ISSN: 2320-5407 Int. J. Adv. Res.

9(05), 18-24

Journal Homepage: -www.journalijar.com

Article DOI:10.21474/IJAR01/12802
DOI URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.21474/IJAR01/12802

RESEARCH ARTICLE
PHILOSOPHY, LOGIC AND PRAGMATIC PRESUPPOSITION

Samadhan S. Mane
(M.A., Ph.D. SET) Associate Professor, Department of English, KBP Mahavidyalaya (Autonomous), Pandharpur
(MS) INDIA-413304.
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Manuscript Info Abstract
……………………. ………………………………………………………………
Manuscript History Presupposition has long history in philosophy of language and
Received: 05 March 2021 linguistic semantics. Recent works in linguistics have given a central
Final Accepted: 09 April 2021 place to the notion of presupposition. It is studied as an essential aspect
Published: May 2021 in providing semantic as well as pragmatic representations. Resultantly,
presupposition has obtained a significant place in linguist‟s, logician‟s
Key words:-
Presupposition, Logic, Pragmatics, and philosopher‟s spheres of interest. It has been studied as a kind of
Implicature, Speech Acts, Inference, unspoken information that accompanies an utterance. Moreover,
Assertion presuppositions perform a significant role in our understanding of how
context and background determine proper interpretation of any
utterance. They are studied as conditions which must be fulfilled for an
expression to be interpreted meaningfully.

Copy Right, IJAR, 2021,. All rights reserved.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………....
Introduction:-
In everyday sense, to presuppose something is to assume something or to take it for granted in advance without
saying it. Levinson (1983) points out that there are significant distinctions between the ordinary usages of the term
„presupposition‟ and its technical usage in the field of linguistics. He provides some examples that distinguish these
two usages of the term:
1. Effects presuppose causes
2. John wrote Harry a letter, presupposing he could read
3. John said “Harry is so competent,” presupposing that we know Harry had fouled things up – in fact we
didn‟t know and so failed to realize that he was being ironic
4. Harry asked Bill to close the door, presupposing that Bill had left it open as usual; he hadn‟t so he
threw a chair at Harry
5. Adolph addresses the butler as “Sir”, presupposing that he was the host Sir Ansel himself
6. The theory of evolution presupposes a vast time-scale
7. The article by Jackendoff presupposes Chomsky‟s theory of nominalizations (1983:168).

In the above examples, ordinary notion of presupposition is used to narrate background assumptions which make the
utterances meaningful. On the other hand, technical usage of presupposition refers to certain inferences built onto
linguistic expressions.

Philosophical Background:
Presupposition has its roots in philosophy. The notion of presupposition can be traced back to Aristotle. As Beaver
states, Aristotle explains the similar concept in the following extract quoted from „Categories‟:

Corresponding Author:- Samadhan S. Mane 18

Address:- (M.A., Ph.D. SET) Associate Professor, Department of English, KBP Mahavidyalaya
(Autonomous), Pandharpur (MS) INDIA-413304.
ISSN: 2320-5407 Int. J. Adv. Res. 9(05), 18-24

For manifestly, if Socrates exists, one of the two propositions „Socrates is ill‟, „Socrates is not ill‟ is true, and the
other false. This is likewise the case if he does not exist; for if he does not exist, to say that he is ill is false, and to
say that he is not ill is true (Aristotle 1950/350 BC, Ch 10:13b, 27-35, in Beaver 2001:3).

In other words, Aristotle treats propositions as having truth value in terms of truth and falsity which is not distinct
from the theories either of Frege or Strawson. Beaver further refers to Horn‟s view that it is the medieval
philosopher PetrusHispanus, who first introduced the notion of presupposition. In the final part of his work
„SummulaeLogicales,‟ Hispanus uses the terms such as „presupponit‟ for presupposition and „denotat‟ for assertion.
The following extract is taken from Hispanus, a translated version, as quoted in Beaver:

We now discuss reduplicative signs. Reduplicative signs are those which imply the reason according to which
something is attributed to another, as „insofar as‟, „according as‟, „by reason of the fact that‟ and so on … A
reduplicative word presupposes [presupponit] a certain predicate to be in a certain subject and denotes [denotat] that
to which it is immediately attached is the cause of that inheritance (PetrusHispanus, in Beaver 2001:3n).

