Talk:Polarity item

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A conditional also licenses "any", doesn't it? I.e. "if you have any overdue library books, turn them in this weekend and pay no fee." Ledelste (talk) 18:00, 14 July 2010 (UTC)


 * "Any" is actually licensed in many constructions, including conditionals.


 * Questions: Does John have any milk?
 * "only": Only John needs anyway.
 * "every": Everyone who ate anything bought something.


 * There is also a form of "any" that appears in constructions like the following. These kinds of "any" are considered distinct from the above (so-called "Free choice any"):


 * Modal: Anybody can do it.
 * Modified: Anything that wasn't eaten was discarded.


 * The article should probably be updated to reflect this.


 * joo-yoon (talk) 00:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Conditionals and some other licensing contexts for NPI are mentioned. See also veridicality for more examples. --X-Man (talk) 22:15, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Licensed ?
This article might have some chance of meaning something to people who are not already expert linguists, if only it gave some idea of what it meant by 'licensed' ! --195.137.93.171 (talk) 10:55, 24 September 2011 (UTC)


 * I think the meaning of licensed is clear from the intro section. If it's not, would you propose creating a separate article for the notion of licensing, or expanding/rewriting the intro to clarify the meaning of the word? --X-Man (talk) 22:16, 14 December 2011 (UTC)