The sources of presupposition:

literature review

Mandy Simons

Dept of Philosophy

Carnegie Mellon University

Grice 1981

“Presupposition and Conversational Implicature.” In P.Cole (ed.) Radical Pragmatics (NY: Academic Press).

• Attempt to derive the existence and uniqueness presupposition of definites as an implicature, assuming Russellian semantics.

Grice 1981

• Russell’s analysis

The F is G is true iff:

There is an x s.t.:i. x is Fii. nothing distinct from x is F andiii. x is G

i. is existence conditionii. is uniqueness condition

Grice 1981

“An implication that there is a king of France is often carried by saying [The king of France is not bald], but it is tempting to suggest that this implication is not, inescapably, part of the conventional force of the utterance, but is rather a matter of conversational implicature.”

• Reasons:• Cancellability• Nondetachability (?)

Grice 1981

• Reformulation of Russellian analysis:The king of France is bald =

i. There is at least one king of France & ii. There is not more than one king of France &iii. Nothing which is the king of France is not

bald.

• 3 separate clauses, each of which can be false independently of the others.

Grice 1981• Proposed sub-maxim of Manner:

• “Frame whatever you say in the form most suitable for any reply that would be regarded as appropriate” (or)

• “Facilitate in your form of expression the appropriate reply.”

• I.e. Formulate your utterance so it’s main point is clear?

• Grice’s strategy: Provide an argument that an utterance of the form “The F is G” would violate this maxim unless the speaker assumed that any denial would be a denial of the G-ness attribution.

• Why would speaker assume this?• Speaker believes existence and uniqueness conditions

are common ground or are uncontroversial.

Grice 1981

• Why would the existence and uniqueness claims typically have this status?• I think Grice’s argument here is confused, so I

won’t detail it.

• Presuppositionality of negated sentence:• Utterance of negation is equivalent to a

negative response to an utterance of the affirmative.

• So speaker must be making the same assumptions that would be made by a speaker uttering the affirmative.

Properties of the account

• Basic structure:• Observation that presuppositions are

entailments of the affirmative.• Provide a pragmatic argument that these particular

entailments must have presuppositional status in order for utterance to be conversationally appropriate.

• Account for presuppositions of the negation (and other embeddings) indirectly, via discourse relation to affirmative.

Stalnaker 1974 on know

Jane knows that Bill is in town.

• Stalnaker: this leaves unclear whether speaker’s main point is about Jane’s epistemic state or about Bill being in town.• So, cooperative speaker should utter this only

when one of these is already common ground.• Utterance will not be informative if main clause

proposition is common ground; so complement will always have presuppositional status.

Stalnaker 1974 on know: response

A: Why didn’t Jane invite Bill to the party?B: She thinks he’s left town.

A: Where is Bill these days?B: Jane thinks he’s left town.

• Main point differs depending on context.

• But no presuppositional effects.

Atlas and Levinson 1981

Jay Atlas and Stephen Levinson, “It-clefts, Informativeness and Logical Form: Radical Pragmatics (Revised Standard Version).” In P. Cole, Radical Pragmatics.

Summarized in Levinson 1983, Pragmatics. (CUP)

• Analysis of presuppositionality of it-clefts.

• Background ideas:• Input to inferential component is logical form

(structured proposition).• it-clefts have special logical forms

Atlas and Levinson 1981

1. It was John that Mary kissed.

2. λx(x=john)(γxKiss(mary,x))• (γxKiss(mary,x)) = “the group kissed by

Mary”• This is the logical subject of the sentence.• Formula predicates property of being identical

to John of this group.

• Entails that Mary kissed John, and also that Mary kissed only John.

Atlas and Levinson 1981

• Further assumptions:• The logical subject of a sentence is what the

sentence is “about”.• General pragmatic principle: If a sentence is

about t, then the existence or actuality of t can be assumed to be non-controversial or given, unless there are specific indications or assumptions to the contrary. (!)

• What is assumed to be given is not normally the main point of an utterance.

Account of affirmative it-clefts

It was John that Mary kissed.

Alleged presupposition: Mary kissed someone.

• Logical form entails that Mary kissed someone.

• Entailment is due to content of logical subject.

• Pragmatic principle states that this content is assumed to be given, and therefore not main point.

Hence this entailment is “backgrounded” and treated as “given” (i.e. presupposed).

