ABSTRACT
Building on recent work of Chomsky (2013), this chapter has two central points. The first is that the composite operation Agree, employing both probe-goal search and feature-valuation, can be eliminated from the narrow syntax (NS), replaced with just (i) 3rd factor minimal search (independently necessary for labeling), and (ii) a certain natural conception of how features are interpreted at the interfaces. Consonant with the strong minimalist thesis, we attempt to simplify the NS, adopting only simplest Merge and the 3rd factor principle of minimal search. Our second point is that with a natural interpretation of how minimal search operates, not only is the theory simpler, but in fact it has greater empirical coverage, accounting for central properties of “multiple-specifier” phenomena in Japanese.
