Poetry

THE HAS RELATION
We are going to see the ways of describing the complexity of something call the has relation. The “things” denoted by some nouns have parts, which
may figure in the nouns’ meaning. For example, a square has four equal
sides and it has 90° angles, and in saying what a square is, one cannot avoid
talking about its four sides and right angles. Grouping the figures circles,triangles and squares,belong together as shapes. In semantic terms
to be introduced below, square, circle and triangle are hyponyms of the
superordinate word shape.

The everyday words square, circle and triangle are also technical terms
in geometry, for example, a closed, straight-sided figure is a triangle if, and only if, it has exactly three sides.
This underpins entailments such as: Thatfigure is a triangle ⇒ That
figure has three sides. For many words, however, we can only be sure that all
the parts are there if the has-relation is stated in terms of prototypes.

Prototypes are clear, central members of the denotation of a word.
Think of what you might advise a child drawing a face to put in:
probably eyes, a nose and a mouth. How about a child drawing a house?Probably you would expect there to be a roof, a door (or doors) and
windows. Prototypes among the things denoted by the English word face
have eyes, a nose and a mouth. The face of a Cyclops, with its single eye,
is a face, but it is not a prototype face. I have seen a windowless house (the
Black House of Arnol, on the Isle of Lewis). It is incontestably a house,
but it is not a house.

Aprototype face has two eyes.
A prototype face has a nose.
A prototype face has a mouth.
A prototype house has a roof.
A prototype house has a door.
A prototype house has windows

Of course that prototype faces and houses may have other parts besides
those listed few seconds ago , for example cheeks and a chin (for faces), perhaps a bedroom and kitchen (for houses).
Restricted to prototypes,the has-relation makes available entailments.

Pragmatic inferences from the has-relation

The has-relation, restricted to prototypes, is the basis for some of our
pragmatic expectations in language use.
A noun phrase that first brings something into a conversation is usually indefinite (for example, marked by means of an indefinite article, a or an), but on second and subsequent mention ofthe same thing in the conversation it will be referred to by means of a definite noun phrase (marked by, for example, the definite article the), as
in a. A: “I’ve bought a house.” B: “Where’s the house?” (not:
“Where’s a house?”)
b. C: (a child showing off a drawing): “I drawed a face.” D:
(responding to the child and commenting on the drawing):
“I like the face you drew.” (not: “I like aface you drew.”)
However, if a whole that has a part has been mentioned, then the part
can, on first mention, be referred to by means of a definite noun phrase,
as illustrated by the use of the in the responses of B and D in (3.4a, b).
(3.4) a. A: “I’ve bought a house.” B: “I hope the roof doesn’t leak.”
b. C: “I drawed a face.” D: “Where’s the nose?”

PARTS CAN HAVE PARTS

Furthermore,the same kind of part can belong to different kinds of whole, a given kerb need not be part of a street; it could be part of an off-street parking lot.
Spatial parts
A prototype thing, such as a rock, can be said to have a top, a bottom (or
base), sides and a front and back. Two points need to be noted about these
words. One is that they are general: very many different kinds of thing –windows, heads, faces, feet, buses, trees, canyons, to randomly name just a
few – have tops, bottoms, sides, fronts and backs. In Section 3.2 this will be
explained in terms of a thing having spatial parts, making the possession
of such parts characteristic of prototypes in the thing-category. The other
notable feature of spatial part words is that they are often deictic.
Pragmatics enters the...