Quantificational Variability Effects with Plural Definites

Abstract

In this paper we give evidence that Quantificational Variability Effects (Berman (1991)) in sentences containing plural definites come about as an indirect effect of quantification over sum eventualities. Evidence for this claim comes from the fact that those sentences – in contrast to minimally varying sentences where the Q-adverb has been replaced by a quantificational determiner – have to obey two newly observed constraints in order to get QV-readings. We show that those constraints can be explained if an analysis that is based on Nakanishi/Romero’s (2004) analysis of the Q-adverb for the most part is combined with the results of Endriss/Hinterwimmer (to appear), where we offer an explanation for similar constraints in adverbially quantified sentences that contain singular indefinites.