Scalar Implicatures, Polarity Phenomena, and the Syntax/Pragmatics Interface

Abstract Negative polarity phenomena, as exemplified in the behavior of English any, and scalar implicatures, as exemplified by, say, the interpretations of some (i.e., “at least one and possibly all” vs. “at least one but not all”), have often been felt to be closely related. However, the exact nature of such a relationship remains as of now not fully understood, insofar as I can tell. And in fact, some important empirical generalizations pertaining to it, if not altogether missed, have perhaps not been properly appreciated. In this chapter, I address the issue of what are the relevant factual connections between scalar implicature and negative polarity and what we can learn from this about the grammatical…