| 1. Domain | 1.1 Scope of the Domain | Boundaries | The range of phenomena the science includes and excludes. | Examines how meaning is shaped by context, speaker intentions, shared knowledge, discourse structure, social norms, and inferential reasoning. Includes implicature, presupposition projection, deixis, speech acts, politeness, discourse coherence, relevance, and contextual enrichment. Excludes purely truth-conditional meaning (semantics) and purely structural form (syntax), except when interacting with pragmatic interpretation. |
| | Scale | The spatial, temporal, or organizational level at which the science operates (e.g., quantum, cellular, social, cosmic). | Operates across utterance-level and discourse-level temporal scales; spans interpersonal, situational, cultural, and cognitive contexts; covers both micro-level conversational moves and macro-level discourse structures. |
| 1.2 Ontological Commitments | Entities | The kinds of things assumed to exist within the domain (particles, organisms, agents, fields, etc.). | Speakers, hearers, intentions, beliefs, common ground, discourse contexts, referential domains, presupposition sets, implicatures, pragmatic constraints, discourse moves, speech acts. |
| | Properties | The fundamental attributes these entities possess (mass, charge, genotype, preference, etc.). | Informativeness, relevance, politeness level, indirectness, felicity conditions, presuppositional strength, contextual fit, discourse coherence, speaker commitment, conversational implicature strength. |
| | Categories | The basic ontological types used to classify domain elements (substances, processes, relations, structures). | Speech-act types (assertive, directive, commissive, expressive, declarative); implicature types (scalar, conventional, conversational); deixis types (person, place, time, discourse); presupposition triggers; discourse-relations; politeness strategies. |
| 1.3 State-Variables | Variables | The measurable or definable properties that describe system conditions. | Context set, common-ground contents, speaker intention states, presupposition accommodation status, discourse-topic state, referent activation level, relevance weighting, implicature strength, felicity-condition satisfaction. |
| | Parameterization | How variables encode and represent the system’s state. | Encoded through discourse models, context-update parameters, probabilistic relevance weights, dynamic semantic/pragmatic representations, speech-act schemas, referent-salience hierarchies. |
| 1.4 Admissible Idealizations | Simplifications | Conceptual reductions used to make the domain tractable (point masses, rational agents, perfect gases). | Assuming fully rational cooperative speakers; idealized common ground; stable discourse topics; uniform politeness norms; clear-cut implicatures; ignoring social/power dynamics; reducing context to a small set of variables. |
| | Validity Conditions | The limits and contexts in which idealizations hold or break down. | Breakdowns occur with deception, irony, sarcasm, cultural mismatch, ambiguous reference, shifting discourse goals, incomplete common ground, non-cooperative behavior, or emotionally charged communication. |
| 1.5 Domain Assumptions | Structural Assumptions | Background ontological stances such as determinism, continuity, randomness, discreteness. | Assumes communication is inferential and intention-based; context updates systematically; discourse cohesion is governed by rules; implicatures arise from rational principles; presuppositions project in predictable ways; participants track shared knowledge. |
| | Implicit Commitments | Unstated but necessary assumptions that shape the field’s conceptual structure. | Assumes speakers intend to be understood; hearers seek optimal interpretation; relevance principles hold; cultural norms guide pragmatic inference; meaning beyond literal form is recoverable by structured reasoning. |
| 1.6 Internal Coherence Requirements | Consistency | The demand that domain concepts do not contradict one another. | Speaker intentions must align with context; presupposition sets must update coherently; discourse moves must follow coherence relations; implicatures must logically follow Gricean or neo-Gricean principles; deixis must reference accessible domains. |
| | Compatibility | The requirement that entities, variables, and assumptions fit together into a unified descriptive framework. | Requires alignment among speech-act theory, implicature theory, presupposition mechanisms, discourse-representation frameworks, relevance principles, and context-update models for a unified pragmatic system. |
| 2. Evidence Layer | 2.1 Observable Phenomena | Observables | The aspects of the domain that can produce detectable signals accessible to measurement. | Conversational implicatures; discourse coherence patterns; presupposition accommodation; reference resolution; deixis interpretation; politeness strategies; indirect speech acts; context-driven meaning shifts; repair sequences; turn-taking influenced by meaning. |
| | Detection Limits | The boundaries of what can be resolved or sensed by current instruments or methods. | Speaker intentions cannot be directly observed; implicatures often ambiguous; presuppositions may be mistaken for semantic facts; context varies unpredictably; cultural norms alter interpretation; silence and indirectness may yield underdetermined interpretations. |
| 2.2 Measurement Systems | Units | Standardized quantifications (meters, seconds, volts, decibels, dollars, etc.) necessary for consistent comparison. | Acceptability ratings; interpretation-choice frequencies; discourse-coherence scores; referent identification accuracy; response latency; scalar-implicature rates; contextual-success measures; eye-tracking fixation counts. |
| | Instruments | Devices and tools (microscopes, spectrometers, sensors, surveys, detectors) used to produce measurements. | Pragmatic-judgment surveys; discourse-completion tests; referent-tracking tasks; reaction-time software; eye-tracking systems; EEG/ERP for pragmatic anomalies; corpus-analysis tools; structured elicitation protocols; dialogue-act annotation tools. |
| 2.3 Operational Definitions | Definitions | Terms defined by specific measurement procedures, ensuring empirical clarity. | Definitions of implicature, presupposition, felicity conditions, common ground, deixis, context update, relevance, discourse relation, indirect speech act, accommodation, pragmatic inference. |
| | Procedures | The explicit steps required to perform a measurement in a reproducible way. | Eliciting implicature judgments; testing presupposition projection; administering pronoun/reference-resolution tasks; manipulating context for ambiguity resolution; running discourse-completion tasks; measuring interpretive choices under varying contextual cues. |
| 2.4 Data Acquisition | Protocols | Formal processes for gathering data under controlled or standardized conditions. | Randomized presentation of dialogues; controlled manipulation of context and speaker intention cues; structured referent-disambiguation tasks; naturalistic conversation recording; corpus extraction of pragmatic markers; cross-cultural pragmatic-elicitation sessions. |
| | Sampling | Rules determining which subset of the domain is measured and how representative it is. | Sampling across discourse types, politeness levels, speaker relationships, cultural backgrounds, deixis domains, levels of shared knowledge, topic structures, and communicative intentions. |
| 2.5 Data Character & Format | Data Types | The form raw evidence takes (time series, spectra, images, counts, qualitative records). | Dialogue transcripts; pragmatic-judgment tables; ambiguity-resolution logs; discourse-relation annotations; referent-identification datasets; ERP waveforms for pragmatic violations; contextual-feature matrices; politeness-strategy coding. |
| | Resolution | The granularity or precision with which data is captured. | Determined by granularity of discourse transcription, precision of contextual annotation, temporal resolution of ERP/eye-tracking tools, sensitivity of interpretation tasks, and detail of dialogue-act classification. |
| 2.6 Reliability & Calibration | Calibration | Adjustment procedures ensuring instruments produce accurate results. | Standardizing pragmatic-judgment criteria; ensuring consistent context descriptions; inter-annotator agreement for discourse roles; calibrating eye-tracking/EEG equipment; validating referent-resolution scoring; checking consistency of cultural-pragmatic coding. |
| | Error Characterization | Identification and quantification of noise, uncertainty, bias, and measurement error. | Judgment variability; misclassification of implicatures; context-misunderstanding errors; cultural bias; ambiguity not properly controlled; discourse-annotation drift; instrument noise in ERP/eye-tracking; unintended pragmatic cues in stimuli. |
| 3. Structural Layer | 3.1 Patterns & Regularities | Laws / Relations | Stable, repeatable patterns governing how observables behave across conditions. | Systematic implicature patterns (scalar, relevance-based); consistent presupposition projection behavior; speaker-intention–listener-inference loops; discourse-coherence relations; stable deixis interpretation rules; politeness and facework regularities. |
| | Invariants | Quantities or properties that remain constant under transformations (symmetries, conservation laws). | Core cooperative principles; conventional implicatures; stable deictic interpretation domains; consistent felicity conditions for speech acts; recurring pragmatic strengthening/weakening tendencies across languages. |
| 3.2 Causal Architecture | Mechanisms | Underlying processes or structures that produce the observed regularities. | Inferential reasoning mechanisms; context-update mechanisms; presupposition-accommodation mechanisms; relevance-optimization mechanisms; reference-resolution mechanisms; speech-act production and recognition systems. |
| | Pathways | Organized sequences of interactions forming a causal chain or network. | Utterance → intention inference → implicature derivation; presupposition trigger → projection/ accommodation → updated context; referring expression → context search → referent resolution; speech act → felicity evaluation → discourse progression. |
| 3.3 Theoretical Vocabulary | Concepts | Core terms that encode the domain’s structure (force, gene, equilibrium, field). | Implicature, presupposition, deixis, common ground, relevance, felicity conditions, discourse coherence, reference resolution, politeness, facework, implicature strengthening, accommodation. |
| | Classifications | Taxonomies, categories, or typologies that organize entities and relations. | Scalar vs conventional implicatures; presupposition types; deixis classes; speech-act categories; discourse-relation types (cause, contrast, elaboration); politeness strategies; reference types (definite, indefinite, demonstrative). |
| 3.4 Formal Representations | Equations | Mathematical constructs expressing laws, relations, or mechanisms. | Context-update functions; presupposition-projection formulas; relevance-weighting functions; dynamic-semantics update rules; information-state transition diagrams; probabilistic inference models. |
| | Models | Structured representations—mathematical, computational, or conceptual—used to predict and explain phenomena. | Gricean pragmatics; neo-Gricean models; Relevance Theory; Dynamic Semantics/DRT; game-theoretic pragmatics; Bayesian pragmatic models; speech-act models; discourse-coherence frameworks. |