This is the first ever reference of presupposition in relation to discourse connectives. In addition, it deals with the
primary distinction between presupposition and assertion. According to Lindberg, the notion of presupposition is
borrowed from philosophy into linguistics and has been used to illustrate the importance of context for the
generation of sentences. He states that presupposition consists of:
(a) Features from the speaker‟s perception of the present situation
(b) Possible associations connecting (a) with features in his long term and short term memories (1979:54).

In modern times, most significant among the philosophers who influenced the theories of presupposition are Frege,
Russell and Strawson. However, Richard Garner (1971:34-35) mentions that the difference between philosopher‟s
talk about presupposition and that of linguist is of „the matter of what it is that is said to do the presupposing‟. In
fact, philosophers have their own abstract views, somewhat contrasting with those of linguists, who deal with
presuppositions of words, utterances and sentences.

Presupposition and Logic:

Levinson (1983) is of the opinion that the characterization of semantic presupposition requires some fundamental
changes in the kind of logic that can be used to model natural language semantics. He provides the following
argument based on the classical logical assumptions:
1. A presupposes B
2. Therefore, by definition, A entails B and ~A entails B
3. (a) Every sentence A has a negation ~A (b) A is true or A is false
(Bivalence) (c) A is true or ~A is true (Negation)
4. B must always be true (1983:175).

The major aim of such presuppositional theories is to cope up with presupposition failure. They also explain that the
sentences are neither true nor false when their presuppositions fail. According to Bickerton, logical definitions of
presupposition have been framed in terms of the three-valued logic. Such theories suggest that:

A sentence S presupposes a proposition P if both S and –S logically imply P. If P is false, then S is generally held to
lack a truth value (1979:235).

Keenan gives a well-defined presuppositional logic when he defines logical presupposition as:
Ǿ LOGICALLY PRESUPPOSES ψiff Ǿ has the third value whenever ψ is not true (Keenan 1969 and
1972, Gazdar 1979:103).
Keenan defines logical presupposition as:
A sentence S logically presupposes a sentence Ś just in case S logically implies Ś and the negation of S, –S,
also logically implies Ś (1971:145).

Keenan simplifies it as the truth of Ś is a necessary condition on the truth or falsity of S, if S is not true then Ś can be
neither true nor false. Levinson makes use of logical devices such as „lambda-extraction‟ and „group- or gamma-
operator‟ to explain presupposition relation. Levinson analyses the sentence „It was John that kissed Mary‟ using
such logical devices:

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λ x(x = John) (γ x Kiss (Mary, x)) (1983:221).

The above abstraction can be read as „A group kissed by Mary has the property of being identical to John‟
(1983:221). Janet Fodor is of the opinion that logical presuppositions are relevant to the truth conditions on
sentences. He characterizes logical presupposition as:

If a sentence S has the logical presupposition L, and L is false, then S has no truth value (1977:206).

Logical presuppositions bear on the truth conditions of sentences, whereas, pragmatic presuppositions arise out of
some extra-grammatical components. In contrast to logical notion of presupposition, pragmatic accounts have
sought to define presupposition in terms of felicity conditions and context or common ground. In conclusion of his
article, Strawson (1950) says:

Neither Aristotelian nor Russellian rules give the exact logic of any expression in ordinary language; for ordinary
language has no exact logic (Strawson 1950, in Levinson 1983:175n).

Presupposition and Third Truth Value:

In truth conditional semantics, pragmatics as well as traditional logic, it is practical assumption that each sentence is
either true or false. As Keith Allen points out:

In traditional systems of logic, truth is bivalent, i.e., there are only two values possible: any proposition P is
either true or else it is false (2001:183).

However, according to Allwood et al., the negation of a sentence is true whenever the sentence is false. Consider the
following example from Allwood et al.:
Have you stopped beating your wife? (1977:149).
The above question would have the following possible answers:
1. Yes, I have stopped beating my wife.
2. No, I have not stopped beating my wife.

