Argument-structure templates

The activity template's subject, with volition, sentience, movement and independent existence. Transitive activities like hit add causation at the class level via root-contributed objects.

The achievement template's subject, which moves, exists independently and undergoes a change of state. The movement entailment fits directed-motion achievements (arrive) but overgeneralizes to non-motion achievements (recognize, notice), whose subjects are sentient rather than moving; those pattern with the psych-state templates.

The accomplishment template's subject is a full proto-agent, the whole agent cluster: volition, sentience, causation, movement and independent existence. Dowty confirms it at the class level: the primary transitive verbs of Dowty 1991 (35) (build, write, murder, eat, wash) have subjects with "volition, sentience, causation, and movement" and no Proto-Patient entailments (p. 577); independent existence is the parenthesized (27e).

The accomplishment template's object, a result patient that changes state and is causally affected. Dowty confirms it at the class level: the (35) objects have "change, causally affected" (p. 577); the remaining Proto-Patient entailments are hedged there as "(mostly) incremental theme, stationary, dependent existence", so incremental themes (eat, build) add IT per class or per verb — not all accomplishment objects measure the event.

An experiencer is sentient with respect to the event but neither volitional nor causal (Dowty 1991 (38)), and exists independently, by Dowty's generalization that every verb entailing any of (27a–d) also entails the existence of its subject (p. 573).

A stimulus causes the experience without being sentient with respect to it (Dowty 1991 (38)).

The object of the surface-contact classes is contacted but not changed, causally affected and stationary without a change of state. Dowty 1991 attributes no change of state to the objects of the hit class ((64 III)), and Beavers 2011 (60c) gives impact verbs only potential for change.

A created object changes state, is an incremental theme, is causally affected and does not exist before the event (Dowty 1991 (30e)(i)).

A consumed object is like a created one but exists before the event.

In manner contact a full agent acts on an object it contacts without changing it. Manner verbs lack result entailments (Beavers & Koontz-Garboden 2020).

In self-propelled motion the subject moves but causes no change in another participant, and there is no object.

In perception the subject is a sentient, independently existing experiencer, neither volitional nor causal.

Stimulus-experiencer psych verbs (Levin 31.1, the amuse verbs; Belletti & Rizzi 1988) have a causal stimulus as subject and an experiencer as object, the mirror image of psychState.

Experiencer-subject psych verbs (Levin 31.2, the admire verbs admire, like, love, fear, envy) have a sentient experiencer as subject and a causing stimulus as object (Dowty 1991 (38)). They are the mirror image of psychCausal, the tie in argument selection behind the like/please doublets (§8.3). Unlike the want verbs of desire, their subjects are entailed to be sentient.

Desire verbs (Levin 32.1, covet, crave, desire, need, want) entail only the independent existence of their subject. Dowty 1991 (29e) John needs a new car is among the "verbs that entail subject existence but have none of (a)–(d)" (p. 573), so there is no entailment of sentience, unlike the admire class (this situation needs a solution). The object is de dicto or nonspecific, and so exists dependently ((30e)).

Commercial transfer of possession (buy, sell) has a volitional agent as subject without entailed movement, since "both buyer and seller must act agentively (voluntarily)" (Dowty 1991 §3.2). Buyer and seller have identical profiles, the tie behind the buy/sell doublet (§8.3). There is no object profile, Dowty raising a "two Themes" worry about the goods and the currency (§3.2) and attributing no entailments to the object. The template does not extend to the verbs of obtaining at large: Dowty counts get and receive, whose subjects need not act or even be sentient (The play got a good review), among the exceptions to argument selection (§8.4).

The manner subclass of the wipe verbs (Levin 10.4.1, wipe, scrub, sweep, rub, wash) has a subject that only moves and exists independently, underspecified for volition, so that agentivity is resolved pragmatically (Rappaport Hovav & Levin 1998 on sweep, which Dowty 1991 does not discuss). The object is contacted without an entailed change.

The instrument subclass of the wipe verbs (Levin 10.4.2, brush, comb, mop, vacuum) lexicalizes an instrument, which forces an obligatory volitional agent as subject; Rappaport Hovav & Levin 1998's canonical realization rule pairs instrument constants such as brush, hammer, saw, shovel with the activity template.

In unaccusative directed motion the subject moves and changes location.

Disappearance verbs (Levin 48.2, die, disappear, expire, perish, vanish) have a sole argument that changes state, is causally affected and exists dependently, since the effected argument "will not exist after the event" (Dowty 1991 (30e)(i)).