Negation, presupposition and

implicature

Jacques MoeschlerVerona Lectures

Course 14 November 2014

The general goal of the course

To give a substantial introduction to the pragmatics of negation, with special focus on pragmatic theories.

To illustrate some general pragmatic issues as

scalar implicature

presupposition

discourse pragmatics.

To introduce you to my research agenda, i.e. the relationship between logical meaning and pragmatic meaning.

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Agenda

Today: Negation, presupposition and implicature

Thursday: The logical square and the meaning of positive and negative particulars

Friday: The context of negative utterances

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A roadmap for today

1. The semantics of negation

2. The semantic and pragmatic definitions of presupposition

3. The classical Gricean theory of implicature

4. Negation and presupposition

5. Negation and implicature

6. A truth-conditional definition for presupposition and implicature

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1. The semantics of negation

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The semantics of negation

Negation is a logical operator changing the truth-value of the proposition.

Linguistic negation is also truth-functional, but its use is restricted to situations where the proposition negated is entertained as false by the speaker.

Its scope is restricted to a linguistic constituent.

Its propositional meaning is semantically correct, but pragmatically inappropriate.

1. Jacques:Who broke the vase? Nath: Not me!

a. It is not me who broke the vase.

b. It is not the case that I broke the vase.

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The logical meaning of negation

Only the second line is relevant for linguistic negation.

1. * It’s not raining, but it’s raining.

2. It’s not raining, so it is false that it rains.

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P ¬P

1 0

0 1

Scope of negationLinguistic negation is a constituent negation.

In a bare negative sentence, linguistic negation is underspecified.

1. Abi is not married

2. Abi is single

3. Abi is engaged

Semantically, negation is associated to a complement operation.

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Universe of discourse

{x is married} Abi

{x is single}

{x is engaged}

Where is Abi?Abi is everywhere but not in the set of individuals who are married.

Abi is at the intersection of all the sets of predicates true of Abi.

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Abibeautiful

smart

studentsingle

married

Conditions on contrasts

The condition on contrasts is semantic: in not-P, Q entails not-P

not-P but Q

For Q to entail not-P, P and Q must belong to the same conceptual domain and a property R must be superordinate to P and Q.

If P is false, then Q is a possible candidate: Q is in competition with other Q’, Q’’, etc.

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R

¬P Q Q’ Q’’

What are the level of possible contrasts?

Is it possible to have a contrast relation such as not-P but R’, where R and R’ are in contrast?

1. Nath did not buy a chow, he bought a cat.

2. Nath did not buy a chow, he bought a goldfish.

3. Nath did not buy a chow, he bought a smartphone.

The further away from the root of the contrast, the more the utterance must be pragmatically accommodated.

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Explanation

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pet

dog

¬Chow Labrador

cat

Siamese Persianetc. etc.

Nath  did  not  buy  a  chow,  he  bought  a  Siamese.

Explanation (2)

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pet

dog

¬Chow Labrador

cat

mammal

vertebrate

fish

goldfish salmon

etc.

etc.

Nath  did  not  buy  a  chow,  he  bought  a  goldfish.

I did not buy a Mac, I bought a toaster.

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computer

¬mac PC

television

audio-visual équipement

smartphone

artefact

toaster

Question: is the ordinary interpretation of negation still possible?

household appliances

I did not loose my checkbook, I lost my smartphone

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¬checkbook credit card

payement means

smartphone

personal valuables

Nath did not buy a chow, he bought a smartphone

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dog

¬Chow Labrador

computer television

audio-visual équipement

smartphone

artefactanimate

?

? = valuables/pet/hobby?

What conclusion to draw?

Contrasts are linked to conceptual hierarchies.

These hierarchies predict that the contrasts are more accessible when the hierarchies are simple.

The more complex the hierarchy, the more accommodation.

The more complex the hierarchy, the less specific the common conceptual organization.

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Examples

1. Chow-Labrador: DOG

2. Chow-Siamese: PET

3. Chow-goldfish: PET

4. computer/toaster: ARTEFACT

5. check-book/smartphone: VALUABLES

Question: Are we facing here presuppositions?

Nath did not buy a chow

PP: Nath bought something

Answer: no

A presupposition is not a superordinate property.

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2. Presupposition

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A semantic definition

P presupposes Q iff

a. P entails Q

b. not-P entails Q

1. My daughter is in Japan

2. My daughter is not in Japan

3. I have a daughter

This definition is truth-conditional.

The prediction is that a presupposition cannot be false.

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A presupposition is always true

1. P presupposes Q

2. so P entails Q et ¬P entails Q

3. (i) every proposition P has a negation ¬P

(ii) P is true or P est false (bivalence)

(iii) P is true or ¬P is true (negation)

4. thus Q is always true

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A problem: another negation?

