From Ora Matushansky:
I saw this counterfactual in an MTV ad in the Netherlands, and I thought it might amuse you:
If Elvis were still alive, he would be dead by now.
Thony Gillies adds:
This reminds me of a great exchange from Seinfeld. George is asking his parents about the cause of death of a Great Aunt of his — “Aunt Baby” — who died (we gather) very young. His mother (Estelle) asks his father (Frank):
Estelle: How old would Aunt Baby be if she were alive today?
Frank (shaking his head): She’d never had made it.
The comicity effect in both cases is intentional. But besides that effect, they are both examples of how human languages are tolerant to inconsistency.
The contradiction in the Elvis’ example above points to the idea that the same mechanisms that avoid paradoxical readings also prevent the application of the Principle of Pseudo-Scotus.
One idea, which I would like to develop, is that von Fintel’s analysis of counter-factuals can be extended to cases where interpretation is paraconsistent. This reminds me that I have to post my paper on Opacity and ask suggestions to the general audience. (Although people can already post their comments on some parts here and there.)
May 24th, 2005, at 12:04 pm #Another one in the same line:
“If Beethoven were alive today, he’d be rolling over in his grave.”
May 24th, 2005, at 2:02 pm #Googling for “If Beethoven were alive today” gives three more good ones:
May 24th, 2005, at 4:41 pm #The last of which is reminiscent of Tom Lehrer’s “When Mozart was my age, he had been dead for two years.”
And then on a related note, there’s Tom Stoppard’s line: “I mean, if Beethoven had been killed in a plane crash at twenty-two, the history of music would have been very different. As would the history of aviation, of course.”
May 26th, 2005, at 1:26 am #In today’s London “Sunday Times” (29 May 2005), there is an article by art critic Bryan Appleyard, critical of the writing of contemporary art critics. He includes this wonderful sentence:
“John Ruskin, Ernst Grombich and Kenneth Clark must be turning in their graves, as would Robert Hughes if here were dead.”
May 29th, 2005, at 10:41 am #Sorry, that should be ” . . . if he were dead.”
May 29th, 2005, at 10:42 am #