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Full Idea
According to the pragmatic approach, presuppositions are constraints on the context: if a sentence s generates a presupposition p, an assertion of s cannot proceed smoothly unless the context already entails p (p is taken for granted).
Gist of Idea
In the pragmatic approach, presuppositions are assumed in a context, for successful assertion
Source
Ofra Magidor (Category Mistakes [2013], 5.3.2)
Book Ref
Magidor,Ofra: 'Category Mistakes' [OUP 2013], p.124
A Reaction
She credits Stalnaker for this approach. There is a choice between the presuppositions being largely driven by internal features of the sentence, or by external features of context. You may not know the context of some statements.
| 9021 | A good way of explaining an expression is saying what conditions make its contexts true [Quine] |
| 15229 | We say there is 'no alternative' in all sorts of contexts, and there are many different grounds for it [Harré/Madden] |
| 10458 | People slide from contextual variability all the way to contextual determination [Bach] |
| 21645 | 'Semantic type coercion' is selecting the reading of a word to make the best sense [Hofweber] |
| 22249 | The Naive view of communication is that hearers acquire exactly the thoughts of the speaker [Recanati] |
| 13448 | The domain of an assertion is restricted by context, either semantically or pragmatically [Rayo/Uzquiano] |
| 18036 | A sentence can be meaningful, and yet lack a truth value [Magidor] |
| 18051 | In the pragmatic approach, presuppositions are assumed in a context, for successful assertion [Magidor] |
| 18406 | The basic Kaplan view is that there is truth-conditional content, and contextual character [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18411 | It is proposed that a huge range of linguistic items are context-sensitive [Cappelen/Dever] |