The Linguist's corner. 30th December 2008.

Stuart Behtam reviews some basic Pragmatic criteria when reading the news. A basic problem in pragmatics and philosophy of language is to draw the right conclusions of each statement in a given context. It goes without saying that the grammatical structure is essential in the process. Natural logic leads me to the concept "common sense" so skilfully used by Thomas Paine in the first days of the American Democracy: freedom, equality, pursuit of happiness. I remember the thorough manuals of logic I used in the 80s and 90s to study logic. I am sure that more than one scholar is applying these old methods to what the politicians have been saying in the last years. My strip is only a first sketch on what one of this basic logic exercises could be.