Mandarin verbs

The Mandarin clause-embedding predicates the studies of Qing and Uegaki, of Glass, of Wang and of Liu and Yip consume: the preferential attitudes qīdài 'look forward to', dānxīn 'worry', xīwàng 'hope' and hàipà 'fear', the doxastic yǐwéi 'think, wrongly' and rènwéi 'think', the factives zhīdào 'know' and hòuhuǐ 'regret', the inchoative kāishǐ 'start', and the control and causative predicates xiǎng 'want', ràng 'let', xiāngxìn 'believe', quàn 'urge', bī 'force', dǎsuàn 'plan' and shèfǎ 'try'. Mandarin is isolating, so a verb carries no inflectional fields; an entry adds its characters to the root entry, whose form is the pinyin.

Main definitions

• Mandarin.Verb: a Mandarin verb, the root Verb with its characters.
• Mandarin.verbs: the inventory of the entries.

References

• [Gla25]
• [QOR+25]
• [Wan25a]
• [LY26]

structure Mandarin.Verbextends Verb : Type

A Mandarin verb: the cross-linguistic core with the pinyin as citation form, plus its characters. Mandarin being isolating, the verb has no inflectional fields.

• valency : Valency
• voiceType : Option VoiceType
• passivizable : Bool
• perfectAuxiliaries : Finset PerfectAuxiliary
• vendlerClass : Option Aspect.VendlerClass
• scaleDimension : Option Degree.ScalarDimension
• scalePolarity : Polarity
• direction : Option Spatial.Path.Direction
• incrementality : Option Aspect.Incrementality
• phasal : Option Aspect.Phasal
• factivity : Option Presupposition.Factivity
• implicative : NaturalLogic.ImplicationSignature
• opaqueContext : Bool
• attitude : Option _root_.Attitude
• readings : List Reading
• complementSig : Option NaturalLogic.Signature
• levinClasses : Finset ArgumentStructure.LevinClass
• levinExcluded : Finset ArgumentStructure.LevinClass
• root : Semantics.Root
• morphs : List Morphology.Morph
• speechActVerb : Bool
• senseTag : SenseTag
• hanzi : String

  The characters.

def Mandarin.instBEqVerb.beq : Verb → Verb → Bool

Equations

• Mandarin.instBEqVerb.beq { toVerb := a, hanzi := a_1 } { toVerb := b, hanzi := b_1 } = (a == b && a_1 == b_1)
• Mandarin.instBEqVerb.beq x✝¹ x✝ = false

@[instance_reducible]

instance Mandarin.instBEqVerb : BEq Verb

Equations

• Mandarin.instBEqVerb = { beq := Mandarin.instBEqVerb.beq }

def Mandarin.qidai : Verb

期待 qīdài 'look forward to' is a positive preferential attitude that takes questions.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.danxin : Verb

担心 dānxīn 'worry' is a negative preferential attitude.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.xiwang : Verb

希望 xīwàng 'hope' is a positive preferential attitude that takes no questions.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.haipa : Verb

害怕 hàipà 'fear' is a negative preferential attitude that takes questions.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.yiwei : Verb

以为 yǐwéi 'be under the impression that' is a nonveridical doxastic attitude.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.renwei : Verb

认为 rènwéi 'think, hold the view that' is the neutral nonveridical doxastic verb.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.zhidao : Verb

知道 zhīdào 'know', presupposing its complement and asserting belief in it; rènwéi is its non-factive counterpart.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.houhui : Verb

后悔 hòuhuǐ 'regret', the emotive factive.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.kaishi : Verb

开始 kāishǐ 'start', presupposing that the action or state was not under way before.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

Control and causative predicates

The entries record the surface form and whether the complement is finite. The sizes and the dynamicity of the complements each predicate selects are the analysis of Liu and Yip and live in Studies/LiuYip2026.lean.

def Mandarin.xiang : Verb

想 xiǎng 'want' is a desiderative verb with a nonfinite complement.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.rang : Verb

让 ràng 'let' is a manipulative verb with a nonfinite complement.

Equations

• Mandarin.rang = { valency := Verb.Valency.ofFrame ArgumentFrame.infinitival, passivizable := false, morphs := [Morphology.Morph.root "ràng"], hanzi := "让" }

def Mandarin.xiangxin : Verb

相信 xiāngxìn 'believe' is a propositional attitude verb with a finite complement.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.quan : Verb

劝 quàn 'urge' is a manipulative verb with a nonfinite complement.

Equations

• Mandarin.quan = { valency := Verb.Valency.ofFrame ArgumentFrame.infinitival, morphs := [Morphology.Morph.root "quàn"], hanzi := "劝" }

def Mandarin.bi : Verb

逼 bī 'force' is a manipulative verb with a nonfinite complement.

Equations

• Mandarin.bi = { valency := Verb.Valency.ofFrame ArgumentFrame.infinitival, morphs := [Morphology.Morph.root "bī"], hanzi := "逼" }

def Mandarin.dasuan : Verb

打算 dǎsuàn 'plan' is a desiderative verb with a nonfinite complement.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Mandarin.shefa : Verb

设法 shèfǎ 'try' is an achievement verb with a nonfinite complement.

Equations

• Mandarin.shefa = { valency := Verb.Valency.ofFrame ArgumentFrame.infinitival, passivizable := false, morphs := [Morphology.Morph.root "shèfǎ"], hanzi := "设法" }

def Mandarin.verbs : List Verb

The verb inventory.

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.