Negation × Temporal Connective Interaction Data #
@cite{giannakidou-2002} @cite{greco-2020} @cite{rett-2026} @cite{jin-koenig-2021}
Theory-neutral empirical data on the interaction between negation and temporal connectives, focusing on:
The two-until hypothesis: Greek lexicalizes the distinction between NPI-until (= ¬before) and durative until.
Expletive negation: before-clauses license truth- conditionally vacuous negation cross-linguistically, explained by ambidirectionality.
Key Empirical Generalizations #
- Greek prin (πριν, 'before') requires subjunctive; mexri (μέχρι, 'until') requires indicative. This mood distinction tracks veridicality.
- Mexri requires imperfective/stative main clause; prin has no aspect restriction. This mirrors Karttunen's durative selectional restriction.
- Expletive negation (EN) in before-clauses is attested in 50 of 74 EN-attesting languages (722 surveyed). EN is NOT attested in after-clauses.
- Italian: prima che non (before + EN), finché non (until + EN). French: avant que ne (before + EN).
Whether a temporal connective entails that the main-clause event actually occurred at the boundary time.
entailment: actualization is part of the assertion — cancellation yields contradiction (@cite{giannakidou-2002}, ex. 38).implicature: actualization is a Q-implicature — cancellable (@cite{giannakidou-2002}, ex. 7: "Sure, the princess slept until midnight. In fact she only woke up at 2am.").none: no actualization inference at all (@cite{giannakidou-2002}, ex. 72–73: prin/before is compatible with the complement event never occurring).
- entailment : ActualizationStatus
- implicature : ActualizationStatus
- none : ActualizationStatus
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A judgment about the two-until distinction, encoding @cite{giannakidou-2002}'s cross-linguistic evidence.
semanticType classifies connectives into three groups:
- before-type (non-veridical, NPI-licensing, no durative restriction)
- endpoint-type (veridical, no NPI-licensing, durative restriction)
- eventive-type (requires anti-veridical trigger, actualization entailment)
Greek lexicalizes all three: prin (before-type), mexri (endpoint-type), para monon (eventive-type). English collapses eventive and before under the single lexeme until, disambiguated by negation context.
- language : String
Language
- form : String
Connective form
- semanticType : String
Semantic type: "before", "endpoint", or "eventive".
Required mood of complement (if applicable)
- requiresDE : Bool
Does it require a DE (downward-entailing) licensor?
- complementVeridical : Bool
Is the complement veridical?
- requiresDurativeMain : Bool
Does it restrict the main clause to durative aspect?
- licensesNPIs : Bool
Does it license NPIs in the complement?
- example_ : String
Example sentence
- actualizationStatus : ActualizationStatus
Does the connective entail actualization of a change-of-state event at the boundary time? This is the central distinction between NPI-until (entailment) and durative until (implicature).
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Greek prin (πριν): before-type. Requires subjunctive, does not require DE context (unlike English NPI-until or Greek para monon), non-veridical complement, licenses NPIs. No actualization entailment: prin is compatible with the complement event never occurring (@cite{giannakidou-2002}, §6, ex. (72): "I prigipisa dhen eftase prin apo ta mesanixta" — the princess may or may not have arrived). "Efije prin na erthi o Janis." 'She left before Janis came.'
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Greek mexri (μέχρι): endpoint-type. Requires indicative, veridical complement, requires imperfective/stative main clause, does NOT license NPIs. Actualization is a conversational implicature, not an entailment. "I Maria perimine mexri irthi o Janis." 'Maria waited until Janis came.'
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English NPI-until: eventive-type (@cite{giannakidou-2002}). Requires DE licensor (negation). Unlike Greek prin, English collapses both types under the single lexeme until, disambiguated by context.
Classified as "eventive" (not "before") because English NPI-until patterns with Greek para monon on all diagnostics: actualization is an entailment, a DE trigger is required, and there is no durative restriction on the main clause. Karttunen's logical form (NPI-until = ¬before) captures the truth conditions, but the phenomenological classification tracks the same semantic type as para monon.
"The princess didn't wake up until the prince kissed her."
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English durative until: endpoint-type. No DE requirement, veridical complement, durative main clause required. "John slept until 3pm."
