Presupposition projection from disjunction is symmetric

Abstract

The role of linear order for presupposition projection is a key theoretical question, but the empirical status of (a-)symmetries in projection from various connectives remains controversial. We present experimental evidence that presupposition projection from disjunction is symmetric. 'Bathroom disjunctions', where either disjunct seems able to support a presupposition in the other if its negation entails it, have been argued to be evidence for symmetric projection; but there are alternative theoretical options. Adapting the paradigm of Mandelkern et al. (2020) for projection from conjunction, our experimental data supports the view that we are dealing with genuinely symmetric projection from disjunction. This contrasts with Mandelkern et al.'s findings for asymmetric projection from conjunction, and thus provides evidence for variation in projection (a-)symmetry across connectives, contra accounts proposing general accounts predicting uniform asymmetry effects due to left-to-right processing (e.g. Schlenker 2009).

An approach to Hurford Conditionals

“…This pattern is an instance of the so-called asymmetry of conjunction, where a constituent is redundant when it appears in the left conjunct but not on right conjunct; analogues to it exist also with presupposition projection,. How to handle such asymmetries is not a straightforward issue (see Schlenker 2009;Fox 2008;Katzir & Singh 2013;Mayr & Romoli 2016;Kalomoiros & Schwarz Forth for more discussion). In the context of the current approach, a natural move is to somehow ban left conjuncts from being candidates for redundancy, e.g.…”