The idea is that, if we were to render a statement like “Colorless green ideas sleep furiously” into formal logic, we’d probably take it to mean the universal statement “For all X such that X is a colorless green idea, X sleeps furiously”.
I don’t think so. “Smoking causes cancer” doesn’t express a universal (or existential) quantification either. Or “Canadians are polite”, “Men are taller than women” etc.
Grammatically, the most obvious interpretation is a universal quantification (i.e. “All men are taller than all women”), which I think is a major reason why such statements so often lead to objections of “But here’s an exception!” Maybe you can tell the audience that they should figure out when to mentally insert ”… on average” or “tend to be”. Though there are also circumstances where one might validly believe that the speaker really means all. I think it’s best to put such qualified language into your statements from the start.
Grammatically, the most obvious interpretation is a universal quantification
Here I mostly agree
I think it’s best to put such qualified language into your statements from the start.
Here I don’t, for the same reason that I don’t ask about “water in the refrigerator outside eggplant cells”. Because pragmatics are for better or worse part of the language.
I don’t think so. “Smoking causes cancer” doesn’t express a universal (or existential) quantification either. Or “Canadians are polite”, “Men are taller than women” etc.
Grammatically, the most obvious interpretation is a universal quantification (i.e. “All men are taller than all women”), which I think is a major reason why such statements so often lead to objections of “But here’s an exception!” Maybe you can tell the audience that they should figure out when to mentally insert ”… on average” or “tend to be”. Though there are also circumstances where one might validly believe that the speaker really means all. I think it’s best to put such qualified language into your statements from the start.
Here I mostly agree
Here I don’t, for the same reason that I don’t ask about “water in the refrigerator outside eggplant cells”. Because pragmatics are for better or worse part of the language.