A presupposition can be negated.

This negation is said metalinguistic, not descriptive:

1. The king of France is not bald; there is no king of France.

2. Abi does not regret to have failed; she passed.

3. Does Abi realize that she failed? – No, she passed.

4. Where have you hidden the body of your wife? – Nowhere, I did not kill her.

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A side-effectWh-questions trigger presuppositions:

1. A: Who called? B: Nobody

PP: someone called

Who called?

I ask [who is the x that called]

∃x(x called) & (who is x)

Nobody

there is no x such that x called

¬∃x (x called)

How to explain that (1) is a coherent dialogue?

A coherent discourse/dialogue is said to share presuppositions.

The classical answer is based on pragmatic accommodation:

Update the Common ground (CG) so that PP does not belong anymore to CG.

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3. Implicature

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Conversational implicature (CIs)

As PPs, CIs are implicit meaning, triggered by the presumption of the respect to the Cooperative Principle and the use or the exploitation of the Maxims of conversation (quantity, quality, relation, manner).

Unlike PPs, CIs are not background information, they correspond to speakers’ meanings (informative intention).

A CI is said to be a non-truth-conditional meaning because it is cancelable (defeasible) without contradiction.

1. Anne and Jacques got married and had children.

2. First Anne and Jacques got married and then they had children.

3. First Anne and Jacques had children and then they got married.

4. Anne and Jacques got married and had children, but not in this order.

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The cooperative principle (CP)

«Make your contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged» (Grice 1989, 26)

The CP states that participants in a communication are rational agents and have expectations of cooperation.

These expectations are fulfilled in 9 conversational maxims.

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The conversational maxims

Quantity

a. Make your contribution as informative as is required.

b. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.

Quality

a. Do not say what you believe to be false.

b. Do not say for which you lack adequate evidence.

Relation: Be relevant.

Manner: Be perspicuous.

a. Avoid obscurity of expression

b. Avoid ambiguity

c. Be brief

d. Be orderly

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Meaning and conversation

In Grice’s theory of meaning, the recovery of the informative intention implies the recovery of the implicated meaning.

Grice makes a crucial difference between what is SAID and what is IMPLICATED.

What is implicated is triggered by the respect or the ostensive exploitation of a conversational maxim.

What is meant is called an implicature.

Grice distinguishes four types of implicatures:

Conventional implicatures

Non-conversational implicature

Generalized conversational implicatures

Particularized conversational implicatures

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PRAGMATICS

SEMANTICS

CONVEYED

SAID IMPLICATED

CONVENTIONALLY

CONVERSATIONALLY

CONVENTIONAL IMPLICATURE

CONVERSATIONAL IMPLICATURE

GENERALIZED PARTICULARIZED

NON CONVENTIONALLY

NON CONVERSATIONALLY

NON-CONVERSATIONAL IMPLICATURE

OUT OF THE SCOPE OF PRAGMATICS

Conventional implicatures

Conventional implicatures are non-calculable, non-cancelable, detachable, conventional, carried by what is said, determinate.

They are triggered by a specific word vs. a specific content.

They are non truth-functional:

(1) is true iff (2) is true.

(3) and (4) are not contributions to the truth of (2).

(3) and (4) cannot be denied by the speaker of (1).

1. Even John likes Mary.

2. John likes Mary.

3. Other persons besides John like Mary.

4. John is the least likely one to like Mary.

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Conversational implicatures

Conversational implicatures are triggered by

the presumption of the respect of the cooperative principle

the use or the exploitation (ostensive violation) of one of the maxims of conversation.

They are calculable, cancelable, non-detachable, non-conventional, not carried by what is said but by the saying of it, indeterminate:

generalized conversational implicatures are presumptive meanings (Levinson 2000): they are triggered by particular words;

particularized conversational implicatures are nonce implicatures (Carston 2002): they are context-dependent.

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Generalized vs. particularized implicatures1. John went into a house yesterday and found a tortoise inside the front

door.

+> John entered a house he is not familiar with

2. How is John going? — Oh quite well, I think; he likes his colleagues, and he hasn’t been to prison yet.

+> John is the sort of person likely to yield to the temptation provided by his occupation, etc.

The triggering of an implicature is caused by a maxim of conversation.

Apart particularized implicatures, implicatures are non-contextual inferences.

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4. Negation and presupposition

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Two type of negations?

It has been claimed that presuppositions are preserved under internal negation, and cancelled by external negation:

1. The king of France is not bald.

2. The king of Franc is not bald; there is no king of France.

Internal negation reading

∃x [K(x) ∧ ¬∃y((y≠x) ∧ K(y)) ∧ ¬B(x)]

External negation reading

¬∃x [K(x) ∧ ¬∃y((y≠x) ∧ K(y)) ∧ B(x)]

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Consequences1. The proposition under external negation is false.

