From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!hellgate.utah.edu!lanl!cochiti.lanl.gov!jlg Wed Sep 16 21:22:44 EDT 1992
Article 6860 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: jlg@cochiti.lanl.gov (Jim Giles)
Subject: Re: missing verbs
Message-ID: <1992Sep10.180152.12137@newshost.lanl.gov>
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Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory
References: <1992Sep9.162211.11503@lmpsbbs.comm.mot.com> <1992Sep9.230021.5182@news.media.mit.edu> <BILL.92Sep9232609@ca3.nsma.arizona.edu> <1992Sep10.124516.3594@uwm.edu>
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 18:01:52 GMT
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In article <1992Sep10.124516.3594@uwm.edu>, markh@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Mark) writes:
|> In article <BILL.92Sep9232609@ca3.nsma.arizona.edu> bill@nsma.arizona.edu (Bill Skaggs) writes:
|> >Anyway, English (and other languages) are full of curious asymmetries.
|> >For example, it's okay to say "The bicycle is next to the house", but
|> >it's not okay to say "The house is next to the bicycle", though
|> >logically they ought to mean the same thing.
|> 
|> Logically, "the bicycle is next to the house" means "the bicycle was put next
|> to the house", and "the house is next to the bicycle" means "the house was put
|> next to the bicycle."

No.  "The bicycle is next to the house" merely specifies the location of
the bicycle.  "The house is next to the bicycle" similarly specifies the
location of the house.  Nothing in either sentence specifies any action
of "putting" anything anywhere.  The latter sounds strange only because 
of the common sense information, that we all share, that houses are 
generally larger and more visible than bicycles, so it's generally 
unproductive to specify the location of a house in terms of a bicycle.  
However, there's nothing ungrammatical about either statement, and their 
semantics are both perfectly reasonable.

In a particular context, it may be quite reasonable to say "the house 
is next to the bicycle."  For example, if the bicycle is in plain view
and the house is obscured by intervening foliage or other objects. In
such a context, the statement would probably be used naturally - with
neither the speaker, nor the listener thinking it the least unusual.

In any case, you began with a discussion about active vs. passive
voice in the concept of "defeated" (a transitive verb), and now
you're arguing over a simple locative.  The concepts involved are
quite different.

-- 
J. Giles


