In the literature on nominal tautologies, it is assumed that common knowledge is a crucial ingredient for their interpretation. This paper explores a different approach: we argue that invoking shared knowledge is at the same time too strict and too vague as a condition for the understanding of tautologies in context. More specifically, we claim that, on the one hand, the hearer's previous knowledge about some specific set of properties of the entity referred to in the tautology is not always necessary: lack of previous knowledge can be repaired by accommodating new assumptions or compensated by providing additional explicit content in discourse. On the other hand, the hearer's previous knowledge about some specific set of properties of the entity referred to in the tautology is not always sufficient: only permanent, classificatory properties can be evoked by a tautology; transitory states, by contrast, are systematically rejected, even if they constitute shared knowledge and are supported by the context. We provide evidence for our claims both from the corpus study, analysing examples of tautologies with proper names from COCA and web-based sources, and experimental study designed as a verification task, additionally measuring reaction times for replying to a given question.

在关于名词重言式的文献中，假设常识是解释它们的关键因素。本文探讨了一种不同的方法：我们认为，作为在上下文中理解重言式的条件，调用共享知识同时过于严格和模糊。更具体地说，我们声称，一方面，听者先前关于重言式中提到的实体的某些特定属性集的知识并不总是必要的：先前知识的缺乏可以通过适应新假设来弥补，或者通过提供话语中的额外明确内容。另一方面，听者先前关于重言式中所指实体的某些特定属性集的知识并不总是足够的：只有永久的，重言式可以唤起分类属性；相比之下，过渡状态被系统地拒绝，即使它们构成共享知识并得到背景的支持。我们从语料库研究中为我们的主张提供证据，分析来自 COCA 和基于网络的资源的专有名称的重言式示例，以及设计为验证任务的实验研究，另外测量回答给定问题的反应时间。