The answer 2 appears to be the negation of answer 1. If 1 is not true, 2 ought to be true. But a person, who never
beats his wife, cannot answer either. If he answers, it commits him to having beaten his wife. Statements 1 and 2 in
such case are neither true nor false. In other words, these answers have no truth-value. To have a truth-value, these
sentences should fulfill a condition that the speaker must have beaten his wife at some time or the other. In addition
to true and false, a sentence may have a third truth value called „Zero‟. Keenan (1971:46) calls it as „nonsense
value‟. Allwood et al define the Third Truth Value as follows:
If both a sentence p and its negation ~p can only be true, when q is true, p presupposes q (1977:150).

A sentence with unfulfilled presuppositions would then have the truth value zero. In such an analysis, presupposition
is treated as a condition for a sentence to have a truth value. It follows that a sentence and its negation always have
the same presuppositions.

Presupposition and Inference:

Pragmatics is concerned with study of meaning that involves making of inferences. Presupposition is such a kind of
pragmatic inference. Inferences are rule governed steps from certain premises or propositions, to another
proposition, called conclusion. There are two kinds of inference: deductive and inductive. Encyclopedia Britannica
defines these two inferences as follows. A deductive inference is:

A type of inference or argument that purports to be valid, where a valid argument is one whose conclusion must be
true if its premises are true (2009).

An inductive inference is:

A type of nonvalid inference or argument in which the premises provide some reason for believing that the
conclusion is true (2009).

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Out of these two, inductive inference is defeasible. It shares certain qualities with presupposition. It can be
illustrated with the following example:

Martha avoided quarrelling with Sam.

One can draw the following inferences from the above utterance:
a. Martha did not quarrel with Sam.
b. Martha tried to avoid quarrelling with Sam.

Now consider the negation of the same utterance:

Martha did not avoid quarrelling with Sam.
The above negation survives the inference (b); however, inference (a) is cancelled.

Presupposition and Assertion:

Relationship between presupposition and assertion can be shown as it is new information that is asserted and it is old
information that is presupposed. In other words, what is asserted in an utterance is new to the addressee and what is
presupposed is familiar or part of the common ground to addresser and addressee. In short, presupposition is a
proposition that follows from a statement. Fundamental difference between presupposition and assertion is that of
status. As Frege (1979) mentions, a sentence has a truth-value only if its presuppositions are satisfied. Frege is of the
opinion that presupposition and assertion differ in status. Regarding the distinction between presupposition and
assertion, Lambrecht has given an explicit statement:

Let us refer to the „old information‟ contained in, or evoked by, a sentence as the PRAGMATIC
PRESUPPOSITION (or simply the PRESUPPOSITION) and let us refer to the „new information‟ expressed or
conveyed by the sentence as the PRAGMATIC ASSERTION (or simply the ASSERTION) (1994:52).

Any assertion does not come about if the presuppositions are not fulfilled, because only sentences with a truth-value
can be the objects of an assertion. The distinction between assertion and presupposition is clarified by Heim and
Kratzer with the following examples:
A. John is absent again today.
B. Today is not the first time that John is absent.
C. John is absent today, and that has happened before. (1998:77).

The above statements A, B and C indicate that the speaker believes that (i) John is absent today and (ii) John has
been absent before. However, they assume different knowledge on the part of the hearer. If the hearer knows that
John has been absent before but doesn‟t know that John is absent today then A is appropriate but B is not. Statement
A presupposes that John has been absent before and it asserts that he is absent today. On the other hand, if the hearer
knows that John is absent today but does not know that John has been absent before, then B is appropriate but A is
not. Statement B presupposes that John is absent today and asserts that he has been absent before. After that, if the
hearer does not know that John is absent today and also does not know that he has been absent before, then C is
appropriate but not the other two. Statement C does not presuppose the knowledge of John‟s absence today or
previous absences and instead, asserts both that he is absent today and that he has been absent before.

