4.4
468. Someone says irreverently “that’s a tree”. He might say
this sentence because he remembers hearing it in a similar situation; or he was
suddenly struck by the tree’s beauty and the sentence was an exclamation; or he
was pronouncing the sentence to himself as a grammatical example; etc., etc.
And now I ask him “How did you mean that?’ and he replies ”It was a piece of
information directed at you”. Shouldn’t I be at liberty to assume he doesn’t
know what he is saying, if he is insane enough to want to give me this
information?
you can assume –
whatever you like –
bear in mind though –
your assumption –
is uncertain –
is open to question –
open to doubt
© greg t. charlton. 2010.