Presuppositions Can Be Disruptors Too: A Case against Strawson-Entailment

This paper has one main goal, which is a negative one. It aims at showing that the theory of NPI licensing defended in von Fintel (1999) is empirically inadequate. In essence, the theory we’re discussing relies on so-called Strawson-entailment, a device which ensures that weak NPIs are licensed despite the presence of presuppositions. We level two main criticisms against von Fintel’s theory. First, the empirical claim underlying the theory has exceptions left unnoticed until now. Among the facts that we bring to light, there is an important discovery, namely the disruption caused by the presupposition trigger too: