Geurts on Grice on "Scalar implicature and local pragmatics" (Mind and Language, 2009)

Scalar Implicature and Local Pragmatics
B. Geurts
Mind and Language, 24(1), 51-79. 2009.

Subject:CONVERSATIONAL IMPLICATURE
Persons as Subjects:GRICE, H PAUL

"The Grice[i]an theory of conversational implicature

has always been plagued by data suggesting that what

would seem to be conversational inferences may occur

within the scope of operators like 'believe'."

"which for bona fide implicatures should be an impossibility."

"Concentrating my attention on scalar implicatures, I

argue that, for the most part, such observations can

be accounted for within a Grice[i]an framework, and

without resorting to local pragmatic inferences of

any kind. However, there remains a small class of

marked cases that cannot be treated as

conversational implicatures, and they do

require a local mode of pragmatic interpretation."

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Well, as long as they are small who cares?