If a speaker tells us that “some guests were late to the party,” we typically infer that not all were. Implicatures, in which an ambiguous statement (“some and possibly all”) is strengthened pragmatically (to “some and not all”), are a paradigm case of pragmatic reasoning. Inferences of this sort are difficult for young children, but recent work suggests that this mismatch may stem from issues ...

In this paper we present our implementation of a system of active logic that processes natural language discourses. We focus on problems that involve presupposition and the associated well{known problems of the projection of presupposition. We discuss Heim's largely successful theory of presupposition and point out certain limitations. We then use these observations to build our discourse proce...

Abstract The author argues that there is no such thing as a unique and general taxonomy of non-at-issue contents. Accordingly, we ought to shun large categories “conventional implicature” (Grice), “F-implicature” (Horn), “ CI ” (Potts), “Class B” (Tonhauser, Beaver, Roberts & Simons) or the like. As an alternative, may, first, describe “semantic profile” linguistic devices accurately possib...

The purpose of this paper is to propose a new type of NPI licensing context through French subjunctive and ne explétif. The distribution of NPIs on previous studies does not exactly correspond to negative function types. French subjunctive and ne expletif are good guidelines for reclassifying NPI licensing context. My classification is by a hierarchy of strength in negative force: overtly negat...

Scalar implicatures (SIs) belong to the species of Quantity-based conversational implicatures, which are derived based on the maxim of Quantity 1, which compels speakers to be as informative as is required. If a speaker makes a statement that is less informative than is required in the given context, the hearer may compute a Quantity-based implicature to the effect that the speaker did not prov...

This paper attempts to overcome certain objections to the idea that Maximize Presupposition! (Heim 1991) is reducible to the theory of implicature.

beliefs explaining the role the first set of beliefs play in the speaker's plan. Pollack's idea of ascribing a set of additional beliefs based on the intentions contained in the recognised plan is similar to our idea of ascribing additional conversational goals to explain why a plan is apparently inefficient. However, her motivation is to show how mistaken beliefs in dialogue can be recognised ...

When a speaker states an argument in arguing—in its core sense—for the conclusion, asserts, as opposed to merely implies or implicates, associated inference claim effect that conclusion follows from premises. In defense of this, I argue how is conveyed when stating constrained by constitutive and normative conditions for cases speech arguing conclusion. The act assertion better reflects such th...