Polar, overlapping and equipollent non-complementary antonyms in standard Arabic

This paper investigates non-complementary antonyms in Standard Arabic in concord with recent denotational theories. Therefore, it builds on first order logic to check how these antonyms are contextualized in Arabic discourse. Accordingly, it has been assumed that the lexical meaning manipulated by these antonyms must express some true and untrue values at the logical level when they are used for debates or arguments. To draw these values, the antonym meaning relations and linguistic properties of the predicate and its arguments are all calculated. It has been found that Standard Arabic tends to use three types of non-complementary opposites: Polar, overlapping and equipollent. Arguments are often carried out by the positive as well as the negative pair parts of the polar antonyms to convey more realistic meaning relations. Debates are also manipulated by the negative pair part of the overlapping antonym, as this pair part helps draw a real meaning value. Exceptionally, Arabic also tends to use certain terms, such as good and not good to evaluate the argument done on the negative overlapping pair part. Arguments are inclusively carried out on the positive pair part of the equipollent antonym, though the negative part also helps draw a true meaning value. In some debates, the positive pair part of the equipollent antonym switches to the negative part which is tagged with another synonym functioning as an evaluative element.