Presupposition as Common Ground:

Barbara Abbott (2000: 1419:1437) states that, Stalnaker and Karttunen initiated the view that the grammatical
concept of presupposition can be assimilated to the pragmatic concept of background information, shared knowledge
or the common ground. She argues that presuppositions are non-asserted propositions conveyed by an utterance,
propositions which are of necessity conveyed but which are not intended by the speaker to be part of the main point.
Presuppositions arise by virtue of the facts that there is a preference for an utterance to have a single main point and
that the expression of any thought involves expressions of many atomic presuppositions. Stalnaker (1978) states that
presupposition is what are taken by the speaker to be the „common ground‟ or „mutual knowledge‟ between speaker
and hearer. The recognition that the familiar or old information and parts that are new, gives birth to common
ground view of presuppositions.

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Presupposition and Syntax:

Presupposition has been treated as pragmatic and logical concept. However, Bickerton (1979:235) suggests that
presuppositions arise because of certain syntactic facts. Gazdar claims that the potential presuppositions of a
sentence emphasize the role of syntactic features. He states:

In terms of their components and constructions as if potential presuppositions were something given to us by the
lexicon and the syntax, but I do this without prejudice to the possibility of some future general explanation as to why
these lexical and syntactic sources of presupposition are such (1976:188).

Here Gazdar envisages a general kind of explanation of how presuppositions are indeed given by the nature of
syntax. Levinson (1983:207) states that Karttunen and Peters (1975, 1979) devised a conventional theory in the
framework of the „Montague Grammar.‟ The theory advocates that the clauses are built up from their components
from the bottom up rather than the top down as in transformational generative grammar. Semantic content of an
expression is built up together with syntax in such theory. As a result, the meaning expressions are associated with
words, clauses and constructions- what we call them as presupposition triggers. Levinson states:

As for presupposition, since many kinds of presupposition triggers seem to be essentially syntactic (e.g. clefts) or to
have syntactic consequences (e.g. factives) there seem to be intimate relations between syntactic processes and the
inference we call presuppositions (1983:373).

In addition, George Lakoff is of the view that the study of „presupposition-free syntax‟ would deviate from the
traditional study of syntax because it would no longer involve the study of the distinction of all the grammatical
morphemes. He says:

It seems beyond doubt that the principles governing the distinction of morphemes will involve presuppositional
information. Where these principles are given by transformational rules, there may be linkages between
presuppositions and the transformational rules (1971:340).

Such linkages, according to George Lakoff, between presupposition and syntactic feature are called „global
derivational constraints‟ (1971:340).

Presupposition and Theory of Implicature:

Most of the linguists and philosophers are of the view that Grice‟s Theoryof Implicature can be used to explain
presupposition. They are of the opinion, as Van Der Sandt (1988:50) points out that most presuppositional
phenomena are explicable in terms of Gricean principles. The notion of presupposition can be eliminated entirely in
favour of the Gricean notion of implicature. It facilitates proper explanation of the existence and behavior of
presuppositions. Van Der Sandt (1988:70) refers to the view that treats most of the paradigmatic cases of
presuppositions as conventional implicature. Others view presupposition as a special kind of conversational
implicature that is associated with the positive sentence as well as its negative counterpart. Karttunen and Peters are
of the same opinion:

A large set of cases that have been called presupposition are really instances of conventional implicature. The most
obvious are those associated with particles like too, either, also, even, only and so on. This class also includes the
presuppositions of certain factive verbs, such as forget, realize, take into account and fail. Presuppositions of cleft
and pseudo-cleft constructions also seem to be genuine examples of conversational implicature. These are a just few
examples; the list could be made much longer (1979:11).

Thomason also follows the same line of impression while stating that presuppositions are those conversational
implicatures that are associated with positive sentences and its negative counterparts. He defines presupposition as:

Sentence φ pragmatically presupposes χ relative to a context c and ¬ χ conversationally implicates χ relative to c

(Thomason 1973, in Van Der Sandt 1988:74).

