The main issue which Wechsler's approach aims to explain is the conditions under which the different resultative constructions can be used, in particular the semantic restrictedness of result phrases in control resultatives. This, however, is somewhat suspect when the idiosyncrasy of the resultative construction, as discussed in Section 4.3.3, is taken into consideration. We showed above (Section 4.4.2, example w21) that a verb which appears to specify a stative canonical end result can felicitously appear with a locative end result. That example therefore violates the predictions of Wechsler's account. In addition, the differences in acceptability between w8a-b and w8c-e and the contrast in w14 suggest that even the result phrase in a raising resultative is not totally unrestricted, as is argued by Wechsler. The conventionalised restrictions on the phenomenon creates difficulties for the general application of the semantic claims about the resultative construction which Wechsler makes. The result phrases in control resultatives do not seem to be consistently predictable on the basis of background knowledge, while those in raising resultatives must be somewhat constrained, at least by pragmatic factors.
Robert ran himself into the ground. Robert ran his shoes threadbare. *Robert ran himself into the shower. ?Robert ran his shoes to pieces. *Robert ran himself to pieces.
The audience laughed the speaker out of the room. *The audience laughed the speaker silly/embarrassed.