The main goal of this paper is to argue for an ellipsis analysis of Japanese null arguments
on the basis of a novel observation that covert extraction (i.e. extraction that does not
affect word order) is possible out of them. Specifically, assuming that the extraction
possibility is a diagnostic for surface anaphora/ellipsis, I claim that the covert extraction
possibility indicates that Japanese null arguments can be elliptic: they cannot be
uniformly silent deep anaphora/proforms. Furthermore, I show that there is an
overt/covert extraction asymmetry in that only covert extraction is allowed out of
Japanese null arguments. I argue that the LF-copy analysis of argument ellipsis provides a
solution for the overt/covert extraction asymmetry. The discussion in the paper also has
consequences for the proper analysis of several phenomena of Japanese syntax, including
wh-in-situ.