In this paper I will develop a view about the semantics of imperatives, which I term Modal Noncognitivism, on which imperatives might be said to have truth conditions (dispositionally, anyway), but on which it does not make sense to see them as expressing propositions (hence does not make sense to ascribe to them truth or falsity). This view stands against "Cognitivist" accounts of the semantics of imperatives, on which imperatives are claimed to express propositions, which are then enlisted in explanations of the relevant logico-semantic phenomena. It also stands against the major competitors to Cognitivist accounts-all of which are non-truthconditional and, as a result, fail to provide satisfying explanations of the fundamental semantic characteristics of imperatives (or so I argue). The view of imperatives I defend here improves on various treatments of imperatives on the market in giving an empirically and theoretically adequate account of their semantics and logic. It yields explanations of a wide range of semantic and logical phenomena about imperativesexplanations that are, I argue, at least as satisfying as the sorts of explanations of semantic and logical phenomena familiar from truth-conditional semantics. But it accomplishes this while defending the notion-which is, I argue, substantially correct-that imperatives could not have propositions, or truth conditions, as their meanings.

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I resolve the major challenge to an Expressivist theory of the meaning of normative discourse: the Frege-Geach Problem. Drawing on considerations from the semantics of directive language (e.g., imperatives), I argue that, although certain forms of Expressivism (like Gibbard's) do run into at least one version of the Problem, it is reasonably clear that there is a version of Expressivism that does not.

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I present two Triviality results for Kratzer's standard "restrictor" analysis of indicative conditionals (while also clarifying the sense in which Kratzer's semantics might avoid such results). I both refine and undermine the common claim that problems of Triviality do not arise for Kratzer conditionals since they are not strictly conditionals at all.

This paper proposes a new model of graded modal judgement. It begins by problematizing the phenomenon: given plausible constraints on the logic of epistemic modality, it is impossible to model graded attitudes toward modal claims as judgements of probability targeting epistemically modal propositions. This paper considers two alternative models, on which modal operators are non-proposition-forming: (1) Moss (2015), in which graded attitudes toward modal claims are represented as judgements of probability targeting a ‘proxy’ proposition, belief in which would underwrite belief in the modal claim; (2) a model on which graded attitudes toward modal claims are represented as judgements of credence taking as their objects (non-propositional) modal representations (rather than proxy propositions). The second model, like Moss’s model, is shown to be semantically and mathematically tractable. The second model, however, can be straightforwardly integrated into a plausible model of the role of graded attitudes toward modal claims in cognition and normative epistemology.

I argue that taking the Practical Conditionals Thesis (PCT) seriously demands a new understanding of the semantics of such conditionals. Practical Conditionals Thesis: A practical conditional [if A][ought(B)] expresses B's conditional preferability given APaul Weirich has argued that the conditional utility of a state of affairs B on A is to be identified as the degree to which it is desired under indicative supposition that A. Similarly, exploiting the PCT, I will argue that the proper analysis of indicative practical (as well as imperative) conditionals is in terms of what is planned, desired, or preferred, given suppositional changes to an agent's information. Implementing such a conception of conditional preference in a semantic analysis of indicative practical conditionals turns out to be incompatible with any approach which treats the indicative conditional as expressing non-vacuous universal quantification over some domain of relevant antecedent-possibilities. Such analyses, I argue, encode a fundamental misunderstanding of what it is to be best, given some condition. The analysis that does the best vis-à-vis the PCT is, instead, one that blends (i) a Context-Shifty account of indicative antecedents with (ii) an Expressivistic, or non-propositional, treatment of their practical consequents.

We use imperatives to refute a naïve analysis of update potentials (force-operators attaching to sentences), arguing for a dynamic analysis of imperative force as restrictable, directed, and embeddable. We propose a dynamic, non-modal analysis of conditional imperatives, as a counterpoint to static, modal analyses (e.g., Schwager [16]). Our analysis retains Kratzer's [8] analysis of if-clauses as restrictors of some operator (with Schwager), but avoids typing it as a generalized quantifier over worlds (against her), instead as a dynamic force operator (cf. Portner [13, 14]; Potts [15]). Arguments for a restrictor treatment (but against a quantificational treatment) are mustered, and we propose a novel analysis of update on conditional imperatives (and an independently motivated revision of the standard ordering-semantics for root modals that makes use of it). Finally, we argue that imperative force is embeddable under an operation much like dynamic conjunction.