), an interval that, when added to another, spans an octave
** Aggregate complementation, the separation of pitch-clas ...
. For instance, the
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ide ...
verb
A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descri ...
''know'' is responsive as shown by the following examples.
# Bill knows whether Mary left.
# Bill knows that Mary left.
Responsives are contrasted with ''rogatives'' such as ''wonder'' which can only take an interrogative complement and ''anti-rogatives'' such as ''believe'' which can only take a declarative complement.
# Bill wonders whether Mary left.
# *Bill wonders that Mary left.
# *Bill believes whether Mary left.
# Bill wonders that Mary left.
Some analyses have derived these distinctions from
type compatibility while others explain them in terms of particular properties of the embedding verbs and their complements.
See also
*
Embedded clause
A subordinate clause, dependent clause, subclause, or embedded clause is a clause that is embedded within a complex sentence. For instance, in the English sentence "I know that Bette is a dolphin", the clause "that Bette is a dolphin" occurs as th ...
*
Propositional attitude
A propositional attitude is a mental state held by an agent toward a proposition.
Linguistically, propositional attitudes are denoted by a verb (e.g. "believed") governing an embedded "that" clause, for example, 'Sally believed that she had won ...
*
Inquisitive semantics
Inquisitive semantics is a framework in logic and natural language semantics. In inquisitive semantics, the semantic content of a sentence captures both the information that the sentence conveys and the issue that it raises. The framework provides ...
*
Interrogative clause
An interrogative clause is a clause whose form is typically associated with question-like meanings. For instance, the English sentence "Is Hannah sick?" has interrogative syntax which distinguishes it from its declarative counterpart "Hannah is ...
*
Question
A question is an utterance which serves as a request for information. Questions are sometimes distinguished from interrogatives, which are the grammar, grammatical forms typically used to express them. Rhetorical questions, for instance, are inte ...
Notes
Semantics
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