Imperatives as semantic primitives

Abstract

This paper concerns the formal semantic analysis of imperative sentences. It is argued that such an analysis cannot be deferred to the semantics of propositions, under any of the three commonly adopted strategies: the performative analysis, the sentence radical approach to propositions, and the (nondeclarative) mood-as-operator approach. Whereas the first two are conceptually problematic, the third faces empirical problems: various complex imperatives should be analysed in terms of semantic operators over simple imperatives. One particularly striking case is the Dutch pluperfect imperative. It is argued that this construction should be analysed as a genuine counterfactual imperative. On the constructive side, in the last part of the paper a formal semantic analysis of imperatives is presented, in the framework of Update Semantics. On this analysis, imperatives are sui generis semantic entities, on a par with propositions. The analysis also includes an account of the counterfactual imperatives.

Compliance and Command I—categorical Imperatives

“…Some authors (such as Mastop (2005Mastop ( , 2012 and Starr (2018)) who adopt something akin to the present semantics also adopt the "dynamical" definition of validity according to which Y will follow from X if in any context c, c [X][Y] = c [X]. 15 They do not necessarily face the disastrous consequence we noted above that no inference will then be valid.…”

Commitment to Priorities

“…Example (39) shows another property noted by Mastop (2011): the individual being treated as addressee is not really an addressee. She is not even truly in the context of utterance, and so some sort of context-shifting is involved in such examples.…”

The Meaning of Imperatives

“…Other views within this general framework can be imagined. Mastop (), Starr (forthcoming), for example, defend Dynamic Semantic elaborations of the PCAImp, on which imperatives variously update plans or preference‐states . For both Mastop and Starr – indeed, any form of Dynamic Semantics – update functions are assigned directly by the compositional semantics, rather than the semantics together with pragmatic and epistemological “bridge” principles.…”

“… For other views that allow derivation of a property or characteristic of a plan from the semantic value of an imperative in context, see Segerberg (), Han (), Lascarides and Asher (), Portner (, ), Mastop (, ); Starr (forthcoming). For comparative discussion of some of these views, see Charlow (, forthcoming).…”