| 3.5 Idealized Structures | Simplified Models | Purposeful abstractions that capture essential dynamics while omitting irrelevant detail. | Fully cooperative speakers; perfect common ground; categorical implicatures; single-layer context representations; monotonic context update; uniform politeness norms; noiseless reference resolution. |
| | Limit Conditions | Regimes where specific models or approximations hold (classical vs. quantum, linear vs. nonlinear). | Irony, sarcasm, deception, humor; cultural divergence in norms; emotional or high-stakes contexts; incomplete or asymmetrical common ground; ambiguous referents; rapid topic shifts; indirect speech acts with weak cues. |
| 3.6 Integrative Frameworks | Unifying Theories | Higher-order structures that connect disparate laws or mechanisms under a coherent whole. | Cooperative Principle frameworks; relevance-driven inferential models; dynamic-update semantics–pragmatics integration; game-theoretic meaning negotiation; discourse-representation theory; multi-level pragmatic reasoning systems. |
| | Interdisciplinary Links | Points where the theory connects to adjacent sciences or larger explanatory systems. | Links to cognitive science (mindreading, inference), sociology (interaction norms), anthropology (cultural pragmatics), AI (pragmatic reasoning in dialogue systems), philosophy (speech-act theory), and neuroscience (pragmatic anomaly detection). |
| 4. Method Layer | 4.1 Inquiry Design | Experimental Design | Structured plans for manipulating variables to test causal claims. | Manipulating contextual cues, speaker intention hints, discourse history, politeness levels, referent availability, presupposition triggers, and ambiguity sources to test pragmatic inference, implicature derivation, reference resolution, and context updating. |
| | Observational Design | Systematic approaches for gathering non-manipulated data (surveys, field studies, natural experiments). | Observing natural conversation, discourse patterns, repair sequences, context-driven meaning shifts, politeness strategies, cross-cultural pragmatic norms, and spontaneous implicature generation without experimental control. |
| 4.2 Testing & Validation | Hypothesis Testing | Procedures for evaluating whether evidence supports or contradicts specific claims. | Testing predictions of implicature strength; validating presupposition projection; evaluating felicity conditions; verifying deixis interpretation; testing reference resolution accuracy; confirming cooperative-principle predictions; assessing discourse-coherence inferences. |
| | Replication | The requirement that results be independently reproducible under similar conditions. | Re-running implicature and presupposition tasks; replicating referent-disambiguation studies; repeating ERP/N400 pragmatic-anomaly experiments; verifying cross-cultural pragmatic findings; reproducing discourse-coherence judgments. |
| 4.3 Inference & Evaluation | Statistical Inference | Rules for drawing conclusions from noisy or incomplete data. | Analyzing interpretation-frequency distributions; modeling implicature rates; computing context-update outcomes; evaluating referent-selection probabilities; quantifying presupposition accommodation; estimating coherence-relations strength; using regression or Bayesian models to predict pragmatic choices. |
| | Model Comparison | Criteria (fit, simplicity, predictive accuracy, robustness) used to evaluate competing models. | Comparing Gricean vs neo-Gricean theories; relevance-theoretic vs game-theoretic models; dynamic semantics vs static models; distributional vs logical models of meaning-in-context; contrasting computational pragmatic parsers; evaluating context-update frameworks. |
| 4.4 Error Management | Error Analysis | Identification and quantification of random and systematic errors. | Identifying ambiguity contamination in stimuli; detecting judgment noise; filtering world-knowledge confounds; correcting context-misinterpretation; addressing misclassified discourse relations; diagnosing cultural interference; identifying unintended pragmatic cues in materials. |
| | Bias Control | Methods for minimizing subjective, instrumental, or procedural biases. | Randomizing trial order; balancing contextual cues; training annotators for discourse/pragmatic coding; controlling for cultural background; designing context-neutral stimuli; screening participants for language dominance; ensuring blinded evaluation where possible. |
| 4.5 Adjudication & Revision | Peer Scrutiny | Collective evaluation of claims through critique, review, and debate. | Independent recoding of pragmatic data; cross-lab replication of inference patterns; external critique of discourse/coherence analyses; reviewing presupposition diagnostics; re-evaluating computational models; validating cross-linguistic pragmatic universals. |
| | Theory Revision | Procedures for modifying, replacing, or discarding models based on new evidence. | Updating implicature-generation rules; revising presupposition-projection systems; adjusting relevance principles; redefining felicity conditions; modifying discourse-coherence theory; refining models of common ground and intention recognition based on empirical evidence. |
| 4.6 Integrity Conditions | Transparency | Requirements to disclose methods, data, assumptions, and limitations. | Disclosing contextual setups, stimuli design, coding criteria, task instructions, algorithmic assumptions, annotation protocols, and cross-cultural considerations; reporting ambiguity sources and interpretation variability. |
| | Ethical Standards | Norms ensuring responsible conduct in experimentation, data handling, and publication. | Respecting cultural pragmatic norms; protecting participant privacy; avoiding deceptive tasks without consent; preventing reinforcement of stereotypes; ensuring fair representation of languages/cultures; responsibly interpreting cross-cultural differences. |