rules about rights to use and so forth.^185 If thefield feature is Ascription, X is just about anything and Y is a Property
or a Kind to which it belongs; this configuration invokes whatever inferences follow fro mthe ascribed Property or
Kind. If it is Scheduling, X is an Event and Y is a time period; the inferences concern the time at which there is an
opportunity to participate in the event.
BE(X,Y) is of theontologicalcategoryState:it is theconceptualization of a staticconfigurationthat can be localized at a
pointintime or throughout an intervalof time. Thisis thefunctionunderlying allthe“be”verbsin(13)–(16). Another
basic function is STAY(X,Y), which is just like BE except that it is of the ontological category Event: it is the
conceptualization of a static configuration being maintained over a period of time. This underlies verbs likestay,
maintain, andcontinue;for instance notice the difference betweenthe little star was beside a big starandthe little star stayed
beside a big star,STAYis a component of the“keep”verbs in (13)–(16).
Underlying thegoverbs in (13)–(16) is a functionGO(X,Y). In eachfield, X is as before, but Y is now a Path or
Trajectory, andGO(X,Y) is the conceptualization of the Event of X traversingY. One way to build a Path is illustrated
in (13)–(16): designate a beginning point (or Source), marked byfrom, and/or an endpoint (or Goal), marked byto.
Some early approaches such as Gruber (1965), Schank (1973), and Jackendoff (1976) recognized only this possibility.
However, particularly in the spatial domain, there are other possibilities. The simplest is to designate adirection: The
airplane went up/north/thataway. Another is to designate the shape of the trajectory, as inround and roundandzigzag.A
third way, for instancego along the river/past the house, does not say where motion started or ended, but specifies the
configuration of an intermediate point; I have called such Paths“Routes.”
Paths can have some of this structure in certain other semanticfields as well. For instance, in Ascription one can
specify a direction(The temperature went up)or an intermediate point(The temperature passed through 100 degrees on its way to
record heights). On the other hand, Possession is a discontinuous“space,”with no intermediate points between one
possessor and another: something can be halfway between two spatial locations A and B, but something cannot be
halfway between belonging to A and belonging to B. Thus, by virtue of the inference patterns having to do with
Possession, the only Paths in thisfield are Source–Goal Paths.
LEXICAL SEMANTICS 361
(^185) I glide over the distinction between ownership and merely temporary control, as when one borrows something. Both of these are distinct from“inalienable possession,”
which often uses the same vocabulary, as inThe house has a roof. The latter involves things having parts, bringing yet another set of inference rules into play.