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Greek para monon (παρά μονον, lit. 'but only'): eventive-type. The true NPI-until in Greek — lexically distinct from both mexri (durative until) and prin (before). Requires anti-veridical trigger (negation, 'without'). Entails actualization: the main-clause event occurred at the boundary time. Scalar (introduces a scale of contextually relevant times).
@cite{giannakidou-2002}, §3.2: para monon is incompatible with negated perfective eventives (ex. 35: I prigipisa dhen eftase para monon ta mesanixta) but compatible with perfective statives that shift to achievement reading (ex. 37: I prigipisa dhen (apo)kimithike para monon ta mesanixta = 'The princess didn't fall asleep until midnight').
Cancellation of actualization yields contradiction (ex. 38): '#I prigipisa dhen eftase para monon ta mesanixta. Dhen eftase kan ekino to vradi.' ('#The princess didn't arrive until midnight. She didn't even arrive that night.')
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The mood diagnostic: NPI-until type takes subjunctive (in languages with the distinction); durative until takes indicative.
The veridicality diagnostic: NPI-until is non-veridical; durative until is veridical.
The aspect diagnostic: durative until requires durative main clause; NPI-until has no such restriction.
The NPI licensing diagnostic: NPI-until (= ¬before) licenses NPIs; durative until does not.
All four diagnostics consistently distinguish the two types.
The actualization diagnostic: the three-way split.
- para monon / English NPI-until: actualization is an entailment
- mexri / English durative until: actualization is an implicature
- prin: no actualization at all
Para monon requires an anti-veridical trigger (negation, 'without'); mexri does not; prin does not. This distinguishes eventive-type from both endpoint-type and before-type.
Para monon patterns with English NPI-until on actualization and DE-requirement, confirming it is the Greek lexicalization of Karttunen's punctual until.
Para monon differs from prin on actualization: prin/before has no actualization, para monon entails it. This is the paper's central finding — NPI-until ≠ before on actualization status (@cite{giannakidou-2002}, §6).
The three Greek connectives are pairwise distinct on semantic type.
An attested instance of expletive negation (EN) in a temporal clause. EN is truth-conditionally vacuous: the sentence has the same truth conditions with or without the negative marker.
- language : String
Language
- connective : String
Temporal connective hosting EN
- formWithEN : String
Surface form with EN
- formWithoutEN : String
Surface form without EN (same truth conditions)
- obligatory : Bool
Is EN obligatory in this context?
- mannerImplicature : Bool
Does EN trigger a manner implicature ("much before")?
- example_ : String
Example sentence
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Italian prima che non — EN in before-clause. "Mario è partito prima che non arrivasse Gianni." 'Mario left before Gianni arrived.' EN is optional; triggers "well before" reading.
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Italian finché non — EN in until-clause. "Maria ha aspettato finché non è arrivato Gianni." 'Maria waited until Gianni arrived.' EN is often felt as obligatory in colloquial Italian.
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French avant que ne — EN in before-clause. "Jean est parti avant que Marie ne soit arrivée." 'Jean left before Marie arrived.' Historically obligatory in formal registers; now optional.
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Note: The ambidirectionality↔EN correspondence formalized here is
also verified (more comprehensively) in
Phenomena.Negation.Studies.Rett2026.rett_generalization
over the ENConstruction enum, which covers all six construction
types. The ENDistribution entries below provide the same
generalization over a subset (temporal connectives only).
EN is attested with before and until but NOT with after or when. This follows from ambidirectionality: before is ambidirectional (negating the complement doesn't change truth conditions), so EN is vacuous. After is NOT ambidirectional, so EN would change truth conditions (genuine negation, not expletive).
- connective : String
Connective
- enAttested : Bool
Is EN attested cross-linguistically?
- ambidirectional : Bool
Is the connective ambidirectional?
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EN is attested iff the connective is ambidirectional. This is the core empirical generalization: EN is licensed exactly in those environments where negation is truth-conditionally vacuous.
EN survey data (722 languages, 74 with EN, 37 genera) is defined
in Phenomena.Negation.Typology.enSurvey to avoid duplication.