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Contemporary theories of speech acts frequently invoke Wittgenstein's favorite metaphor: to speak is to enter into a game whose rules determine which moves and counter-moves are legitimate. The opening gambit in the game of ordinary conversation is the use of an assertoric sentence by a speaker. The rules of this language-game are such that the legitimate linguistic responses to the opening move are ultimately reducible to two. The interlocutor may parry for a while by asking for clarifications, expressing doubts, and adding qualifications, but must finally either say "yes" ("That is true.") or "no" ("That is false.").1 According to this view, to judge is to take a stand with regard to a proposition. This definition applies both to the opening move and to the subsequent counter-moves in the game of conversation. Both the original speaker and the interlocutor take a stand with regard to a thematized propositional content. An interlocutor's positive or negative response to a statement is obviously the taking of a position with regard to the asserted proposition. But the original assertion itself, so the argument goes, is already the taking of a position by the speaker with regard to the proposition framed in the speaker's statement. This is because the original speaker's assertion presupposes the possibility of its denial. In what follows, I shall trace the development of this theory to the modern dissociation of predication from pre-predicative intuitions, and contend that it does not adequately account for what actually goes on when we talk with one another.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-009-1888-7_6

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