I don't have time to reply fully to Bob's response, but let me just say this: if by 'meaning' you mean truth value, then the examples Bob gives are indeed synonymous. If, however, you have a more detailed idea of meaning, then the examples are not synonymous. Notice, for example, that the three Rush sentences would not be intoned in the same way. _One_ function of punctuation is to signal whatever it is that intonation signals in speech. Another thing is clausal relationship, which should differ across all three examples (and the movement possibilities suggest that this is the case). The relations between clauses that a speaker wishes to express are an aspect of meaning, otherwise we would never have a reason to prefer a semicolon over a period over a subordinate clause. The 'enjoy' and 'please' sentences can't mean the same thing, if you count focus as an aspect of meaning (functionalists do). The argument structure is, of course, reversed for the two verbs. Argument structure is also a part of meaning, in cognitive linguistics. I would bet that the two sentences would be found to occur in different discourse contexts. This turns out to be the case for a lot of supposedly synonomous constructions. Not noticing this comes from too heavy a focus on the sentence level of language. A lot of the difference between cognitive/functional and generative linguistics is in where the boundaries between components are drawn, whether or not full predictability is insisted upon, and whether you are satisfied to stop at a 'syntactic' explanation such as 'the syntactic properties of the verbs are different' (i.e., their argument structure is different; in generative ling. arg. structure is not a part of semantics; in cog/fxnl ling it is), or whether you go on to look for semantic stuff that underlies the syntactic behavior. Looking 'behind' the syntax to meaning and discourse DOES provide explanations. Bob, can you tell me why we can say 'John resembles his father' but not 'John is resembling his father'; and why 'Sue knows the answer'can have moment-of-speaking reference, while 'Sue builds a canoe' cannot? Happy New Year to all. I'm away for a few days at a conference now til Monday. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Johanna Rubba Assistant Professor, Linguistics ~ English Department, California Polytechnic State University ~ San Luis Obispo, CA 93407 ~ Tel. (805)-756-2184 E-mail: [log in to unmask] ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~