Account of negative it-clefts

1. It wasn’t John who Mary kissed.

2. ¬(λx(x=john)(γxKiss(mary,x)))

3. λx(x≠john)(γxKiss(mary,x))

Claim: 1. interpreted as 3. by Principle of Informativeness (distinct from Quantity).

• If an utterance has multiple possible interpretations, assign to it the most informative one compatible with the common ground.

Account of negative it-clefts

• λx(x≠john)(γxKiss(mary,x))

• Logical subject remains outside scope of negation• So account of affirmative extends to the

negative.

Properties of the account

• Similarities to Grice’s proposal:• Based on particular assumption about logical

form. • So the pragmatic account is really a

semantics/pragmatics interface account.

• Invokes a highly specific pragmatic principle.

• One construction at a time…

• Presuppositionality identified with backgrounding, non-main point.

Cancellation and accommodation revisited

• Cancellation: on a conversational account, is just a case where the inference does not arise.

• Accommodation: simply a matter of accepting new information, not a matter of “fixing” a context which fails to license a particular utterance• But this is a consequence of the particular view

of what presupposition is, not of the conversational derivation.

Wilson and Sperber 1979• Approach: explain presupposition as an

interaction of semantic (conventional) and pragmatic (inferential) factors.

• Semantic innovation: Semantic representations include ordered sets of entailments. Linguistic features render particular sets salient.

• Pragmatics: Interpretation involves identifying the pragmatically most important entailments – the ones which determine the relevance of the utterance.

• Other entailments constitute the background, and are presupposed.

Ordered entailments

1. Bill annoyed Sam’s father.

a. Ex.Bill annoyed Sam’s x.b. Ex.Bill annoyed x.c. Ex.Bill annoyed x’s father. d. Ex.x annoyed Sam’s father.e. ER.Bill R Sam’s father.f. EP.P(Bill)

1⊢a-e, a⊢b,f, c⊢b,f, b⊢f, e⊢f

• Grammatically specified entailments: determined by replacing constituent with variable and existentially closing.

Bill annoyed Sam’s father

Ex.Bill annoyed Sam’s x.

Ex.Bill annoyed x’s father.

Ex.x annoyed Sam’s father

Ex.Bill annoyed x.

ER.Bill R Sam’s father.

EP.P(Bill)

Selecting a focal scale

1. Bill annoyed SAM’S father.

• Picks out this set of entailments: 1. Bill annoyed Sam’s father. c. ∃x.Bill annoyed x’s father. b. ∃x.Bill annoyed x. f. ∃P.P(Bill)

• c. is the background entailment.

Main point and background

1. Bill annoyed Sam’s father. c. ∃x.Bill annoyed x’s father. b. ∃x.Bill annoyed x. f. ∃P.P(Bill)

• Main point: whatever information the utterance contains beyond content of background.• Equivalent to: It was Sam’s father that Bill annoyed.

• Presupposition: The background and everything below it on the focal scale.

• Theory of presupposition or theory of focus?

Application to regret1. Susan regrets that she left.

Presupposes: Susan left.• Sentence entails that Susan left.• But this is not a grammatically specified

entailment and neither entails nor is entailed by background entailment.

• “It should play no part in the normal interpretation of [1]…In particular, [1] could not be used to make the primary point that Susan left.”

As it is not primary point, it is “felt to be presupposed.”

Problems

• Presuppositions from lexical entailments:Jane left Paris at noon.

• Lexically entails:1. Jane was in Paris before noon.2. Jane was not in Paris after noon.

• Presupposes only 1.• Theory needs a pragmatic supplement to

explain this; pragmatic supplement might turn out to do the work that theory does.

Problems

• Projection• No account: as embedding changes

entailments, there is no obvious account of sharing of presuppositions by P-family.

• Hint: main point of a negation, question, etc. will be the same as that of embedded affirmative.

• Justification?• Question case would require reformulation of notion

of main point.• Hard to extend this to cases of deep embedding:

• Jane thinks that Bill knows that it was Harry who left.

Properties of the theory• Similarities to Grice, A&L:

• Proposal based on semantic innovation; special semantic representation is taken as input to pragmatics.

• Driving idea: Presuppositions are entailments with special status.

• Goal of theory is to explain/predict which entailments get this special status.

• Assumption that presuppositions of non-atomic sentences can be derived from atomic case.

