ARGUMENT LINKING IN DERIVED NOMINALS 419a performance object. With Type CACTs like investigation (cf. 65d), the
delimiting y argument, as the focus of the ACT, may be treated as a PAT
U if by virtue of the activity having been completed, the activity as a whole
may be interpreted as coming into being as a performance object.
Of particular interest with the Table 2 group of nominals is the fact that
with the ACM subsets, the U cannot be interpretationally deleted from
vNPs which include a topical NP. That is, in nominals including an argu
ment in the LDP, if the U is not overtly included in the vNP as a direct
argument or as the topical NP, itself, it must be interpretationally included
in the meaning of the vN on a result reading. With the Type nominals,
this last option is not available: the U cannot be incorporated into the
meaning of the result nominal. Thus, for example, whereas a Type CACM
result-vN either names the equivalent of the PAT (cf. 66a) or names an
instantiation of the PAT (cf. 66b), a Type result-vN names something
quite different from the PAT (cf. 66c).
(66) a. The light bulb I the invention was displayed at the World's Fair.
{invention = the thing invented)
b. The poem/the translation is exquisite, (translation = an
instantiation of the thing translated)
The destruction/the city was widespread, (destruction Φ the
thing, or an instantiation of the thing destroyed)
As a consequence of being unable to incorporate the U into the meaning of
the vN, Type nominals can include the U in the vNP only as a direct argu
ment or as a topical NP. This means that in the absence of the U direct
argument, the topical NP can only be interpreted as the PAT U.
(67) a. the enemy'sA =u destruction
b. the enemy'sA destruction of the cityU dir _arg
In distinction to the Type and Type CACM nominals, the Type CACT
nominals need not include the "U" (i.e. the delimiting argument treated as
an U) in nominals having a topical NP but lacking a direct argument. As
ACTs, these vNs do not have an argument in their LSs which is linked to
the U via the Α-U Hierarchy. Rather, it is the pragmatically-permitted per
formance-object interpretation in the vNP which induces the "PAT-U"
interpretation (cf. 65d). Consequently, as is true of most vNs which take
neither a PAT nor an EXP U, but which include an ACT component in
their LSs, Type CACT A's may function topically in vNPs lacking a direct
argument: