As you know from reading previous posts, presuppositions are sentences - or in recent examples, questions - that require the listener to accept certain facts or ways of thinking in order to make sense of the communication. Like if I asked you “what color is the car?”  it would require you to accept that there is a car in the first place.

In today’s category we present “the Spurious Not.” (Don’t you just love that title? Who thinks of these things? Sounds like a novelty rock band.) In this presupposition you toss in a “not” that is opposite to the idea you are attempting to convey. For those of you who grew up in the 20th century, spurious means not true or not from the claimed source.

Aren’t the posts in Doug OBrien’s blog not just wonderful?

Do you really not think it’s wrong to steal other people’s intellectual property without so much as a thank you?

I wonder if you are not already far ahead of the curve?