The Gricean account of presupposition is significantly represented in the works of Kempson (1975), Wilson (1975)
and Atlas (1977). They are of the view that special mechanism is not needed to account for the additional

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presuppositional inferences. Such inferences could be derived as generalized conversational implicature by

application of Grice‟s theory. Sadock puts forward the same view:

Conversational implicatures include all non-truth-conditional aspects of what is conveyed by an utterance solely due
to the words or forms the sentence contains. These include, then, most of what have been called by linguists the
presuppositions of a sentence; they are closely allied to what is said in the strict sense, at least in that the same clause
can determine either the truth conditions of a sentence or a set of conventional implicature (1978:282).

However, Van Der Sandt (1988:71) objects to the idea of explicating the reasonably well-established notion of
presupposition in terms of the totally unexplained notion of conversational implicature. He further states that the
notion of presupposition has a long and respectable tradition, but the same cannot be said for conversational
implicature.

Presupposition and Speech Act Theory:

If the presuppositions of a sentence, which is used to make speech act, are not satisfied; such speech acts are turned
into infelicitous. According to Van Der Sandt (1988:26), the semantic and pragmatic accounts of presupposition are
based on two fundamentally different but not incompatible views. These two accounts can be related to each other
by means of Griceanprinciples and speech act theory. For some reason, if a speech act is defective, as Van Der Sandt
states, nothing follows about the truth-value of a sentence:

… assume that a speech act is in some way defective unless the speaker believes what he says, then the assertion of
a sentence φ which semantically presupposes a sentence χ , is defective in every context unless the speaker believes
φ , the obvious entailments of φ, and thus χ (1988:26).

In other words, a semantic presupposition of a sentence is a pragmatic presupposition of the users of the sentence
but not vice-versa. Austin (1962) is of the view that speech acts performed by means of uttering a sentence are
invalid if the presuppositions with definite description in subject position are not satisfied. He says:

… some says that … if … someone asserts that the present king of France is bald, „the question whether he is bald
does not arise‟; but it is better to say that the putative statement is null and void, exactly as when I say I sell you
something that is not mine … (1962:136).

Fillmore (1969) as well as Langendoen and Savin (1971) state that presuppositions are conditions that must be
satisfied in order for a sentence to be used to perform a speech act. Particularly, Fillmore is of the view that
presuppositions are conditions which must be satisfied to use a sentence felicitously. He says:

I shall deal with a distinction between the presuppositional aspect of the semantic structure of the predicate on the
one hand and the „meaning‟ proper of the predicate on the other hand. We may identify the presuppositions of a
sentence as those conditions which must be satisfied before the sentences can be used in any of the function just
mentioned (commanding questioning, asserting etc) (1969:120).

According to Van Der Sandt (1988:30), presupposition in terms of felicity alone predicts that a presupposition of a
sentence used to perform a speech act is the prime factor responsible for illocutionary success of that speech act.
Searle and Vandervaken (1985) distinguish between linguistic phenomenon tied to particular linguistic expressions
and the presuppositions derived from the illocutionary force of an utterance. They say:

Preparatory conditions determine a class of presuppositions peculiar to illocutionary force. But there is another class
of presuppositions peculiar to propositional content … Regardless of which of the various philosophical accounts
one accepts of these sorts of presuppositions (i.e. the presuppositions associated with definite descriptions and
aspectual verbs), one needs to distinguish them from those that derive from illocutionary forces. The same
propositional presuppositions can occur with different illocutionary forces, as, for example, one can both ask
whether and one can assert that Jones has stopped beating his wife (1985:17).

Presuppositions are seen as conditions for bringing about a speech act. As Van Der Sandt (1988:32) states, the
defining characteristics of a speech act are presuppositions of the sentences that can be used to perform speech acts.

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Moreover, Karttunen‟s (1974) view is that a speech act is defective if any presupposition of the sentence used to
perform it, is not satisfied.

Conclusion:-
Thus, presupposition is one of the pivotal pragmatic concepts having relations with logic and philosophy. It has
crucial relation with other disciplines with respect to language in use and function of the language. Having its roots
in philosophy, presupposition has acquired status of a significant concept when it comes to the study of logical
reasoning.

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