Kennedy (Linguist Philos 30:1–45, 2007) forcefully proposes what is now a widely assumed semantics for absolute gradable adjectives. On this semantics, maximum standard adjectives like “straight” and “dry” ascribe a maximal degree of the underlying quantity. Meanwhile, minimum standard adjectives like “bent” and “wet” merely ascribe a non-zero, non-minimal degree of the underlying quantity. This theory clashes with the ordinary intuition that sentences like “The stick is straight” are frequently true while sentences like “The stick is bent” are frequently informative, and fans of the indicated theory of absolute gradable adjectives appeal to loose talk in response. One goal of this paper is to show that all extant theories of loose talk are inconsistent with this response strategy. Another goal is to offer a revised version of Hoek’s (Philos Rev 127:151–196, 2018, in: Proceedings of the 22nd Amsterdam Colloquium, 2019) recent theory of loose talk that accommodates absolute gradable adjectives after all, while being defensible against a range of important concerns.

Kennedy (Linguist Philos 30:1–45, 2007) 有力地提出了现在广泛假定的绝对可分级形容词的语义。在这个语义上，像“直”和“干”这样的最大标准形容词都赋予了底层数量的最大程度。与此同时，像“弯曲”和“湿”这样的最低标准形容词仅仅归因于基础数量的非零、非最小程度。这一理论与通常的直觉相冲突，即“棍子是直的”这样的句子通常是正确的，而“棍子是弯曲的”这样的句子通常提供信息，并且绝对可分级形容词理论的拥护者诉诸宽松的谈话作为回应。本文的一个目标是表明所有现存的散漫言论理论都与这一应对策略不一致。另一个目标是提供 Hoek（Philos Rev 127:151–196, 2018，in：第 22 届阿姆斯特丹学术讨论会记录，2019 年）最新的松散谈话理论的修订版，该理论毕竟容纳了绝对可分级的形容词，同时可以防御一系列重要问题。