Abstraction and Underspeciication in Semantic Transfer Gehh Ort Zum Antragsabschnitt: 12.4 Kontextuelle Constraints

ion and Underspeci cation in Semantic Transfer Bernd Abb Bianka Buschbeck-Wolf Christel Tschernitschek Institute for Logic and Linguistics IBM Informationssysteme GmbH Report 112 April 1996 April 1996 Bernd Abb Bianka Buschbeck-Wolf Christel Tschernitschek IBM Informationssysteme GmbH Institut f ur Logik und Linguistik Vangerowstr. 18 69115 Heidelberg Tel.: (06221) 59 4900 Fax: (06221) 59 3200 e-mail: fabb;bianka;[email protected] Geh ort zum Antragsabschnitt: 12.4 Kontextuelle Constraints 12.6  Aquivalentwahl Die vorliegende Arbeit wurde im Rahmen des Verbundvorhabens Verbmobil vom Bundesministeriumf ur Bildung, Wissenschaft, Forschung und Technologie (BMBF) unter dem Forderkennzeichen 01 IV 101 G gef ordert. Die Verantwortung f ur den Inhalt dieser Arbeit liegt bei den Autoren. Abstract This paper introduces the semantic transfer approach MinT (Minimal Transfer) that has been developed in the speech-to-speech MT system verbmobil. As a uni cation-based and lexicalist semantic transfer model, it relies on some central ideas of the MRS-based transfer approach outlined in [Copestake et al., 1995]. It di ers, however, from the latter in certain aspects: in MinT, the idea of abstraction and underspeci cation is worked out in much more detail and has been applied to a variety of translation phenomena. MinT relates SL and TL semantic descriptions on a maximally abstract level, which results in simultaneously decreasing the number of transfer rules and leaving a considerable amount of options for lexicalization and grammaticalization up to the generator. To preserve ambiguities that hold across the involved languages MinT processes underspeci ed semantic representations.This paper introduces the semantic transfer approach MinT (Minimal Transfer) that has been developed in the speech-to-speech MT system verbmobil. As a uni cation-based and lexicalist semantic transfer model, it relies on some central ideas of the MRS-based transfer approach outlined in [Copestake et al., 1995]. It di ers, however, from the latter in certain aspects: in MinT, the idea of abstraction and underspeci cation is worked out in much more detail and has been applied to a variety of translation phenomena. MinT relates SL and TL semantic descriptions on a maximally abstract level, which results in simultaneously decreasing the number of transfer rules and leaving a considerable amount of options for lexicalization and grammaticalization up to the generator. To preserve ambiguities that hold across the involved languages MinT processes underspeci ed semantic representations.