Transparency: An Incremental Account of Presupposition Projection

Abstract

We sketch a theory in which presuppositions do not directly impose conditions on the context set, but rather on the contextual meaning of a sentence. Specifically, a part of an expression's meaning which is marked as presupposed should satisfy a principle of Transparency, according to which this part can be disregarded without affecting the contextual meaning of the sentence. We argue that if Transparency is checked incrementally, i.e. as soon as a clause is pronounced, it yields a predictive account of presupposition projection: unlike competing theories, it derives the projection behavior of connectives from their bivalent semantic contribution. We speculate that Transparency originates from a more general pragmatic principle, Be Articulate!, which states that one should not say too much at the same time, i.e. express a meaning that is too complex with a single expression. Transparency is a way to satisfy Be Articulate! even when an expression with a complex meaning is uttered because it ensures that part of this meaning can be disregarded.