Entailment (linguistics)

Linguistic entailments are entailments which arise in natural language. If a sentence A entails a sentence B, sentence A cannot be true without B being true as well.^[1] For instance, the English sentence "Pat is a fluffy cat" entails the sentence "Pat is a cat" since one cannot be a fluffy cat without being a cat. On the other hand, this sentence does not entail "Pat chases mice" since it is possible (if unlikely) for a cat to not chase mice.

Entailments arise from the semantics of linguistic expressions.^[2] Entailment contrasts with the pragmatic notion of implicature. While implicatures are fallible inferences, entailments are enforced by lexical meanings plus the laws of logic.^[3] Entailments also differ from presuppositions, whose truth is taken for granted. The classic example of a presupposition is the existence presupposition which arises from definite descriptions. For example, the sentence "The king of France is bald" presupposes that there is a king of France. Unlike an entailment, presuppositions survive when the sentence is negated. The negation test can be used to determine the difference between entailment and presupposition.^[4] For instance, "The king of France is not bald" likewise presupposes that there is a king of France.^[3]

References

^ Beth, Evert Willem (1955). Semantic Entailment and Formal Derivability.
^ Murphy, M. Lynne (2010). Lexical Meaning. Cambridge: Cambridge Textbooks in Semantics. pp. 31–40.
^ ^a ^b Sauerland, U (2007). Presupposition and Implicature in Compositional Semantics. Pelgrave.
^ Indarti, Gatri Asti Putri (2015-04-01). "Distinguishing Entailment and Presupposition Under Negation Test" (PDF). Language and Language Teaching Journal. 18 (01): 27–38. doi:10.24071/llt.2015.180104. ISSN 1410-7201.

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[1] Beth, Evert Willem (1955). Semantic Entailment and Formal Derivability.

[2] Murphy, M. Lynne (2010). Lexical Meaning. Cambridge: Cambridge Textbooks in Semantics. pp. 31–40.

[:0-3] Sauerland, U (2007). Presupposition and Implicature in Compositional Semantics. Pelgrave.

[4] Indarti, Gatri Asti Putri (2015-04-01). "Distinguishing Entailment and Presupposition Under Negation Test" (PDF). Language and Language Teaching Journal. 18 (01): 27–38. doi:10.24071/llt.2015.180104. ISSN 1410-7201.

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See also

References