Compositional Semantics With Lexicalized Tree-Adjoining Grammar (LTAG): How Much Underspecification is Necessary?

Let us consider a possible implication of the lexicalization of grammatical structures and the localization of dependencies (especially the predicate- argument relationships) that are central features of LTAG. Consider the elementary trees in the LTAG in Figure 1.. The tree corresponding to John likes peanuts passionately is derived by starting with the elementary tree for likes and then substituting the trees for John and peanuts at the respective nodes of the tree α1 and adjoining the tree for passionately at the VP node of the tree α1. The derivation tree in Figure 1. shows this derivation. If both substitution and adjoining are described as attachment of one tree to another tree, then the entire derivation consists of a set of attachments.