• Presuppositionality is identified with “backgrounding” and “non-main point” • Common ground typically seen as a way to capture

these notions.

Projection again

• Great challenge for pragmatic accounts; great success of dynamic accounts.

• Needed: a principled explanation for sharing of presuppositions among P-family members, and in other embeddings.

• Hope for synthesis? The principled explanation would provide a theoretical foundation for e.g. DRT accessibility algorithms.

Projection again

• The propositions that P and that Q may be related to each other, and to common beliefs and intentions, in such a way that it is hard to think of a reason that anyone would raise the question whether P, or care about its answer, unless he already believed that Q. (Stalnaker 1974: 205)

Simons 2001

• Attempt to provide a general principle for the derivation of presuppositions, along with a motivated account of projection.

• Spelling out Stalnaker’s hint:• When does an utterance count as raising a

question or showing that you care about its answer?

• What sort of relation between propositions would lead to the proposed constraint?

Simons 2001

• Raising a question• L. Carlson 1983: Any assertion can be

construed as an answer to an implicit question.• Jane won the race / Jane didn’t win the race

• Explicitly asking a question is a way to raise a question.

• Did Jane win the race?

• Epistemic modal assertions: indicate a willingness to discuss truth/falsity of embedded content.

• Perhaps Jane won the race.

Simons 2001

• Conditionals• Groenendijk and Stokhof 1984: conditional can

be used to raise the question which would be answered by assertion of the antecedent.

• A: Do you think Jane is at home?B: If her car is in the driveway, she is.

• Conditionals (typically) state conditions for the holding of the consequent, and so can also be seen as raising this question for uptake.

• A: If we miss the bus, we’ll be late.B: Jane will be mad if that happens.

Simons 2001

• “Raising a question” quite vague.

• Quite plausible that any embedded clause counts as raising the question of its content in the relevant sense.

• Searle (1969): To predicate a property P of an object o is to raise the question of whether or not P is true of o.• “The man who asserts that Socrates is wise,

the man who asks whether he is wise and the man who requests him to be wise may be said to raise the question of his being wise.”

Reminder

• The propositions that P and that Q may be related to each other, and to common beliefs and intentions, in such a way that it is hard to think of a reason that anyone would raise the question whether P, or care about its answer, unless he already believed that Q. (Stalnaker 1974: 205)

• What relation would this be?• Asymmetric entailment

Simons 2001

• If P entails Q, then Q is necessary for the truth of P.

• So: establish truth of Q before wondering about P.

• Interpretation Principle (tentative)Suppose that P asymmetrically entails Q. A speaker who raises the question whether P indicates a belief that Q.

Presuppositions are beliefs so indicated.

Simons 2001

• Application: Jane doesn’t know that George dislikes Bill.

• Questioned proposition: Jane knows that George dislikes Bill.

• Entailments:• George dislikes Bill. George is sentient.• George exists. Jane is sentient.• Jane exists.• Bill exists.

• All of these propositions escape scope of negation.

Problems: lexical vs. grammatical entailment

• No necessary projection from non-lexical entailments.

1. Jane didn’t eat the sandwich.• Incorrectly predicted to presuppose (indicate

speaker’s prior belief that) Jane ate something.

• Are standard cases of presupposition simply backgrounded lexical entailments?

• Focal presuppositions are backgrounded grammatical entailments?

Problem: Symmetric entailments again

1. Jane didn’t stop laughing.a. Did Jane stop laughing?b. Jane stopped laughing.

• Interpretation Principle: A speaker who utters 1. indicates a (prior) belief in all propositions asymmetrically entailed by b.

• Entailments include:c. Jane was laughing immediately before t.d. Jane was not laughing immediately after t.

• Speaker of 1. could not coherently assume c. & d.

Problem: Symmetric entailments again

1. Jane didn’t stop laughing.c. Jane was laughing before t.d. Jane was not laughing after t.

• Possible solution: Modify IP to ensure that entailments taken as assumed are jointly consistent with content of utterance.

• Still need a pragmatic story to explain default interpretation: start state is assumed to hold (c); end state (d) is denied.

Properties of the theory

• Presuppositions are taken to be entailments with a special status.

• Special status has something to do with being non-maximal entailment.• Maybe related to non-main point?

• Attempt to explain projection facts in terms of discourse relation between sentences: share their “question-raising” properties.