LINGUISTIC ASPECT OF MODALITY IN MODERN MATH DISCOURSE IN ENGLISH

Abstract

The article reveals linguistic aspect of modality in modern math discourse in English, critically outlines a number of actual problematic issues in the area, such as the distinction between epistemic modality and evidentiality marked by formal logics philosophical grounding. General reference to previous scholarly activity in math modality research proves that it is largely based on propositional aspects of meaning. The math text corpus analysis aims to extract a set of modalities that are indispensable for formulating modal deductive reasoning. However, from a linguistic perspective academic math discourse requires natural language premise selection in the processes of mathematical reasoning and argumentation. It is presumed that two different self-attention cognition layers are focused at the same time on the proper classical symbolic logic and mathematical elements (formal language), while the other attends to natural language. Defining the semantic meanings of math discourse modality markers involves the interpretation phase. Thus, objectivity is generally associated with evidential adverbs which are markers of the evidence verification concerning the speaker’s assessment of the truth value of the proposition. Modal auxiliaries of high, medium and low modality, semimodal verbs and conditionals involve ascribing a justification value in the set of possible logical inference making. The formal logical structure of mathematical reasoning explains the non-intuitive possibility of a deductive proof. It has been grounded that a linguistic category of modality in math discourse indispensably presupposes the universal truth of knowledge, high level of logical formalization in propositional verification status, formulaic nature of the argumentation, i.e. synthesis of hypothetical preconditions, theoretical knowledge and subjectivity of reasoning leading to a new hypothesis verification and visual exemplification of the empirical deductive processes in particular by linguistic means of modality expression.