•  559
    Update rules and semantic universals
    Linguistics and Philosophy 46 (2): 259-289. 2023.
    We discuss a well-known puzzle about the lexicalization of logical operators in natural language, in particular connectives and quantifiers. Of the many logically possible operators, only few appear in the lexicon of natural languages: the connectives in English, for example, are conjunction _and_, disjunction _or_, and negated disjunction _nor_; the lexical quantifiers are _all, some_ and _no_. The logically possible nand (negated conjunction) and Nall (negated universal) are not expressed by l…Read more
  •  445
    Aboutness Paradox
    Journal of Philosophy 118 (10): 549-571. 2021.
    The present work outlines a logical and philosophical conception of propositions in relation to a group of puzzles that arise by quantifying over them: the Russell-Myhill paradox, the Prior-Kaplan paradox, and Prior's Theorem. I begin by motivating an interpretation of Russell-Myhill as depending on aboutness, which constrains the notion of propositional identity. I discuss two formalizations of of the paradox, showing that it does not depend on the syntax of propositional variables. I then exte…Read more
  •  305
    On Hierarchical Propositions
    Journal of Philosophical Logic 49 (1): 1-11. 2020.
    There is an apparent dilemma for hierarchical accounts of propositions, raised by Bruno Whittle : either such accounts do not offer adequate treatment of connectives and quantifiers, or they eviscerate the logic. I discuss what a plausible hierarchical conception of propositions might amount to, and show that on that conception, Whittle’s dilemma is not compelling. Thus, there are good reasons why proponents of hierarchical accounts of propositions did not see the difficulty Whittle raises.
  •  258
    Why do we use epistemic modals like 'might'? According to Factualism, the function of 'might' is to exchange information about state-of-affairs in the modal universe. As an alternative to Factualism, this paper offers a game-theoretic rationale for epistemic possibility operators in a Bayesian setting. The background picture is one whereby communication facilitates coordination, but coordination could fail if there's too much uncertainty, since the players' ability to share a belief is undermine…Read more
  •  216
    Natural language contains simple lexical items for some but not all Boolean operators. English, for example, contains conjunction and, disjunction or, negated disjunction nor, but no word to express negated conjunction *nand nor any other Boolean connective. Natural language grammar can be described by a logic that expresses what the lexicon can express by its primitives, and the rest compositionally. Such logic for propositional connectives is described here as a bilateral extension of update s…Read more
  •  208
    The Evolution of Denial
    British Journal for the Philosophy of Science. forthcoming.
  •  179
    On the Origin of Negation
    Erkenntnis 1-20. 2022.
    The ability to express negation in language may have been the result of an adaptive process. However, there are different accounts of adaptation in linguistics, and more than one of them may describe the case of negation. In this paper, I distinguish different versions of the claim that negation is adaptive and defend a proposal, based on recent work by Steinert-Threlkeld (2016) and Incurvati and Sbardolini (2021), on which negation is an indirect adaptation.
  •  174
    Who's afraid of common knowledge?
    Philosophical Studies. forthcoming.
    Some arguments against the assumption that ordinary people may share common knowledge are sound. The apparent cost of such arguments is the rejection of scientific theories that appeal to common knowledge. My proposal is to accept the arguments without rejecting the theories. On my proposal, common knowledge is shared by ideally rational people, who are not just mathematically simple versions of ordinary people. They are qualitatively different from us, and theorizing about them does not lead to…Read more
  •  151
    Proof analysis for Lewis counterfactuals
    with Sara Negri
    Review of Symbolic Logic 9 (1): 44-75. 2016.
  •  144
    Epistemic modality and coordination under uncertainty
    Proceedings of TARK 355 295--306. 2021.
    Communication facilitates coordination, but coordination might fail if there's too much uncertainty. I discuss a scenario in which vagueness-driven uncertainty undermines the possibility of publicly sharing a belief. I then show that asserting an epistemic modal sentence, 'Might p', can reveal the speaker's uncertainty, and that this may improve the chances of coordination despite the lack of a common epistemic ground. This provides a game-theoretic rationale for epistemic modality. The account …Read more
  •  138
    Is Honesty Rational?1
    Philosophical Quarterly 72 (4): 979-1001. 2022.
    According to the Maxim of Quality, rational agents tend to speak honestly. Due to the influence of Grice, a connection between linguistic rationality and honesty is often taken for granted. However, the connection is not obvious: structural rationality in language use does not require honesty, any more than it requires dishonesty. In particular, Quality does not follow from the Cooperative Principle and structural rationality. But then what is honest rational speech? I propose to move the discus…Read more
  •  101
    Two-Dimensional Paradox
    Australasian Journal of Philosophy 97 (3): 605-617. 2019.
    ABSTRACTTwo-dimensional accounts of speech and thought make use of so-called ‘diagonal’ propositions. If diagonals are indeed propositions, they can be negated: an ‘anti-diagonal’ is the negation o...
  •  13
    The Logic of Lexical Connectives
    Journal of Philosophical Logic 52 (5): 1327-1353. 2023.
    Natural language does not express all connectives definable in classical logic as simple lexical items. Coordination in English is expressed by conjunction and, disjunction or, and negated disjunction nor. Other languages pattern similarly. Non-lexicalized connectives are typically expressed compositionally: in English, negated conjunction is typically expressed by combining negation and conjunction (not both). This is surprising: if $$\wedge $$ ∧ and $$\vee $$ ∨ are duals, and the negation of t…Read more
  •  13
    The rejection game
    Mind and Language. 2023.
    We introduce the rejection game, designed to formalize the interaction between interlocutors in a Stalnakerian conversation: a speaker who asserts something and a listener who may accept or reject. The rejection game is similar to other signalling games known to the literature in economics and biology. We point out similarities and differences, and propose an application in linguistics. We uncover basic conditions under which the Gricean maxim of quality emerges from incentives among the players…Read more
  •  12
    Assertion, denial, and the evolution of Boolean operators
    with Fausto Carcassi
    Mind and Language 38 (5): 1187-1207. 2023.
    Given current data, only a few binary Boolean operators are expressed in lexically simple fashion in the world's languages: and, or, nor. These do not occur in every combination, for example, nor is not observed by itself. To explain these cross‐linguistic patterns, we propose an encoding of Boolean operators as update procedures to accept or reject information in a context. We define a measure of conceptual simplicity for such updates, on which attested operators are conceptually simpler than t…Read more
  •  10
    Performative reference
    Synthese 202 (2): 1-18. 2023.
    Reference may be fixed by stipulation through a speech act, just like bets and marriages. An utterance of _Let n refer to an/the F_ is a speech act by means of which, if successful, a speaker institutes a practice of referring, and a hearer coordinates by choosing a referent from the domain of discourse. We articulate a metasemantics for this view. On our view, the interlocutors can select a referent randomly, if necessary, motivated by the incentive to coordinate on the use of a name. Moreover,…Read more
  • Proceedings of the 23rd Amsterdam Colloquium (edited book)
    with Marco Degano, Tom Roberts, and Marieke Schouwstra