Robert Levine (levine@ling.ohio-state.edu)
Fri, 16 Dec 94 13:18:52 EST
There are other examples to the same point. Consider This new kind of box was hard for me to persuade Leslie to retool her factory to produce__ which seems markedly better than comparable examples with human subjects: Robin was hard for me to persuade Leslie to get her parents to invite__ over for dinner. This strongly suggests a processing problem arising from the persuadability of the human subject and the impossibility of placing that subject into what would be the highest available complement slot, viz., the position immediately following _persuade_, given that this position is occupied by _Leslie_. Clearly no such conflict can arise when the subject is unpersuadable, as in the first example. There are other points involved and I don't really see how any approach which does not treat _tough_ constructions as UCDs can get them: (i) parasitic gaps: This book is tough to start reading__ without going on to finish__ (Similarly for _too/enough_) (ii) extractablility from NP-internal positions: Robin is easy to take bad pictures of__; unfortunately s/he just isn't very photogenic. I don't know what Grover's latest take on such constructions is; in earlier stuff I've seen of hers she just throws up her hands or denies the existence of the phenomena, which left me rather underwhelmed with her control-based alternative. Bob Levine Ohio State University
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