Epistemic stance without epistemic modals: the case of the presumptive future

Abstract

This paper deals with the non-temporal use of the future in Italian knownas ‘epistemic’ or ‘presumptive’ (PF) in declaratives and interrogatives. We firstdistinguish PF from epistemic necessity and possibility, as well as from weaknecessity modals, providing in the process the main empirical challenges PF raises.We then propose and justify a semantic account that treats PF as a special normalitymodal that involves a subjective likelihood component. Since in our account theprejacent (the proposition in the scope of the modal) is at issue, the use of PF triggersthe implicature that the speaker is not in a position to appeal to what she knows inorder to support her commitment to the prejacent. This, we claim, is the source ofthe intuition that PF is often used to offer a “guess” relative to the question underdiscussion (QUD).