2. Negation is semantically ambiguous.

How to account for the ambiguity of negation?

The classical solution is to avoid bivalence, and add a third truth-value, the value Neutral (N).

So under an external negation, the negated proposition is neither true (1) nor false (0), but neutral (N).

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true

not false false

not true

1 N 0

A pragmatic account

Negation can deny not only a proposition, but the assertability of a proposition:

1. It is not the case that if Abi takes penicillin, she will be better.

2. ¬(P → Q) ⟷ (P ∧ ¬Q)

3. Abi will take penicillin and will not be better

(1) does not mean (3): negation is not truth-conditional, or descriptive, it is metalinguistic.

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Examples

1. The king of France is not bald, there is no king of France.

2. I did not stop smoking, I have never smoked.

3. We do not like L.A., we love it.

4. Anne does not have three children, she has four.

5. Marguerite Duras n’a pas écrit que des conneries, elle en a aussi filmées. ‘M.D. has not written only bullshit, she also filmed some’

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What does metalinguistic negation means?

Metalinguistic negation not-P means ‘the speaker cannot affirm P’:

1. I cannot affirm that the king of France is bald, because there is no king of France.

2. I cannot affirm that I have stopped smoking, because I have never smoked.

3. I cannot affirm that we do like L.A., because we love it.

4. I cannot affirm that Anne has three children, because she has four.

5. I cannot affirm that Marguerite Duras has written only bullshit, because she also filmes some.

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5. Negation and implicature

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Two negation with implicatures?

What happens with implicatures?

Are implicatures cancelable as presuppositions?

Yes they are, but with different truth-conditional effects.

What is the pragmatic meaning of (1) to (3)?

1. Anne has three children.

2. Anne does not have three children.

3. Anne does not have three children, she has four.

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Are implicature triggered by negation?

1. Anne has three children

a. +> Anne does not have four children2. Anne does not have three children

b. +/> Anne has four children

c. → Anne has less than three children3. Anne does not have three children, she has four

d. → Anne has four children

e. → Anne has three children

f. +> it is false that Anne does not have four children.

Descriptive negation does not scope over the implicature of POS (Anne has three children).

Metalinguistic negation scopes over the CI of POS.41

A summaryWe face three uses of negation:

one descriptive use (DN)

two metalinguistic uses (PPMN and CIMN)

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assertion entailment PP CI

DN not-P Q or not-Q Q

PPMN not-P not-Q not-Q

CIMN not-P P and Q not-Q

6. A truth-conditional definition for

presupposition and implicature

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PP and CI: a truth-conditional account

The focus on negation of PPs and CIs allows defining these meanings in a truth-conditional way.

They are clearly opposed to entailment and show relevant differences with logical connectives.

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Entailment and presupposition

The first difference is between entailment and presupposition.

With entailment, negation is compatible with the truth or the falsity of the entailed proposition.

With presupposition, negation yields a true relation when it is false.

When the presupposition is false, the relation is false with DN but truth with PPMN.

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Entailment and PP

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assertion entailment relation

1 1 1

1 0 0

0 1 1

0 0 1

assertion PP relation

1 1 1

1 0 0

0 1 1

0 0 1 ∨ 0

CIs

The truth-table shows that CIs are not truth-conditional relations, or logical ones:

the falsity of the CI leaves the implicature relations true.

The CI cannot be true when the assertion is false, but when both assertion and CI are false, the relation is true (CIMN).

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assertion CI relation

1 1 1

1 0 1

0 1 0

0 0 1

Conclusion

We have investigated the semantics and pragmatics of negation.

PP and CI are good tests for defining the pragmatics of negation.

We conclude with three use of negation: DN, PPMN, CIMN.

The behavior of negation allows for a truth-conditional definition of entailment, PP and CI.

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References

Carston R. (2002), Thoughts and Utterances, Oxford, Blackwell.

Horn L. (1989), A Natural History of Negation, Chicago, The Chicago University Press.

Moeschler J. (2010), « Negation, scope and the descriptive/metalinguistic distinction », Generative Grammar in Geneva 6, 29-48.

Moeschler J. (2013), « Is a speaker-based pragmatics possible? Or how can a hearer infer a speaker’s commitment? », Journal of Pragmatics 43, 84-97.

Moeschler J. (2013), « How ‘Logical’ are Logical Words? Negation and its Descriptive vs. Metalinguistic Uses », in Taboada M. & Trnavac R. (eds.), Nonveridicality, evaluation and coherence relations, Leiden, Brill, 76-110.

All my paper are available on my website:

https://sites.google.com/site/moeschlerjacques/publications/articles-2010-2013

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