If the adjective is based on a multidimensional domain, the situation
becomes more complex. In general the comparative means “closer
to the prototype for the adjective”: Greener means closer to the green
prototype in colour space, healthier means lower value on some of the
dimensions involved in illness.
Nouns refer to things and verbs say something about what happens
to things. So why are there adjectives in language?7 Firstly, an adjective
can be used as a specifi cation of a noun (or noun phrase) that helps
in identifying a referent. For example, if you want somebody to fetch
you a particular book and there are several books present in the context,
you specify it further by saying “the green book” or “the big book.”
In addition to this kind of “element identifi cation”, Frännhag (2010)
also considers “kind identifi cation”. For example, you may request “a
thick book” when you want something to put on a chair for a child to sit
on, but it does not matter which book is delivered.8 Here, the goal is not
a particular object, but something that has a desired property.