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19: Sentences with baggage - Presuppositions
🕑 Added 2018-04-19 21:29:14 +0000 UTC What’s so weird if I say, “the present King of France is bald” or “I need to pick up my pet unicorn from the vet”? It seems like those sentences should be false: at least, they certainly can’t be true. But if you reply, “No, he isn’t” or “No, you don’t” it still feels unsatisfying: aren’t we still both assuming that France has a king and that I have a pet unicorn?In this episode of Lingthusiasm, your hosts Lauren Gawne and Gretchen McCulloch explore different kinds of meanings: sometimes sentences wear their meaning on their sleeves, but sometimes they instead smuggle it in as baggage. These assumptions are known as presuppositions. Presuppositions are incredibly useful (we couldn’t manage conversations at a normal pace without them), but in the wrong hands (such as when you’re trying to influence an eyewitness) they can also be very dangerous.
We also announced a new round of Lingthusiasm merch: you can now get scarves with a subtle tree diagram print suitable for all your language family tree/syntax tree and other structural needs, and t-shirts, mugs, totes, and pouches with Heck Yeah Descriptivism or Heck Yeah Language Change on them, as well as the existing IPA scarves and NOT JUDGING YOUR GRAMMAR, JUST ANALYSING IT items in more colours! [And remember, that as patrons, you can order custom colour merch by messaging us through Patreon with the Hex code of the colour you want!]
To see this episode's shownotes, go to https://lingthusiasm.com/post/173106183816/lingthusiasm-episode-19-sentences-with-baggage
Comments
Lingthusiasm
Yup, definitely presupposes that your compliance training is boring!
Richard Almy
I got some spam at my work email today that made me think of this episode. The lede was something like "Do you know how to stop your compliance training from being boring?"
