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Wednesday, May 5, 2010

"Martha fell into a trance" --> "Martha fell"?

From Grice, PPQ, vol. 67, p. 23.


Martha fell into a ditch
------
Therefore, Martha fell.

--- OK with Davidson and Grice.



Martha fell into a trance.
------
Martha fell?

Dubious.

The important fact here is Davidson's inability to grasp the implicature. He goes straight to 'formalise' action without even having weeded off the terrain with linguistic botany. "Fall" is surely NOT ambiguous.

---

In a way it relates to 'he sneezed violently', 'he beat his wife violently.'

The IMPLICATURE solution for Grice:

"The problem which originally prompted Davidson's analysis has an independent solution" which does NOT trade on ontology.

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