Towards a normative epistemic account of presuppositions

Abstract

In this paper I propose a normative account of pragmatic presupposition as a criticism and enrichment of Gauker's theory. By an appeal to epistemic contextualism, my aim is to integrate Gauker's normative account with an explanation of the different ways in which speakers ought to share presuppositions. In particular, I focus my analysis on some stereotypical situations to show that the epistemic goal of a conversation determines the level of justification of a presupposition. Finally, I claim that coherence with the level of justification is a condition for appropriateness of assertions: in order to appropriately assert a sentence p that requires a presupposition q, speakers should recognize how they ought to be able to justify q in a specific communicative context.