Jaume Solà i Pujols - Departament de Filologia Catalana ...

allow null objects in a way Modern English does not. Rizzi claims that such null objects are pro:
(128) a. Questo conduce pro a concludere quanto segue
This leads to conclude what follows
b. This leads *(people) to conclude the following
See Rizzi (1986) for an explanation of how such a pro is licenced. One appeal of Rizzi's
characterization of the facts is that it predicts an interesting correlation: languages allowing null
objects as in 0.a) also allow null expletives as in 0.a); languages not allowing null objects (as
English, see 0.b)) do not allow null expletives either (see 0.b):
(129) a. Gianni ritiene pro probabile che Mario venga
b. John considers *(it) probable that Peter comes
Early Modern English (until the XVIIIth century) allowed both null objects and null
expletives, so the correlation is highly plausible, as it holds of as closely related languages as
early Modern English and present Modern English.
In the light of these facts, then, we conclude that:
- there-expletives are an exclusive property of (some) non-NSLs.
- it-expletives are universally available. They are null in contexts where null
pronominals are allowed.
With the above assumptions, we can address the problem of CPs and obligatory Case
for I-subjects: whenever a CP is coindexed with AGR, there must be an I-subject to which AGR
provides Case. Since the CP itself cannot be assigned Case, it will have the option of being
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