Scripts and Reference

Schank's scripts[Schank, R. C. and Abelson, R. P., Scripts, Plans, Goals, and Understanding, Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1977.] can be seen as memory triggers that bring into focus the objects that may be referenced in later sentences: 


   John went to a restaurant.
   The waiter ...
In order to understand the definite reference the waiter, the reader must be prepared to see such a reference. Conceptually, a script implements something like:
&forall x Restaurant(x) &rarr &exist w Waiter(w) &and &exist z Food(z) &and ...
These newly created objects can then be related to the things mentioned in later sentences.

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