V 171
Negation/Searle: the philosophers have long abandoned the idea that there are irreducible negative sentences
>
Existence statement.
V 219
Negation/Searle: the negation of certain sentences such as "He doesn't know if he is in pain" are simply wrong, not as is sometimes assumed, neither true nor false.
>
Truth value gap.
But if they are wrong, does their negation not have to be true?
---
IV 113
Negation/metaphor/Searle: the negation is just as metaphorical!
>
Metaphor/Searle.
---
VII 91
Negation/Searle: the negation of an A-word (for an activity that one can sensibly call "voluntary") is not again an A-word!
For example: I did not buy my car voluntarily, I was forced to do so.
I did not come voluntarily, I was dragged here.
He doesn't know if the object in front of him is a tree.
There is considerable asymmetry between A words and their opposite or negation.
>
"Voluntarily".
VII 95
SearleVsAustin: Austin's thesis ("No modification without aberration”) does not even go over sentences: making an assertion means committing oneself to something that is the case. If the possibility that the facts do not exist is excluded, it is pointless.
Austin's slogan should be reformulated too:
"No remark that is not remarkable," or
"Not an assertion that's not worth asserting."
Negation/Searle: the opposite of a standard condition is not itself a standard condition.
Therefore, no A condition is required for the utterance of a negation of an A proposition. A-phrases mark standard situations, but their negations do not.
A-condition: an A-condition is normally a reason to assume that the negation of the A proposition is true. Generally, only where there is a reason to assume that a standard situation could have been a non-standard situation, the remark that it is a standard situation makes sense. >
Sensible/senseless, >
truth value gaps.
